new day, new house

It's a new day in my new house that i will be living in for the next three years. We received our loaner furniture which get us by until our household goods arrive I pray before Aug 9.  This temp bed is like sleeping on a rock. And I have slept on few rocks, this one being the hardest. I'm really hoping our first shipment arrives today. It's got my air mattresses in it.

I took my husband to the Italian version of Walmart yesterday, a place called Emisfero. I think I overwhelmed him a bit. We did however purchase an European microwave yesterday, unfortunately all the instructions are in every other language but English! Go figure. Now I'll get lots of practice translating Italian. Another favorite American store that is here is Ikea. I cannot wait to go there. We need some shelves for this house and other essentials to make it nice. With tape measure in hand, I will go and procure some of those shelving needs, especially something to make up for my lack of a closet, any closet, in this house.

At any rate when we were handed to the keys to our castle yesterday i was surprised by the enormity of my keychain. Beleive it or not, I was handed 22 keys to my house. No two locks are exactly the same so I need a separate key for each one. That is totally insane. In addition to the keys, I have a master list of what each key unlocks and a certain order in which they must start so i can obtain the correct key. And the security features of the house are almost as good as Ft Knox. I know it's to keep out the gypsies but wow, I am impressed by the 4 lock system on the door, shutters with lock features on each window, and by far the coolest windows i have ever seen.

All the appliances are in either German, italian, Russian or Greek so I spend a good amount of time translating everything. Thankfully there are plenty of pictures, smiley faces, and sad faces on the papers to help me along. I will soon be an expert Pictionary player, so friends beware.

We've also met a couple neighbors, our American counterparts. The Italians do not wave and kind of look at you rather funny for waving hi to them. I was told it's because we are in Northern Italy and that's how they roll here. Sounds pretty darn close to the US and the north versus south friendliness. As my husband and I are from the south, we tend to wave hi alot, so we are getting lots of bewildering looks. Alorrah! At least my nearest neighbors are awesome and I think we will become a close knit group of folks who have been thrown together. I see commuting and carpooling opportunities in our future as well as a few cookouts.

Ciao, ciao for now.