We're trying to catch up on a back log of posts. It's been an unexpectedly busy few, actually 6, months, so we're starting all the way back in April. Hang with us!

So far, we haven't had a lot of visitors (save for the Haskins, Brittany & Leif, Lindsey & Matt, Peter & Donna), but back in April, we DID get a very important visit from the Meyers family - of Billy Meyers fame, one of Dave's closest friends. Well, we didn't get a visit to Munich exactly, but to the greater continent. So we'll count that. The Meyers clan had a family trip planned for a week in Rome to celebrate Tina's birthday (Tina is the matriarch of the Meyers family), so thanks to some United frequent flier miles, Dave and I hopped on a plane and joined them for a day touring around town and a delicious dinner then spent the rest of the weekend exploring The City of Love. It also helped that the Meyers were visiting Italy, original home of the Zisa.

FRIDAY: DAY OF THE MEYERS

One of the reasons I love the Meyers family is that they appreciate good food as much as I do. We got up early and landed at 9am in Rome, so we met Billy and Jen (Billy's better marital half) in the heart of a true Roman open-air market, Campo de' Fiori, filled with fresh fruits and vegetables, fish, spices, pasta, and a few random other goods. Turn around, and Tina is in the middle of negotiating with the local Grandma of the market, who was multi-tasking as she precisely and efficiently chopped up an artichoke in a matter of seconds.

After dropping our groceries off, we grabbed coffee at Bartaruga, piled into a taxi, and headed straight for Saint Peter's Basilica in Vatican City. Whoa. This place is grand, and majestic, if busting at the seams with tourists. Tina pointed out little intricacies, like sites for Papal Masses, or all the statues on the colonnade and who they represent. Walking slowly through the church, the sense of history and importance is obvious. The tourists more interested in snapping pics and posting them quickly online made me annoyed, but I quickly realized this wasn't exactly a good place for judgement. Calm down, Sarah, you're a jew tourist here too! I spent a lot of time thinking about the architecture and formation of light, and the intentions of the original designers and builders. Were they wanting us to look up and think of heaven? Were they wanting us to feel small? Were they wanting the light to focus on them so they felt important? I also thought of my paternal grandma, Lillian Zisa, a devoted member of the Roman Catholic Church, and how a visit to this site would have been a spiritual moment for her in a way that it wasn't for me. That made me feel... voyeuristic. Undeserving to be there, even, when so many people around the world would be touched by this place in a way I wasn't. I could appreciate its history and importance, of course, but I wasn't moved like she would have been. I ended up feeling satisfied about my experience and lucky to be there, a place that connects a lot of the world through religion, tourism, history.

After Saint Peter's, Jen, Catherine (Billy's younger sister), and I went shopping. Catherine was the only successful one of the bunch, but these two girls were some of the easiest, chillest, most pleasurable shoppers to hang with. No time pressure. No decision pressure. Just support and enthusiasm all around.

Shopping was followed by a proper FEAST at the Meyer's apartment. Andrew (more loyal ski compatriot than Billy, also the oldest Meyers child) and Tina cooked up their treasures from the morning excursion to the market, and they succeeded with a bang: fresh pasta bolognese, fresh pasta with pesto, and a salad with crazy delicious curly-q bitter greens. Holy delicious.

SATURDAY & SUNDAY: WEEKEND OF PENNDORFS

The Meyers all flew home the next day, so Dave and I had the city to ourselves for exploration. Upon Billy and Jen's recommendation, we ran up Parco del Gianicolo, and into another adjacent park. We took Rick Steve's free self-guided tour of the Colosseum and the Roman Forum. [Sidebar: Dave and I are HUGE fans of Rick's free self-guided tours. You get all the context and history you want, the freedom to do it on your own time - stopping for ice cream or beer or coffee as you please - and IT'S FREE! Highly recommend whenever traveling with a destination in his repertoire).

On Sunday, we continued on the Rick Steve's tour theme, walking around the Jewish Ghetto and Trastevere, the neighborhood where we stayed. We punctuated almost every stop with gelato, and definitely became self-appointed experts pretty quickly. Dave liked to claim his quick assessment from Lauren's semester in Florence when she learned that you can tell everything about the quality of a gelato shop from the color of its banana flavor: yellow is fake / white or brown is real. The rule of thumb seems to hold true today!

We wrapped up our weekend with a long walk along the river, talking about life and families and dreams and expectations, listening to street artists and watching college kids and adults smile for no good reason at all. Other than the fact that they're in Rome, a magnificent, authentic, visitor friendly, ancient city.