a pain au chocolat a day keeps the boyfriends away

Just kidding. I don't eat a pain au chocolat a day. But I think I should start. Life's too short not too, right? As it happens, this morning I was reading an article* which listed and described the "10 best pains au chocolat in Paris." In all honesty, there was a brief moment where I thought to myself, "Well, I've got nothing to do today..." but I forced myself** to stay home and do my work instead. Ah well. Maybe the tour du chocolat is best carried out over a long stretch of time rather than an afternoon.

For those of you who, upon reading my last entry, thought maybe I had actually fallen in love with somebody who loved me back and was in a healthy relationship or something, I'm sorry to say that is not the case. Every few weeks or so I will have an encounter with a very attractive man (this time it was a student who was in charge of helping us foreigners figure our school business out) and then convince myself that I am destined to be with this person forever. Besides this, I picked up a habit from Clara and Lucas of declaring I'm "in love with" anybody I might have the smallest crush on***. I think it is a result of trying to translate the word "amoureux" into english. Or maybe it is a result of me being silly and dramatic. And Parisien men being too goddamned attractive. Who will ever know?

Finally, I just want to give a small word of advice- never, ever try to purchase (transatlantic) plane tickets while intoxicated. I realize that for most people this is probably a given, but if you ever find yourself on the verge of doing it, know that you WILL drop your computer (although in my defense that less to do with my being inebriated and more to do with my having to sit on the microwave for internet), and you WILL make stupid decisions ("maybe being home for thanksgiving would be more important than finishing out the semester" ), but luckily you WILL get tired while expedia is loading and eventually give up.

*I can't pretend I innocently stumbled upon this article. google search: best patisseries in paris, et voila.
**sloth 1, gluttony 0
***I cringe when I end sentences with prepositions. Just in case anybody noticed that.

Forget everything you've ever learned about ab workouts

Done.

(Yeah I wasn't serious when I said I was done writing in here)

So, in my most recent "I have no idea what I'm doing with my computer" move, I deleted a bunch of music from my iTunes library. I keep finding that more and more is gone. The worst? All-yes, ALL- of my Wilco music is GONE. ALL OF IT. I was ok with the rest but this? It can't be! In my head I was seriously pleading with my PowerBook- "No, wait you don't understand! You can't have the Wilco! It's ME, it's WILCO we're talking about! You must be mistaken." I'm not kidding. It just seems unfair. It feels very similarly unfair to my unfortunate situation regarding my post-secondary education at the moment. So unfortunate that it has forced me to seriously re-evaluate what I'll be doing with my life, post-Paris. Or, maybe life post-Paris won't happen for awhile longer. Fuck. Serves me right for being such a snot in high school about everything. Long story short, screw Hampshire College. Is there some TripAdvisor type page for colleges where I can go and post about the many ways in which going to this school will fuck your life? Hopefully.

I wanted to post a little excerpt from my real journal about this because that would be more truthful (speaking of which, my journal is the MOST beautiful book in the world-I love living in a city where a fucking Swedish paper shop can stay in business, you know?) but then it fell open to a different page- "I'm in the waiting area for my flight to Chicago! But wait- I think I accidentally showed up to an Overeaters Anonymous meeting?" I'm one to talk. But come on, America, we can do better. Can't we?

Anyway, I need my life to pick up- and it will, I just want it now. I want classes and school and new friends and work and running around. I can see in my face how bored and lazy I've been these past few weeks. It doesn't look good. I can feel the French melting away from my brain slowly but surely. It's funny how much living alone changes that. Going from hearing French around me all the time to waking up in my English-speaking head and listening to music in English and reading books in English. And then when I go out and try to interact, the French words feel awkward in my mouth. I bumped into some guy the other day while listening to some song on my iPod and nearly let "excuse me" come out of my mouth- what? I ordered "un baguette" the other day at the boulangerie. Yeah, it sounds stupid but it's bothering me. Paris, Paris, please be done with your vacation soon. I need people to talk to again. My brain feels dull when it's only working in one language.



song you should listen to- "sea of love," -cat power. better before it was in that juno movie. hey girls! get preggers and it'll all be ok and you'll get to date michael cera. psych.

Oh- did I mention I'm working for Chanel's HR director? I'm working for Chanel's HR director.

In America, idiots say "for all intensive purposes." In France, idiots say "comme-meme."

Kim says "comme-meme" constantly. The first week here I turned to host mother and said "Comme-meme? What does that mean?" She told me what it meant (even so, all the same, etc.) However, I was pretty sure the expression was "quand-meme" (it is). Yesterday I asked her, "Is it COMME-meme or QUAND-meme?"

She looked at me like I was an idiot.

"Comme-meme."

WRONG! OMG! victory is mine you stupid lesbian asshole.

Today's favorites: blondie, prince cookies (an everyday favorite), the tandoori sauce i finally decided to just steal from the house, knowing that in a short amount of time i'll no longer hit my head ever five minutes, knowing that in a short amount of time i'll have a bedroom door, knowing that in a short amount of time i get to see my brother (wtf! in the midst of everything i've barely thought about it!), flowers my mom sent me that Beatrice thought were hers for a second and I was like oh actually they're mine, thanks and snatched them from her real fast (actually that happened yesterday), "unforgiveable (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VX8_M-KI7IQ)" (actually that happened like a year ago but i'm still lovin it), thinking about how tomorrow on the way to school i'm going to go to a boulangerie i've never been to before and buy who knows what!

Things I am INTO: baguette (duh), chevre, chevre pizza, pommes chauffes, coca cola light, actimiel, prince cookies, nutella snack n go's (NOT to be confused with snack n drinks, which are creepy), my audi, violette (always), when kim is being cute and adorable as opposed to obnoxious and spoiled, sitting at school all day doing nothing, carrefour, this leather coat i am going to buy from promod, the weather here, common languages that are not native to either speaker.

Things I am not into: anne and beatrice both being out of the country thus leaving me alone with kim, the electricity not working in the morning, me having to puke for like a million years, kim throwing a tantrum when i try to wake him up in the morning, having to puke more, realizing kim wet the bed last night, having to explain to kim why the tv isn't working. None of those things are so shitty, but when they all happen within 15 minutes of one another, I want to shoot myself.

wham city

Victories:
-Again, Violette shows adoration beyond belief towards me and only me.
-Kim shows adequate adoration towards me, but always much moreso than he does Anne (the Man [creative, witty, inspired nickname came to be after I realized that Anne a) resembles a man, perhaps because she b) is a lesbian, and c) has a name which rhymes quite well with the word "man."]).
-Have begun to call Beatrice by "tu" but continue to vousvoyer ATM, and in doing so, display my respective comfort levels. Quite intentional, yet natural-feeling.
-Bought Most Amazing Shirt Ever (Shitney you'd seriously love this-it involves a cat) for 3 Euro
-Am now able to wake up at 7 a.m. and be somewhat coherent shortly thereafter
-Fooseball (sp? wtf? maybe better to just call it baby-foot?) skills improving immensely
-French skills improving somewhat.

Losses:
-Anne is a bitch and I hate her
-Still not sure how to make the euro symbol while typing unless in microsoft word or unless I find a website with it and copy/paste
-Too many to document. Probably better to ignore.

I can't spell any of the words I learned today. Most of them are names of exotic animals Kim taught me while watching some French variety of Planet Earth.

at some point I should figure out how to put accents on words

A French-English dictionary sits at the dinner table with us every night, a silent fourth member of the family. We consult it constantly. Often the french word my host mothers look up does not exist in english. Perhaps worse is when they ask me how to say something in english and I have to spit out the same word with my ugly accent: fiance, ambulance, obligatory. BEING AMERICAN IS SO EMBARRASSING!


-piquer: to prick or sting
-la betterave: beet
-mouiller: to wet, dilute (as in Kim telling his mother that I got water all over the side of the bathtub and the floor. Thanks Kim. Nobody believes your stupid lies, so just keep telling them.)

*coincidentally (mostly) water-related*

1. eclabousser: to splash
2. flac: puddle
3. etang: pond
4. boule (?): bubble
5. pompiers: firetruck/firefighter