Operator...can you help me make this call?

 After several years living here and bopping around from place to place, I finally found a hairdresser I really like and I am comfortable with.  She doesn't, by the way, speak a word of English.   Anyway....

Since I was hospitalized and operated on and so on and so on....my hair started falling out....then finally stopped falling out and now, at long last, is growing back in again....slowly.  Everything is getting better, but at a snail's pace.  I guess that's because I'm not so young anymore.  But it is growing back and I am getting better.  Yay.

Sooooo, it was time to call the hairdresser.  I hate going out in the cold.  I hate going out in the rain.  And this winter has had a lot of both.  So I watched to forecasts closely and it looked like this week would be a decent opportunity to get out and get my friggin' hair cut!!

I called.  After a couple of rings..."Pronto!"...the Italian version of "hello" which actually means "ready."  I said I needed an appointment.  I could hear a hair dryer, rather loudly, in the background.  She answered me and I couldn't understand what she said...then..."Pronto!  Pronto!"...aggh...I tried again, she said something....more hair dryer and "Pronto!"  Then she hung up.  What a disaster!

I gave up.  I felt stupid.  Incompetent.  I'm not Italian.  I don't speak fluently.  I tried.  I failed.

Then it was the weekend.  I sort of decided I would walk there (it's just around the corner) and make the appointment in person.  However, the weather didn't cooperate.  It was bloody cold today, even though the sun was shining.

So I mustered up my courage and tried calling again.  I called in the early afternoon, when I know it is usually more quiet since that is "pranzo" time...lunch time, in Italy.  She answered right away and thank goodness, the line was clear...no background noise.  I said "Buon pomeriggio"....good afternoon....and asked if there was an appointment this week.  "Si!  Domani o giovidi??"  I said I preferred afternoon.  I was given an appointment on Thursday in the early afternoon.  Hallelujah.  

The moral of the story is....I am not stupid, I can speak Italian fairly well, and she just could not hear me the first time.  I beat myself up for no reason.  And I will look human again on Thursday.  Hurray!