October sent a greeting card, and I want apple cider.

That's the way it always works, doesn't it?  At least for me.  As soon as winter starts to wave hello, I'm going to want hot chocolate.  I think the main difference between those two seasonal beverage cravings is that my title is in an iambic meter.

Sunday evening.  Milan.  Fashion week.  What to do... what to do?  FASHION SHOW!  Yes folks, that's right.  I went to a fashion show the other night.  It was hosted by Vogue Italia (one of the top--if not THE top--fashion magazines in the world) and was the only free fashion show of all the big ones.   There was a big stage set up in front of the Duomo, and there were benches set up like auditorium seating over half of it, splitting it longways.  Important-looking people were allowed to sit down on the benches, and we, the unimportant public, were allowed to stand on the ground and look up at the stage.  It was probably four or five feet above the ground.  My friend Angela and I got there early and snatched some spots close to the front, and watched the lucky sitters find their seats.  The stage was between the people sitting and the people standing, so we faced each other.  People watching is really fun when you speculate what the heck people were thinking as they chose their sometimes crazy outfits for a high fashion show.  The show was just what you would expect.  Ten or fifteen models would walk across the stage and back, then the designer would come out and take a bow, and then the next set of models for the next designer.  There were maybe six designers and the show lasted around 40 minutes.

Classes started Monday.  I always have a little bit of a hard time getting into a school rhythm.  I hate giving up the freedom of summer and having to show up at the same place at the same time week after week, and buckling down to do homework when I finally get time that I should have free.  For some reason my Italian class didn't really feel like school.  Oh, well.  Mondays I am in a class on Leonardo da Vinci, who spent much of his career in Milan.  I think it will be a good class.  Most Wednesdays instead of class, we will be going around the city and seeing Leonardo's art.  He has paintings around the city, and there is a whole museum dedicated to his science and technology ideas and inventions.  Mid-October my second Italian class will be starting.  There are going to be two teachers; one will be Manuela, who taught my first one, and the other is unknown.  I'm pumped to have Manuela again.  She's great.  Tuesdays and Thursdays I am in a class on the history of Italian cinema, and how it influenced and was influenced by Hollywood, and a class on everything behind high fashion.  Its history, philosophies on it, and marketing strategies employed to make people think they need it.  We watched a movie the first day on Valentino, a major designer in days gone by, and towards the end of his career he had a major party.  Ironically enough, at least a couple of the people shown at the party or interviewed were people that Angela and I saw at the show on Sunday!  They sat front and center of the seated people, and we were center and nearly front of the standing people, and we noted that one woman was wearing a purple jumpsuit made of silk or something, and another wore big sunglasses during the whole show, and took them off when the show was over, which seemed like funny timing.  Maybe it's her signature, because she also wore big sunglasses during the evening while indoors at Valentino's party.

In other news, I get to skype with my lovely sister soon and I'm PUMPED!  Nothing like a little chat across thousands of miles.

That's all for tonight.  Buona notte!