and so the cimice saga comes to an end

Day 3, Wednesday: Burnt Fur

Ciao! I left you all with the image of me heading to class with a trash bag of coats. The third installment shall tell you just what became of those coats. We made it to the IES center for our 9am class, a little worse for wear considering our lack of coats and still wet ballet flats, oh and who could forget the extra baggage under our eyes considering we were up all night boiling the t-shirts we wore. Arriving at the Center we spoke to M about our previous night. It was becoming evident to us that M non capisce aka did not understand the 411. Between the language difference and cultural barriers (the age-old body odor vs deodorant battle), M seemed to struggle to comprehend the horrors we had endured. We let her know that we would leave our bag of coats in her office and take them to the dry cleaners after our class. Fast forward through 3 hours of Italiano tutorial and the standard morning lecture head-drop snooze and I reconvene with my more advanced roommates at M's office. Walking into the office we quickly realize that our trash bag of worldly possessions have Houdinied their way out of the place. "M, where are our jackets?", we ask cautiously. "Oh, they are in the wash," M replies proudly. "What wash? With water?" we question. "Yes, yes wash in hot hot water and dry," M responds. Time out. WTF? Any young woman knows the first rule of wool and fur is that they must be dry cleaned, not cleaned and dried. Lava secco, M! DRY cleaned! Why, you novices in the audience may moronically ask, because washing and drying these delicate fabrics ruins them. It's easy to predict what happens next in our tale of horrors. A young man returns our garbage bag of coats and what do we find? Monica now owns a child-sized peacoat that forces her to do a penguin dance as she stretches out her arms in the sleeves. And I? The fur fairy herself? I am left with flatten wet down and burnt fur, the ruins of my lovely Michael Kors down jacket. I expect the expression of dismay and revulsion on my face during this discovery would match that of a man who had unknowingly just undressed a transvestite at a strip club. (Please note this reference has relevance to our trip to Amsterdam). "My fur," I wail, as the fire starts burning in my sleep deprived, bloodshot eyes. I whip my tail of burnt fur from the hood of my decimated coat and look around for a target. All I find is a group of male IES students huddled behind one of the rather large IES employees, looking quite frightened and unsure of how to react. Their confusion may have been in part to Monica's sobbing into her hands behind me or the profanities exploding from me and Monica. "Hell no," I spite out through clenched teeth while doing my best black girl finger wave (thank you Tri-North Middle School of the hood region for this lesson in attitude) "Nobody messes with my family and friends, dog, or clothes. That is my holy trinity and nobody messes with my holy trinity!" I scream out.

The red bites and itchy rash I could treat. The disaspora and caravan of trash bags I could laugh at. The cold and lack of sleep was only temporary. But my fabulous fur hood? No, that crossed a line inside me. I believe this tragedy marked a turning point in the cimice saga--a point at which I could not longer be the victim of insects and incompetence, but it was time to raise up and fight back. I found an inner strength inside me, fueled by a fight for justice, a passion for fashion, and a desire (shared by all of my fellow beauty queens) for world peace.

Here is the image that kept me going through the next week in my battle against injustice and gross creepy crawly things:

RIP my furry friend, taken from me too soon by incorrect washing procedures

I will end the cimice saga here, my friends, with my roommates and I jetting off to Amsterdam to forget our troubles. Needless to say, Rome was not built in a week, and the girls of Milan did not recover from bedbugs in that time either, but we are slowly readjusting to our now cimice-free abode. A story of horror indeed, but as I like to say, I plan to give birth to four children one day, so any discomfort I experience now is just practice, right? Childbirth ready or not, at least I will know just what to do if any of my children ever meet a bedbug--call my old roommates first and pop open a bottle of spumante. Thank goodness for my bella Milanese roommates, whom I have now experienced more with than most people ever will (as said by Mrs. Jenna's Mom), and who have kept me laughing through my tears. Tonight, we will drink to our burnt fur. Cheers to you old friend! And in the words of my English neighbors, good riddance cimice!

xoxo,
your bedbug-free blogger

the cimice saga continued

Day 2, Tuesday: The Evacuation

Alright, I have established the validity of the cimice invasion, now I must tell you what happened after the discovery.  Monday night, when the bedbugs were discovered, Jenna and I were shunned.  We were told to close the door to our room and leave our possessions in the infested area.  We were instructed to sleep in the living room.  The living room is not a typical Americano cozy space, but consists of a chair and a sofa, a thin sheet borrowed from our C.A., and the absolute coldest temperature found in the apartment because of its many windows and the fact that in Milano our heat is shut off every night at 10pm.   I believe this is also why I am frequently forced to take freezing showers.  In turn, the freezing showers are probably the reason why Europeans bathe less and therefore produce terrible body odor oftentimes.  I will not detail these odors at the moment a) because I'm eating and b) because there is enough revulsion in this blog already.  Anyways, Jenna and I spent a sleepless night freezing and worrying about what tomorrow would bring.  I lay awake on the cold chair imagining the cimice feeding on my beautiful new fur vest and cried.  These were the first of many tears in the days to come.

Tuesday morning, after a sleepless night, my roommates and I headed to the IES center for our 9am classes and to speak with the housing director who was notified of the discovery the night before.  I'll call our housing director, M, to protect her identity in this account and myself in case I rant in an inappropriate manner.  After 2 1/2 hours of intensive Italian class, we reported to M's office for instructions.  We were informed that we had 2 hours to evacuate from our apartment before the exterminators would arrive with the bug bomb.  We were to leave everything in our rooms and take only a few articles of clothing in a sealed trash bag.  The catch was that any article of clothing that went into this bag would need to be washed at approximately 200 degrees Farenheit aka ruined and destroyed.  Obvi, I am not agreeable to the idea of ruining my clothing and hardly packed anything that could be considered junk clothes for my semester in Milan, arguably the greatest fashion capital of the world.  Along with packing our trash bags, we had to strew the rest of our belongings about the apartment so they could be fully treated with the pesticide.  We raced about our apartment during our time limit like some daytime grocery store game show I used to watch when I stayed home sick when I was younger where the contestants had shopping carts and various challenges to grab certain products off the shelves in a set amount of time.  In the show they were gambling with money, in our apartment we were gambling with the risk of spreading cimice across the greater metropolis of Milano and beyond.

We left our newly nested abode loaded down with trash bags of t-shirts to boil in the laundry, food we didn't want to waste, and all of our infested bedding to take to the center as specimen evidence.  We left our apartment in the hands of two men in ghostbuster uniforms, lugging heavy trash bags like some sort of disaspora.  We snuck out the back door of the building to avoid the attention of our doorman and fellow residents.  Much to our relief, Eduardo, my roommate Brooke’s TIM boyfriend was kind enough to load our bags into his car.  I later learned that he insisted on hiding them in the trunk for fear that the policia would stop him to question him about harboring illegal goods or running a homeless shelter out of the trunk of his mother’s car.  While Eduardo and Brooke drove to our temporary shelter at the Collegio dorms, the rest of us girls made our way on the metro to bumblefuck Milan.  Who knew this region existed with highways and gas stations?!  There are no gas stations in Milan, but we were clearly headed to an alternative world.  In addition to the cornucopia of automobiles we discovered, we also found that this region at the far end of the green metro line was plagued by thick, heavy fog.  We exited our stop and stood in what looked like the creation of a dozen fog machines at some European Halloween party (I am unsure of whether they celebrate this holiday here, but I suspect they would be quite good at it considering the amount of food with eyeballs I see in the markets).  Naturally between the insufficient directions provided by M (we later find this is standard and to vastly lower our expectations of her) and the heavy cloak of fog, we are soon lost and disoriented.  And guess what?  No one has even heard of the Collegio di Milano!  Of course not, it would be too fortunate for us to be able to find our new shelter quickly, so we wait it out in a small coffee shop in which we were instructed not to sit on the chairs for fear of spreading our cimice.  Freezing, frightened, and with sore legs from standing, we waited for our trash bag caravan to arrive and direct us to the Collegio.

When at last we did find the massive establishment of dorms (obviously the Italians couldn't see them from the windows of their speeding cars--again we were in bumblefuck where people drove cars rather than using public transport like the rest of the city), we had to propagate M's concocted tale that granted us entry to the Collegio in the first place.  Apparently when people heard of the bedbugs they didn't want us in their beds.  So instead we had to tell everyone that our plumbing overflowed and soaked our apartment and all of our belongings.  Thanks for the shot at our dignity, M.  No one in the apartment was able to produce anything that could clog the toilets because of the lack of fiber and extreme amounts of carbs we were consuming anyways!  Pardon my language, especially you, Cat, I know how you hate foul talk, but it is a harsh reality of traveling without your FiberOne bars.  Our dignity gone, we followed the procedure of entering our new apartments, stripping down, sealing our clothes in bags, and showering.  We dressed in sweats and workout tops borrowed from our wonderful bedbug-free friends and headed downstairs to start boiling our clothes.

Next issue: coin-operated laundry machines.  Typically, not a big deal; however, with our continuing streak of great luck, we had only dollar bills.  Does the front desk have change?  No way!  Do the vending machines give change?  Nope, they only accept students' swipe cards.  Do the students' standing by the vending machines have coins?  Of course they wouldn't.  Plan of attack: walk upstairs to the library where students are hard at work, still in my sweats, stomach-baring, spandex workout tank, and oh yes, no shoes (they were being soaked in bleach) to beg for coins.  I knew I needed an extra boost, so I relied on the never-failing hair flip before marching into the library and disrupting the first male I spotted.  Thankfully he spoke English and hair flip, so he proceeded to race to his room to look for coins.  He asked his friends.  And when all else failed, he left his studies to walk to the closest pizzeria to get change.  TIM.  Thank goodness for chivalry and the lessons I've learned from Legally Blonde or I don't know how we would have ever washed our clothes that night.  About 6 hours later, after boiling and excessive heat drying, we all had a t-shirt to wear to class the next morning.  A very nice accompaniment to our still soaking shoes, and you guessed it, no coats because those had to be taken to the dry cleaners the next day!

A picture's worth a thousand words, so let me show you just how we made our way to the metro the next morning in this ensemble di hobo.

Outfit: T-shirt, no jacket (no worries, only about 30 degrees Fahrenheit), and a large trash bags of coats (makes more sense to carry them like stolen trash than wear them anyways).  Definitely worthy of a spot in the worst dressed issue of Cosmo this year.
Photo Credit: Jenna Michelle

the cimice saga

Ciao my darling readers!  Yes, I have heard the complaints that it has been too long since my last entry.  And yes, I agree it has been far far too long, my dears, but I do have a good explanation.  And so the cimice saga begins.  Let me preface this entry with a warning: although I have shortened this tale and tried to keep the documentation of the past week's events PG (for those of you out there using TIM as bedtime stories for your children, a move my publicist brother would most certainly approve of), it is rather frightening and at times graphic (thanks to the photo evidence from my roommate, Jenna).  I will not be held liable for feelings of disgust, the need for psychiatric care, or vomit stains after you read this entry.  You have been fairly warned, now I shall begin the cimice saga.

Day 1, Monday: The discovery of the cimice

It was a typical Monday evening in mine and Jenna's bedroom.  We were lounged about, skyping, hollering over to Monica next door, when Jenna lept from her bed as if her behind were on fire and pointed to something on her bed with a scream, "Guys, what is that?!  What the hell is that?!".  After the girls race to our room and spot the cause of the shrieks, we turn to our most trusted resource, Google.  We didn't want to believe what we saw online, so we ran the test results past our Community Assisstant, Annalisa, and turned to our mothers, but the verdict was undeniable.  It was indeed a bedbug.  Upon an inspection of Jenna's and my mattresses (an action that caused me to turn my head and hide), we found that our little rascal was not alone.  He had many accomplices in his operation of terror.  The news rung throughout the apartment: we had bedbugs!  Little did we know the drama and havoc our cimice (for my slower readers who have not picked up on this yet, cimice is the Italiano word for bedbug.  TIM on my part expecting everyone to speak this foreign, un-American language) would wreck in the following week.  Now that I have returned from our evacuation, I am here to tell you the tale.  For those of you who are not familiar with cimice (I hope for your sake it is all of you), the facts of this story sound unbelievable, but trust me, I pinched myself multiple times a day to see if I was dreaming, but no, these are the bare, dirty facts of the Via Tiziano cimice epidemic.

blonde down!

I have never considered myself clumsy or a clutz, but today's occurance makes me question this belief.  Allow me to set the scene: I was walking along via Carducci with two of my roomates, Ashley and Monica, just heading to the metro stop on our way back from eating a most delicious panini (wet those appetites, food blogs to come!).  I am dressed in black riding pants, my black buckled boots, a gauzy white blouse, an army green belted jacket (courtesy of my benevolent shopping angel, BAP!), of course my long Michael Kors winter coat overtop all of this and the creme de la creme, my new white eskimo mittens (purchased only yesterday by the Duomo--Io ha vestiti nuovi, one of the first things I asked to learn in Italian class, meaning I have new clothes!).  Anyways, I am detailing my outfit not to create stirrings of jealousy about my location in an international fashion capital, but because of legit relevance to my story.  Now before I get too sidetracked trying on more of said vestiti nuovi, let me finish my tale.  The three of us girls were walking along, talking when all of a sudden BLONDE DOWN!  No, I was not shot and I am not writing this entry from a hospital.  As Ashley reported on the scene, one moment my blonde head was trotting along side her and the next I was out of sight on the ground!  I suppose I stepped on a slippery bit of a grate on the sidewalk and down I went.  Naturally, I can't do anything without a bit of Sam style, so rather than falling to my hands and knees or trying to catch myself, I simply slide from a vertical position directly into a horizontal one, landing in something I can best describe as an exercise DVD leg lift position.  You know, the kinds in which the instructor is wearing a neon sweatband over her teased hair and a skin-tight leotard, excitedly telling you to work your inner and outer thigh by "lift and hold, and again ladies!".  Confession: I am proud to have been born in the '80's so it is possible that I have explored my birth heritage through a history of cardio videos.  Regardless, all of this occurred in a matter of seconds, I was there and then I was on the ground.  Thanks to the down padding of my knee-length coat and my precious new gloves, I was spared any scrapes or cuts and rose to my feet hastily, unscathed, except for my pride.  Never would I fall in stillettos, but walking home from class in my everyday riding boots caused this embarassing debacle!  If passerbys mocked me, I couldn't understand them considering I was walking back from only day two of Italian 100.  All in all, I was able to enjoy a good laugh about the incident with my roomies on the metro back to our place and took a few Advil to ward off any oncoming soreness from my swan dive.  I am devastated to report that the greatest victim of the incident was my charming gloves, as seen below.  They truly acted as any of my fabulous clothes would and took the fall for me.  Anyone who questions why I love clothes should ask themselves  this: how many things do you know that would take a bullet for you or jump in front of a quickly approaching sidewalk to protect you?

xoxo's
grieving for her gloves

Not a Total Italian Move, but a Total Sam Move

more shocking news from milano

To continue my earlier discussion of my cultural acclimation to the beautiful city of Milano and the Milanese people:

6. Dogs are welcome everywhere.  Big or small dogs walk right into cafes with their owners.  They come to the grocery store and sit inside by the shopping carts, sometimes patiently and sometimes barking up a storm.  Today I bumped into one in a department store.  In other news, owners do not seem to be required to clean up after their beloved pets.  Dog poop and yellow puddles litter the sidewalk so you better watch out while you’re walking or your perfume will be in extremely poor taste!  Despite the poo-poo problem, I give the Milanese 5 stars for their doggy loving.  After all, my mother’s favorite child is my four-legged, fluffy baby sister, Nellie.

7.  Let’s talk refrigeration, or rather, the lack thereof.  While at the grocery store the other day, I discovered that both the eggs and milk were NOT in the refrigerated section!  What?!  I faced a fierce internal struggle between option a) refrigerated milk with fat or b) non-refrigerated skim milk.  Place your bets, but the skim milk won out with assurances from my roommate, Monica, that the carton is completely sealed and safe to drink.  Getting home with my groceries, I discovered why nothing is kept in the refrigerator because our fridge for 7 girls to share is about the size of one you would keep in your college dorm room just for booze and chaser.

8.  Prices are different here in Milan, as well.  No, I am not referring to Euros vs. American dollars.  For those of you less Euro-savvy than me, google the European Union and you will discover the Euro is the shared currency of many countries in Europe, including Italy.  Anyways, the price variation I was referring to was the water vs. wine phenomenon.  Please don’t mistake this for a biblical reference, I am simply alerting the alcohol-drinking population of America (shout out to my fellow IU students here) that wine is cheaper than water in many stores here in Milan!  Prediction: mass exodus from Bloomington, IN to Milan, Italy.  Warning to you hasty travelers, the wine is cheap, but airfare is often not.

9.  Alright, I’ve already addressed the driving situation in fair Milano, but parking is enough of an issue that it deserves its own bullet point.  Similar to dogs going everywhere, so do cars.  They appear to be particularly fond of driving on sidewalks.  They park on sidewalks, on the road, in private drives, and today, even in the middle of the road.  Be wary pedestrians, they will jump out from inside buildings or start backing up on the sidewalk in front of you!  Forecast for Milan’s sidewalks: dog poop and smart cars galore.

10. The last point I’d like to make today is that I walked for about 4 hours, uncounted miles (or should I say kilometers?) in heels--lovely, snakeskin, t-strap heels.  Thankfully, they are broken in, so this is not a whine fest about blisters, but in fact, a sigh of happiness that not one bratty little girl stared at me or made snide comments to her friends about me wearing heels in the middle of the day.  Thank goodness I have found a home where I can dress up and wear heels at anytime, any day.  *Sigh*.  Despite the afore mentioned differences, some of these little things are making me feel very much at home in my new environment J

xoxo's your milanese sam

Culture Shock

Ciao!  I apologize for my delay in blog updates...I've been busy settling in to my gorgeous new apartment with my 6 fabulous roomates!  The internet here is also somewhat unreliable, making it difficult to blog many days.  Rather than providing you with a play by play of my past few days in Milano, I am going to address some of the biggest surprises and adjustments (aka culture shock) I have experienced upon arriving in my new city.

1. For starters, Milan is in fact a metropolitan city, not the Tuscan countryside.  I knew this before leaving, but still had visions of wineries and olive trees in my mind when I arrived.  Milan is the largest urban city in Italy with a population of 1.3 million in the city proper and over 4 million including the suburbs around the city, so it definitely has the feel of an urban environment.

2. People in Milan speak Italian.  Again, this may seem like something I should have assumed, but I am an American so forgive me my surprise that not everyone speaks English.  Even among the younger population I have met here, many do not speak a word of English.  For example, Thursday night we were at one of our standard drinking spots, Bar Magenta, and we met a table of Italian men.  One of the group of four spoke some broken English, but the others did not.  Manuele, my enamored new friend, tried to communicate with me using a combination of sign language, Spanish, and translation.  All that I understood was te amo (translation: I love you).  Total Italian Move.  TIM.

3.Coffee comes in a cup about the size of a double shot glass.  Venti does not exist here.  The coffee is very strong and comes in a tiny cup that you drink while standing up at the bar.  Which brings me to my next point...

4. You eat breakfast and go out drinking at the same places.  Our first breakfast in Milan was at Bar Magenta, where we ate brioche (Italian coissants) and tiny cappocinnos.  Later that night we went out and where did we go?  Back to Bar Magenta where they also serve a full selection of wine, beer, and liquor.  They even had a live band!  Definitely a space saver culture and fans of multitasking.

5.  I also must touch on the driving style here in Milan.  I suspect that the Milanese are big users of steroids because the drivers act like a bunch of juiced jocks in the locker room.  It is a battle of agression.  The cars go fast and they do not stop.  It is a test of nerves to cross a street.  The crosswalk is not a safe zone for pedestrians as in the States, but rather a test of whether you will trust the oncoming traffic to stop when you have a green walk sign.  Although my roomates and I predict that odds show one of us will most likely be tapped by a car while we are here, thankfully, I have the experience of being a pedestrian at IU, where knocking over students is becoming a popular sport.

More to come soon...for now I am off to explore the shopping (which is just as fabulous as you here in the States, no shock there!)! 

xoxo's

the calming effects of champagne and leather seats

Ciao bellas!  So I am officially here in Milano.  How I arrived here is quite the unusual story.  After an uneventful flight to Roma, I was delayed in the most un-TSA sanctioned security line.  Essentially it was a mob of people waiting to go through the body scanner without even taking off their shoes!  I cringe to think of all of the shoelaces that made it on to airplanes this afternoon and could have been used to strangle unsuspecting passengers.  This untimely delay caused a mad sprint of IES program participants to various connecting flights to Milano.  Panting (due to the fact that recently I have been getting juiced by pumping iron at the gym rather than partaking in my usual cardio), I arrive at B23 where I am greeted by a woman in Italian who has clearly been waiting just for me.  Thankfully, the plane was held and I board a lovely Alitalia Express jet.  So distracted by the fact that I have not one, but two plush leather seats and champagne, I am not bothered by the fact that none of the other students are on the same flight as me.  We're all headed to Milano afterall, right?  WRONG!  My plane did not in fact take me to Milano, it landed at the Orio al Serio airport in nearby Bergamo.  Upon this realization the normal Sam reaction would be a complete panic, but maybe it was the champagne or maybe it was my Mimi's voice playing in my head, but I remained calm and waited for my luggage to come off the conveyor belt.  I managed to hoist my previously discussed cargo off the line to discover that my 70+ lb. red suitcase had a wheel completely torn off of it!  Yes, I was left with an overweight tripod along with my other large suitcase, smaller wheeled suitcase, fur coat, and large tote.  Keeping my zen face on, I decided to use my handy Italian cell phone to call the program coordinator to ask for advice.  So much for overnight shipping and hours of reading through instructions to register and activate my feather-light candy bar contraption passed off as a cell phone (can you feel the bitterness of an iPhone 4 user on an unlimited account?), my phone was speaking to me in Italian when I tried to dial and whatever it was saying it was not good.  Thank goodness said iPhone was still in my bag and Internationally prepped because I busted it out and called the IES emergency hotline.  "Hello, this is Samantha, I landed at the wrong airport," I say.  "There are no wrong airports.  All of our airports in Italy are very nice," is the response I receive.  Would I call an emergency hotline for a sales pitch of Italian airport facilities?  For those of you still pondering this answer, no I would not.  It was time for answers!  After a few more minutes of conversing with Italy's hostess with the mostess, I learned I must buy a bus ticket to the Cardona station and then take a taxi.  I bought the ticket.  Check.  I hobbled with my heavy tripod and friends outside.  Pause.  Pause a little longer.  Man in a tailored business suit, speaking no English, comes and assists me with my luggage to a bus.  I think there were several jokes between my savior and the bus driver about all these bags for one little girl, but I was just relieved to have made it that far with as few blisters as I had developed getting my belongings through the airport.  Mom, for the record, I cannot stack my bags because they are taller than me and people stare even more.  I am already a target for flirting and theft.  The bus ride was about an hour, most of which I slept through.  Cardona station offered a similar situation to the airport trying to hobble with my luggage, only this time it was on cobblestone and in the rain.  I decided to implement Plan Pause again to see if I had the same positive results.  I'd rate it as slightly less successful because I had to fend off street vendors shoving umbrellas and roses at me, but then a man appeared with a cart and an umbrella and loaded me up.  I told him I needed a taxi and he took me to one for the low price of 10 Euros.  I was hardly in the position to argue.  I believe he was in collusion with the cab driver, because despite our shared hair color, I believe she drove me around the city a couple of times before reaching my apartment.  It's all water under the bridge now, though, because I arrived at the most lovely apartment with the sweetest doorman!  More on my new home to come!

ciao ciao! xoxo's!

crash dieting & bribery

Hello darlings!  I made it!  And by made it, I mean through the luggage check and security.  After countless hours spent crash dieting my two 30" suitcases yesterday to shed those last lbs., the decision was made to pay overage charges for the extra weight, because as we should all know by now, crash dieting never works.  For best results you must change your lifestyle, and let's admit it, a lifestyle change would mean that I would no longer be quite so well-dressed and with Milan as my destination, this is simply not an option.  This truth affirmed, I made it to O'Hare International with one bag weighing in just below 50lbs., a second barely topping 70lbs., a carry-on of well over the 17lb. limit, and a large tote bag (hidden from the baggage check employees by my delightful fur coat).  Panic struck when I realized in the baggage line that Alitali airlines do in fact weigh your carry-on and hold you to the 8 kilogram (17lb.) limit posted on their website!  Upon reaching the ticket counter, I began by proudly presenting the single bag of mine that complied with the stingy weight regulations.  Following the 50-pounder, I (and by I, I mean my stronger father) placed the second suitcase on the scale and it tipped in at 70.2lbs.  The nice Alitalia employees decided this was acceptable for a $100 fee (in addition to the surprise $55 for my second piece of checked luggage--for those of you as numerically challenged as yours truly this is $155 total for baggage).  Just when I thought I was doing so well, up goes my beautiful herringbone carry-on onto the scale.  Please note, this is post hiding half of its contents in my Tory Burch tote (still safely stowed under my furry jacket).  The carry-on weight was, as expected, completely unacceptable.  I choose this moment to accidentally tell the airline lady that I am an only child leaving the country for 4 months, much to the anguish of my parents (I'm sorry Andy and Bryna, between her accent and my desperation this story told itself and I cannot be held responsible for negating your existence).  The kind airline employees took pity on me and told me to move a couple kilos to my heavyweight bag and I'd be ok.  So, I moved my belongings and snuck a couple more in for good measure.  Tags on, bags checked, and a window seat reserved, I booked it out of there before my new found friends at Alitatia could change their minds!  Fast forward through my last mediocre meal at McDonald's in America, and I'm saying my goodbyes to my parents.  The first step is awkward iPhone pictures courtesy of my father (thanks Dad), followed by hugs all around.  I make it to the security line and look back at my parents standing by the "ticketed passengers only past this point" rope.  When I glance back again they are gone, but a security guard nearby alerts me of their new location--lurking around near the McDonald's, trying to get as close as possible to check out the new body scanners in action.  Thankfully, despite the parental lurking, I made it speedily through security with my blonde, non-threatening hair color.  So brings me to terminal M10, waiting to board my flight to Italy!  While waiting I am approached by an airline employee (a man watching the weight debacle earlier) who asks me about my destination and tells me about all the fun I will have in Milano, all in a lovely Italian accent.  I see a friend, so I duck out of the conversation quickly, but Mr. Tall, Dark, and Moderately Handsome returns a few minutes later with a slip of paper with his name and instructions to add him on facebook so he can offer me more travel tips.  TIM.  Total Italian Move.  And so it begins, my saga of Milano adventures and escapades through Europe.  I'm excited and I hope you are, too, so please stayed tuned for more TIMs (total italian moves).

xoxo
your bella sam