Sunshine.

Sandals. Shorts. T-shirt. This is what I was able to wear today, because it was 60's and sun all day long. Thank goodness I didn't get sunburnt!!!

Tomorrow morning at 5am, so midnight your time, I will be awake, in a cab, and on my way to Palermo, Sicily!!! I am excited to see what southern Italy has to offer, and I am also excited to the weather ahead of me...high 60's and sunshine.

Have a great day!

Budapest

This weekend I was lucky enough to go visit my grandma (Nugyi) in Budapest, Hungary. It was about 10 degrees colder than it was here, but still beautiful. The thing that struck me the most were the mountains...just amazing. We started off by seeing the countryside of the city the first day, the downtown area the second (my grandma showed me where she grew up as a child), and went all over on the third day. Words cannot describe how cool it was, so let me show you with some pictures!

P.S.- When you look on the near side of the river, that is Hungary, the far side is Slovakia

Examination

Sorry for the lack of posts! I have been studying my butt off for my first exam over here, in cognitive psychology, and man is it tough. The material isn't hard by any means, but at school back home we have exams after most of our topics, and over here we only have one or two exams in the class before the final, so there is a ton of material. For example, today I have to know everything about the history, methods, and paradigms of early cognitive psych, and then we jump to attention, perception, learning, and theories, THEN! we get to all of the people associated with the theories, and before you know it....my brain hurts. I am confident that it will go well today, and, despite the rainy weather, I will come out of the exam a happy guy.

Hope everyone has a fantastic Tuesday!

SNOW?!

For the first time in 23 years, Rome has experienced snow, and it stuck to the ground! I am very happy to have seen it, and I feel like this is equivalent for Romans to seeing a Haley's Comet, but at the same time, I thought I left all the snow in Wisconsin!

On another note-

I had heard about "keeping your valuables (wallet, phone, etc) in check" because there are many pick pockets here. After being here for a month, I had determined that this was just a misconception of the city....fooled. My roommate had his Italian cell phone, blackberry, and wallet all taken last night without his knowing. scary!

Vatican

On my friend Charlie's final day here, we decided to take a trip to the Vatican. I had been to the Vatican before, but never to St. Peter's Basilica. Walking into the square, it was amazing at just how vast it was, but then I quickly remembered that I was standing in the most holy place of the Christian faith. Walking into St. Peter's, we were all stopped, as a group of Swiss Guards walked past...pretty cool. They looked goofy, but I'm sure they meant business if they were responsible for protecting the Pope. As we entered, my eyes got wide at the overwhelming amount of art and history associated with the building. There were many amazing things, but I think that the part I liked the best was seeing the popes in their tombs, with wax over their faces, perfectly preserved. Here are some pictures from the day, hope you enjoy!

Colosseum

I have now officially hit all of the touristy spots of Rome. Today was the colosseum day, and ho-ly crap was it cool! Although it was a cloudy/rainy day, we didn't let that stop us, and made it through the colosseum, palatine, and the roman forum. I'm usually not all about old stuff, but this city is just amazing. Tomorrow we are going to the Vatican!!!

More to come later, enjoy the pictures

Typical Day

Hey there again,

I am quickly realizing that I have great days, but am then unable to put those days into words!

So let me just run my schedule of today down...

745am- Wake Up

815am- Finally get out of bed

830am- Jump on tram to get to class on time

9am- Human Trafficking and Contemporary Slavery (talked about what a slave is)

1030- Intro to Italian Cinema (talked about the movie Umberto D. terrible movie)

1pm- Ate lunch on the go (grabbed a great piece of pizza from a very small place)

2pm- Living the Good Life (learned about how to live a good life I guess...)

330pm-headed back to my apartment

4pm- Skype with the motha, then went to workout

530pm- Picked up dry cleaning

6pm- Went to the supermarket with the roommates...chicken parm for dinner

7pm- Sat on my butt listening to new music

8pm- Started making dinner

And that is where I am at for the day!!!

Hope you make the most of your day

Casey