il nove di agosto

Hey, friends!
Sorry it's been a little while. I had a busy weekend, and I'm sure most of you saw the pics on fbook, but I'll share the adventure with you :) or at least what I can recall of it.
So on Friday after Italian class Spence and I went on a quick trip through the Uffizi, which is Italy's national art gallery that has like Botticelli's "Primavera" and the "Birth of Venus" and some Da Vinci's and other things that are insane to actual stand in front of. When we were sitting outside I spent much longer than it socially acceptable staring at this group of Asian school children. You can obviously tell which one was my favorite. Friday evening my teacher gave our class a tour of a church across the Arno that has Donatello frescos above the alter, which was really cool. Even though I hardly understood any of her lecture. Obviously. So at the church we met some new friends from our school and went out an had a few beers with them. We had decided earlier in the week that we were going to rent a car and go to the beach this weekend, and we invited them to come with us. (When I say 'us' I'm referring to my friend Spencer, the Austrian boy he lives with, the Austrian girl I live with, and myself. haha) Only one of the girls could come. Her name's Marina, she's the one on the left in the beach picture.
So that's the crew. We rented the car early Saturday morning. And it took for freakin' ever because I forgot my passport at home. (Out of character, I know). When we went to the "supernegozio" to get snacks Spencer and I learned that there are no open container laws in Europe. So obviously we bought giant beers for the drive at 10:30 in the morning. The drive was really pretty, and when we stopped at a gas station on the way we found the outrageously huge Danish beers called FAXE. Six Euro for 3 1000 ml cans. Incredible. We got plastered in the car while Lucas and Rafaela sat in the front judging us for being retarded Americans.
Got the beach, saw way more men wearing speedos recreationally than I ever wanted to. Italians are very proud of their bodies, I guess. Even when they probably shouldn't be... The water was so clear and beautiful, but the beach was full of Europeans wearing and doing hilarious things. Or I was drunk. Either way, it was a good afternoon.
At some point we were all climbing on a giant rock and diving off of it and we met a group of German guys who were driving an RV across Europe. You can imagine how ridiculous they were. One of them looked and acted exactly like Conan. So we called him the barbarian. Nonsensical drinking and wandering continued through the night... I got in a number of arguments with them for shitting on America. Short rant: I've met way too many Europeans (not Italians) who claim that Americans think they're better than everyone else. In reality, they think they're better than us. And it drives me freakin' nuts!
So, we never bothered to get a hostel, and ended up all five of us passing out in the TINY car we rented. Apparently I was speaking Italian in my sleep and contorting myself strangely. Sorry you got stuck next to me, Spence!
We woke up and all the windows were fogged up and we smelled like shit. It was awesome. Went back to beach for all of the next day, walked around the city a little bit. It was unreal how pretty it was. I wish people could come visit me :( The trip back to Florence wasn't anything to write home about. Filling the car up with gas was really funny, just because we had no idea what we were doing and I was imagining how funny it would be to watch someone in America not know how to fill a car up with gas. Or read what kind of gas they were pumping for that matter...
Oh! Spencer told me my new favorite joke. It might even replace the duck in the bar. But probably not.
A slug is sliding down the street, minding his own business, when he gets mugged by a turtle. So the slug goes to the police station and says to the first officer he meets "I'd like to report a mugging." The police officer says, "Okay, tell me what happened." To which the slug replies, "I can't. It all happened so fast."
Needless to say I was hysterical. You know how much I love animal and food jokes. School was mizzz today because I'm freakin' exhausted from this weekend. Still loving life. Still missing all of you. Va bene.