The first stop of our trip was Rome.

Adam and I were pretty excited.

Here I am with T. Gee Wing, a FEMA Engineer who worked on the New Orleans levee!

We had to take the train into Rome, but that’s okay.I’m ex-press!

The advertisements in Rome were all saucy.

And the subway layout was very confusing.

The streets were very clean, however.

While starting out, we found this awesome picture house that only showed old-timey films.

We also found lots of giant Santas.

One of them confronted Adam.

Adam socked his stuffing.

At some point we got to the walls of Vatican City.

Vatican City is a sovereign City-State of 800 that came into existence in 1929.

More interesting than that, its ice cream trucks sell pizza.

80 percent of Vatican City is clergy.

To be clear, these pictures are not of Vatican city.

Even though there’s a lot of religious imagery around.

We couldn’t get into Vatican City...

Because the f’ing Swiss stopped us!

“What are you hiding, Benedict?!?”

So we left…

To go to an Italian Eatery.

Yum! Fancy Stimulants!

When our coffee break was done, we walked along the Vatican wall…

...Until we got to the Tourist Entrance.

The Vatican really rides its gimmick to the hilt.This is the Catholic equivalent of a Zen rock garden.

I could not find the Popemobile.

I did find a coffee bar next to centuries-old architecture.

And lots of priceless Catholic property.

Like St. Peter’s Basilica.

It’s all pretty impressive for two people who pay rent.

This is where the Pope goes to play frisbee.

This is a sculpted portrait of the Holy Spirit.

This is where Adam stood while I took a picture.

Once we got inside the Vatican museum, I took a picture of tourists that were not Adam.

Everything there is very intimidating.

Or boring. Maybe it’s boring.

Really, all the museum has is old Greek junk.

Perhaps the museum was wasted on us.

We took a lot of great pictures, though.

Here’s me pretending to take a picture while Adam takes a picture of me.

One of the themes of my photographs is trivial modern items next to priceless ancient artifacts. Have you noticed yet?

Another theme is me embarrassing Adam Katz.

I didn’t know I was allowed to take pictures, so I often snapped too quickly and ruined a lot of them.

No big loss at this stage, though.

I mean, there was a whole section of the Vatican that was just outdated maps. Whatever.

The ceilings did look quite nice, though.

Adam seemed to think so, too.

Yep.

When we got out, we checked out the Grail Room,where the Cardinals keep all of their bowling trophies.

Outside of the Grail room, Vatican employees sold tchotchkes.

Remember my themes? Another one is the sacred vs. the profane.

Look! A ceiling!

On our way out, I saw a chair I would love to have in front of my TV.

And a head of one of the Piuses.

And the heads of a bajillion Greek dudes.

“I never say this, but I am so tired of busts.”

Thankfully, we were at the end.

So we headed out of the museum…

...And across the street to a Vatican-themed pizzeria!

Cowabunga!

This cost about 10 dollars.

My favorite part of the pizzeria was the barely hidden Don Corleone poster above the register.

It tasted weird, but it was damn close to tasty.

Really hard to eat while walking downhill, though.

Once we consumed our pizzas, Adam and I went window-shopping.

This is actually a very reasonable price for a world-protection package.

And this is not at all reasonable.

This Italian dolly cuts itself.

The local movie theater showed me that Italians have terrible movies, too.

We got lost walking around, so we got directions from this guy, who probably hates his job.

Following his directions, we came to...

The Trevi Fountain!

I had never heard of it before.

But everyone was there, so apparently it’s famous.

The Trevi Fountain was built between 1732 and 1762 to mark the end of an aqueduct.

The legend is that, if you throw a coin into the fountain,You’ll return to Rome someday.

About $4,000 is thrown into the Fountain each day.

We tried looking for the Pantheon next...

We had a hard time finding it, though.

We found more giant Santas.

A lot of giant Santas.

And we thought we found the Pantheon.

But the interwebs said this was the Roman Pantheon.

I DID NOT TAKE THIS PICTURE

Nevertheless, we took pictures…

And started off toward the Jewish Ghetto.

I mean, Adam wanted to go to the Jewish Ghetto.

You know, because of the history, and maybe we could check out an old Italian synagogue.

We couldn’t find it, though.

We did find a lot of crazy-looking buildings...

Don’t know if they’re significant or not, but we found them.

I still don’t know what this is. Anyone know?

Finally, we used the restroom at a cramped Italian bistro…

Walked back the way we came…

And took the train back to the ship.

Back on the ship, we said goodbye to Rome,Knowing we’d never be able to come back.

We didn’t put any money into the Trevi Fountain.