Various Tales of Bois de Vincennes, etc.

Yesterday in my last phonetics class, while gargling my R's and making O sounds through my nose, I had a small, unpleasant realization. Because I am so incapacitated in my language abilities here, people will never get to know my actual personality. And by my personality, I basically mean that I am funny/witty. My wit does not translate well into French, even if I could figure out how to say things. And so I feel obliged to dress really well all of the time to compensate at least a little bit. The problem with that is that my favorite pair of pants have re-developed their huge crotch-hole and my only other pair of pants are extremely ill-fitting. I think I'm going to have to do what I always do: ditch half my wardrobe and thrift shop the rest. Jack Bee told me of a cool-sounding thrift place in Montmartre and I am planning on going there on Friday before French class to look for trousers and a blouse or two. Maybe some more socks?

Met Abby and her mom and stepdad at their fancy hotel to go have dinner last night. We met a couple of their friends at a brasserie near the Jardin du Lux and had wine and cheese there, before exploring up on Blvd St. Germain for dinner. Their friends, from Arkansas of all places, were highly amusing. And, being in my comfort zone (i.e. with adults and in English), I was very very happy to ask any ridiculous question or make any crazy joke I wanted. Yesssss.

We chose a cute-looking place called "Les Editeurs" for dinner and ordered 2 bottles of wine for starters. Robin, Abby's adorable physician mother, ordered a beet appetizer with vinegar whipped cream that was excellent, and Mark (Abby's stepdad), Abby, and The Southern Lady ordered a tomato carpaccio with lime, vanilla-infused olive oil, and salt. That was unbelievably good and I actually almost cried because it tasted just like that heirloom tomato salad I made with my quinoa that one time. Then our entrees arrived (which in France are called "plats" and appetizers are actually called "entrees," which really makes much more sense): I had the salmon filet with crunchy vegetables and a dijon sauce (medium rare, obviously), Abby got this delectable cream-based risotto with seared scallops yumm, and Robin had the "plat du jour," a large steak with pommes frites (which, even here, I still can't really dig too much). Basically it was hilarious and delicious. And our waiter was gorgeous and loved me because I spoke to him in French. And probably because I did my hair the same way that seems to attract the most handsome of the French boys. Teehee.

And when I got home a bit after midnight, my host brother Julien and his gorgeous friend from culinary school were smoking cigarettes and watching the French version of Survivor downstairs. The show was hyper-dramatic and I couldn't watch it for too long without just thinking of America and how ridiculous we are. I think that Julien has started to take the hint that he should bring over his gorgeous chef friends to flirt with me, because there are different ones here all of the time now. Too bad I can't remember their names.

But today I went to the wrong rendez-vous point for the walking tour again, despite that my walking tour map says definitively "Meet at Place de la Sorbonne at 12h." So instead of trying to find them, I decided that it was fucking ridiculous that we're given wrong information and subsequently did not feel like wasting 3 hours until my French class. Thus, I went straight back home, lay down, and took a brief nap. My host mother awakened me about 30 minutes later, asking if I wanted to go to the Bois de Vincennes with her and Laika, our dog. Today is a gorgeous day and though I was, and still am, quite groggy, I agreed to come along.

We arrived and let Laika out of the car and she immediately bolted off at breakneck speed into the forest, scavenging for things to hunt. This dog is ridiculous. She whined and whined in the car the entire drive there, desperate for open spaces. The entire time we were at the park walking around the lake she pretty much never stopped either running as fast as she possibly could or swimming frenetically after the various ducks, geese, CORMORANTS (huge ink-black fishing birds - not common in the US!), and the hugest swans I've ever seen in my life (came up to about my waist). She'll run extremely far from us too, and come when we call, most of the time. It was an immensely gorgeous day, with lots of sun and wind and no temperature above 65.

Driving back home with the windows down found me saying for the first time that I love it here. It's very true. Within a 10 minute drive of my house, there is a huge park, a zoo, 2 lakes with boats for rent, a Buddhist temple, about 3 million cafes, 25 boulangeries, and a castle from the 12th century. You have to be kidding. Plus I like any day where it's nice out and I'm not cooped up in a classroom filling out worksheets.

Soon I will have tales of the 20-year-old buying liquor and how ridiculously happy I looked and how amused the cashiers were at my huge grin and subsequent skipping out the door.

A bientot!