Erin

Erin

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okay, it's been a while. seriously.	[Oct. 28th, 2006\|11:38 pm]
Sorry, I've just been lazy lately. And last weekend I got sick so I didn't feel like doing much. The term is really wrapping up. We now have only 2 weeks of class and one Saturday trip left. Crazy! Today we went to Siena and it was really fun. Some of the girls and I found a McDonald's there and... well... we really wanted ethnic food. So we decided that McD's was definitely "ethnic" enough. So I got a big thing of fries and ate some of Nare's McFlurry and it was actually great. Plus, the McD's here in Italy are like ridiculously nice. I mean, there is "art" on the walls. And the walls are charcoal-coloured and they have little square stools that are yellow or red, and it doesn't look dirty, and the employees don't look like they want to die and/or hate the world. We debated how Italians must view their countrymen who work at McD's. Working there in Italy probably doesn't quite have the same negative connotation as in the US, I would think. Anyway, then we shopped and went to the Museo dell'Arte Contemporanea (er, the Museum of Contemporary Art). It was incredibly refreshing to finally see some modern stuff. And the theme was shadows, so there was some really cool work dealing with shadows. It was fun. And Stephanie touched a piece of art (that was actually ashes, so she left a fingerprint and the museum lady had to fix it - hahah!). Then our whole group met at the Duomo to check that out. It was pretty impressive from the outside and overwhelming from the inside. There's a lot in there. Unfortunately Donatello's John the Baptist bronze was missing, but I saw 2 Bernini sculptures that were awesome. Then we came back and I cooked all of my 50 cent pasta (I love cheap food!) and shared that with Kassi and she donated some pesto to the cause... mmm. For bronze casting, we were going to pour on Friday at noon, but we took two of the investment molds out of the kiln and they weren't burned out totally. Andrea (the Italian guy who helps us know what we're doing with all these Italian materials) said we didn't make the kiln hot enough, especially considering the size of our investment molds. So we had to put them back in the kiln and Joe started it up again tonight after we got back from Siena. And now I have a kiln-watching shift from 12-2am (including an extra hour for daylight savings time/fall back) so I'm just sitting around waiting for that to start. I was going to watch a movie but then I watched the latest South Park with Betsy and Nare and then we also watched an episode of Invader Zim, which I'd never seen before but it's so cute! Anyway now I'm just killing time and figured I should probably update. I really haven't been on the computer much at all lately. I basically just check my email and that's it. Heh. What a change, eh? Well, my other classes are winding down as well (obviously). In painting, I'm working on my final piece, and it is my favourite of them all so far. It's the plague doctor, from the Commedia dell'Arte. I think he's an interesting character. I need to buy some more plates tomorrow so I can start my final print on Monday, even though I don't know what I'm going to do for it. I will probably get 2 tiny plates so I can do a two-colour print just for fun, but the final print has to have an edition of 20 so we can have a print exchange among all the printmakers, which will be cool but it will be a lot of work to get 20 good prints. I really like that class though. Etching is really cool; I think I like it better than relief, honestly. Well, maybe. Haha. I guess it depends. For art history we have a paper due on Thursday and our 2nd exam is the following Thursday. I can't wait for that class to be over. On Tuesday, we have a special Halloween Dinner at Tonino's, which will be fun. I'm not sure how it will be different from any other dinner, but I guess we'll see. I mean, probably a lot of us will be dressed in costume... I'm going to be conjoined twins with Erika. Hehe. I'm still not quite sure how we're going to work it, but it's pretty much guaranteed to be hilarious and awkward. Man, only a month left. I'm really sad to think about leaving. On the way to Siena this morning, I couldn't help but think how much I love it here. It is so beautiful. I would love to get a little apartment here, even though I don't really know Italian... but it's just so... different from Greenville and what I'm used to. Also, it's going to be really tragic to leave all my friends from here. I wish I could go to school with them for the rest of the year! Oh yeah, the only other thing I can think to say here is that I signed up for classes for winter term - HES with Tony (Caterisano - I'm not sure what I'll actually call him in class... hm) and EES-Oceanography with Steppen (Murphy), who John Paul and Heather had last spring. Then I'll overload with Senior Seminar for art and do as much art and costume work as I can manage in the meantime. My schedule (in terms of classes) will be really sweet though: 1050 HES, 1215 EES, and then on Tues and Thurs 140-255 seminar. Crap, I'm tired already, and I've got a 3-hour kiln-sitting to come. Hopefully One Hundred Years of Solitude will keep me awake. I started it yesterday. Yeah. I'm out now. Ciao.
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I was online so I figured I'd update...	[Oct. 11th, 2006\|08:39 pm]
So tonight our "dorm mom" Lauren (who's in her early 20s) and her friend David from Bulgaria taught some of us some swing dancing. It was really fun! And last night we learned a bit of salsa. Um. I don't really have an awful lot to say, honestly. Oh yeah, last Wednesday the Furman crew went to Arezzo to visit that Furman crew and that was a good trip. Overall I'm very glad I'm doing this Cortona program and not one like they are doing in Arezzo. It is a nice city, I mean a lot bigger than Cortona (our entire group went to Arezzo on Saturday so I got to see more of the actual city that day) and a lot of shopping and stuff. But I'm really glad I'm not with only Furman people. It's been really a new experience getting to know all of these people here and I am very glad I'm doing it. The villa the Arezzo people live in is quite nice, and it's been refurbished just a few years ago, so the inside is nicer than our place, but ours has so much more character. And they are really far from town. But I got some great gelato both times in Arezzo from this place called Slurp that Helene and Michael led me to on Wed. I got fragola, stracciatella, and cioccolata. Mmm possibly best ever. Oh, and to get to Arezzo (for the Wed. trip) we took a bus to Camucia (the town at the bottom of the mountain that we can see from Cortona) and then a train to Arezzo. We took like the last train back, leaving a little after 10, and so we got to Camucia again around 10.30. Then the busses aren't running to get back up to Cortona, so we all had to walk up the hill on this "shortcut" that Joe knew. So we were going in some places at a 60 degree incline, no kidding, it was really steep... and by the time we got into town we were all burning up and it was a cold night (fortunately for us). So we're all stripped down and then we decided to stop at the Lion's Well pub for some water because we were so exhausted from that hill, haha. Anyway it was a good night. Last Thursday morning, then, Terry let us skip painting to go to the market in Camucia which is only Thursday and Saturday mornings, so we'd never be able to go otherwise. It was fun but not overly extensive. I did get a couple sweaters for 2.50 each, one for doing art and one that was just pink and cute. Also I got 3 pairs of knee socks for 5 euros, which I think was a pretty good deal as well. I really want to go to Camucia next Wednesday for lunch to get falafel - I saw a restaurant that had it there (but it wasn't open in the morning)! Monday I had my first art history test/midterm. It was not too bad, but pretty long. Not to mention I just don't really care about that particular artsy stuff. Eh, late Gothic altarpieces are just not my thing. I feel like our class was supposed to be a Renaissance class, but so far we haven't talked about the Renaissance at all. It's all like, "this is setting up for the Renaissance! yay!" but it's really boring. Oh well. For sculpture, our wax wasn't sticking, so we had to build armatures and make clay models, which I finished yesterday. On Friday we're going to being doing plaster to make the molds. Apparently there are a lot of things that just aren't really working out for us. But I hope it all turns out well in the end. My model is really quite different from my maquette, which I find interesting and kind of cool. In painting I basically had to start over on my current painting. It's okay though, because my painting was really boring and didn't make me feel like working on it at all. So it's really just as well and I like it a lot better now. Printmaking is ... going. I am going to start on a new plate tomorrow. I have the drawing ready for it - it's going to be of the theatre in Bevagna I visited. Now I have to figure out what classes I'm taking in winter and spring terms. I have to register for winter on Friday. I will defnitely be taking the studio seminar and a GER (or at least one... oh jeez). Then one or two more GERs in spring, and I really want to take stagecraft, and of course more art classes. I may have to do an independent study for studio in winter term so that I have enough studio credits... Oh man. I'm probably going to die, more or less, when I get back, because I'll have so much work. And plus I'll have to be getting lots of art done for the presentations (April 11, 12, 16, 17, 18 - I think) and costume designs for Translations (May... when?). Ah. so much to think about. My friend Genna got her mom to send her DVDs, so now she has her favourite movie, West Side Story, and she's watching it... I thought she would be singing and reciting all the lines but she's not... I still need to see it. I'm sure she'll watch it again sometime with me. There's basically only a month left for me now. I mean, a month in Cortona. And after that, it will go so quickly, I'm sure it will just be crazy and way too fast but what can ya do. I am going to call a meeting of my travelling partners this Friday so we can solidify where we are going and when. After Naples, where we end the program, we have 10 days. That is NOT a lot of time. And we know we can stay in Austria (somewhere) with Heather's grandma's friend. And we know we can stay in Madrid with Stephanie's cousin, who is our age, a vegetarian, and an artist as well. And we all feel we should go to Paris and see the Louvre, and we have to end up in London, so we may as well see the city. Plus, there's the 60s Fashion exhibit at the Victoria and Albert Museum!!! dies I just HAVE to see that, or my life will not be complete. Anyway, I'm going to read a bit now before I go to bed. 8am class tomorrow. SUCK. But anyway... ciao.
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(no subject)	[Sep. 29th, 2006\|11:44 pm]
Tomorrow will be Bevagna and Torgiano. I have no clue where either of those are, but it takes about 90 minutes to get to Bevagna from here... I'll look 'em up on the map, I guess. In Bevagna we're going to see a medieval papermaking factory and I also want to see an old theatre and roman baths there. In Torgiano we're going to a wine museum... now that could be interesting, haha... some people here really like their wine, let me tell you. Hopefully it's free. ;) I've been getting way too much gelato, but it stops being served when it gets too cold. So I figure it's okay. The other night I got shat on by a bird. On my hair. It was the grossest thing ever. Apparently you couldnt tell at all, and my friends helped me clean it off. But it was still gross. And rather embarrassing. Um, I can't really think of anything else to say at the moment. I watched Aladdin the other night with my girls and then last night we played the hat game, which is like a combo of taboo and charades and memory and teamwork. It's awesome. Anyway, I'm out...
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(no subject)	[Sep. 25th, 2006\|11:45 pm]
So it's kind of been a while, I think... I figured I should update even though I don't feel like that much is really going on. I "finished" my first painting. Er, not really. And it's a "grey painting" (aka raw umber, ultramarine blue, and white... yeah i know, not grey) and we are eventually going to add in colour at a later date. I have to figure out what the crap I'm doing though. It's not easy. Not at all. I just don't know what I want to say, but I want to create a unified body of work by the end of this year so I can feel like my senior show isn't a bunch of random pieces thrown together because I have to have multiple things in the show. And Terry was no help. Surprised? Not really, not at all. I think I may talk to Joe about it tomorrow; he seems like he might be able to help me figure out some things, or at least point me in the right direction. Anyway, I have no idea what to do for my next painting, which is going to be a "brown painting." So far I have a burnt sienna wash on the canvas and that's it. No further ideas. Terry told me to leave class early and try to think of what I want to do, like an idea or theme that I could build on for like five paintings or something. Um. So far I've got nothing. I checked a book out of our art library and looked through the whole 500+ pages today... and I realised that my problem (or one of them, anyway) is that I know when I like other people's art, and I usually know why I like it, and I appreciate their ideas and wish I could do something like what they do without just copying them. But they've already thought of the idea, and I just feel sort of paralysed from the start because I just can't get around feeling that I can't think of anything really unique to do... I am basically pretty frustrated in the whole art-painting-idea world. But I've got several maquettes done for sculpture, and hopefully Joe can help me decide which of them I want to make into my model... I can't decide if I want to go more realistic or more abstract, and I honestly really like them both. Oh, that reminds me, I need to figure out actually how much I can afford to spend on this bronze project. 7 Euros per kg of bronze isn't that cheap... but it's less than what I'd pay in the US; I'm just so afraid I'm going to be totally broke when I get home. Bah. I did make a nice print today. It turned out pretty awesome, if I do say so myself. is proud It's a foot. A foot-print. Hahahhahha. I love puns. This weekend was pretty fun. I went dancing with some girls for my friend Betsy's birthday, and then we joined some other people up behind the dorm for a bonfire. No smores, though we discussed bringing up some nutella and the cracker-toast that is always sitting out on the tables in the dining area. Then on Sunday some of us went to Joanne's apartment for brunch. She's the book arts prof and it was really tasty. Then some of us girls went to this market that was in one of the piazzas and that is apparently held the last Sunday of every month. It was so neat, lots of antiques and jewelry and trinkety items. I got a couple things. Maybe they'll be surprises though. Not sure yet. Sunday night we had a group of 12 girls and we went to this restaurant called Il Loggiato that was up on, well, a loggia (balcony). It was soooo good. And it was, of course, ridiculous to figure out how much we all needed to pay at the end. Haha, I definitely called that. But it was so filling and so great-tasting. Mmmm. Definitely a splurge, but it was really nice and fun, and we all dressed up for the occasion. We got assigned our first art history paper today. It is only 1-2 pages though so I... don't really care too much about it. I can make up that much analysis, I suppose. It was cool and dismal again today, with sort of off-and-on rain/mist. I used to think that I was not really affected by weather but since being in Italy I feel that I am affected by it. Every time it has been cold and rainy I have just felt really... blah and sort of depressed. For some reason this sort of weather makes me a little lonely and sad. Plus our dorm is cold, especially my room. It's kind of ridiculous. And I need to shower but I just can't bring myself to do so unless I'm really hot immediately beforehand, and with this chilly of weather it's going to be somewhat of a challenge to get hot enough to brave the cool-to-possibly-tepid shower. Lame. So anyway people, anyone reading this: send me mail. Please. It would seriously make my day, week, month, and, let's face it, probably even term because if I get one single piece of mail it will be like a little present from god or something. Hah. Not to sound really stupid and wimpish and whiny, but every day I look in the Q-R box (we get mail sorted by last initial) just hoping that one day I'll see something in there and that it will be for me. Or seriously, if you're too busy to actually write me a real mail, you could just email me. I check my email. I also go on AIM hoping that I can talk to people on there, but usually everyone is away or idle. I know there's a time difference though... so whatever. Ignore this. But don't really... Write me: Erin Rodgers c/o University of Georgia Casella Postale 46 52044 Cortona (AR) ITALY and I'll love you forever. Okay I'm gonna go now. Yep. I'll survive. It is rather nice here. ;)
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Today... mostly sucked.

[Sep. 17th, 2006|12:31 am]

[	mood	\|	confused	]
[	music	\|	The Proclaimers	]

Today we LEFT Cortona at 730 am to go to Urbino and Gubbio. It was a little chilly, but when is it not at 730am? So I wore short sleeves and flip flops. Definitely did NOT bring a jacket OR an umbrella. And it rained all day. And was really freaking cold. And windy. And generally gross and horrible. We went to the Palazzo Ducale in Urbino which was neat, lots of paintings and the most fantastic thing ever was this drool-worthy wood inlay that was just completely beyond my imagination regarding wood inlay. And there were some nice paintings. We waited 30 minutes to get lunch because the waiters at this cafe basically ignored us for a long time and it was really confusing who actually took the orders, etc. Gubbio totally sucked because it was raining harder than ever then. So I had an actually really great cioccolata aromatizzata or something that was like the thickest, most intense hot chocolate ever with cinnamon crystals on top. Delicious and warming. But it didn't take 2 hours to drink, so we had to walk around in the rain some till we could get back on the bus. So basically the day was filled with me being freezing, having to roll up my jeans so they didn't get wet, and my toes being numb from the cold rain. I did get a bit of sleep on the 5 hours or so we spent on the bus today and lots of music-listening time too. Then for dinner we just stayed here at the dorm and Heather and I had gnocchi with arrabiata sauce I got and a bit of Kassi's pesto. Yum. Totally quality meal, totally filling, and less than 2 euro for me and Heather combined. After that Stephanie, Kassi, Alison, Ru-Shyan, Heather and I watched Benny and Joon, which I just adore. Johnny Depp is SO CUTE in that movie. I want to find my own Sam - who has to be Johnny Depp, incidentally - but yeah, that's going to happen. Isn't that the way... And tomorrow we might watch Pride and Prejudice, which is just another romantic movie that will probably make me sad, but it's good too so whatever. Arrgh. Hopefully I'll get some art work done tomorrow. I want to do a lot more monoprints... even though what I really should be doing is working on my painting (which is kind of sucking so far) or my 2nd maquette for sculpture... oh well.

Oh yeah, I can't tell if it's the changing weather that's been making me feel a little sick every now and then or if it's all the yogurt I'm eating. Seriously I eat a thing of yogurt every single morning for breakfast, with some granola in, and I sort of feel like I may be having a dairy overload. My body probably isn't used to it. But there's really nothing else to eat for breakfast, except rolls. And I don't want to spend money on breakfast and lunch food. Blast. I think I'm going to bed now. Maybe I'll just sleep a lot tomorrow. Eh.

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Art: what is it?	[Sep. 15th, 2006\|04:48 pm]
So last night we had our first of the professor presentations. Every Thursday night at 9, right after dinner, we all meet in the lecture room to hear from 2 profs per night until they have all presented. Last night the sculpture prof, Joe, and the book arts prof, Joanne, presented. They showed lots of slides and talked a lot about their art and even though we were there till nearly 11, it was really cool to hear what they had to say. I was impressed with the variety in Joe's work - he had some pieces that were made of rebar and thousands of bolts welded on that were really cool, and he had some pieces where he built a frame of wood and covered it with some sort of rubber, making sort of huge pot shapes, and he had this awesome piece that was a little wooden boat covered on top so it looked like a coffin, standing on end, and it had a bell hanging from the cover/top with a string going from the bell to inside the boat/coffin. And he had pieces that had more mechanical bits to them and some with electronics too that were really interesting. His stuff made me realise how much I want to learn, like about carpentry and generally building things. Joanne had some fabulous slides too - she showed us a linoleum print she made when she came to Cortona in the 70s and it was amazing, so intricate and detailed and just really cool looking. She had lots of other work and it was really neat to see artist books that she had helped design and print. She said she has some of the books with her so I really hope to get a look at them. Afterward I couldn't help but think about what am I doing here, or what am I doing ever? In terms of art, I mean. I feel like I'm not really an artist or something because I don't normally feel like there are things that I need to say that need to be expressed through art. This past year, I got more into poetry, and there really were times when I would feel like I needed to say something that I could express only through poetry, and so I'd write a poem. But lately I have hardly even felt like writing poetry... and that sucks. I feel like I'm less of a person when I haven't written anything in a while. And outside of poetry, I honestly can't think of a single time when I thought of something I wanted to say that could be expressed only through visual art. Does that single fact negate the fact that I call myself an artist? I don't know. I mean, occasionally I'll do a photo shoot of myself, hehe, but other than that, I do virtually NO art that is not for class. Not that I can think of anyway. So basically the only reason I ever do art is because it's an assignment for class. Given, this is partially because I'm really lazy and undisciplined. But truthfully I just mostly don't feel inspired to do art on my own. All the same, though, I do really enjoy it and I like to learn from doing art, so that has to count for something... right? Gah. Also, last night, I was thinking about what I want to get out of art. Like why am I really doing it? Why do I classify myself as an artist and why do I feel so strongly that I need to do something artistic for, like, my life? It occurred to me that most art that I have done so far has been non-functional, and maybe that's why I haven't felt a necessity to do it. I mean, I feel very strongly that things that are functional should also be artistic and not all the same. This principle I think is what led me to be originally so interested in architecture. I still love architecture, and I still really think that some of my favourite pieces of art are buildings... I mean if you have to have a house, which you do, then why would you want a cookie-cutter house that is smashed into a development with tons of other identical houses? The same applies for furniture and things you put in buildings and things you wear. Thinking about all this made me think that if I could design and build clothing and furniture for life, I would really be happy. So yah... things to think about.
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update number... whatever	[Sep. 13th, 2006\|11:23 pm]
so the past couple days have been the first days of real class. well, sunday we went to a concert at a church in cortona. it was 2 violinists and an organist playing mozart stuff, and it was really awesome. and free. score! and in the program, the pieces were called like fa maggiore or re maggiore, etc., not the actual note name. neat-o. monday i had my first painting class and there were problems with our computers and then the printer so it was basically impossible to print out a photo to paint from, so i had to use my flash drive to draw a picture from that i could then draw on my canvas, which i put a wash on last week. then i traced the drawing in paint. it looks a little messed up in perspective, but i think the horizontal measurement of my canvas is not the same proportion to the height as the horizontal measurement of my photo i-m painting from. but i think it will be fun nonetheless. then i had printmaking and we did a mono-print where we inked our zinc plates and then wiped off the ink in some places. i used a skinny paintbrush and a piece of thick paper to wipe of the ink in a little design and made a pretty decent print. then we just wiped off the ink and we can use our zinc plates again, as we are doing another monoprint on thurs. today i had my 2nd sculpture class for bronze casting. i did some drawings yesterday, and we started work on our maquettes today. we are making them of wax, and we have to use this sort of gas torch thing to heat the knives to cut and mold the wax. it was a little tricky to figure out how joe actually wanted us to make our maquettes, but once i got the hang of it i really enjoyed it. i have to go back into the studio tomorrow to finish my maquette so i have it done before class on friday, and joe is gonna be there tomorrow so i figured i better go when he-s there so i don-t blow something up with the gas torch. also tomorrow i am going to buy some bread tomorrow so i can eat nutella and peanut butter sandwich on bread instead of rolls that i took from breakfast and which are hard by lunchtime. boo. but the peanut butter here, just let me say, calve- with the accent aigu- is the best peanut butter i have ever eaten in my life. no kidding. it is so good. and cheaper than skippy. amazing. plus nutella, which is fantastic, and is also my favourite gelato flavour. yum. but things are good here. yay. i heart italia. however i do miss you guys, so you should send me mail. grazie.
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encora...	[Sep. 10th, 2006\|04:50 pm]
So finally I am updating again. Let-s see if i can recall everything i did recently, or at least most of it. Thursday night we all went to this bar-club thing called Route 66 because they were giving out free wine to UGA students for an hour. This translated into a few small plastic cups - like bathroom cup size, you know - of free wine per person. But it was still fun; we got to dance and be silly anyway. The music was soooo loud though. By the time we left my ears felt so weird. I hate that feeling. Anyway... they played a lot of american music. go figure. Friday was our first day of classes. I had only my sculpture class at 11-2 that day. Joe, the prof, apparently started the Governor-s school with Brodeur - the drawing/painting prof from furman - and Joe now has Brodeur-s position there. joe is cool and sang some 60s songs during class, haha. we didnt do too much but i know now more or less how the bronze casting process we-ll be doing works. Well now i cant really remember what i did for the rest of friday, although we had dinner at tonino-s as usual and then we probably walked around aimlessly for a while. then we came back up to the dorm and heather and i played nerts and pig with mauro and georgia ann. it was kind of a crazy night; everyone just seemed really wacky and we don-t really know why. heather thinks it was because it was a full moon... it was really fun though even though we didnt actually do anything. we did find two scorpions on the wall in the hallway and we put them in a cup together and they fought for like a second and then the amusement was gone from that actiivity. haha. oh yeah, then we watched the latest episode of project runway - woo! mauro downloaded it on his pc. Saturday was our first day trip and we went to Perugia and Chiusi. in perugia we thought we would be able to go to the perugina chocolate factory, but it was closed and so a lot of us were left disappointed. so we went to the perugina store and bought some chocolate anyway. heather, stephanie, kassi and i wandered around the city, which is crazy because you have to take multiple escalators and/or flights of stairs to get up to the main part of the city where the duomo is, and we ate lunch at a little restaurant there - great pizza. mmm. then we drove in our tour buses to Chiusi, which is really small and not that exciting, frankly. it had a nice view but what city in tuscany doesnt. however, this was the place where heather, steph, kassi and i realised that jumping is really fun. we started jumping off benches and took pictures of each other mid-jump. i love jumping because it is really and truly a childlike activity. there is no pretense because you don-t think, you just jump. anyway, that sounds silly but it is true. anyway, we amused ourselves by jumping in chiusi and we also got gelato and met a retired couple from california on their 15th or 18th trip to italy who were about to go to cortona. it-s really neat to meet americans here and sort of find out their stories, even if they are mostly retired people. its nice to see that all old people arent irrelevant and that you can still get out and do lots of stuff even when you-re old. then we met back in the piazza of the duomo in chiusi, waiting for the rest of our group, and a wedding happened. the guests gatheredin the piazza and the bride finally rode up in an old morgan - i think that was the type of car - from the 50s. it was sooo cute. hint hint, dad. hehe. so that was amusing, our cortona group sort of accidentally became part of the wedding guests. hehe. good times. oh, and we also got terry, our painting prof, to jump with us in the piazza. he-s amazing. then last night heather, stephanie, kassi and i went out to eat and i got gnocchi for the first time ever and it was so great. it was in a parmesan asparagus sauce that was divine. and we accidentally ordered a more expensive chianti than we meant to but it was good so whatever. then we met up with some more of our group and watched a fashion show in one of the piazzas in cortona. the show was cool because it was a fashion show happening right in front of me, but in terms of the actual designs... well, i think i could do at least as well. personally i thought they were almost all too glittery and too 80s or late 70s looking. and there was this sparkly gold jumpsuit that really, no woman should ever wear. aaand the designer was wearing a royal blue tie with a navy blazer and black pants. i just had to cringe. but it was fun all the same. afterwards we just hung out with our people at the pub we went to the other night for the match, the lion-s well. i got a free 3/4 sleeve t-shirt, not quite sure why but whatev. and then we went back to the route 66 place to dance for a bit, and they were playing ridiculous music like happy days and grease and the ymca and all. so it was pretty ridiculous but fun to dance anyway. having never actualy gone out and danced in my life, i do quite enjoy it. it is fun because it-s like, whatever, i-m in italy and i can do what i want, and if i embarrass myself dancing then it-s okay because i dont live here for real. hehe. today i havent done anything, except i-ll probably have to read some of this dumb art history book in a minute... blahh. and at 6 there is some sort of mozart performance thing at a church and the UGA people are the special guests or whatever, so i-m going to go to that. anyway catch you later... ciao.
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Update for 6 sept	[Sep. 7th, 2006\|12:43 am]
So... today was a pretty full day. We met each of our classes for one hour. And now I will share about them. hehe. 1. Painting. Normally will be Mon/Thurs 8am-11am. met today at 8am. This is my first ever oil painting experience, and this is intro and intermediate combined, so my paintings may look crappy compared to the people who actually, you know, know how to paint with oils. Actually I don't really know much about painting at all. So we'll see how it turns out. I bought a canvas and a palette knife today and we have to do a wash so that we can begin gridding or drawing on the canvas on monday. The first project will be all grey tones at first, and later we will go back in with colour. and this project is to be of a figure and can be a self portrait, which could be cool... i don't know what i want to do yet though. the teacher is terry, who is awesomely hilarious and awkward. he has several nicknames including terrycloth, terrydactyl, militerry, and basically any other word that has the terry sound in it. he also is from athens and used to hang out with the likes of kevin barnes, jeff mangum, and olivia tremor control. so basically he's fantastic. 2. printmaking. normally mon/thurs 11am-2pm. met today at 9am. this will be intaglio, and next week we are going to do some monoprints before starting on our other prints. so today i bought a zinc plate for that class. this teacher is jack, who is funny as well, but i think he will be demanding. i'm pretty sure he knows his stuff. 3. art history. normally mon/thurs 5pm-7pm. met today at 11am. this is renaissance art, from about 1280-1550 or so. this class is the one i'm least looking forward to, mostly because an evening art history class right before dinner can be destined for only one thing - sleep. but hopefully shannon, our prof, will make it interesting and i'll stay awake even in a dark room. 4. bronze casting. normally tues/friday 11am-2pm. met today at 3pm. this is goign to be ridiculous because i've never done anything remotely like this before. it will be really expensive if i want to actually take my sculpture home, as bronze here costs €7/kg... and joe, our prof, said we might expect to pay like $200 or something for it. i'm not sure if i really want it that badly, haha... either way i'll take lots of pics, but honestly i may be too poor... that would be really sad, to have to leave my sculpture here to be melted down, unless it just sucks so badly i don't even want it at all. but i am hoping that will not be the case. joe seems pretty intense about wanting us to do good work, so hopefully i'll not suck at making molds or casting or whatever all we'll be doing. also, joe started the governor's school with my drawing-painting prof at furman, michael brodeur. and now that brodeur came to furman, joe took brodeur's job at the governor's school, which is pretty awesome. and our class is only 4 people (as of today anyway) so that is kind of cool. after classes today i walked around cortona a bit and discovered that the best thing to do before taking a shower is to walk around outside when it's hot and just get really heated up so the shower water won't feel so cold. actually the shower i took today was much warmer than the one i took the other night, but maybe it was just the time of day... still wasn't that hot, but much better than the other night. that night i was actually shivering for almost the entire shower. then tonight we went to dinner as usual, and i actually put on makeup before hand since i showered. it is strange that i really havent felt the need to do makeup here. maybe it's not being at furman, maybe it's that i just don't care, i don't know. but anyway. dinner was fantastic as usual, felt like 2 meals as usual. then liz, stephanie and i went to this pub called the lion's den to watch the italy-france game (although it rather sucked, italy didn't play so well...). but i got a guinness! finally! una pinta! haha. but i was too full from dinner to actually finish it, which was kind of tragic, but what can you do. i didn't want to overconsume even MORE. i swear i eat so much here. i suppose i exercise more, walk more, etc, but i still don't like eating this much. yet the food is so good i just can't NOT eat it... oh the agony. haha. so as you can tell i'm totally roughing it over here in cortona. hehe life is pretty much awesome at the moment.
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yep, updating again!	[Sep. 5th, 2006\|10:50 pm]
so today was our first full day in cortona. we had a nice late breakfast - around 930, haha - and then met in one of the piazzas for a short walk around the town to locate some things like the art store, the photo store, the post office, the atm, etc. but mostly the professors want us to explore cortona on our own and find things for ourselves, which i think is cool. at the end of the walk, claudia - the photo prof, leading my group - decided that we should go back to the dorm a different way to avoid the giant killer hill. so we went this back way, which still seemed to involve a lot of hills, and ultimately led us through this so-called path that was actually like walking through a lot of unkempt vegetation. apparently there used to be a mowed path there but no more. so we are walking along and suddenly a girl behind me says 'oh my god, my legs are stinging!' and we decide that it must be stinging nettles, which none of us actual know what they look like. but we have to keep walking, and finally we decide that a certain plant is probably the stinging nettle, and immediately afterward we come upon a huge patch of them that we have to walk through. of course i chose today to wear shorts... so i tried to step on them and hold them down but that didnt really work and so i ended up just sort of jumping and running through them. i believe i also was sort of screaming wildly. but i only got stung on my finger, amazingly enough. after that awesome occurence, some girls and i went back into town for lunch and i totally scored a 1,20 euro pizza slice and then we found the thrift store - which was so cool and had tons of 60s stuff, including really awesome 60s italian fashion magazines that i really wanted to buy but they smelled pretty musty and then i kind of accidentally bought a pair of white patent leather mary janes... i had them in my hand because i wanted to ask an american about the size - these shoes are 35, and i wasn't sure exactly what size i wear in european sizes - but this little old woman comes up to me and takes the shoes and puts them in a plastic bag and gives me the bag. and she said some stuff in italian, but of course i could not understand her, so i just asked how much they cost - i can say that, quanto costa - and it turned out to be 3 euros, so i decided to just go for it and hope for the best. they're so cute anyway, and some of you may know how much i love mary janes. well, they fit perfectly. and i wiped them off on the outside and they cleaned up beautifully. i am not sure how to clean the inside, like i don't know if there is a special way to clean the inside of shoes. they are mostly leather on the inside, except for the inside back of the heel. i don't want to cause the insole to come out or anything, so if anyone miraculously knows anything about cleaning shoes, please let me know. at 330pm today we all met up and went in our school building, where most of the studios are, and also there is an art library and a computer lab. the building overall is not really that nice, actually, but i guess it's quite old so what can you do... but like furman's stuff is way nicer, on first glance anyway. so every studio is in that building except for ceramics and sculpture, which are in the basement of the building where we live. the kilns and stoneyard are out behind the dorm building, and the kilns also look not as nice as furman's as well. oh well. i'm sure it will be fine anyway. then after the school exploration, i took a nap and then we had dinner at tonino's and it was fabulous. again. and i'm sure it will be pretty fab like every night. lucky us, i guess. but then we have to walk up the big hill with really full stomachs... ick. tonight i had a fig though. my first fig ever. it was pretty good. now i'm just hanging out, obviously. my friend alison is downloading the last week's episode of project runway so hopefully i'll get to watch that soon. hehe. not much more to say for now, so ciao...
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Since my email didn't so much work, i'll update here...	[Sep. 4th, 2006\|09:59 pm]
hey everyone! i'm in cortona now, on a new computer - well the computer is not new, in fact a rather oldish mac - but this one is easier for me to use, except i still have not mastered the question mark or the capital letter. alas, rome wasn't built in a day. so the last few days in florence i spent mostly wandering around with heather and my new friends stephanie and liz, who are so awesome and i can tell already we are going to be great friends. our hotel was pretty nice but probably quite old, but isn't everything... anyway, we ate dinner every night at a restaurant around the corner and the food there was a step up from the torre rossa hotel food in rome, but this afternoon we got to cortona and tonight we had our first dinner at tonino's! it is amaaazingly good. i had the best ravioli ever as the first plate - primo piatto - and that was followed by eggplant parmesan, which incidentally we vegetarians just had last night in florence as our 2nd plate - secondo piatto - but i wasn't that taken with it. however tonight's eggplant parmesan was pretty tasty, but i was so full from the awesome ravioli that i couldn't really enjoy it. it also came with some sort of plant dish... the waiter said fennel, so maybe a fennel plant... i didn't really like it though. after that though, was the biscotti. yum. so there's a little bit about the food for you people who like that sort of thing, hehe. i really can't deal with having 2 courses and a dessert every single night. the thing that may save me from being fat when i get back is the huuuge hill we have to walk up to get to our dorm. seriously, i was so exhausted going up it this afternooon. it was hot, and i was carrying a bag, and i felt like i'd never exercised in my life. haha. but i guess i'll get my exercise walking around here for sure. but our dorm building - the kehoe center… is amazing. i mean, the entire town of cortona is beautiful. but our dorm - for lack of a better word - is almost literally on top of a mountain, and the view is spectacular. there is such a charm here that the buildings have and that seems to permeate the entire way of life. it really feels like home, i have to say. i was so ready to leave florence and stop sight-seeing and just relax and be at home. i do love sight-seeing but it was so intensive that i am glad to have a break, though we will be taking trips every saturday. anyway, the dorm is great. we have a breakfast room and a common room that we can hang out in - where i am right now - with 3 computers for general use. my roommates are heather and a girl named megan, and we have the coolest room ever. it is actually two adjoining rooms, one with two bunked beds that megan will sleep in and one with two bunked beds and two non-bunked beds that heather and i will sleep in. so in total we have 3 extra beds... heather and i want to have sleepovers with stephanie and liz, our new friends. hehe. and we have our own bathroom. i have yet to use the shower and to discover the temperature, but i'm hoping that i can shower at odd enough times that i will have hot or at least warm water. from heather's and my room we have double doors opening onto a little terrace where there is a bocce ball court and kids were playing there today, how cute. we have 2 washing machines we can use for free, which is awesome, and there are clothes lines on higher up terraces where we can dry our clothes. it is all so great and pretty and wonderful. i love it already. after dinner tonight, to avoid walking up the killer hill right after getting such full stomachs, some girls and i walked around the town a bit. we saw the museum where our exhibition will be at the end of the term!! yes, our show will be in a real museum. how cool is that. and cortona is a walled city, the wall having been started by the etruscans thousands of years ago, and there are only 2000-some people living here, so it feels very safe. tomorrow we are going on a walking tour of cortona and in the afternoon a tour of the school where our studios and classes are. oh, and every wednesday we have no class. i think my schedule is mon and thurs, 8-11am painting, 11-2 printmaking, and 5-7 art history - though art history may be mon and wed. and then tues and fri, 2-5 or 11-2 sculpture - let's face it, i already forgot my schedule. but i am going to be taking bronze casting!!! i am so excited about it. i wanted to do carving but i thought i had a conflict so signed up for casting. it turns out i didnt have a conflict but now i'm glad i'm signed up for it anyway. so i'm doing 3 things i've never done before - oil painting, intaglio printing, and bronze casting. that is crazy. but at least i have an excuse if my work sucks haha. however i hope it will go well. i am going to take a lot of pictures of cortona tomorrow and more of our dorm, and maybe i can transfer my pics to the computer and share some of them with you guys!! i want everyone to see this, it is so beautiful. well, i am going to go now as i want to get some good sleep tonight for once. hope everything is swell in the good ole us of a. say hi to george w for me. hahaha. peace, guys. love you all. - erin p.s. hope you liked the loooong update...
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First post...	[Aug. 2nd, 2006\|03:15 pm]
So I just started this LJ as a way to share photos and updates with you people. Uhhh don't have much to say as yet. 24 days to Italy. Well, till I leave, anyway. I got my passport with visa back today, which is nice. My picture is kind of bad, but what can ya do. Now I just have to figure out what digital camera I want, and whether I want to take a regular manual camera. I also have to get an iPod power adapter and a regular AC adapter for outlets in Europe, but I think I can borrow the latter. Also, I have to figure out what is the best way to communicate with family and friends back home (via phone) while I'm there... advice, anyone?
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