Same thing, different country

Apparently I only remember to write posts on Sunday nights. I swear every time that I'm going to write more often and then the week slips by somehow. This week we were all shocked back into the life of studying and drawing and studying and working. Its not like we can't handle it, this is what we're trained for, but it hurts a little more spending an entire Saturday working on one page of drawings.

Anyway, enough of the dreary! I'm in pretty high spirits at the moment. Just finished a skype conversation with my entire family and it made my week to talk to them. Its the first time I've heard my siblings' voices since I left 3 weeks ago. We had the usual lewd conversation about the latest boys in our lives while my brother and dad sat there and cringed. I also got a little laugh about my brother breaking his wrist on the first day of a snowboarding trip and then having to get his wisdom teeth out the next week. Crappy for him but just a tad funny for everyone else. Its also amazingly comforting to get to see my parents. Although I don't get to reach out and hug them, just the sound of their voices makes me feel a little more at home here. Thank god for modern technology.

I'm also on a high because I'm realizing how awesome the next few months are going to be. We leave for a class trip to the region of Campania on Wednesday. We have three of these trips throughout the semester. We are gone for about 3 days. Stay in hotels with classmates and professors and go on walks around all the sights in that region. After that, we are free to make our own way back. Meaning, we can stay wherever we are for the weekend. After Campania, my girlfriends and I are heading to Sicily. Little nervous about the Mafiosa, but we'll be fine.

On top of looking forward to that, we just bought tickets for a weekend trip in Barcelona the weekend after that. We are having a girls trip there. Its Valentine's day and none of us particularly want to be around boys.

On top of that! One of my good friends is studying in Madrid right now and he just booked his fight to come and visit me in Rome. My first real visitor! I'm really excited. Plus, I haven't seen him since April so it should be a good reunion.

This week was a tough one, though. I have been pretty sick for a few days now. I think it might be laringitis and its been going around our apartment. I'm kept up all night coughing and sniffling and when I'm forced to swallow, it feels like I'm swallowing knives. I've been trying to ration the box of American medicine I brought with me, but last night I ran out. Of course, there aren't any pharmacies open on a Sunday. I walked around for an hour today trying to find a pharmacy and finally stumbled onto an obscure one the middle of nowhere. I told him the words for "hurting throat", "cough", and "tired" and got some kind of liquid which I think is cough medicine. I guess I'll just have to try it out.

Despite the illness and onslaught of work, I feel tonight, for the first time, that I'm getting healthy again and I'm really excited for the next few weeks. Oh yeah! We got our one and only design project for the weekend and I can't wait to start designing. All this work will hopefully pay off.

I need to go to bed now. My eyes are starting to droop. I hope everyone is happy and healthy and having a fantastic week. Hopefully I'll write before next Sunday (doubtful).

Love,

Ash