"Wakey Wakey!" "Eggs and Bakey?"

I did laundry yesterday for the first time. The washer is so small that a full load was 1 pair of jeans, 3 shirts, and some socks. There is also no dryer so I had to let everything air dry, consequently my socks are all sort of hard. I don't know why air makes them dry like that but they do. I don't really like crunchy socks. 

This morning we did some walking tours with IES. We were randomly divided up into groups. My group went to St. Peter's! We walked across Ponte Sant'Angelo and then down Via Conciliazione (built by Mussolini). The teacher leading the group kept complaining about how ugly and square the road and the other Fascist architecture is. I actually think it looks really amazing. There are these long straight lines and square corners contrasted with the really ornate, decorated and round St. Peter's. It's a beautiful contrast. February is a really nice time to be here also because there are not that many tourists. That's not to say they aren't literally busing them in, but you can actually walk around and there was no wait to get inside. I want to buy some cheesy tourist trinkets soon. Mostly I just want to buy things with my name on it. You never find things with "Valentina" on them in the States so anything I see with my name, I'm buying.

In the afternoon we started the process to get our Permits of Stay. I waited in a 45 min line and was then told I wasn't in the system and had to go redo the part of the computer (I had most definitely already did this). I then had to wait another hour and a half in line only to be told by the same guy that I still wasn't in the system. We figured out it was because I have an apostrophe in my name that he hadn't typed while searching for me. I guess I can't be too upset. It's really not a very Italian last name. I also have to redo the photocopy of my passport by next week because I didn't copy the back cover. I asked Sonia if it would be OK to just color a dark blue rectangle on a piece a paper because, really, that's all the back cover is. That however is not going to fly with the Italian government.