The day started off with rain showers and police. After jogging around a storm-cloudy Florence (which is quite difficult to do with all the tourists), I realized our trash bags had not been picked up from our front stoop. Clearly the bags were ours, because my roommate and I thought it would be neat to buy green trash bags, while everyone else uses the standard black bags. Not a good idea. The two green lumps were still on the stoop at 11 am. I just figured the Florence garbage men were running late, as it is customary for EVERYTHING in Florence to be late and leisurely.

After returning from my run, I found Vincent, my landlord, at the entrance of our apartment door. I knelt down to pick up our bags, figuring the garbage was just not going to be picked up, when Vincent told me to get rid of the trash—NOW. The police had been by with a ticket and were currently trying to figure out who’s trash was out on the stoop of the apartment complex. As it turns out, leaving trash out is a big no-no. You can get fined up to 250 euro for leaving trash out past the assigned time—7:30am on Wednesdays. So I quickly threw my into the front door and rushed up to my apartment, hoping and praying the polizia did not come knocking. AH! Just to be safe, my roommate and I took the trash out later tonight—in case any of the polizia recognized us as the green-trash-bandits.

Aside from wondering if I would be locked up in Italian jail today, Maddy, Sami (my two roommates) and I also got caught in the rain on our way to Italian class. And to top it off, we got lost. Yep, I tend to get lost frequently in foreign countries.  Navigating a large, cobblestone city is quite difficult in the rain, and my Italian professor has just learned to laugh and smile when I show up to class late, panting from running all over the city.

But to finish out my hectic day, Maddy and I made homemade spaghetti tonight for dinner. We were only able to do this after locating a cheap supermarket, out of the way of the expensive tourist-y stores. I was able to get fresh pesto, chicken, yogurt, noodles, and an assortment of Italian chocolate for only 9 euro. Score.