You get to see it for yourself.

Marco is learning. Instead of "grand fire" he now says this...

Why am I laughing?

Marco just scored again, so he screamed "GRAND FIRE!!!" in Ryan's face. To which Ryan responded indignantly, "It's I'm on Fire not grand fire."

Street Fighter Updates

I'd love to have video of this epic battle... I am laughing my butt off.

PS - Marco just scored.

What's happening at our house...

Ryan has two of his work friends over, and they're playing Street Fighter II. One is trying to beat Ryan and the other is keeping score. Be jealous, ladies... be jealous.

Pregnant Mouth

If you've never heard of this phenomenon, you're not alone. I don't exactly get it. But Ryan, on the other hand, is an expert. He knows when a person is pregnant simply by detecting differences in their mouth. I never believed it, but lately, I cannot deny Ryan's strange and completely useless power.

We were watching Project Runway. I read somewhere that Nina Garcia was pregnant, but she wasn't showing - AT ALL. They weren't even picturing her stomach... just a shot of her face. Out of nowhere, Ryan says, "pregnant mouth." This happens all the time. Facebook pictures - pregnant mouth. Reading magazines - pregnant mouth. Visiting friends - whisper - pregnant mouth. It's not negative it all, just... different? It's completely insane, but no matter what stage of pregnancy, I'm starting to believe people do in fact have "pregnant mouth." Even if I can't see it.

There are a couple of rules, one being you have to know what the person looks like before they get pregnant. If you try and test him on You Tube, detecting pregnant mouth on strangers, it doesn't work. I just tried.

Not Much to Say

We're just trying to get through this week, because Vienna vacation starts on Friday. We're taking a sleeper train, which is a first for us. We were told to sleep directly on our valuables, because a lot gets stolen on overnight voyages. However, since we're married, we're required to have a private cabin, so hopefully we won't have problems. I predict the only theft taking place will be Ryan stealing my Kindle every three seconds. That boy loves my new toy. He's lucky I have a lot of homework these days... he's had it all to himself with no complaints.

Fall is in full swing. Last week, we decided to walk to our English Film Club, and I thought I'd bring the camera along to catch the changing scenery. The pictures are kind of blah, except for this one, taken from our balcony. I am in love with this apartment on a daily basis. The only time I want to be more central is when it's raining and cold (like today). That's when you wish you either had a car, lived closer, or could fly.


These don't really capture the change I was going for, but I realized I don't post many pictures of where we live anymore, so enjoy!

Happy Birthday to us! I mean... to Sarah!

It's our friend Sarah's birthday today, but last Saturday, we felt like the special ones!

Sarah and her husband Tom wanted to share their celebratory meal, so we all went to Il Gatto Nero in Italy, on top of a mountain overlooking Como Lake. It's an amazing restaurant with incredible views. It's also George Clooney's favorite when he's in town, so we decided to step it up and get "suited and booted" (English people are so funny). They rented a car, picked us up, and off we went through many a hairpin turn up the mountain.

We had an amazing meal, great wine, and an all around fantastic time. Here we are after dinner... all smiles and wanting to capture the moment.


In Switzerland especially, we know the power of a good meal with friends. And considering this was a GREAT meal, the night couldn't have been better.

Lugano Hockey

We went to our first HC Lugano game on Wednesday with people from Ryan's office. Maura (pronounced Mow-ra) has season tickets, and she blocked out some seats for us. The beginning was strange... a series of serene images played on the jumbo screen with Enya type music in the background. I'm pretty sure they were the exact images you get as stock screen savers when you buy a new computer. Think waterfalls, pretty meadows, and snowy landscapes. This picture is of Caribbean looking beach. Screams hockey, doesn't it???


Then, when the team started to come out, the music went straight to Rage Against the Machine. F words and all. It was insane.

We had a great time watching the game, but I think we liked watching the people even more. The "superfan" sections were on opposing sides of the rink, without a way to connect the two (people on one half of the stadium cannot get to people on the other side of the stadium). We were told this was done to eliminate the possibility of fighting. Here's a picture of Lugano's side. Their sign reads "Lugano one faith."


The cheers (hockey fans probably don't call them "cheers") coming from each side were HILARIOUS. I really can't even write half of them down they were so vulgar. We asked our Italian friends to translate. The first, "Black and White, Black and White, you are s*&t." Pretty simple, that one. The next was, "you who doesn't jump, is a farmer." This was a little harder to understand. Apparently, the opposing team was from a rural area, and our friends said that this cheer was very "heavy."

The cheers got heavier and heavier, but surprisingly, each side waited for the other to finish before they started. I thought this was very Swiss - very polite. If the cheer was particularly "heavy" the opposing side would shoot the bird at their opponents. But STILL, they waited for them to finish.

Lugano won 6-0, which was embarrassing for the other team. At one point they started to throw things onto the rink. People came out with a little broom and pan, and as soon as they'd head for the exit, the opposing team's fans would throw something else. Ryan called it "1 2 3 throw more."

It was a lot of fun, and we dont get to hang out with a big group very often, so we REALLY enjoyed ourselves.

Friday Night Fun

This is what happens when the weather's so nice you leave the windows open and you've shared a bottle of wine.

Ryan vs. the moth.

Toilet on the Floor

We're planning a trip to Vienna over Halloween, and we're doing things a little differently this time. We have less than one year left in Europe, and we still have so many places we need to see. So, we're prioritizing and budgeting. When we travel, we never stay in the hotel room for long, so we thought this was the obvious place to cheap out. I started looking at pensions in good neighborhoods... hotels on the same block charge upwards of $500, but pensions have dated furniture, uncomfy towels, and sometimes shared bathrooms, and therefore, are MUCH less expensive (to the tune of $85 per night). I had my eye on a pension in particular with a great breakfast. I emailed my request, and the response had me cracking up. "I can only offer you a small budget room with shower, bed size 140 x 200 cm (translation - 4 x 6.5 ft), and toilet on the floor." Toilet on the floor??? I've heard of them. One time I went to a restaurant in Italy and there was just a tiled floor with a hole in the middle. I didn't end up going, but told our Italian friends about it... they said they'd seen that sort of thing before.

But, I'm committed to our plan. I emailed Ryan to see if he could use a "toilet on the floor." That's when he pointed out the second option - there's a bathroom on our level (i.e. one on the 1st floor, 2nd floor, 3rd floor). That was an aha moment right there.

So, knowing I don't have to pee on the floor sort of solidifies it - I think we've found our pension! It actually looks really cute - even the pictures of the room (although it looks like the deluxe option was photographed - not the budget 4x6). And if it means we can go on an obscene amount of vacations this year, I see a lot more pensions in our future.

Ryan calls this post: Dork gets noticed

Teachers don't notice you as much as I remember in my bachelor studies. It's fine by me... it's just a little more business and a little less hand holding, which I guess is appropriate for a masters class.

I'm taking an economics class with the same teacher that taught me a similar course in the first semester. I came in five weeks late to that class, and tried so hard to catch up. I'm one of three Americans in the master's program, and the only one studying management. I sit near the front. I write everything down. I went to all the tutorials and asked the teacher questions at the breaks. Still, yesterday I would have bet that the professor couldn't pick me from a lineup.

This year's class has started much like the first. The teacher was working through a difficult equation. I was writing as quickly as I could and scrunching my brow at the board when he said (in a thick Italian accent), "Kelley, you understand?"

Surprisingly, I did understand, but even MORE surprisingly, he notices?!? You could have knocked me over with a feather. I would have paid good money to see the look on my face as I managed a "yes."

He thinks my name is Kelley for good reason... that's how it appears on the class registry and we've never actually met. But now I know he knows me, and it's the coolest thing ever.

Here's a picture of last year's class, all smiles on our last day.

Italian Chinese

Sounds like an oxymoron, but thankfully, it produced one of the best meal experiences we've had in a while. Our English friends suggested we come with them and their new Argentinian and Peruvian neighbors to a Chinese restaurant in Italy. We took a little train to the Swiss border, walked across, and made our way to the promise of ethnic food (something Lugano doesn't exactly deliver). The meal was amazing and the company was even better.


When the check was presented, the waitress gave us tiny trinkets - sparkly pink keychains for the girls and tennis shoe keychains for the boys. No clue. But it was hysterical, and definitely rounded out the quirky night. This is quite a mouthful, but I hope to be eating Italian Chinese with English and South Americans very soon!