Does anybody want to hear about some crazy things that happened to me in Boston.

I didn't think so. Regardless.

10. I was propositioned in the office by a married man and kept a paper trail.
9. I attended the Boston Gay Men's choir rehearsal and a wine tasting with both a furbie and a swinger.
8. I learned what "Do you want to come back to my place?" means. ("Do you want to play Scrabble?")
7. I stayed in the Presidential Suite on business.
6. I flew across country four times in two months for a dude.
5. At my first happy hour, an investment banker from Manhattan bought me a drink(diet coke), and I learned what an investment banker is.
4. I traveled to a foreign country by myself on a whim.
3. I saw the Red Sox reverse the curse.
2. I went out with an ex-convict, a cute Jew from Israel, an Italian Catholic from New Jersey, a closeted gay dentist, a pro hockey player, a Japanese investor, an investment banker from Manhattan, and a nice, sweet normal guy from work.
1. I went to Sephora, the Cheesecake Factory, and Sax Fifth Avenue.

Throughout my life, my feelings toward a holiday were based in large part on my circumstances. For example, during elementary school, I really enjoyed EVERY SINGLE HOLIDAY, because it meant no school. This is the time in my life when I cared about Chinese New Year and UEA but not so much President's Day. Then came high school where I was really into Thanksgiving and Christmas because they were such large blocks of time off. I really didn't care for St. Patrick's Day or Martin Luther King Day. College, well in college, every day was a holiday... Then I worked in the chocolate business and grew to really dislike Valentine's Day, Easter, Mother's Day and the whole month of December but the Fourth of July was pretty hot and definitely too hot to ship chocolate. At my corporate job in Boston, I started to hate bank holidays and all the lucky bank workers who didn't have to work on those days. But I really began to love Patriot's Day, because who doesn't love a day off from work in the middle of February. And now that I am working retail, I can safely say I am not thankful for the entire weekend that is the Thanksgiving weekend.

Walking down Via Corsa in Rome last week, a man sitting at a cafe called out to me, "Scuzi signora you dropped something back there?" When I looked back, he said, "ah it was your beautiful smile."

Rome and Florence were all about aesthetics. Even the drinking fountains seemed to be designed more for looks than for actually dispensing clean drinking water. The men and women followed suit. I unknowingly bought a pair of Armani sunglasses. I found out they were designer when I was out with Alessandro, an Italian carbenieri. He brought out his Armani sunglasses and we compared them. Luckily by this time I was becoming accustomed to knowing less about fashion than my Italian boyfriends. One night in Florence I left my hotel to meet Enrico for dinner. When I got outside into the piazza, he was across the street, leaning on his scooter. He had changed into his dinner jacket, a new shirt and designer jeans and I noticed his Dolce & Gabanna belt buckle. It was cute but sort of sad that he was wearing a $1000 dollars worth of clothes but did not own a computer. In Milano, my friend Francesco was describing another man, "He is nice but he wears such ugly ties."

Of the three grown men, two still lived at home with their mamas. I was dying to meet an authentic Italian mamma, but neither boy found me good enough to introduce to mama. In Alessandro's case, he gave me a kiss outside his house, and then ran upstairs to talk to his mom and change into his dinner outfit while I had to sit in the car and wait.

It took me about close to two hours to get ready every morning, even without a hairdryer, which I blew up early on in my trip. In Rome, to have men follow you with their eyes or their comments, is less of a threatening insult, and more of a nod of approval for a job well-done. And it makes sense in a city that had more billboards of beautiful women than helpful street signs.

Rome

One afternoon I was walking down Via Vittorio Veneto in Rome. I was listening to my iPod and walked past a few carabinieri, which I think are some kind of police but I only ever saw them strut around in their uniforms, which are very pretty. They motioned to me and being concerned that I was doing something wrong, I took out my earpods to talk to them.

Scusi? C'e una problema?
Non problema. E bellisima.

Right. So, after a little confusion, it was decided that the cutest one would take me to dinner later that night. Unfortunately the cutest one, was also the most non-bi-lingual one. So, in preparation, the things I bought were:
1. Gold Obi Belt
2. Necklace
3. Black camisole

We met up at 8 and walked over to get his car. This guy literally spoke NO ENGLISH and well, I spoke as much Italian as possible having started from scratch two weeks before. We talked about family:

Me: Fratello? Sorella?
Him: Si.
Me: OK

Work

Him: Que cosa fai?
Me: Non capsico
Him: (motions toward himself) sono carabinieri (points to me) e lei
Me: Oh, uh, lower level marketing pee-on at a satanical pharmaceutical company?
Him: Non capisco
Me: Publiccita (suddenly remembering the word for TV commercial, while gesturing as though I was making bread)
Him: Ah, attrice!!
Me: Not quite.

Music

Me: Gusta Simone Cristicchi?
Me: Oh wait. That's Spanish. Um, Lei...amore...Simone Cristicchi?
Him: ....
Me: Music bene o music male
Him: Ah, music!! (And he pulled out this mix CD that I swear they must hand out to every Italian boy when they graduate or something. It is a mix of the blandest, crappiest American music ever made and they ALL have a copy.)
Me: Oh, Bryan Adams AND Backstreet Boys in one place. What luck!

But dinner was the best I have ever eaten.

Every time I go on a trip, it takes a few days for me to adjust. I remember the exact moment I adjusted to Italy. In Milano, everything is about the aesthetic. Even the drinking fountains are designed more for looks than for actually dispensing clean drinking water. To get a drink in Milano, you stop up a fountain with your finger to push the water towards your mouth. Which means the water you are drinking has passed through literally thousands of hands and mouths. Staring at that fountain, I realized I was at a crossroads in my trip and I DRANK THE WATER.

One night, while walking around the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele, Jazmin turned to me and started pointing to a mosaic of a bull on the ground. She began trying to act out what I was supposed to do, which looked a lot like grinding my heel into the bull's groin. Suprisingly this was right on. I dug my heal into the bull, and spun three times, something the Italian men do regularly, and now theoretically I am more sexually potent than I was before.

List of Italians molested by me in Italy.
1. Il Porcellino
2. Torino Bull
3. Carabinieri

That night we also went to a concert at the Duomo, which turned out to be the MTV Italia TRL Awards. Hillary Duff won like everything and he came up in conversations with almost everyone. "Ciao, where you from...oh you know ill a reeee, oh I love ill ah reee." Francesco explained that Italians love Hillary because she is ..."scandaluz wiz a man on dee elevaterrrr." Also Italian rap group Inoki won for best Italian cornrows.

My last day in Milan we went to the Europa Amusement Park, although driving to the park was scarier than any ride, like a massive racing video game and the results were for keeps. My favorite part of the park was the fun house. This was one of those rides where the floor is made of rollers and there are stairs that go up and down. You know what I mean. Anyways, places like that are super boring in America. But in Italy, the building/health/safety codes are a little, how you say, interessante, and this makes for a much more exciting caterpiller ride. It's pretty exhilarating to turn the corner in a roller coaster and wonder if you are actually going to turn, or go off the rails. The fun house was absolutely pitch black, with extremely dangerous machinery, and no one to hear your screams.

How to say No in Italian

When I get into Florence, I get off the train and saw my first real live gypsy. She is little and old and wearing actual colors. I hold my duffel bag tighter because she is little and old and wearing colors. Thankfully, I am wearing my money belt, and so any money she decides to take will have to involve removing my button fly pants, which makes me realize that I'm going to be paying for a lot things whilst being naked. I see a couple of billboards and relax.

One of the first things I am concerned about finding is a tabacci because Rick Steves said this is what I have to find to get like phone cards and like tickets to the Colosseum and like pretty much everything. I have practiced saying, "Dove il tabacci," in my head because apparently it is going to be DIFFICULT to find a tobacco shop in a country where fresh air smells like cigarettes. I find about three in the train station alone and look for the payphone phone cards because that is what Rick Steves said to use and if Rick Steves said it then it is gospel truth. The tabacci shop has no idea what I am looking for because honestly who uses payphones in country where ambulance sirens sound like that and drivers drive like that. Next I go to the ATM, get 240 euros and suspiciously look around for anymore colorful elderly gypsies who are looking to sell my body to the mafia. But instead all I see is a mildly annoyed Italian woman waiting behind me. I unbutton my pants, shove my money into my convenient money belt and go on my way.

Next I go outside and wait to be accosted by the taxi drivers who I've been told will try to drive you to places you don't want to go, like Naples. I kind of stand around but none of the taxi drivers try to tempt me with their taxis. So I run back inside, discretely pull out my Rick Steves book, which I have discretely wrapped in a piece of blank paper, so it looks like I am casually reading the most poorly designed book ever written in the middle of SMN station.

I want to look like an Italian (walking by the train station, with blond hair, a heavy winter coat, and a duffel bag) so I refuse to open up my map again. I look up at the street signs and nod and then head purposefully in whatever direction seems appropriate. After doing this for 45 minutes, I find a little square and lean on a stone wall. I notice a small golden plaque on the wall about the size of a business card. Hotel Aldobrandini. MY HOTEL. I see two gigantic wooden doors, but no door knob or alternate method of opening. I whisper Open Sesame. But still nothing. Then about halfway down the sidewalk is a little intercom. I push the button as a last ditch effort. And right I as I get ready to curse Gregory Peck, the door slowly creaks open. I walk inside into a huge dark hallway, up three flights of stairs and through a wrought iron gate. I'm concerned that I'm at a museum, and start to take out my camera, discretely, in case there are any gypsies, but eventually I see the doors for the hotel and I walk in.

Ignazio shows me to my room, which has a sink in the shower which is actually just a shower head next to my bed and a funny little sink to wash my feet, how thoughtful. No toilet, but at least my feet will be clean. The first thing I buy in Italy is a purse because Rick Steves is an idiot.

The next morning, I realize that most of my wardrobe is not tight enough or sequined enough or Prada enough. I run into Ignazio who has me sit down for breakfast, which is nutella and croissants and steamed foamy milk made to look like cappuccino because he can't understand why someone over the age of 4 is drinking milk for breakfast.

I head out and walk over to the duomo, the piazza della signoria and other places. I have no idea where I am, but I am aware that I am the HOTTEST thing ever. Because everyone keeps telling me this. Hot men, in their hot jackets, and their hot jeans, and their hot designer shirts keep telling me I am HOT. This is so the opposite of the reaction I get in Boston which has ranged from no reaction to .... still... no... reaction. I find the Uffizi gallery, and for once Rick Steves has been right. I was able to walk right up to the door with my reservation, which prevented me from having to watch the freaky statue people for two hours outside the ticket booth.

After soaking up Italian art for 45 minutes, I walk outside and across the Ponte Vecchio. I find a little park which has no tourists because they don't speak English south of the Arno river. Unfortunately, as I'm sitting there, a man across the street decides to stare at me and I'm worried that he will be embarrassed because I always win staring contests with hot Italian men. So I get up and go back into the city and try to find my way to the David.

While I'm walking, a man next to me says ciao and asks where I'm going. When I look over, BOYFRIEND ENRICO smiles at me and he's hot. He's tall, with dark curly hair and he doesn't say ciao bella. And I think, "Statue of David or Real life David standing in front of me?" And it is kind of an easy decision. So, Enrico/David asks if I want to go get a caffe and I say no, just a diet coke and I am lucky he doesn't cut his losses and leave. We head over to a sidewalk cafe and he goes in to get our drinks. I sit down and he comes out with two little coffees, one is an American coffee which he had them make special since I don't drink coffee. And after I explain Joseph Smith and the golden plates he completely understands. We head over to buy a leather coat and he holds my hand because that is what Italians do and that is what Carolyn does when cute boys try to hold her hand. We spend three hours...shopping...for clothes. Enrico/David gives passionate opinions about every single thing I try on, and I consider moving to Italy. I finally get a coat and in the first of many similar transactions, I get the "beautiful girl discount" which is 30% off the 50% "tourist girl mark-up."

I remember my seventh grade English teacher telling us that there would come a time when we would learn how truly stupid Nancy Drew novels were. In complete horror and disbelief I resolved to try this whole expanding my reading horizons thing without even really expecting to ever stop LOVING Nancy Drew.

My first attempt at breaking from Nancy Drew Mysteries, was with a book called My Name is Asher Lev, by Chaim Potok, about a Jewish boy who also paints. Then I read The Promise and The Chosen. And then eventually read every single book by Chaim Potok because I was absolutely fascinated by the Jewish religion and culture. I thought the level of study required to interpret the Torah was incredible. It seemed that just to have a basic understanding, you had to be familiar with several different interpretations of each verse, which I thought was really cool. However, living in Utah, I was never really allowed to gush about just how cool I thought the Jewish religion was.

Well, fast forward to a few weeks ago when I was working out and came face to face with my first honest to goodness Jewish guy from Israel. I was so excited to meet someone who actually had studied the Torah and grew up in a Kabbutz. He was even kind of shy and reserved like all the jewish people I had read about.

Poor Samuel got all 967 conversations that had been filed away in my head under "Jews, I love." Some of these include; "The Restoration of the Ten Tribes," "Triumph of the Will," "Chaim Potok," "yeshivas," "Yentil," and "the Palestinian-Israeli conflict."

Unfortunately, Sam mistook my "I love the Jewish people," for "I love the Jewish person I'm talking to RIGHT THIS MOMENT." And when he turned my line of interrogation back to me by asking, "now, what can Mormons do?" I realized that our little social studies lesson had better come to an end. Which is sad because I really wanted to know if Jewish women have to shave their heads.

The other day, I referred to "the Church" and it wasn't a reference to the Mormons, so I knew it was probably time for me to concentrate on my own religion for a little while. I decided to accomplish this by going to the temple in Belmont. The only problem with this idea is that I am physically unable to ever find this structure. Although this is often the case with me and almost all other locations in Boston...it's ridiculous that I experience it with the Belmont temple. The temple is located right off of Route 2 in Boston. When I say "right off," I mean the entire town of Belmont exercised every legislative process available to them to prevent the temple from being built as it would be visible from almost anywhere in the area. Every week I drive on Route 2 and never noticed this building with the spire an illegal number of feet in the air. It's like my own personal Hogwarts, in that it's mysteriously hidden from my view...However, when I resolved to go to the temple, I had faith that I would find it. I drove around for about 45 minutes completely NOT SEEING the temple...which is the same as driving down North TEMPLE in Salt Lake and not seeing the white granite TEMPLE.

After driving through all of Belmont, a little bit of western Cambridge and I think some parts of northern Connecticut, I realized it was going to take something a little more extreme than three sets of directions, seven maps and a person on the phone giving me step by step directions to get there. So, kids, meet the newest and possibly the most dedicated member of the ward choir.

At church last week, a girl got up to share her feelings about church and naturally she started off with the month of February, including how February is just a really hard month for us with the holidays coming up...and I was running through all the February holidays in my head and came up with President's Day. I like President's Day. It's a corporate holiday and that's what pretty much makes or breaks a holiday in my book. So I leaned over to Sarah and was like, "What is she talking about?"

Well, so, Valentine's Day is also in February. I also like Valentine's Day. I met a potential boyfriend at Stop and Shop last week. As has been the case with most of the guys I've met here, James was very steeped in the hip hop culture. He came up to me while I was buying my pinto beans and was like..."girl, g'on witch your fine self." And, I know I use the following phrase way too much in my posts now, but in UTAH if someone said something like that to me, I'd probably have laughed and told them to go back to the UVSC dance that they came from. Here, though, I think the hip hop culture is actually a reality for some people. So, I can't exactly laugh at someone's entire way of life...I can however, completely make fun of it on the internet. So, James went on to tell me he thought we should hook up, but I wouldn't give him my number. He asked why, and I thought about telling him that I don't give out my number to people who use hip hop phrases circa summer 2003 and that if he had used the word "crunk" things might have turned out a little differently. Instead I mumbled something about not giving my number to strangers. He then sealed his fate by saying, "but that's why I be here conversating wit you," and I felt like I was in some rap video gone horribly wrong. I grabbed my pinto beans, told him the one thing I could think of that would resolve the situation pretty quickly.

James, I feel that pre-marital sexual relations are a sin and I do not and will not have sex.