Waiting to no avail

Waiting, waiting, waiting waiting waiting. And not getting much done anymore. Essays on Enlightenment. . . just not very interesting tonight.

Giving up on it for today.

Masse? Si.

This morning, Heather and I woke up at 6 to hike 5 miles to the Vatican city. We walked into St. Peters with the sunlight just peaking over the top of the cathedral. We noticed immediately the amount of people already to get into St. Peters. We also were highly impressed with the amount of police and security around. We went through metal detectors and baggage exray and got in. Then one security man pointed to us and asked ''Masse'' pointing us through to St. Peters. We said ''si. si'' and in we went. Another man hands me a book and we get ushered into seats. Before we can actually sit down I hear Heather behind me saying ''This is mass. This is mass. We don't need to come here for mass.''

I figured. Why not. We're here. We'll just hear mass, sneak out before the end and check out the Vatican museum. She whispers in my ear ''Mass lasts 2 hours and we still have an hour before it starts.'' Out we go with one or two security guards laughing at us and pointing us the way out into the ''soleil''--sunshine.

Apparently, since it is Epiphany day today, there was a special mass being held. C'est la vie.

Tomorrow we go to the Borghese museum and a stroll through this beautiful park. We'll bring our books to read. On Monday we'll be off to Florence for a few days.

Venice, by the way, ties with Scotland as my favorite place to visit thus far.