So a lot has been happening to keep me away from blogging. Last week, Cristiano had us studying hard to understand different concepts in thermodynamics. If we didn’t understand the way he explained it, we went to ask another professor. That was an extremely tough/frustrating week. I think I understand it quite a bit better now. This last weekend we traveled to D.C. Another first for me. Saturday we toured the area around the capitol building, Arlington National Cemetery, various war memorials and we ended our trip near the White House. There was a protest to impeach Bush going on when we got there. Our hotel was in the Georgetown area. When we got there it started raining. But the weather in D.C. is much like SD….it can be raining one minute and sunny the next. In about a half hour we were set free to explore the area’s food and shopping in groups. Veronica and I went with Francesco, PierFrancesco, Chris and Danilo. They’re a lot of fun to listen to but they aren’t open to many foods besides Italian. We ended up at a pizzeria. Our waiter was fun. He tried to pretend he forgot my food after I had ordered for the Italians. I have some pictures that I’ll have to remember to put up when I bring my camera to the computer with me. After eating, we went to Walgreens and got some souvenirs before heading back to the hotel for our check-in. One of the groups was a half hour late. Veronica and I went to find St. Matthew’s cathedral so I could lead some of the Italian students to it in the morning. We decided to go to mass at 7 am so I went to bed kinda early. PierFrancesco was the only one to come with me in the morning. The mass was nice but there wasn’t any music. We ate breakfast and then went to the National Mall area for more touring of museums and galleries. Veronica and I hung out all day. The Museum of Natural History was my favorite besides just sitting in the shade. The national Art Gallery was fun to wander to. We left D.C. at about 5pm. We stopped somewhere along the way to get food. About an hour away from Princeton, the food didn’t set so well with me and I got sick. I felt bad for stopping the bus. I was glad when we finally got back to Princeton so I could go to sleep. I got 9 hours that night (felt so good to get sleep). Grey didn’t show up to class on Monday morning because he got sick too. I think it’s a bug going around. Both of us are feeling better now. I think I just needed a reason to catch up on sleep. This week Frank is teaching us about electricity and magnetism. I like this better because I can find more practical applications for it. We get to do a fuel cell lab on Friday. It sounds like Barbara will be back on Friday so we’ll see what the plans for the weekend will be. Frank wants us to come over and have a cook-out Sat or Sun and we’re going to try to invite the Italians. Still working out the details of coursework and getting home next Wed so we’re keeping busy. Hopefully I’ll remember to post some more pictures soon so you can see our adventure continued in America. Anyway, hope all are well.
Sarah 
