Eventful dinner leads to missed trains

Last Thursday we were invited to our guest Professor’s house for dinner. Megan makes a mean lemon bar, so after getting the recipe from her we miraculously found all the ingredients in a local grocery store we hadn’t been to yet. So we baked the lemon bars and they came out delicious. We sliced them up, so that no one could tell we had a taste test already, and brought them over to the professor’s house. At half past seven we rang the doorbell and were greeted with a warm kitchen a delicious smells wafting down through the apartment. Dom, our professor, showed us around the apartment that the guest professor gets to live in all semester. We were of course jealous that they had a shower you didn’t have to hold up to use… lucky. Then we began dinner with some antipasta, a selection of cheese, pears and olives. Kim, Dom’s wife, shared with us her trying day of getting locked out of the apartment earlier that day and then having to put everything back at the grocery store because they didn’t accept credit cards. It was good to know that we weren’t the only ones who suffered from lack of communication skills.

Dinner was good and afterward we played a six hand euchre. Being from Michigan it was just assumed that I already knew how to play Euchre, but alas, people have neglected to teach me to play my entire life! So, I finally learned how to play. Although mostly confused at what I was doing, my team won :)

On our way home from dinner, I began getting this deep groan within my stomach. At first I thought, oh no, upset stomach. But upon finally reaching our humble abode, I was doubled up in cramping and felt like death was on its way. I tried a hot shower to loosen up my body (who knows why I thought this would work) but nothing helped and I just turned into a wrinkly raisin. I loaded up on tums and pepto and called it a night. We had another excursion of Macerata for the group the next day and I needed to be well rested.

The night was anything but restful. Getting up a million times during the night to rush to the bathroom only left me more confused and in pain as my body refused to do anything to rid myself of some poison I had digested. The alarm to wake up came quicker than I’d hoped and I struggled to put on clothing on stand up straight. Trying a few laps around our apartment to see if I could properly stand up only left me with a resounding, “Stay in bed!” Tearful that I would be missing out, my roommates assured me they would take many pictures so that I wouldn’t miss a thing. I crawled back into bed as they left and didn’t wake up again until 4pm.

I got up and slowly began to function as a human again. I was able to keep down some bread and boy oh boy did it taste good. By the time my roomates got back I was sitting upright and couldn't wait to see the pictures from their day. According to them, I didn't miss much. The only thing that would have been nice to see is the view from the clocktower, but they promised to take me up there the next time we have a weekend off.

Saturday morning rolled around and I felt 100% better, it's amazing what fluids, bread and a lot of sleep can do. Mmmmm, oh how I love sleep. We met everyone at the train station in the morning, which apparently is just down the road from our apartment, and took the train to Civitanova. Civitanova is a town right on the Adriatic Sea and has a great fish market. We got a private tour of the fishing boats, harbor and an inside look at the fish market that works like a miniature Wallstreet. Then Filiberto lead us to a restaurant right on the beach. We had lunch there that consisted of about 7 different courses- all of which were delicious! I've never tasted seafood so fresh. Some of the clams still had sand on it, but it was all so good! We were served clams, mussels, squid, gnocchi, salad, egg noodles, smoked tuna and french fries to top it all off. The meal was concluded by a cup of espresso and then a delicious cup of lemon sorbet to cleanse the palet.

After our tummy's were content we headed off to explore the shopping options. Time passed rather fast as we tried on ridiculous sequin tights and took pictures of our attempts at fitting in to the European fashion. Amanda and I went off to look for some more clothes. Once we were satisfied with our purchases we checked our schedule of the train times home and headed our way to the station to pick up the 6:30 train. But to our dismay, the train never arrived. Either it was very early, or just decided to never show up. Trying to read the train schedule posted was a disaster so we finally asked the help desk when the next train to Macerata was coming. (I clearly have no idea how I managed the train system by myself to get here, obviously it was a miracle) We were then told the next train was leaving at 8pm. Oh joy. With a tired body and soar feet we thanked the man and made our way over to the pizzeria across the street. Pizza- always a comfort food to make any situationi better. We downed a couple pieces and then sat there waiting for time to go by. We left the pizzeria 20 minutes before 8pm, just to be sure we would make it home. While waiting for the train this Italian woman came up to me and asked if this was the train to Macerata. Only understanding a few words I just nodded and smiled and replied with a generous, "Si." Clearly she was in the same situation as us. But then she asked another questions, to which I guessed at and once again replied with, "Si." .... I sure hope she got home okay, whoops.

We boarded the train, plopped down into seats and made our way home safely. What a good day, God bless the train system.