Pillow Talk and Bed Partners

For as long as I've owned them, I've always had this thing about cats sleeping on my head. I'm not ok with the concept. Maybe it's the fact their little feet, which step in their litter box, get into your face. Maybe it's because I used to be allergic to them and hair on my pillow meant an eternal runny nose, multiple sneezes, and puffy eyes. Maybe it's just because I'm really particular about how I sleep.

Regardless of the reason, for whatever matter, my track record in following through with this personal preference rule is abysmal. My oldest (and now dead and decomposing) cat, a devotee of my dad, kept his thinning hair covered at night with her calico pelt. The first night I spent over at a guy's I used to see, I asked specifically if his territorial cream-colored she-beast was prone to staking her nighttime claim around his pillows. He said never, but the next morning, I woke up to her nesting quite contentedly in my hair. As I reached up to move her, she bit me. That is what you get for taking another woman's pillow, apparently, even if she's not the same species.

Nicholai la Citta (pronounced "NEEK-o-LIE la CHEETA), aliases "Nicco," "Piccolo Niccolo," "Raccoon Cat," and when annoying, "The Whiny Pussy," with a name much longer than his body-- Nicholas the City, when translated out of Italian like his namesake-- sleep exclusively on my pillows on the nights I have cat custody: First, the ones of the right side of the bed, and then on mine.

Evidence.

I share. This may be because he's growing up so fast, and as I said wistfully to Alli and Emily yesterday, "Sometimes I wish he needed me more." As they say, cat people thrive on rejection.

XOXO

The original Nicholai, head waiter of Coquinarius in Florence. Small, dark, a fan of cigarettes, and with entirely too

much energy for someone that small and sprightly. Exactly like the cat. Exactly why we named him after our favorite Itai.

Because I Want You To Eat Well, Too...

The closer and closer I get to leaving Italy, the more and more I realize what a fetishist-at-heart foodie I am. For me, it's all about appealing to the senses. My most cherished memories of Italy will be in the art I saw and sketched, the fashion I went into debt for, and the food that gave me an ass like Beyonce. My most rigid plans before I leave are a list of things still yet to be eaten (a famous tripe sandwich at Nerbone in Marcato Centrale,) and restaurants like Coquinarius I need to eat at just. one. more. time and say goodbye to my favorite waitstaff and the entrees I will dream about for the rest of my life. (Or my next trip here.) And other than seeing the people I love, putting the things I love into my mouth tops my list of right-off-the-plane activities for getting back home. (And we're not even going to touch that innuendo...)

So. Because I want you to eat just as well as I do, here are two places in or around Burlington that you absolutely MUST dine at. And do it preferably before I come home on May 15th, because I will not tolerate waiting a single second more for another customer before putting a pint of Bobcat Cafe and Brewery's Heller Bock in my hand and some of Bluebird Tavern's fall-off-the-bone lambs ribs in front of me. And you do not want to see me when I'm hungry.

...Can you tell I'm on a budget-and-health induced diet right now? Dear god. I'm dreaming in Florentine steaks and roast potatoes.

XOXO

Debauchery: Adventures Abroad Include...

A brief synopsis of the Good, the Bad, and the Downright Ugly:

"Il Treno E In Retardo": The day before my mid-term exams start, Alli and I decide to go hike Cinque Terra. After hiking from Corniglia to Vernazza and indulging in the world's most orgasmic cannoli at Il Pirata, (where bar-keep Massimo declared, "Si, the clams are closed--they're shy. But they're like women; to open them, you just have to charm them. Then they melt like ice cream,") we realize that we can either A.) Go on to dinner in Montorosso since we're STARVING, or B.) Hop our last train to La Spezia and Florence and starve.

Well. We are not the Kitchen Bitches for nothing. So after trolling Montorosso for a store still open to buy a blanket-- none-- and contemplating stealing some hotel's towels off of a drying line-- couldn't reach-- we indulge in a 3 hour long dinner, then head to Fast Bar, proceed to make friends with everyone from the 30-something American tourists to the bartender who is Sealy Booth's Italian twin, drink ourselves warm, and then went and sat on the beach for the next 3 hours until our 5 AM train came, hiding from the carabineri and over-eager local guys from the bar, drinking wine, and having reflective heart-to-hearts. (Which I don't remember.) This day also includes: "My depth perception sucks." "Try mine." "No. I saw yours.", public urination, our first encounter with Italian men who don't know the meaning of the word "no", taking three exams with possibly the worst hangover of my life and only an hour's worth of sleep, and finding out that a classic corkscrew is pretty much a sobriety test in itself. (It takes two drunk blondes to open a bottle of wine, if you were wondering.)

"Ok, You Can Bring Him Back To The U.S With You": For Thursday Night Girl's Night, the girls, Alli and I went to Coquinarius. Feeling bad about us having to wait an hour for a table, Nicolai brings us all out complimentary glasses of wine, then shuffles us inside to a table ASAP, ignoring other waiting customers. At the end of the mean, we all get free glasses of vin santo and biscotti, and when I went up to the register at the end of the meal to "grazie mille" him profusely, he "prego"d and kissed me on both cheeks. As I stumbled back to the table where Alli and Arielle were waiting, I think I said something along the lines of, "He kissed me! Did you see that?! He kissed me like an Italian!"
Alli: "I know! I saw!"
Still in the high-pitch of a five-year-old: "HE KISSED ME!"
Alli: "I am in full support of you bringing him back to America with you."

"...And A Left At The Horse's Tail!": St. Paddy's day, Alli and I decided to go for apertivo at the swanky and fun Kitsch bar, where I proceeded to order a Mai Tai, even though it's first ingredient was rum, and, as we know by now, rum makes me DUMB. This was proven right yet again as we met up with Robin to find the Irish pub we were going to, and my usually impeccable sense of direction appeared addled, right until the point in time I stopped in the middle of the street, picked my nose up into the wind like a spaniel on point, thought for a moment, and then took off like a shot, muttering, "...And a left at the horse's tail!" Let me explain. We had been past the pub only once before, when looking for another restaurant about a month back, and the guidebook's directions to it were literally "take a left at the horse's tail of the statue in the piazza." 3 minutes later, I bring Robin, Alli and I out right in front of the pub. Where I proceeded to drink green beer and get further schnockered to a point at which Alli and I ended up recreating Rape of the Sabine Women in front of the statue, or, as I call it, Rape of the Champlain Women's Dignity. And then Sassy Drunk Carissa came out to play: "Oh, my boyfriend is playing with a balloon. I pick them so well!" "I have a watch. Do you know what time it is? Drunk time." "30...40...50...60 in my cash cow. Do you have a cash cow? I don't think so!"

"Abusement-- That's When You Beat Other People For Fun": Alli and I go to Perugia, where we encounter a metrorail that nearly dropped us into the compacting abyss-- "Alli, I don't want to go there!"-- and then made it better by soothing me with a familiar rhythm-- "Oh, this is a familiar rhythm." "Yes?" "It is. It's the same rhythm."-- Men Who Don't Know The Meaning Of The Word "No", a Romanian knock-off of George Clooney, a Very Small World episode in which an Australian who one of my best high school friends from the Netherlands lived with who Alli met her first time through Perugia, who introduced us to a friend who introduced us to a Middlebury grad student studying in Florence, and a houseparty that could have been straight out of the Burlington scene. I kept looking for the junglejuice and familiar faces. Quotes from that night include: "I think...you want to kiss me." "You want to touch my body?" "He means 'cock'." "It's impossible? No! Come dancing with us at the disco!" "No. No, no, no, no, no, no. NO." Also, Alli gets an 80 year old boyfriend named Sergio. I think it's time to start investing in Viagra.

"Just Call Me Molly": The Button Factory, a Dublin club, is having a 90's themed night. I conveniently forgot all my 90's themed clothes...in the 90's. Instead, I substitute cleavage for theme, because as Jamie says, "You have boobs. You don't need a decade." And it's true. Also, let it be stated here and now that Irish boys are far nicer and more polite in clubs than Italian men are. They actually ask you if they can dance with you, unlike Italian men as JD put it so eloquently, "will fuck you right on the dance floor."

"Gone Wilde In Dublin: One Morning In The Life Of": "Raaaaaaaahhh!" "Reptar?" "If I start humping something on the street, just keep walking." "Oh yeah. It's so much better not inhaling pressed powder." "Well, in the dark last night it looked relatively clean. Though that's been said about things before and proven wrong."

And "Two Pints Cheap-Date Night": Dublin was fun. Real fun.

"Get Me Home. Right Now": On the way to class yesterday, on the cramped Italian sidewalk, two days into coming back from A Land Where They Speak English And I Don't Want To Leave, after seriously considering just flying home from Dublin and hiring people to move my stuff out of my Italian apartment for me, I reached my threshold for Italian tolerance when a man straight-up grabbed me by the crotch. Now, yes, this is Italy, and yes, shitty things happen here all the time, but this was no mistake, and it was downright violating. All I saw as I went to angle my body to pass between him and the people on the other side of me was him smirk, and then it literally knocked the air out of me when I felt him plant his hand and felt finger through my jeans. I was too shocked to do anything than keep walking. After telling some of my friends about it, we realized that this was the same man who has done this to numerous girls. If you are reading this and are a girl studying abroad in Florence, beware a 30-something, brown-haired man about 5'10" on Via Nazionale with a wandering and very purposeful right hand. Give plenty of room to people on the sidewalk, and seriously, if it happens again, take him out. God knows I'm planning on it.

Spring Break Activities: Went spelunking in caves. Rolled down the hills of ancient fortresses of the kings of Ireland. Same old, same old.

And A Collection Of Recent Quotes: "Well, that's how I FEEL!" "Well, I'm sorry, but if you can't commit, I am totally free to eat other men's sandwiches." Sleep rambling: "I feel like a turtle."
"You feel like a turtle?" "Yes. my bed's all warm and I feel like I'm in my shell with only my little head sticking out. I'm a turtle." "Spending the night at a guy's apartment is like going to a one star hotel with a prostitute." "Places to go. Things to see. People to do." "We were basically a room full of people who sounded like we were in the Witness Protection Program." "So basically you're only druggie friends because you use them for their amenities." "Lush-- it's what women call themselves when they want to make alcoholism sound sexy."

So. Eurobreak and studying abroad. This is all what it's about. 45 days until I come home.

XOXO

Foodie Love.

My favorite Florentine waiter, Nicolai, has now met my parents.

Does this make this a serious culinary relationship? It is more than most of my exes and men can claim to. Yet again proving that this is a family you can get closest to by wining and dining together. Tonight it was a bottle of Trebbiano d'Abruzzo and free shots of lemoncello.

XOXO

"Of Course It Is."

I fall in little love here every day. It's a good lesson for a girl who's never said Those Three Words. Some days it's with a passer-by on the sidewalk. Others, someone I actually talk to-- a vendor, a waiter, or another student.

A different man every day-- that is my plan. Not as in, 'a different man every day' in the Biblical sense. No, thank you. As I once said, I really wish I were having as much sex as people assume I do. Because, let me tell you, when eating heavenly pear and cheese ravioli is the closest to a purely physical experience you have had in the past month, life is pretty sad, my friends, and you are NOT a-knockin' boots on the regular. 'A different man every day' as in, I would like to meet, talk to, and potentially flirt with, a different man every day. My own special way of getting to know the locals. I am an incorrigible flirt, and part of my self-designed work-plan is to get better at opening up and actually talking to people, so, why not keep myself occupied doing something I can't help as much as I can't help breathing, and also stretch my solo-emotion-zone comfort boundaries? That's my debatable (dateable?) goal here. Breaking hearts, taking names, and integrating myself with the culture.

Last night, it was my waiter at Coquinarius. (Coquinarius-- possibly the best meal I have eaten here, even better than the Bon Appetit restaurant in Venice. Mixed salad with Gorgonzola, pear, celery [which was not ingested-- can't stand the stuff. It's food that takes more eating it than it puts in you. I mean, what sort of wickedness is that?!] and walnuts paired excellently with a crisp, bright, and lively Pinot Grigo and the infamous pear and cheese stuffed ravioli.) It took me half the meal, but I eventually realized I had taken an instant comfortable liking to him because he looked like the Italian version of The Small Man, one of my favorite young professors from last semester. (He also chain-smoked Camel Lights out front of the restaurant's front stoop, too, so that bumped him up a few 'general likability' points.) He was attentive and possibly the most brilliant speaker of the English language I have met while here, and by the time I went up to the front of the restaurant to pay, we struck up a conversation. He asked me if I wanted an aperitif, on the house. You never, ever need to ask me if I want free liquor twice.

"Si! Grazie!"

"Do you like anise?" he asked, and I was nodding before I even processed, because, my adorable little waiter could have asked me if fresh lamb's blood was ok, and I would have "si"-d him to death and happily guzzled it down. A minute later, as he tipped the bottle toward me, the scent of something came riding over to me on the air currents like an ungodly chariot of death. Liquorice. Anise is liquorice, you dumbfuck. As in, that liquor that after an unfortunate experience in London junior year of high school, you swore to never drink again. As in, I don't even eat liquorice candy. As in, I think it is the black tar of plague, pestilence, and the putrid.

And yet, I reached forward, grabbed the first shot, and downed it. For you, adorable Italian waiter-friend, I will drink liquorice flavored demon water. The second one quickly followed. The room tilted a little bit.

“What is your name?” he asks.

“Carissa.” We shake. His hand is very, very warm, and I feel tiny hairs on the back of it, where the pad of my forefinger is pressing. “And what’s yours?”

“Nicolai.”

“Of course it is.” It’s out of my mouth before I can even filter it. Two glasses of pinot grig and anise, you’re a bitch. He gives me a quizzical looks. It didn’t translate, but he knows enough to be confused.

“It’s a good name,” I tell him quickly, trying to cover.

“Yes,” he agrees. “The best name. No…” He gives a little laugh and shrugs. “Will you be back?”

“I’ll be back a lot,” I tell him, no lies there. “The ravioli were molto bene. Very, very good.”

“Si. My friend says that they are like little bundles from heaven. Come back again, very soon.” I watch as he bangs the register keys, and suddenly, my total of 29 Euro is somehow, magically, 24 Euro. He winks at me.

You, sir, are a little bundle from heaven. Hello, waiter—check, please? I’d love to take you home in a doggy-bag.

"I think you are very brave," he tells me as he hands me back my change.

I push 2 Euro back at him, and he pockets it. "Pourquoi?" I ask, out of habit, not meaning to mix my French and Italian, as I inevitably do at least once a day. I have always heavily favored "pourquoi-- for why?" over just a simple "why?"

"You are here alone," he says. "Not many girls do this."

If you only knew the half of it, Nicolai. If you only knew the half of it.

---

Hindsight of this experience?

Do not ever, ever let me drink liquorice flavored liquor again. I hate it, and no matter how cute you are or how free it is, I still shouldn't have it.

Date your waiters. Seriously. They know good food and where to find it. If nothing more, you'll get a few good meals and some table-side conversation from it.

XOXO