Day 3: Jet Lag and Driving School

My first blog post!! You will have to bear with me...in fact I'm not sure why this paragraph is underlined/a link, but I couldn't figure out how to un-underline or fix it! It might take me awhile to figure all of this out!

Anyway, after 24 hours of traveling and 3 flights we finally made it to Italy!!! We have definitely been suffering from a bit of jet lag. The first night after hardly any sleep I woke up at 2:00 am and was hungry! Even though I had eaten dinner, my American brain was telling me..."It is 8:00 in Texas and you need to eat dinner!" Taylor and I were both wide awake so we decided to take a Tylenol PM. He had to wake up to go sign in at 9:00, but I slept until 11:00...which is unheard of for me! Last night we took sleeping pills before we went to sleep and still woke up around 2:30, but luckily went back to sleep fairly quickly. I have also suffered from nausea and irritability...although Taylor would say the irritability is the norm for me. :)

Yesterday, I met the Battalion Commander and his wife. They are awesome!! They brought us this amazing goody bag filled with wine, bread sticks, Asiago cheese from...well the town of Asiago of course, some salami, and little chocolates. Did I mention that the bag is a wine holder and holds 6 bottles of wine!!!

Today we went to "driving school" which is required in order to get an Italian driver's license. We will have to take a test that includes 50 questions and 50 road signs. We can only miss 4 on each test!! If you think this is bad listen to this!!! All Italians have to wait till their 18 years old to get a license, they take a 6 month driving school, pay between $2,500-$3,000 dollars (and no those numbers are not a typo), AND take a 450 question test where they can only miss 4 questions!!!

In other news, my truck is here!! We were really surprised that it got here so quickly! We have to get the insurance and registration figured out, take the driver's test and then we will be able to drive! I was a little worried about bringing my truck, but I think it will be okay. The roads are not too narrow, but I will stick out as an American since most Italians drive small vehicles. We are hoping to find a house down town so we will not have to do too much driving.

Speaking of housing, this is where we are staying right now...they lovely Ederle Inn. It is actually quite nice. We have a separate room, living area, small kitchenette, TV, and internet!

Here is Taylor in front of the post gate. The post is called Caserma Ederle. It

is right in the middle of town. It is surrounded by tall fences with barbed wire on

top. It is very small and we can easily walk everywhere. We have been out to eat

twice and had some great (real) Italian food. Luckily both our waitresses spoke

English so I didn't have to pull out my trusty yellow Italian phrase book or the cool

voice translator Gram and Bo got us!

Tonight we picked up some food from the Commissary (grocery store) and had us a great meal of sloppy joes, macaroni, broccoli, and wine! (not sure why this sentence is in a different font?)

Well, I am blogged out. Later.