It is almost 10:30 and I just applied what I thought was body cream or lotion to my leg after a shower to learn that it was a body wash instead of lotion. Chalking it up to another lesson learned. Perhaps instead of writing the shopping list in English, I might have to write it in English and then find the translation into Italian before going to the store. See the picture to understand that I am not an idiot, it looks like a lotion type of bottle with the words ‘Skin Care’ and ‘crème’.
Also, we learned that Italian school supplies aren’t like the school supplies in the States. You get a list that seems easy enough, but there are some differences: The majority of the pencils don’t have erasers; None of the notebooks are spiral-bound; Binders have 4 rings instead of 3; Just little things like that.
We decided to open up an Italian bank account so we can get internet connection and a toll pass. My co-worker went with us to translate when we opened the account. Today I tried using my ATM card for the first time and it was all in Italian. I guess they assume if you open an Italian bank account, you must speak Italian – not so in my case. I got through telling it I wanted to withdraw and how much, I was pretty proud of myself at this point. But… then it asked another question and I had to ask somebody to translate it for me, it was asking if I want to donate to a telethon. I am learning a lot, but sometimes it isn’t a lot of fun to be the new one.
On another note, Rick finally got the ‘granny cart’ he has been wanting. He was pretty picky about his granny cart, so he had been holding out for the one that met his specifications. Now he has moved on to finding his “man purse”. Lord help us.
After six weeks in the hotel, tomorrow we move to the apartment. We’re pretty excited about this. We bought some pancake mix, syrup and sausage links to have a real breakfast in our real kitchen on Sunday morning. I also got a cake mix so we can bake some cupcakes too. The lady at the commissary must have thought I was crazy to be so excited about buying these things, but I know I am not the only one who has done the same thing.
Oh, our household goods shipment is in Rome now and we expect delivery next week some time; in the meantime we will be ‘camping out’ in the apartment with our new camping equipment. I think the kids will like the ‘camping’, but I am not sure that Rick and I are going to do too well with the sleeping part. I see massages in our future after sleeping on air mattresses. I just keep telling myself “this is the price of admission for living in Rome”.
Wow, Rick & my Dad have more in common than I knew with the man bags & such. Speaking of Dad, he's in the hospital with some swelling, but the doctors think it's a drug interaction & it should clear up. No damage to his kidneys, though that is apparently the norm for this type of interaction - the swelling alerted them & they were able to switch him off the offending drug.
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