Italian Getaway - Day 2 (part 1)

We started the day with a trip to the grocery store for a cheaper breakfast than we could have bought in a shop. We had purchased Uffizi tickets for 10am and had slept later than we intended, so we were rushing around pretty quickly to make sure we didn’t miss food OR the museum (hmmmm, which is more important?). We grabbed a pair of oranges and juice, as well as some spicy meat slices, some sliced provolone, and two baguettes. We walked over to the entrance of the Uffizi and wolfed down what ended up being really awesome sandwiches for breakfast.
We stood in a few different lines until we finally figured out how to pick up our reserved tickets and find the entrance into the museum. I’d been there before, but it’s still awe-inspiring. The Birth of Venus is so amazing up close and in person, as is La Primavera. I also got to see the original painting of the piece I “borrowed” from Artemisia Gentileschi called Judith Beheading Holofernes for the front and back covers of the Anthrofuge CD (the Death Metal band I played in back in the day).

In the basement of the Uffizi is this long cavern system where they have hidden a bathroom. Hilarious to hear all the comments from people wishing they had brought trail mix and made savings throws once in the caverns under the museum. After you’ve walked most of the museum, got the snack bar on the roof of the Uffizi as a break. You have to finish your food and drink before you go back in to the museum, but it’s a good view of the city and is a well needed break. We heard a classical guitarist down in the courtyard whom we then went out and watched for a bit when we left the museum. While watching the guitarist perform, we saw groups of people selling cheap prints of the famous pieces in the museum (which is apparently illegal). We’d see them scoop up their art pieces amazingly quickly and run away whenever someone official-looking or a cop showed up. We saw one of them getting hauled away by a very angry officer, literally holding the kid by the back of his shirt collar and hauling him through the piazza to the police station. Excitement all around!


We grabbed lunch at a small restaurant (Caffe Mokarico Letizia) with outdoor seating and a stoner server. You pick out your food from the display case and there is also food all over the top of the case. You might think it sounds like it’s an awful idea to display things like that, but these people have it down to a science. Everything moves so fast that it is always freshly made.

We grabbed a salad and I got a pizza for myself. The lady behind the counter tried to get me to order beer, but I wouldn’t cave. D.Rough did get talked into ordering herself a small bottle of wine. While they were heating up my pizza, we went out to the patio to sit down. The stoner guy grabbed our food and carried it out for us. My pizza came out shortly after sitting, and despite the fact that it was a tad greasy, it really was a delicious pizza. I won’t complain at all (even though my guts did a few hours later). D.Rough’s tomato and mozzarella salad had TONS of mozzarella. The olive oil and vinegar comes in condiment packages like we have in the US for ketchup, so that’s fun. And the bottle of white wine D.Rough got talked into was pretty good as well. It was a great lunch, with entertainment provided by the couple who was clearly in mid break-up speech while we dined less than 10 feet from them. Dinner and a show. (It's the woman with her hand on her head behind the flower planter thing)


It was snacking time, so we grabbed some gelato, which we both love. I got amarena (cherry) and ananas (pineapple) and D.Rough got pistachio and tiramisu. We headed back to the Ponte Vecchio to do more window shopping and looking at rings. Then (again, to make a long story short), we went and bought us a ring… I mean RING. "THE" RING. Yeah, major freak out time on someone’s part, but I don’t regret it one bit. I’ll save the haggling stories and discussion over resizing the ring and the VAT you have to pay on expensive things. But we were pretty happy about this whole process. Things were looking up. We had to come back right before the jewelry shop closed that night to pick up the newly sized ring, so we had some time to kill. What better way to kill time than with a sweet Italian nap. Out like zombies for a couple hours. We headed back to the shop and picked up the newly sized ring. We only let D.Rough try the ring on for a second to make sure it fit, and then it had to go back in the fancy box until I got the balls to ask her officially.