The Italian Diaries

I didn’t get Verona’s discount tourism card when I was there last Spring, but I did print out some of the free walking itineraries from their website.  I’m so glad I did, or else I never would’ve stumbled upon Giardino …

When I think of Italy in the summer I think of two things.  The first: hoards of sweaty, rude tourists.  The second: le sagre.  For probably obvious reasons, I prefer to think about le sagre.   “Le sagre” are local …

“In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue”.  It was the first piece of poetry I ever memorized.   I was five years old and in Mrs. Lowe’s kindergarten class in Geneva, Florida.  Christopher Columbus is the first historical figure I …

I always see three little letters on Italian foods – both here and in Italy – and the ones that have them are always significantly more expensive than the ones that don’t.  I figured these initials were similar to the …

Like any good college graduate, I’m intimately – and painfully – familiar with Jägermeister, that destructive German digestif that left so many of us hating the world the next morning, and with its bottle that strangely features a stag with …