Titolo! Roma Bueno! Grazie. Buon Giorrnio

Ok....so.....heres the world. its ROUND. and here i am in ROME.

hehhehehehehehe.

Disclaimer: I just drank half a bottle of Chianti with a 12.5% alcohol per volume (only 5 Euro, what!).

My trip couldn't have started off worse. I arrive at the airport to find that my flight to Chicago (which connects to Rome) was Cancelled!! WHAT! yea. Nokay. Luckily the nice lady at the desk for American Airlines connected me to a flight from Dallas to Chicago which got me right in the nick of time for my flight to Rome! Thank goodness!

The flight to Rome sucked. I was cramped by some Spaniard who was hogging all the space and drooling by my chair. So i was scrunched near the window the whole way (which explains why my right shoulder hurts). We finally get to Rome, go through immigrations, and I see my wonderful amazing loving boyfriend holding a sign that reads "Sweetie! :)" I knew that was the person who was picking me up because he calls me "Sweetie" but not because I recognized him. Since Its been SOOO long since I've seen the Evans.

Our Bed and Breakfast is amazing. For 30 Euro a person, we have our own private room and bathroom in the middle of Rome, 10 minute walk to the Coliseum. I took a shower because I smelled like airplane, and we immediately adventured through Rome. First stop, Coliseum! OBVIOUSLY! It was weird standing in the same spot where plebians stood watching gladiators getting their guts torn out of them from wild animals/big swords/etc... Next stop, the Roman Forum ruins. This was neat because we got to stand right next to the heap pile where Julius Caesar was cremated. How weird standing where history occurred thousands of years ago. The ruins here are amazing! Never seen anything like this in my life. This is the best experience EVER! And its only my first day!

Before the Coliseum, we were starving. We found a little street right off the side of the Coliseum which happened to be Rome's Gay Street. We ate at a cafe with a rainbow flag painted on it. The waitor was nice but they didnt have anything on the menu so we had to settle for some pizza and pasta which was mediocre. However, the vino was very strong and we got to experience the Coliseum with a little buzzzzzzzzz.

Evans and I are on a budget, so we thought we'd learn more from following the tour guide groups. Yes, we cheated. We heard all the fabulous stories for free! I mean serously, why do people even pay for tour guides when you can just follow them around?? Whenever we lost the travel guide, we looked for his little red scarf and immediately pursued.

The Trevi fountain was funny because some rose peddler literally pried my hands open to stick a rose in my hand. He then told me "free". He looked at Evans and rubbed his thumb and first finger together, gesturing for $$. Evans reluctantly gave him 1 Euro. Travellers beware of the conniving rose peddlers!

After the Trevi fountain we found the Spanish steps but there were so many tourists that we immediatley left. Not so special anyways. We had some more vino at a cafe and it was quite tasty.

Also, throughout our adventure we found natural springs where pure water flowed out of the aquaducts. We filled our water bottles with this and drank this tasty water. Seriously tastier than any bottled water I've had.

Notice I use the word tasty quite frequently?

Thats because the food and drinks here are great. To top off our day, we went to a market around the corner from our B & B and bought some bread, cheese and a bottle of wine for only 10 Euro. That was our din-din.

Anyway, enough ranting, i'm sleepy. See pics posted on FlickR!!! They are funtastic.