bah! ok, 40 minutes till my viticulture exam. simone saved my ass today in a major way- picked me up from the train station at 8am, allowed me to accompany him to the vineyard, where he, gigi, and myself spent 4 hours in the hot sun trimming leaves for chlorophyll examination, while simone explained viticulture in its entirety. tried to be both a filter and a sponge, recording all information and mentally highlighting major points. think im gonna do ok. and as simone says, since im an american and an anthropologist, and not planning on running a vineyard, i can probobly expect the exam to be alot more chit-chat and wine garber than chemistry and irrigation techniques. the exam is oral- which means i go and sit down across from this man and he asks me questions and i have to answer them outloud and in a timely fashion and i will have no pen to chew on and the whole process can take up to an hour. really dont like the sound of this. i remember billy told me about these exams (the norm in europe) and i thought, my god, how horrible, and asked him "are you allowed to smoke a cigarette or something, at least?", and he said he thought maybe at the universities in spain. not friuli, unfortunately. anyway, am stalling from the last few minutes of studying, but wish me luck!