Pics here.

6:15 AM MONDAY

Hooray for jetlag! Actually according to most of our clocks, it's only 7:15 since we didn't bother changing them last night.

The rest of our trip went well, except for a few small hiccups. Saturday we woke up feeling like we had seen most of what we had to see in Rome, so took it rather easy. We strolled to San Clemente and looked at the beautiful mosaic above the altar of Jesus surrounded by his flock but opted not to see the catacombs, since we kind of did that already at St. Peter's. Then we headed to St. John Lateran, but not before passing by a huge anti-Berlusconi protest that was exciting to see. I remember at St. John Lateran, the first time I was there in high school, we were strangely titillated to learn that St. Peter's was the second most holy church in Rome, and St. John was the first, being the official church of Rome and all that. Anyway, we walked around and bought a few religious souvenirs.

Steve really wanted to take the Metro as part of his Rome experience, so we rode the train from San Giovanni over to Piazza Spagna so he could get a look at the Spanish Steps. It's another rather touristey area (when I say "touristey" by the way, I don't mean to sound like I hate tourists: I AM a tourist, after all. It's just that sometimes you get to certain parts of town that obviously solely cater baldly to tourists, in an aggressive manner, and it makes you feel like you're not spending your time very wisely there. You'd have a more authentic Italian experience going to Bruna's in the Heart of Chicago) but luckily right NEXT to the steps was a site that Steve wanted to check out: the Keats/Shelley house. Those two wild and crazy guys had a house right next to the steps and they enjoyed the view out the window, as did we. I am ashamed to say that I don't know much about Keats/Browning/Shelley/Byron but I learned more in that hour than I have in my lifetime, including seeing several locks of their hair, Keats' death mask and the urn that contains Shelley's jawbone. Based purely on personality and looks, Byron seemed like the one who was the most fun. Steve bought a book of Romantic poems about dogs and cats and we were excited to find one about a lost greyhound in the snow, but to our chagrin, it was pretty racist.

After that we strolled back to our hotel and had our final lunch in Italy, including a celebratory bottle of wine. I bought a few food type treats for friends and family (I wanted to bring home some pasta but a.)it's much heavier than you'd expect and b.) it seems like it would crumble in my bag.)

We got our stuff from our hotel (which was nice in all respects except that our room was on the second floor, facing the street and I'm not kidding, the Italians start collecting their trash and hollering at each other at 4 AM, so if you like fresh air when you sleep but dislike noise, you would be SOL if you had our room.) We got a cab, and the cabbie tried to talk us until driving us all the way to the airport instead of just the train station (it's cheaper to take the train to the airport than to drive) and after I kept turning him down he basically hurled our luggage onto the street and sped off. Hey buddy, vaffanculo.

After some stressy running around trying to get our tickets, we hustled to our train (Steve says I'm very speedy for a little person) and rode on to Fiumicino airport, which is not very efficient in a few ways, first in that their self-check-in kiosks seem to be completely worthless, second, their state-of-the-art shopping experience in the terminals is very silly in that it directs you in a complete circle around where should go (in order to encourage you to shop) and yet there aren't enough seats for everyone to sit and wait for their planes. I would have been happy without a Gucci or Hermes store if it mean that Steve and I didn't have to sit on the floor.

We rode British Airways to London (for our 24 hour layover) and Steve loved the free drinks and fancy televised maps that show how you're getting to where you're going. I liked that we got free sandwiches until I realized my "vegetarian" option (the ham and cheese looked a little ick to me) was hardboiled egg and mayonnaise which actually didn't TASTE that bad except I kept thinking about what I was eating and that turned me off halfway through. We also endured some pretty rock-n-roll turbulence. I opted not to take a plane pill before the flight, since I can suck it up for a couple of hours, but when the plane really started rocking and rolling, Steve offered me one and I took it without hesitation and without even anything to drink (except some wine, later). I asked one of the stewards if he ever got scared when it was turbulent (he looked just like that gay breakout star kid on Glee, but I don't watch the show and don't remember his name, but just envision that guy, but in a British Airways uniform, and British) and he said "No. Livens up an otherwise dull day if anything." That made me feel better.

My friend Lisa Coburn recommended this hotel called the K+K George, and my dad, who goes to London frequently for work, backed up the recommendation because it was a direct shot from Heathrow on the Tube, but wouldn't you know it, the Tube was down both Saturday and Sunday since it had to be fixed up for the Olympics, so we had to take an express train to Paddington Station (you know, where the bear was found) and then a cab to our hotel which wasn't really a big deal except that everything in London is so expensive you could die. It makes New York look quaintly affordable.

Our hotel was very nice and in a lovely part of town, Kensington, so we walked down the road for some dinner. Steve had sausages and mashed potatoes, I had shepherd's pie and we both had Strongbow cider. See how we adapt? From our hotel room we could see the fireworks for Guy Fawke's day, which was not too shabby a view. I could barely keep my eyes open though so we headed back to the hotel and slept better than we had in a long time.

The next morning, after a nice buffet breakfast (I love the British for including baked beans with the first meal of the day: that should happen everywhere) we did something unabashedly touristey, which is take the hop-op hop-off double decker bus tour of London (cue Arrested Development hop-on jokes.) We only had about four hours in the city and it was a good use of our time. I've been to London twice but Steve's never been so he saw all the important stuff, like the Ritz and Harvey Nichols and Harrod's. Oh and the Tower of London and Hyde Park and the back of Buckingham Palace and Trafalgar Square and all the rest. (I didn't take any pictures while we in London but I'll link to Steve's later when he puts his up.) One of my dreams is to come to England for a week or something and tour the other parts of the country, especially those big old houses because I want to pretend like they're mine.

We took the Tube from Picadilly circus back to Earl's Court, where I donated a few coins for Remembrance Day and got one of those nice red poppies and bought an onion and cheese pasty, which was not all I had hoped it would be. Weird how the food you buy at the subway station might not turn out to be a gourmet delight.

We got a cab back to Paddington, riding through Notting Hill and then were back at Heathrow, which is similarly mall-like but at least there were seats for us. We killed some time at a bar in the airport (Steve was not very impressed with Heathrow's approximation of a hamburger) where I spent some of our pounds on three different kinds of candy bars and a magazine I used to enjoy called Company (think your average women's fashion mag here in the States but with funnier writing) and then we were off, back home to Chicago. Our trip back was uneventful, just the way we like it. It's good to be away, and it's good to be home.