We made friends!!!

Yayayayay! On a reference from one Jenn's friends, we went to a pub called "The Lions Fountain". We were told to ask for two people who were not working at that time, but the bartender coincidentally had dated said friend of Jenn's! (Apparently he wasn't working at that bar when she knew him.) He was very fun and friendly and held Jen's credit card hostage so we wouldn't leave! He also introduced us to two other Americans that were just starting their stay in Florence -- one is studying art restoration at the University here and the other is her cousin who came to "chaperone" (re: have a good time). So -- instafriends! Jenn and I and the other girls all stayed at the pub WAY too late and ended up going with J (first bartender) and the other bartenders (all super nice) to a "secret" bar after they closed up shop. It was fun but we didn't stay for very long...we were very tired, as such a late night was not expected.

Other than that, our day was pretty uneventful. We woke up late again (this pattern has to stop sometime). And then it rained. So, we got ready and sat out on our balcony and watched the rain until it stopped. We headed out to the city center to try and find some markets and the elusive hotel where Jen and her Mom had stayed previously. We found a market, and it made me laugh because the stuff being sold is almost identical to the fare sold at Eastern Market back home, possibly with a greater emphasis on "leather" goods. We then stumbled into a large square with a basilica against one side. We tried to check out inside of the basilica, but a service was going on and neither of us wanted to interrupt that! (Though that didn't deter many people).

Things started to look familiar to Jenn and she realized that we finally had found the area where she had stayed before! That mystery solved, we set out to find a phone store but ran into the Archeology Museum of Florence. I dragged Jenn in and made her look at all the relics of the bygone Italian ages. I learned about the various groups who had roamed through Italy, from the Etruscans to the Greeks to the Italic tribes (not in that order). The museum also had an impressive collection of Egyptian artifacts, though the room with the mummies and sarcophagi freaked Jenn out. It was a titch creepy - there were exposed skulls/bones, open caskets, and the lights were dimmed so everything was bathed in an eery half-light.

After I decided I had tortured Jenn enough, we left to go in search of a place to have a glass or two of wine. We found a darling wine bar across the square from the Lion's Fountain and had some wine, and an antipasti plate. We met some nice Canadian women who were toward the end of a European tour, and chatted with them for a bit. And then it was off to the Lion's Fountain, shenanigans outlined above.

Ciao Belli!