Any country that dresses its law enforcement officers like this, even ceremonially, can not be trusted to get a plane out on time.

Our Alitalia flight to Rome is delayed more than an hour coming into Miami today. Which means we now have a more-than-five-hour wait in Rome for our flight to Genoa.

We are getting in around 9am tomorrow and leaving for Genoa at 1:30pm. Oh yeah.

We pick up a rental car there, and drive less than an hour to Baur B&B.

This is definitely impetus for me to really try to sleep on the plane. Something I don’t do well, if at all.

Just thinking about it makes me tired. But I can’t help but smile at these ridiculous outfits.

Last time I flew Alitalia, my bags went somewhere else for a three-day vacation. I got very crabby without clean underwear. Now, I always throw necessities in my carry-on when I travel abroad.

And today I’m practicing: Non riesco a trovare tutto al bagalio. (I can not find all the baggage.)

Actually, I had to use my Italian phrase book to look that up. I spent NO time practicing my lousy Italian this time. Unlike other times. Too busy.

On the positive side, we are flying Magnifico or first class. That means all my obsessing over the size/weight of our bags was for nothing.

When you fly up front, there’s no weighing and measuring. They kiss your ass the whole way. And don’t I just love it. Baciami il culo, I always say. And the more often, the better.