So there it is: Hello homesickness, my name is Morgan

First off, enjoy a short story that I forgot to share yesterday, and am going to type now before I forget it once again. Becca and I were chatting on the street in front of the bank waiting for someone to finish using the atm when a crazy old lady walks up. She then stops right next to Becca, just out of her peripherals, and makes a hissing dinosaur noise. I can see her, so it doesn't scare me so much as wonder what this old lady is up to. Becca on the other hand, turns at the noise, sees scary old lady, and screams. Hysterical, Becca has obviously just screamed in terror at this old woman's appearance, who is now asking us if we speak Spanish, and flapping her suit jacket (I know, she was very very strange) at us. We tell her we speak a little Spanish and she proceeds to say, "America esta aqui" Which means,"America is here." Perhaps she spoke less Spanish than she thought, or she was just straight up crazy. After this statement of pure insanity she wandered off making her dinosaur noise much to the befuddlement of Becca and I.
On to today. Becca and I woke up early to visit the Vatican Museum, which is free once a month. We made it to the Vatican by nine thirty and after asking a guard for directions found the line to get in. We waited in line for two hours. I've never waited in line that long for anything in my life. The line curved around three corners, and each time we rounded one and saw no end we sighed and hoped that maybe around the next corner. The line moved pretty fast, it was just very long. We finally reached the entrance (hallelujah) and entered the massive maze that is the museum. We decided to see the Sistine chapel first, and explore whatever else we had time for, as we only had two hours before the museum closed, and the place was huge. We followed the Sistine Chapel signs, and reached it after an hour and a half. They place the Sistine Chapel at the end presumably so everything else is appreciated. We probably didn't even cover half of the rooms in the museum (we missed the Raphael rooms, not happy) and the ones we did see, we were rushed through by the current of the tourists who only wanted to see the famous ceiling. I anticipated that the Sistine chapel would a quiet still place with people absorbed in it's beauty, quiet and motionless with awe. I was so very wrong. It was noisy, packed, and everyone was taken pictures, despite the many signs and multiple guards yelling No Photos. They even has an overhead announcement telling everyone in several languages to please be silent and put away their cameras; it had absolutely no effect. On top of that the chapel is very dimly lit, and the masterpiece that is the ceiling is not how it is depicted in the pictures can find on the web. The colors are much dimmer, I'm not sure if this is the result of the recent restoration, or photoshop. In either case seeing the Sistine chapel in person, I felt (and quite strongly) is not worth it. The experience was so far from what I romanticized it would be, and the blatant disrespect broke my heart a little. Becca and I didn't stay for long, and once we were out we only had twenty minutes before the museum closed. The crowds persisted, and I don't think I have ever wanted to be out of a building more in my life. Dad, you would have been killing people at this point I think, I could hardly stand it. It was more crowded than Disney world, in a confined space with no fresh air, no one spoke your language, and seemingly no exit. It took us another half an hour to navigate the winding halls with following the exit signs. Becca and I were both pretty hungry at this point, but after investigating the shops outside the Vatican we decided to pass. After all this madness we are going back, on the next free Sunday to see everything we missed. We plan on being in line at seven (the museum opens at nine) so that hopefully things will be less crowded, and at the very least we can take our time. We headed home, and I stopped at Pizza Boom for some suppli: rice, mozzarella, and marinara sauce fried into a ball. I took a quick nap, the Vatican had pretty well drained me. When I woke up I edited a paper my sister sent me, and emailed it back to her, and then decided to cut my pineapple. I actually found a website www.howtocutapineapple.com that had very handy pictures and step by step instructions. I managed just fine, while making a pretty big sticky mess, our cutting boards in the apartment are absolutely tiny. Totally worth it though, my under two euro pineapple tastes amazing. I decided that for dinner I would cook my rice with mushrooms, cashews, and pineapple, but it wasn't quite dinner time yet. I started to do homework, when Becca heard back from her mom, so we booked the south of France. We found a round trip flight for $108 and a very nice hostel for three nights at sixteen euros a night, which averages out to be about sixty dollars total, not too shabby. The only thing else we'll have to pay for is food, as we plan to lay on the beach for the weekend :) After we finished booking, I didn't get either of my confirmation emails, and I didn't write down my booking number because I knew I'd get a confirmation email; wrong. My recent web history wouldn't let me see my flight page, but allowed me to see the hostel, so I sent my self another email with the confirmation info. I checked my online banking, and their was a charge that matched my flight cost, so I knew I didn't have to rebook it, I figured I'd have to make a phone call to the agency to get it all figured out. It had been a long day, and at this point I was pretty upset, and wishing I could book flights without hassle, when my sister logged on to msn and asked if we could webcam. As it turned out my entire family was there, and I got to see them all for the first time since I left :D It was pretty awesome. I couldn't understand them, and the picture was equally unclear, but it was wonderful to see them, and type to them for a bit. Once everyone went their separate ways, Johnathon logged on, and invited me to the website tinychat, where you can webcam with (I presume) an unlimited amount of people, It was awesome. The quality of the sound and picture went way up, I could actually make sense of both. We talked for awhile and then invited Stu to join :) It was very cool. Johnathon had to leave after awhile, but Stu and I continued to chat for the remainder of the night.It was amazing to see my family, but it made me pretty homesick, and for a little bit I felt guilty for not fully appreciating my circumstance right now. I know that I'll be home in the blink of an eye before I know it, and then miss Italy for the rest of my life. I got over myself pretty quickly by reminding myself to enjoy Rome while I can, and that my family will be waiting for me when I return. I cooked myself some dinner around nine, and wasn't feeling putting in the effort to make my rice dish, I had some pasta with red sauce and mushrooms instead. I started my blog post, but then decided to leave it for the morning as I was pretty tired.