Sleepy Sunday in Rome

In pleasant contrast to the madness of yesterday — where I experienced everything from nightmare, to high culture, to disappointment, to good times — not much happened today. I did some laundry. I had a coffee break. I bought a book. I grabbed a kebab. I bought a new backpack (first item from yesterday's incident to be replaced — can't do much without a day pack — cheap and dodgy, but it'll do for now). I cooked up some pasta for dinner (which my Mozambique buddy at Gulliver's shared with me). And I spent plenty of time online, gradually catching up on what I'm realising is the Great Sicilian Blogging Endeavour. A sleepy old Sunday in the heart of the ancient world.

It was a good day to do very little, anyway. The weather was grim all day: raining on-and-off, as well as being quite cold. Apart from the fact that I already spent half the day there yesterday, the Vatican was also out of the question today: as the pope was giving a public blessing in St. Peter's square, I hear the masses packed the square in full force (and got soaked in the rain); plus, since it's the last Sunday of the month, the Vatican Museum and the Sistine Chapel were open for free — hence, yesterday's massive queue and sardine-packed crowds would have been nothing compared to today's. The only other big thing on today was the market at Porto Portese (which is big every Sunday): but the rain would have made the market less than amazing; I've already seen plenty of Porto Portese before; and the Sunday scene there is meant to be rife with pickpockets (and I've had quite enough theft for one weekend, thank you very much).