Catching Up

[12:29:12 PM] Katie Symington: troy-o!
[12:29:18 PM] Katie Symington: What you up to?
[12:31:14 PM] Troy Symington: I'm trying to find mom and dad! They're not contacting me! I just knocked on their hotel room door for like five minutes! I just got back home (luckily their hotel is like 5 minutes away).
[12:31:35 PM] Katie Symington: Whoa, are they in Florence now?
[12:32:01 PM] Katie Symington: You could always ask the hotel front office about them, maybe they saw them go out or they asked for information about where to go.
[12:32:37 PM] Troy Symington: Yeah, they arrived at like 5. They sent me a facebook message saying that they're here, but I didn't get back from Napoli until 8.
[12:33:01 PM] Katie Symington: what time is it now?
[12:33:06 PM] Katie Symington: ah 9:30?
[12:33:11 PM] Troy Symington: yup
[12:33:13 PM] Katie Symington: they must be exploring!
[12:33:17 PM] Katie Symington: Do they know where to find you?
[12:33:40 PM] Troy Symington: Nope. Because they won't contact me. I don't think that they even know I'm back in the city.
[12:35:21 PM] Katie Symington: oh no!
[12:35:43 PM] Katie Symington: Well, perhaps you could slip a note under their door telling them you are here, and to come by and visit you! Give them your schedule for tomorrow or something.
[12:36:18 PM] Troy Symington: I'm already back home and I've sent them a fb message.
[12:37:27 PM] Katie Symington: Well there you go!
[12:37:40 PM] Katie Symington: So how are you buddy? Now was Napoli?
[12:37:44 PM] Katie Symington: *How
[12:39:44 PM] Troy Symington: Napoli was awesome! The city itself was kinda disgusting and totally filled with trash, but there were some really cool sights and Pompeii was awesome!
[12:40:13 PM] Katie Symington: Pompeii! How exciting, what did you do there?
[12:42:18 PM] Troy Symington: We explored the ruins! There's soooo many ruins but alot of it was blocked off unless your part of a tour and there wasn't too much info available there. There was more in the Museo di Archeological Nazionale in Napoli. Today we saw La Capella Sansavero (a mausoleum/museum) which had the really, really famous Veiled Christ statue and omg... my mind was blown.
[12:42:53 PM] Katie Symington: http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2010/04/alot-is-better-than-you-at-everything.html
[12:43:15 PM] Katie Symington: I sure hope that there are some pictures for you to put up! I'd love to see what you saw.
[12:44:09 PM] Troy Symington: Did you send me this link purely because I typed "omg"?
[12:44:19 PM] Katie Symington: because you typed "alot"
[12:44:39 PM] Katie Symington: it's "a lot" and this is a hilarious blogger. you must read it.
[12:46:23 PM] Troy Symington: One type-o and you find this necessary? You're a silly face.
[12:46:58 PM] Katie Symington: She is the most freaking hilarious blogger ever, Troy, and knowing about the existence of the Alot is necessary!
[12:47:08 PM] Katie Symington: Anyhoo. What are you doing now?
[12:50:15 PM] Troy Symington: Talking to you while attempting to do homework. Oh! I typed on an Italian keyboard for the first time yesterday, and it was reeeeaaaally weird. The apostrophes and left shift key are TOTALLY in the wrong spot, and there's a whole different button which is like a shift key except it gives you a third option so it totally took me like five minutes to figure out how to use an @ symbol...
[12:50:37 PM] Katie Symington: LOL
[12:50:42 PM] Katie Symington: what hw do you have?
[12:51:50 PM] Troy Symington: Physical anthro. We just had a test the other day and I totally aced it! (which isn't saying much because all of our classes are kind easy).
[12:51:58 PM] Katie Symington: FABU!
[12:52:25 PM] Troy Symington: Katie... fabu is worse than alot.
[12:52:32 PM] Katie Symington: I'm bringin' fabu back (Yeah!)
[12:52:53 PM] Troy Symington: ...
[12:53:29 PM] Troy Symington: If I weren't 5000 miles away I would bop you on the head.
[12:53:29 PM] Katie Symington: Anyhoo. I just got back from Nick's parent's, it's his mom's b-day and we had blueberry pancakes over there, and then cleaned the garage and I trimmed their dog's toenails and we came back home and Nick left for Sac
[12:53:50 PM] Katie Symington: and last night we were all at his grandparents to celebrate three b-days intheir family and I had PRIME RIB and delicious foods and held a 4 month old baby boy
[12:53:56 PM] Katie Symington: and now I have a ton of hw and cleaning adn stuff to do
[12:54:11 PM] Katie Symington: and I'm fixing myf ish tank. It is covered in algae, my fish are unhappy, and the water chemistry's off.
[12:54:19 PM] Katie Symington: and I'm about to eat crackers and avocado
[12:54:29 PM] Katie Symington: and the internets here is SLOW
[12:54:33 PM] Troy Symington: Cool! (besides the hw and cleaning). How are your classes and work?
[12:55:26 PM] Katie Symington: all bueno! I just did progress reports for all my kids which took a while, and teaching is still fun! My school classes are all good, but the projects are piling up and midterms are upon me in the next two weeks!
[12:58:45 PM] Troy Symington: Ahhhh! I know the feeling. But again, all my classes over here are pretty easy so I don't think I'm gonna hafta deal with that very much! That's awesome that you're still enjoying working there! Is it difficult to write progress reports? I don't think I'd be able to give out bad grades.
[1:00:42 PM] Katie Symington: For the younger grades it's S for Satisfactory with a few Excellents! The older grades get letter graded on their behavior, typing, projects, and overall. I can write comments if I want but I only did for a few.
[1:01:17 PM] Katie Symington: It was fun. A litle tedious at times but overall interesting to do!
[1:01:34 PM] Katie Symington: Okay, my new favorite thing is avocado on stoned wheat thins.
[1:02:24 PM] Troy Symington: That's great! (The school thing, not the avocado thing... it would be great but I don't have any right now so I'm jealous).
[1:02:44 PM] Katie Symington: heeee
[1:02:49 PM] Katie Symington: I'm about out! Very sad.
[1:03:05 PM] Troy Symington: I realized today that I totally should have asked mom and dad to bring me peanut butter.
[1:03:20 PM] Katie Symington: Is there no peanut butter in Italy?
[1:03:22 PM] Katie Symington: Weird!
[1:03:25 PM] Katie Symington: Buy peanuts and grind your own!
[1:04:26 PM] Troy Symington: There's peanut butter but it's RIDICULOUSLY expensive. My roommate Sean was asking earlier today how much it would be to ship peanut butter over from the US!
[1:11:54 PM] Katie Symington: lol wow!
[1:12:02 PM] Katie Symington: how expensive???
[1:13:00 PM] Troy Symington: Hey! Sorry but the internet quit on us for a minute there! Peanut butter is about 4.50 euro for a really tiny jar!
[1:13:11 PM] Katie Symington: Yikes a doodle!
[1:13:34 PM] Katie Symington: Guess you will just have to suffer without it. What about different types of butters--almond or a different type?
[1:14:32 PM] Troy Symington: Ha, it's kinda weird to think that you don't know this stuff! Nutella is sooooo popular over here! It's in all of the pastries and the candy bars and just about everything else!
[1:14:51 PM] Katie Symington: wow!
[1:15:02 PM] Katie Symington: but nutella is so sweet. I was thinking something similar to peanut butter. Do they have different kinds or are they as expensive?
[1:15:49 PM] Troy Symington: I haven't seen anything else. You can probably get others but I dunno.
[1:16:01 PM] Katie Symington: huh.
[1:16:10 PM] Katie Symington: Well I sure am glad I actually get to talk with you today! Usually you're all "gotta go!"
[1:16:20 PM] Katie Symington: :)
[1:16:38 PM] Katie Symington: How is the weather in Italy now? It is raining on and off today here.
[1:18:33 PM] Troy Symington: Ha, well I SHOULD be doing homework! It's warmed up in Florence over the weekend and it was mostly sunny here I guess, which is too bad because in Naples it was raining ALL day on Saturday (which made Pompeii kinda miserable because we were all totally soaked). It was sunny in Naples today though.
[1:19:03 PM] Katie Symington: Dude, how cool is it that you are just tossing out words like "Pompeii" and "Naples"??? YOU'RE IN FREAKING ITALY!!!
[1:19:46 PM] Troy Symington: I KNOW, RIGHT!!! AND WE'RE GOING TO ROME WITH MOM AND DAD NEXT WEEKEND!!!!
[1:20:21 PM] Katie Symington: AAAAIIIIEEEEEE! SOOOO COOOL!!!
[1:20:28 PM] Katie Symington: :D
[1:20:42 PM] Katie Symington: I love just tossing out, "My brother's studying abroad in Florence. Oh, and my parents just flew to Venice."
[1:20:52 PM] Katie Symington: LIKE WE'RE ALL WORLD TRAVELERS WHEE
[1:20:57 PM] Katie Symington: (Except moi)
[1:22:14 PM] Troy Symington: Well... get rich and go travelling! I'll take you to the carribean in my yacht (because in this fantasy I'm rich too)!
[1:23:38 PM] Katie Symington: Such a nice brother ;)
[1:24:12 PM] Katie Symington: The dogs say hi, btw. and Io is walking around yawning. Oz was fascinaed by the fish tank yesterday
[1:24:34 PM] Troy Symington: Ha, good. How is the remodeling coming?
[1:26:20 PM] Katie Symington: the counters are beautiful and the stove, new sink, new faucet, and dishwasher are back in. the dishwasher isn't attached yet because the floors are not put in, so we're walking on the stuff that goes under the tile. The dishwasher tries to tip over if you don't hold it up when loading it! the bathroom downstairs is totally gutted and the new shower floor/concrete bit is going in to cover the huge hole that was in the floor. the entire house is full of dust from the tile bein irpped up and it is still settling!
[1:28:59 PM] Troy Symington: Ha, wow. It's going to be so weird going home with everything totally different!
[1:30:05 PM] Katie Symington: it will look totally gorgeous! mom and dad just chose the tile for the floor--it's kind of hard to explain. It's a similar sized tile, kind of beige/brown with a bit of gray to mach the counters, and the brown to match the cabinets. It's very soothing, the design of it is kind of like sand swirled around so it's not too busy.
[1:30:52 PM] Troy Symington: Molto bene!
[1:31:14 PM] Katie Symington: Yeppers!
[1:31:33 PM] Katie Symington: Ugh totally ahve hw to do today and don't want toooo! I'm having fun researching stuff for my fish tank!
[1:32:20 PM] Troy Symington: I totally have hw to do and I want to go to sleep soon! But I can procrastinate long enough to talk to my sister.
[1:34:39 PM] Katie Symington: :)
[1:34:41 PM] Katie Symington: yay!
[1:35:00 PM] Katie Symington: It's like 10:30 now, though, right? you should probably get to work.
[1:36:12 PM] Troy Symington: Eh. The awesome thing about living with fellow college kids: you can stay up as late as you want and you get used to not having enough sleep. (Although I'm kinda sick so I probably should get some sleep).
[1:36:29 PM] Katie Symington: sick? you got a cold?
[1:37:14 PM] Troy Symington: I've been coughing so much and my throats been really sore for the past day or two. But I have some tea right now and that helps a lot.
[1:40:48 PM] Troy Symington: Yo! You there?
[1:45:57 PM] Katie Symington: sorry!
[1:45:59 PM] Katie Symington: i'm here!
[1:46:16 PM] Katie Symington: Sorry bud, got caught up readin about otocinclus'!
[1:46:21 PM] Katie Symington: what kind of tea?
[1:46:51 PM] Katie Symington: when you see mom and dad please bop them on the head for me too, because I sent them a big facebook message a few days a go and they haven't responded at all!
[1:47:31 PM] Troy Symington: They've been really bad about that! They didn't even let me know that they were alive when they got to Venice! It's green tea, it's not bad.
[1:47:44 PM] Katie Symington: me neither! just that facebook wall post!
[1:48:48 PM] Troy Symington: They would be so angry if we were doing that to them!
[1:48:53 PM] Katie Symington: i know!
[1:48:59 PM] Katie Symington: mom promised she would write me!
[1:49:18 PM] Katie Symington: omg the dogs are running on the ripped up floor and it sounds like nails on a chalkboard! so totally trimming their nails!!!
[1:49:29 PM] Troy Symington: Do it!
[1:49:39 PM] Katie Symington: ;)
[1:51:13 PM] Troy Symington: Sooo... what's on the agenda for you this week?
[1:52:06 PM] Katie Symington: monday school from 10-7 and i drive to sac from mv. tues work 9-2 then home cuz class was canceled in the evening. wed school 10-4ish. thurs work 9-5. fri work 2-5.
[1:52:29 PM] Katie Symington: i visited nanny yesterday for a few hours. i'll be calling her daily and try to visit again.
[1:52:57 PM] Troy Symington: How's she doing? I haven't talked to her at all since coming here!
[1:53:16 PM] Troy Symington: I keep meaning to send her a postcard... maybe I'll send it back with mom and dad.
[1:53:32 PM] Katie Symington: well! she had an international dinner last night at the church up the hill, she was playin cards when i got there. She would LOVE postcard! Write as much as you can on it, k?
[1:53:48 PM] Troy Symington: Will do!
[1:56:33 PM] Katie Symington: Okay bud, I need to go start laundry and get hw together. You go do hw and feel better, k? Give mom and dad a hug for me when you see them!
[1:57:37 PM] Troy Symington: If they ever contact me! Say hi to Nick and Nanny and all the animals for me! Love ya!