Texas-ness

I have a friend named Rachel, who is in my class. I've mentioned her earlier...she is from New York, and we amuse ourselves sometimes by talking about how different it is in her part of the world than in mine. She finds several characteristics of mine to be baffling, and these things she blames on my "Texas-ness." I am not sure that my being a Texan is to blame for all of them, but I don't really argue with her. Her New York-ness might become intimidating if I did, lol. Here are a few examples:

The fact that I don't sweat/moan constantly about the heat: Texas-ness
The fact that I do always think it's humid: Texas-ness
The fact that I'm conservative: Texas-ness
The fact that I don't wear sunscreen, except at the beach (and haven't gotten sunburned, except at the beach): Texas-ness
The fact that I don't seem to notice the blowing dust that is blinding everyone else: Texas-ness
The fact that I don't get particularly worked up over late buses/bad sunburns/roommate drama/overly friendly Italians/ultra slow tourists/etc: Texas-ness

Hmm well, she must think Texans are impervious to heat and dust and sun and drama. I think she's a bit misled...the fact that I'm not griping about the heat doesn't mean I'm not hot, and just because I'm not visibly sweating doesn't mean I don't have it trickling down my back (I usually do, not that any of you really wanted to know that). The dust thing, sure, but that's a Lubbock rather than all of Texas thing. And being laid back in general is, I think, the result of how happy I am to be in a place where I have all the time in the world, and very few responsibilities. Why get stressed out? I'm on vacation! Life is easier if you just decide to relax.

So anyway, just thought that might amuse some of you Texans back home.

I have very little to report today...I had a very interesting class, although a rather strenuous one. My professor apologized for the "big walk," and before we headed to our last monument, she asked us, "Do you have any more power?" Haha. I love the fact that her English is perfectly undertandable, yet often amusing. The other day she made a comment about a statue of a naked Venus who is attempting to cover herself (but not succeeding, of course): "Yes, she is trying to cover her pieces." Rachel and I couldn't help ourselves and started laughing. Fortunately, our prof has a sense of humor and didn't seem to be offended. She's sweet.

Anyway, my class visited the Forum of Nerva, the Forum of Augustus, the Forum of Trajan, the Forum of Julius Caesar, the Pantheon, the Temple of Deified Hadrian, and Hadrian's Mausoleum (aka Castel Sant'Angelo). All of it making me happy, but the pizza Rachel and I got afterward made me even more content with the world.

So life is good for me. The roommate drama mentioned earlier is something I've been having to deal with lately, and there's a chance it might get ugly tonight, although I doubt it really will. I won't go into all the details, because it's tedious even for those involved...but suffice it to say that putting five girls into a 2-bedroom, 1 bathroom apartment was a recipe for drama from the beginning. By now I have two different roommates ranting to me on a regular basis against the other two roommates...and I don't really give a hill of beans about the whole situation either way. I'm not going to be here in a week and a half, so I'm willing to just let my roomies do whatever, but I am getting a little tired of having to listen to the drama. I say, if you have an issue, spit it out to the person you have it with. There's no reason not to, especially since after these few weeks you'll never see them again. That advice, however, goes unheeded every time. Ah well. Girls will be girls. Alisha, I can't wait to go back to living with a sane woman again.

So that's my roomie rant. Haha.

And not much else has happened lately of note. It's been even hotter than usual the last couple of days, so I've been taking it easy. Tonight all the roomies are supposed to go out for Courtney's birthday (hence my concern), and I'm determined to have fun if possible. I'll be working on a paper tomorrow to get it out of the way, but maybe I'll have some more adventures to talk about later in the week. Anyway, ciao for now!