A few years ago we attended a wedding in Austin where Daniel bumped into an old friend he hadn't seen in years. This friend told him he was now living in Milan ever since he had claimed his birthright citizenship in Italy. If you are descended from an Italian citizen and can prove it, you can claim your jure sanguinis right to your own citizenship. Italian citizenship, of course, comes with full rights and privileges of a European Union citizenship allowing you to live or work anywhere in the EU.

It wasn't for a while after we got home that we really got curious and started looking into whether this was a viable option for Daniel or not. We knew for certain he was Italian by blood, but just weren't sure exactly what the rules were, if we could sufficiently prove it, etc. We finally decided to take action and looked up the consultancy that his friend had used and set up an appointment. The guy did some genealogical research on the fly with us watching. He did it so incredibly fast using a multitude of tools. And what I appreciated the most was fast and accurately he could type. He was just zooming around the internet, pulling down documents, loading them into a folder.

He told us we could proceed and gave a list of documents to procure. And it was a lot. Basically every birth, marriage, and death certificate for EVERY member of his lineage all the way back to his great-grandfather, Segundo. It was time consuming and bureaucratic, but not terribly difficult. For some of the old documents from Italy we had to hire somebody to physically go look them up. The rest we could pretty much order online for a nominal fee. Some of those were quick and easy, some required telephoning some lady in an office in upstate New York and asking what the dillyo. But after a couple of years we had compiled the full list.

That then had to be notarized and approved as legit by the US government before they could be translated and sent to the Italian government. Then we waited. Last December he was informed that he had won his elective court case in Turino, Italy and was now a citizen! There was still more waiting for this decision and the resulting paperwork to be officially filed and on record in Asti. But we got notified last week that his Italian birth certificate and our Italian marriage certificate are both on file and official!

For next steps, he has registered online as an "Italian Living Abroad" and we'll probably have to wait a few months for that to go through and get approved. Then he will have access to services from the Italian consulate in Houston including getting his passport.

All we have to figure out then is when and where we're moving to in the EU.... Stay tuned!

I have been keeping up with my DuoLingo lessons. The streaks and friend streaks and leaderboards do enough to make sure I never skip a day. That and the incessant notifications from the app. But ... I do have one distraction from my language lessons.

DuoLingo has chess lessons. I've always wanted to learn to play chess, but beyond learning how the pieces move and then getting destroyed repeatedly in online games, I never pursued it. But now I'm getting little tiny play by play lessons of different scenarios and how to respond and why. I am BY NO MEANS good at it. God damn, is it ever hard. When I do go on Chess.com and play strangers, I do NOT do well. I get so nervous and make so many bonehead mistakes.

I will say this though. I know very little about openings. And I'm completely lost in the midgame. But the endgame. Man do I seem to be good at the end game. After my opponent has decimated my ranks, I can dance around, gobble up their pieces, avoid checkmate, and usually in even the most dire circumstances end things in a stalemate draw. I'm sure a lot of that is due to me being matched with people with similar ranks who don't know how to close out a game and against anyone competent I would be dead in seconds. But it's still fun. I wish I could play someone I know regularly but I can't find anyone willing to play me. So if you have a Chess.com username and want to play with me leave a comment. I love saying leave a comment like anyone is reading.

Also, side note. I now know what a Queen's Gambit is and honestly it's not that cool. It's just an opening move/moves. It sounds like it's some kind of dramatic endgame sacrifice of your queen to win the game or something. But nope. Just the first move or two with your pawns.

Last night I went to Daniel's parents' house for dinner as we do from time to time. When I got there, there was a large, misshapen box wrapped and bowed for me. It was an xmas present from the whole family. I was pretty excited to open it. The first thing that was in there was a large, hollow, fake gourd. His mother had placed it on top of the box to throw me off as to the contents. But below that was a brand new receiver! (As if a rectangular box is obviously receiver shaped.) Now, I know they say it's better to give than to receive, but if you give a receiver, does it all even out?

I have no speakers, but Daniel had a few that he doesn't use anymore and an extra subwoofer just laying around. He also had a VCR he doesn't use any more. So we trucked it all over to my apartment and I ate chips while he hooked it all up. Yes, folks, this relationship is finally starting to pay off.

A little while ago Daniel came home with two festive holiday ovalish kleenex boxes. His mother had given them to him and told him to give one to me. I chose the one I liked better. For some reason they were all in half English, half French, and the top of mine said, "Doux." So I said, "Oh my g*d, Daniel, why does this say 'douche'?!" And he grabbed the box, panic striken, and after reading it ... continued to be panic striken for a good additional 4 seconds. And I laughed. So hard.

I didn't laugh so much at the fact that I was able to convince him, albeit momentarily, that the kleenex was actually a douchebox (that's a new insult, try it). I laughed because I imagined his mother, innocently reaching into what she thought was a douchebox and pulling out a kleenex instead. And then she kind of pauses, confused, face melts to terror, and she yells, "Oh no! Danny!"

We were relaying that story to a girl friend of Daniel's and we were laughing about how douche could very well come in a box, as much as we know about it, which is nothing. And she informed us that douche is nothing but vinegar and water! There you go, ladies. I help you out. Save yourself some money.

Speaking of recipes, yesterday I found these really delicious looking avacados at the grocery store. I've never made guacamole before, but I was inspired. So I called my brother because his wife makes a pretty killer batch of guac. Her recipe uses salsa. Holy crap, that's brilliant. Instead of chopping up all the onions and g*d knows what else people pile in there, you just spoon in salsa. And then a little salt, pepper, and garlic powder. Mmm Mmm. I hope she doesn't mind me divulging her secrets here. But seriously, it was so easy and delicious. I left it sitting out and it turned black. Shit. But I have half a mind to go get some more 'cados. But I probably won't.

Oh dear, my father is bringing over new end tables for me tonight and my apartment is a total mess. I should probably at least hide the mess if I don't clean the mess. Hangovers are so demotivating. We'll see how far I get. Is it just me or do my hungover posts jump from subject to subject a lot more than normal? Oh well. Later have-nots.

Could Ryan S■■■'s Holidaze Party been any better? Absolutely not. His apartment decorations were so cute, they even had me in a festive X-mas mood. Either that or my new red scarf from the Gap. And by the way your mom says hi.

We did a Secret Santa exchange. I drew Lil' Jarrod for my recipient. I got him a double chambered flask with his name engraved on the front. I think he liked it. Ha. Sean W■■■■ got me several pairs of argyle socks. He learned during our trip to College Station that argyle socks are one of my favorite things about life. And these are nice socks. I'm not being facetious or anything. The first time I put a pair on I thought o myself, "Damn, these are nice socks." He also got me a T-shirt espousing the virtues of the Cavalier - The Champagne of Cars! I rounded out the evening drinking a whole bunch of wine and just a few sips of the candy cane martinis. Thanks for another fabulous party Ryan!

You've all seen the List-Eater, right? The chick who cut in line to pull tickets for the Cotton Bowl and when she was challenged with the list of people who had been camping out for 4 days, she ate the list. When I heard about it, I chuckled. But then Brianne up in Chicago sent me the video. It was then that I realized I know the List-Eater! She's Michael W■■■'s fiance. He is in my major and we used to work together back when I was doing that NASA thing a few summers ago. That made it absolutely hilarious. [Click here] for the official List-Eater video. I sent it to everyone in my office today and they all thoroughly enjoyed it.

And our final piece of news. I signed up for Netflix! It was spur of the moment. I saw a commercial for it and logged on and signed up. I now have 86 movies in my queue and I rated over 400 movies. I didn't really think I could have possibly seen that many movies since every movie I've seen I've seen about 4,000 times. Go figure. I should be adding a lot to that list soon as I'm going to make a habit of watching a movie every night instead of whatever crap happens to be on TV. As soon as I start getting my movies shipped to me, I may start reviewing them on my website. We shall see.

Alright sluts, I'm gonna go veg out for a while longer. Hope you all have a fantastic weekend.

Welcome Sidesho-Viewers. Today I greet you all from the interior of Club 511, my new home away from home. I've been all about the firsts lately, so I thought I would give Ms. Leslie B■■■■■ the honor of watching me whilst I update. She is, naturally, one of my most loyal viewers, and most deserving of this. We are closing out my 32nd hour of being awake. It's been a long ass time since I've been awake for this long, and I can't say that its entirely enjoyable. However, the many beers of Leslie's that I've drank and the 'martin-ay' that I drank at Chili's are helping to take the edge off just a tad.

This is the second time this week that I have stayed awake to watch the sun rise due to school. I fuckin hate school, but its over now and there's nothing anyone can do about it. I was totally supposed to go to work today but hahahahaha. So when I finally finished my paper this afternoon around 12:30 I decided to check my email. After that, it was most definitely time to get drunk with Leslie so I woke her ass up and invited myself over.

Now I find myself nestled on the most comfortable couch with far too many people. I vowed to LESLIE, Rick, and Ty, that I would stay up and party until we go to Northgate to watch Aaron dunk his ring and Josh re-dunk his right (What? who does that?). I will do my best, and I'm a total trooper. Ms. B■■■■■ and I (who together comprise B■■■■■'s Photogrizzaphs) are supposed to sojourn to Houston tomorrow to take some pictures of office furniture. My uncle resales the shit, but me being the artist I am totally have an idea to, like, sell the shit out of this stuff. We're gonna have Leslie pose erotically on top of all the furniture. It's GOLD!

Leslie totally has a wireless router inside her apartment which has totally allowed me the mobility to continue updating despite the fact that we have travelled outside the confines of Club 511. I am now smoking while updating ... Another first! I completely feel (and look, as was confirmed by Leslie) like Carrie Bradshaw. Is it really our inner selves that dictate our relationships or are we all just playing the inner child?

I have to go now before I have any more fun, because there is much more to be had as the night progresses. Hopefully, I'll be awake and cognizant for all of it. Catch you sluts on the flip side. Peace out, have nots.