I had to share the following email from a friend and fellow Lay Centre resident. Just another sign of the cultural encounter living in Rome:

Our local weather forecast from the American “weather.com”:

Rome: Windy, rain.

But when you click on the Rome weather forecast from the big Italian weather website, they say that the forecast is:

PEGGIORAMENTO, marcata fase perturbata e ventosa per Capodanno.
LAZIO PROSSIMI GIORNI: Il vento di Ponente sarà il vero protagonista dell’avvio del 2010 e sono attese mareggiate piuttosto consistenti sulle zone costiere esposte. Si avrà un calo termico, che potrà favorire qualche nevicata sui monti appenninici. Il freddo diverrà maggiore nel week-end, quando tuttavia si attende un temporaneo miglioramento con ampi rasserenamenti.

Which roughly means:
A WORSENING, with markedly disrupted (perturbed) phases and windiness for the New Year.
LAZIO in the coming days: The West Wind will be the real protagonist of the start of 2010, and expectations are for quite large storm surges on exposed coastal areas. There will be a thermal drop, which may encourage some snow on the Apennines. The cold will become even greater during the weekend, however, when a temporary improvement is expected, with ample clearing (literally: ample re-serenity-making).

PS: I am way behind on updating posts, so you’ll get most of the Christmas holiday updates in one fell swoop when i edit and upload pictures; we are off to Assisi tomorrow for a couple days so it will be after that! Do not forget to look for “older” posts that might show up later!