First, have a good (safe) time on your travels this weekend. I’ll most likely be here in Florence, having a gelato (or two) at Grom (pistacchio, stracciatella, fragola, mmm).

For next week, the schedule will be as follows. On Monday, it will be an optional class meeting day, starting in the classroom you are assigned to, UConn in Santa Maria Novella (back in the corner) and PSU in room #3 in the Library side of the building. We will be around from 10-12 to talk to you about how the class is going and to provide help with your wiki entries. For those of you that have not done any work on your journal, this might be a good time to get some help to get that started.

On Wednesday, we’ll have regular class time at Palazzo Rucellai, 9am until noon. We will talk about some of the company visits and do some work to set up our last trip to Bologna/Modena. There are some videos on the wiki (look at the vehicle production page under company visits) to introduce you to the products we will see assembled on Monday. In addition, we are very likely to visit showrooms at each company where you’ll be able to purchase gifts from the company (I have a nice Lamborghini tie, for example).

I am working with GE to see about setting up a visit for Wednesday afternoon for those that were not able to go this past week. Sorry about the mixup. When I have the details, I will let you know, but it will be a quick train ride out, the tour and a ride back. Both of us will be on the tour, and may be able to help in explaining some of the things you’ll see.