E troppo caldo!

Today in Rome it has been 36 degrees. Oddly enough, it's really quite pleasant - I even bought a cono medio al gelato limone to celebrate getting some warmth and sunshine into my bones - it feels fantastic to let it seep in after the months of English meteorological dreariness. Then, after a while, you notice your skin begin to tighten and redden a bit - well, you do if you're me with pale, quite easily burnable skin - which is a bit of a pain when you're on the top deck of an open topped bus! By the time I got off the bus, I swear I could feel my skin crisping like a roast chicken (shame I didn't smell as good...).

And then something lovely happened - in front of the beautiful St Peter's Basilica in Vatican City I met up with my family. Now, you might think, "And?" But I thought it was fantastically, wonderfully odd that none of us live here, and we're all travelling on to somewhere else, but we've managed to arrange it that for 20 minutes or so this lunchtime - and dinner tonight - we can get together. Danielle didn't know I was coming, and i'll cherish the look on her face when I walked up to them - and the big hug - for a long time to come. It's nice to be loved :-)

So, back to the hotel, with my new parasol and the hundredth bottle of water today - the public drinking fountains are saving me a fortune! - and the maid has very kindly switched on the air conditioning woo hoo! So now I lie down until I've cooled down, get a shower, lie down to cool down, blow dry my hair, more lying/cooling down, then off for a marvellous "tasting menu" dinner at a fabulous Italian restaurant in Trastevere. I know it will be fabulous because my brother booked it - it will therefore have been fully researched and assessed clinically beforehand. We don't do shit food (well, they don't - I try not to mention my love of chicken nuggets too often...).

Buona sera x