A Day of Little Details: Catholic Mass in France

I fear that the sneezing robot air freshener has a cold.  Its sneezes have become twice as loud and rather prolonged, and instead of a fine mist, it expels drops of congealed vanilla fluid.  The poor thing also seems to sigh pitifully post-sneeze, as if each expulsion is simply more than it can bear.

This morning I strolled on down to the church for my first French mass.  Last week I tried to go, only to find that I'd gotten the time wrong.  Since the town is so small, there is only one mass every Sunday.  It really surprised me how comfortable I felt during the service.  Walking in, I was worried I wouldn't be up to speed on the local customs.  Do they still shake hands and say peace?  Does a basket still get passed around during offerings?  Is there hand holding during the "Our Father?"  It was all identical, except I understood almost nothing.  It was fun to listen to all the songs in French, but I had to look the readings up online later, and every bit of the priest's homily was lost on me, because he was Indian and spoke French with such a thick Indian accent that I didn't have a chance.

For lunch we had chicken curry and an excellent almond cake topped with violet-flavored glaze.

Violet is such an interesting flavor.  After that, I did laundry, but they don't have a dryer here and it was raining, so I turned my bunk bed into a tent with all my damp clothes.  I'm going to refer to it as Fort Fresh from now on.  

It wasn't a super eventful day, so I'll tell you something interesting that Nico told me about driving in France:

When you get your license, you start out with 12 points.  If you get pulled over and ticketed, these points get taken away.  For example, speeding a little, like 15 miles over, will lose you a point.  Speeding a lot might lose you 3.  Every infraction has a corresponding point value, and if you lose all your points, you get your license taken away.  At that point in your sad driving career, it's impossible to ever get your record back to its original pristine 12 point status again.  When you get your suspended license back, you get three points.  Lose those and you might have to do without driving forever.  Normal people with just a few lost points have opportunities to take remedial drivers' ed classes to gain them back.  It's a lot like a kindergarten sticker system, except you don't get a pizza party for having all 12 of your points at the end of the year.  Still sounds more fun than ours, though.

On an unrelated note, it's gotten quite chilly over here, so it's officially fuzzy socks and sweatshirt weather.

Bonsoir, mes amis!

Life is a Movie Now

Yesterday evening was ridiculous, but in a great way.

Gui picked me up and we drove down to Marignane, the city where my second host family lives.  They had a few other people over, so it was kind of a little party.  We sat around drinking wine and eating pizza until about two in the morning.  It sort of felt like I'd been transplanted into a French version of the show "Friends."  Everyone was such a character.  There was the restless bachelor, the powerful, stylish group leader, the gayest man you will ever meet, the girl so sweet you love her instantly...
It was a veritable collection of archetypes.  I got to be the random American the writers threw in to spice up the story line.

Now for the really interesting part.

Well, Gui has probably the most bizarre living situation I've ever seen.  He lives in a tiny suite above what used to be a nightclub owned by his father before he died.  The building looks abandoned, and for the most part, it is.  The club has been gone for nearly ten years.  But anyway, Gui told me this story:

Two nights ago, Gui was dozing in front of the television when he was roused from his half-slumber by a noise downstairs.  He went to investigate and heard voices coming from downstairs in the club.  Being the go-to guy that he is, Gui grabbed his gun (which he says most people aren't allowed to have, but due to problems with the mafia one encounters when one owns a club, club owners are allowed to have one gun.  Gui inherited his father's) and called the police.  While he waited for the cops to arrive (they took their sweet time-- around half an hour), the whole building began to smell of pot.

When the cops arrived, they and Gui burst into the club and found two guys, stoned off their asses.  They were promptly arrested, and had apparently been stealing stupid stuff (matches, ashtrays, Gui's high school diploma) from the building for weeks.  But the story does not end here.

While it was still dark outside, Gui heard another sound, so he again grabbed his gun and booked it downstairs.  There was some random guy doing who knows what in the club, so Gui shouted some expletives and death threats.  To scare him, Gui fired a couple of warning shots.  However, it turns out that the bullets had been in the gun for like ten years, so when he pulled the trigger, the gun only made sad popping noises.  The guy still decided to jump through a window feet first and take off running into the night. Gui ran outside in his boxers and tennis shoes and continued to give him a verbal beatdown.

Last night after the party, I stayed over at Gui's house, as Fontvieille is an hour away and it was already 2am, so I got to see the place.  Check out Gui's new security system:

We stayed up til 4am watching reruns of Scrubs.  French television is more enjoyable, I have to say.  There was only one set of commercials per episode, and it was still shorter than the average commercial break.
To my knowledge, no one else tried to break into the nightclub last night, but Gui's security system is so sophisticated that it could be they were simply forced to give up their quest for free match sticks and childhood keepsakes.  Part of me was hoping something crazy would happen, because Gui's story seems like a ridiculous movie or something, but alas.

Whatever.  If this isn't living, I don't know what is.

This evening, Gui is taking me to spend the night with my second host family.  I'm excited that I'll get to meet them early-- we weren't supposed to get together until Halloween.  Since I won't be coming back to the house tonight, I'm writing a weird midafternoon entry, so as to leave my bloggin' streak pristine.

Today marks one week since I imposed upon myself a writing plan that will allow me to complete a novel by Christmas.  The goal is 7000 words per week.  "Art of War for Writers" said to give yourself a weekly goal instead of a daily one, so that you can redeem yourself if you screw up and get lazy on whatever day.  How did I do this week?

3715/7000

I'm disappointed in my self discipline too.  However, writing got done every day, even if it was only 300 words, so I am not entirely embarrassed.  Slowly but surely, this novel thing is happening.

That's all I've got for today, as the interesting stuff hasn't happened yet.  But here's a picture:

Haribo did not enjoy the experience.

Adventures with Gui: Avignon

My friend Gui picked me up today and we headed over to Avignon for lunch.  Here is Gui, looking all French and saucy with his telephone:

We went to a restaurant whose name, when translated, is "The Little Square Cow."  Their logo might help you understand that better.

This block pattern is apparently a thing.  It was a really cute little restaurant.  I decided to act with couth and not take a picture of the dining area or the food (though I didn't refrain from pulling cash out of my bra later), but for lunch I ordered roasted duck in this creamy cheese sauce with potato wedges sprinkles with herbes de Provence.  It was absolutely the best meal I've ever had in France.  It was one of those meals that makes you less concerned about untimely death, because you realize it's probably not going to get much better than this anyway.

Lunch was filled with witty banter.  Gui made fun of American breakfast habits, and I knocked soccer.  After all that and a bottle of wine, we went to check out the city. The architecture was all extremely old and interesting.

There's some sort of castle that Gui said the Pope lived in for fifty or so years several centuries back.  Catholic influence is obvious:

We saw a little bit of the inside, but admission was ridiculously expensive and I didn't think this castle was as cool as the last one.  Gui snapped a photo for me just inside the entrance.

Fun fact:  these little sitting areas were all over the last castle, too.  Apparently they were heavily used in winter when it was too cold to go outside, but people still wanted to get sunlight.  I imagine it still must have been rather cold to sit there, though, because the areas aren't positioned to get any heat from fireplaces.  

The hill that the castle is situated on offered some really nice views of the city.

After a leisurely walk around Avignon, we decided to head on over to St. Remy, where we strolled around and then decided to get some tea and coffee at an outdoor cafe so that we could do some good people watching.  Gui's friend from school stopped by for a drink and told us about how she's been working with American celebrities lately-- she facilitates vacation rentals for super extravagant apartments.  St. Remy is where incredibly rich people vacation.  She said she rented an apartment to Sarah Jessica Parker a few weeks ago.

So adventuring with Gui was a great success.  Except all food that I taste from now on will probably fail to live up to that duck dish I had today.  C'est la vie.

Differences in Fashion and Food

Today's post will be sans pictures to compensate for the deluge of photos yesterday.

This morning I awoke and it was cold and overcast.  Autumn has come to the south of France, apparently, so I decided to make soup.  This endeavor involved a leisurely stroll to the supermarche, during which everybody in town stared at me, presumably for my eye-catching white trench coat.  They don't wear lots of color here.  Last week when I asked how the French imagine the average American looks, Edith said, "The women wear dresses with flowers, and everyone wears lots and lots of bright colors!"  Yeah, we like our color.  And you might be thinking, "White isn't even a color."  You are correct.  But from what I've seen, the French like their greys and blacks and ivories and neutral tones.  Bright white does not fit into this category anymore than do pumpkin orange and fire engine red.

But moving on.  The supermarkets are really tiny here, practically convenience store sized.  I wish they had bacon, but alas.  By the time I come back to the States, there's supposed to be a shortage of the stuff.  Boo.  Anyhow, I bought some potatoes, onions, and celery and came home to make potato soup.  There were some bananas turning a very disagreeable shade of brown on the counter as well, so I decided to introduce Edith and Nico to the delight that is banana bread.

They didn't seem particularly fond of either dish.  They ate dinner in the same manner that I eat the grass, soap, and dirt-flavored Bertie Botts Every Flavor Beans.  With interest, but without much pleasure.  I think they must not be fans of dishes that are 90% potatoes here.  They actually called the potato "the vegetable of America," which seems accurate.  I happily sprinkle potato chips on my potato soup back home, and can be perfectly content with a plate of mashed potatoes and fries for dinner.  Best vegetable ever.

So all in all, it was kind of a lazy rainy day with comfort food, tea, and books.  Also Angry Birds.

JK Rowling's new book comes out tomorrow.  Damn, I love the Kindle and not having to tackle a tardy postman.

Exploring Tarascon, castle and town

Today is a picture heavy day, because there was much adventure!

So my friendly kidnappers returned and took me sightseeing.  We went to a street market with cheap clothes and shoes, and then we checked out this church:

Quite pretty!  I went down into the crypt, too, but I have no photography skills and couldn't take a good shot in the dark.  Anyway.  After the church, we went on a long walk through this winding neighborhood:

That's Mr. Elvis Sir, for those of you who read my last post.  But eventually, we arrived at the CASTLE.

And it was the coolest castle I ever did see.  I think what I liked best is that very little was roped off, and being the kind of person that I am, I touched EVERYTHING.  Except this stuff, because it was under glass:

Playing cards from the 1800's!  I think that's some sort of fossilized egg to the right, but don't know for sure because my French literacy is at the level of a seven year old.  Just outside the room with the artifacts, however, was the garden.

If I'd lived in this castle, this would have been my spot.  One would have found me there every day in spring, summer and fall, reading and writing or just looking down at the moat and all the people passing by.  I feel like some girl centuries ago did exactly that.  But on we go to the inside of the castle:

It looks kind of like an apartment complex, doesn't it?  Side note:  sculptures of these things positively littered the city:

Some sort of mythical dragon/cow/fish beast that roamed the land back in the day.  But moving on.  Hitherto, I'm just going to give you captions for my other photos.  Picture tour time!

These strange devices were all emitting bird sounds that would have been around from 1100- 1800.  It was really cool to hear all the chirps echoing off the vaulted ceiling.  

It's a bathroom!!  I was really obsessed with it, because I always thought people from centuries ago would have used chamber pots, but they got all fancy with the toilets!  I tried to take a picture of the view through the hole, but again-- no photo skills.  They did their business four stories above the moat!  I thought it was cool.

We went up an almost never ending spiral staircase that made me dizzy both ways to get to the top of the castle.

It provided an excellent view of the city of Arles.  

There was graffiti from 1820!  Teens were annoying in the 19th century, too.

They have dead rats that presumably ran about the castle encased in amber or something.  Despite the fancy toilets, I guess castle life still wasn't as glamorous as a fairy tale here.

Found a turtle.  Fed him lettuce.

So that was the castle adventure.  I'm a little light on words today; this afternoon contained less time for introspection, as there was so much to take in.  Resolution of the day:

If I am ever a hobo, I will attempt to live in this castle, undetected by castle authorities.  I will make weird noises in the night, sparking the legend that the castle is haunted.  If they try to catch me, I will escape by rappelling down to the ground through the toilet.  

Kidnapped by Nice People

Today I woke up and said, "I feel like having a baguette for breakfast."  So I got dressed and took a leisurely stroll to the corner bakery and bought one that was still warm for 80 cents.

And then I ate some of it with jam and tea outside while reading a book.  Basically, it was the perfect French morning.  I did whatever until the afternoon, and which point, a series of strange events took place.

I heard the door open and someone called, "Lindsey?"  It was a woman and a man who looked like Mr. Sir from "Holes" with Elvis hair.  I did not know who they were, but they beckoned for me to come with them.  I grabbed my purse and followed them to the car and got in.  It's easy to kidnap me, I guess.  We drove for about half an hour and passed a castle.

I really want to go in at some point.  But anyway, we eventually pull up to this little building, and I follow the woman inside.  The place was obviously a veterinarian's office, and I sat down, puzzled.      These people spoke absolutely no English, and even though she tried to explain stuff to me, I just couldn't understand her for the life of me.  We waited for twenty minutes, and at some point, a llama walked through.  Yes.  Llama.  But eventually someone brought a mangy little dog out, and it was apparently the one we were waiting for.  We took it to the car.  It was a very bitey dog.  

We eventually came to a neighborhood with very narrow, cobbled streets and parked the car.  I followed the couple and the bitey old dog to the door of an apartment, and we went in.  There were two elderly people in there who were pretty out of it.  The woman set the dog down and we went into the tiny kitchen.  She gave me a lemonade flavored beer, and considering it was pretty late in the game to be suspicious of her motives, I drank it.  We sat at the kitchen table, and she showed me how to roll cigarettes.  As we sat rolling these things, I briefly wondered if perhaps I'd been sold into some kind of nursing home drug ring as a slave or something, but I was pretty sure they were just tobacco cigarettes.  

After another half hour, we left and went to someone else's house.  It was flat out gorgeous, and I snapped a picture when no one was looking.

There, I watched French game shows for twenty minutes with Mr. Sir Elvis while the lady did something upstairs.  Then they whisked me off to the grocery store and then back to the first house with the bitey dog.  They asked me what kind of pizza I like (literally the only thing I understood all day), and we walked down to a pizza fan parked on the side of the road to go get some.  While we stood waiting for the pizza to be ready, Edith and Nico inexplicably appear.  I was too embarrassed to ask Edith who these strange people were after spending the last three hours with them, but eventually ascertained that they are Nico's parents.  Glad they weren't serial murderers.  

Perhaps I ought to be more suspicious, but everyone is so nice here that going along for the ride always turns out to be interesting and ultimately, safe.

One last thing.

After pizza, Nico took me up three floors to the roof of the building, and the stars and view were absolutely amazing.  There isn't so much light here, so I could see triple the number of stars that are visible back home, and all the buildings in that neighborhood are close together and uniquely shaped, so it just created the most magical, lantern-lit rooftop view I've ever beheld.

Today was a day for productivity.  While trying not to fall asleep in the Belgium airport on the way here last week, I made a list of things I want to do/become before coming home.  Three months abroad seems like the perfect time to reinvent oneself, away from work and baggage.  Here's my list:

Make new friends
Get muscles in my arms
Become braver
Improve French
Become a better writer
Finish writing a book

Today, while perhaps not that interesting in terms of globe-trotting, was great, because I exceeded my writing quota and am actually really excited about where the book's going.  I'm also reading this great book called, "The Art of War for Writers," which is probably the most useful book on writing I've ever come across.  It has several chapters devoted to character development, which has always been my weak area.

But anyway, you're probably not interested in that.  Today I also had a mega craving for salty snacks and would have walked three miles both ways for a damn bag of potato chips or something, but it's Sunday, and basically everything in the country is closed.  So I went to the kitchen and scrounged up the closest thing I could get to crunchy and flavorful:

Look at that dang healthy snack!  Yellow pepper slices with wasabi and a mysterious white sauce lurking in the back of the fridge.  I had my reservations about its freshness, but ate it anyway.  So far no projectile vomiting.  

While hanging out in the outdoor living room, I met Felipe, the man who lives upstairs.  Felipe reminds me of House without the snark.  He has a bit of a limp and uses a classy walking stick wherever he goes, and he had some nice grizzly stubble going on.  He speaks about as much English as I speak French, so we had a delightful half and half conversation.  

Later on, I got pissed that I can't watch Netflix, Hulu, or even videos I own on Amazon while I'm in France.  Something about viewing license, whatever.  If I bought it, it should be mine, wherever I am!  Stupids.  I took out my rage on Angry Birds.  While doing that, Haribo climbed into my shopping bag.  

I hung him on the doorknob.

Pretty ordinary day, but hey-- adventure isn't about covering the most ground.

Super Short

Today will be short because je suis fatigue!

I spent most of the day writing, because I've resolved to have a complete first draft of a new novel by Christmas.  Please harass me when I get home if I fail to do so.

Tonight we went over to Nico's friends' house and had dinner.  They were a funny couple, and their children freaked out over the peanut butter cookies I made.  Olivia told me that tomorrow in Fontvielle, there's going to be a collective garage sale in the town square.  Her husband referred to it as the "shit market."  I'm gonna check it out anyway, and buy the weirdest thing I can find.

That's pretty much all for today.  I have an odd relationship with the air freshener.  It goes off every hour, but it's also motion activated, so every time I walk into the bathroom, it spits vanilla on my left leg.  One of these days I will remember, ninja jump out of its line of fire, and gloat.  Then I will feel like an idiot, because it's a machine.

Night!

End of Week One

So either I sleepwalked last night or the cats can open doors, because this morning I woke up to the sound of the cat hacking something up on my pillow.  Son of a bitch, Haribo!  Puke in one of your own damn beds, you have like five!

But whatever.  Today we went to Arles.  I was pretty lazy with the picture-taking, but here is one of two things I found noteworthy:

I regret not putting something in the picture for scale, because it's hard to tell how impossibly huge this keyhole is.  The key would have to be roughly the size of a femur.  I'm confident it could double as a small club with which to smack assailants if need be.  I like practical multi-use items.  

Arles isn't my favorite town.  It was kind of run down, and several men tried to come on to me as I walked down the street.  One of the reasons I didn't take many pictures today was actually because I didn't want to mark myself as a tourist; it seemed like a bad thing to broadcast in this town.  But I did covertly snap a pic of this thing:

Whatever it is.  I just thought the carving was cool.  After a while in Arles, we went over to the mall because Edith wanted to book a trip to Scandinavia through an agency there.  I bought a sweater and then wandered through the French version of a Walmart.  The building was a similar size to our big box stores, but there were fewer shelves, so the place was disconcertingly sparse.  I bought some random stuff in the sweets aisle.  My swag: some hazelnut Milka chocolate, a box of apparently Christmas bonbons, a box of macaron mix (because every time I try making the damn things from scratch, they melt all over the place), and an avocado.  

Then we went to Edith's parents house for dinner.  They are currently entertaining a Swiss couple, so for dinner, we had authentic Swiss fondue.  I was kindly reprimanded a few times for insufficiently coating my bread in cheese.  The cheese to bread ratio must be about 3:1.  After two slices of baguette and fondue, I started to feel a little sick, and the Swiss man looked at my glass of water and flipped out.  Then Nico explained to me that drinking cold things while eating fondue can make you feel ill (who knew?), so it's best to only drink either wine or hot tea.  He poured me a cup of caramel tea (the best tea on the face of the planet, in case you were wondering), and after only half a cup, I felt totally great again.  Super weird.

There was a little 8-year-old girl at the party too, and it was nice to talk to someone whose vocabulary was closer to my level.  She was super sweet and really intelligent, offering me words to use when I faltered.  She asked me if I was going to "move in with my love," when I go back home to America, and giggled profusely when I said no, then suggested I fall in love with an Italian.

Lovely evening overall, as are all evenings here.  

At the Edge of the World: Sausset-les-pins

(Whoops, fell asleep mid-blog entry last night!)

It is no exaggeration to say that today was one of the most magical days of my life.  

We got up bright and early and headed over to a little seaside town called Sausset des Pins.  Edith dropped me off in the center of town and went to work, and I immediately made a beeline for the beach.  With the mountains on the horizon, partially obscured by fog, and the deep blue waters all around, it seemed as though I stood at the edge of the world.  I took off my shoes and stepped in the water, and for some reason, I felt as though I'd never really lived until that moment.

I just sat on the rocks for a few hours and stared at the water.  Instead of sand, the beaches, when you get down far enough, are made of pebbles.  I accidentally dropped my phone through the cracks between the giant boulders near the shore at some point.  It landed in water six feet down and is gone forever now (sorry, Mom).  On the plus side, I finally found a phone store today, so I am no longer technologically crippled.  However, before I gave up on retrieving the old phone and had one leg down in the rocks, trying to grab it with my toes, I made friends with this man:

Our friendship mostly involves him laughing at me.

After a solid four hours in the town, Edith got off work and we ate sandwiches with the waves licking at our feet.  There was a man near us who stripped down naked on the beach and leisurely slipped into a snorkeling suit, which put me off my applesauce.  He doesn't believe in underwear, I'm assuming.  But once we finished eating, we got in the car and left town.

Edith felt like going to Salon en Provence, so she put the top down on the convertible, we slapped on our sunglasses, and then we drove along the beach and through the mountains, and it was every bit as amazing as you would think.  Once in Salon, we wandered into a cafe for cups of tea.  There was an outdoor patio that was walled in by 20 foot stone walls, but there were still trees growing in it, like natural umbrellas.  We were joined by Edith's friend Gui, and the only part of the conversation I really understood was related to the end of the world that's coming in December.

After the tea was drunk and the conversation ran dry in Salon, we popped back in the convertible and made a quick stop at Edith's sister's house.  Mom, I figured out what you should do with the new deck:

They've coaxed this viney plant to spiral up around the poles of a lattice canopy, and once they grow to the top, they spread out and weave together, forming a rooftop of blue berries and leaves that turn red in the fall.  This is the most perfect backyard I have ever seen.

We departed her sister's house and went home, where Edith made omelettes for dinner and I made Nutella cookies to take to her parents' house tomorrow.  I also attempted to make sugar cookies, but they melted all over the pan and became a solid mass of flat, sugary crisp.  WHY?

I don't know, but there was blue wine.

Why is it blue?  I don't know that either, but it was delicious and sweet.

French McDonalds

You might remember that I said everyone keeps their doors open during the day.  Because of this, walking down the street is an audible montage of human life.  On my way to the post office, I heard phones ringing, snippets of conversation over morning coffee, television shows, wooden spoons tapping against frying pans.  It felt like I was not walking by peoples' houses, but through peoples' houses.

But anyway, today I mailed a big fat stack of postcards and then headed up the hill to see the chateau that the famous French author, Daudet, got most of his inspiration from.  After wandering through the woods for a while, I found it, but it was closed.  The outside was pretty, though:

I guess being an American has spoiled me when it comes to hours of operation.  I expect that things be open every damn day for normal business hours unless it's a mom and pop shop and mom and pop are sick.  Places in France close whenever the people working in them feel like it.  I am irritated at the Chateau, because they said they'd be open from 10-1, and I got there at 10:30.  The French and their business hours, man!

So I walked around the grounds.  I saw graffiti on the back wall and gasped in a manner that would make a pompous aristocrat proud.  Damn kids!  In retrospect, though, it was probably a bad idea to erect a skate park right next to a treasured historic estate.

While I was standing on top of one of the jumpy things to snap this picture and survey the area, a couple drove by at about 5 miles per hour and stared at me with their mouths agape.  I wasn't naked or anything (though I've learned that it's totally cool to sip coffee outside in your thong underwear), so I don't know why they gave me that expression of disbelief, but I made sure to stop what I was doing for the full two minutes they were in sight and stare back at them in earnest.  

In the afternoon, I made baby donuts with the special pan Sabeen gave me.  I can't figure out why, because I didn't add any, but they taste kind of salty.  Things I bake just haven't turned out quite right here, and maybe it's because I suck at converting, but I'm starting to wonder if their baking materials just have a different composition than ours.  

Aww, they look like giant chocolate-covered cheerios.  I'm enjoying the square plates.

We went to McDonald's for dinner.  With the French accent, I didn't even recognize the name until we pulled into the parking lot and saw the arches.  All I could hear was "Makedonow," and I couldn't understand why jaws dropped every time I said I didn't know it.  Downright un-American.  The menu was almost unrecognizable.  I've had McDonalds near Paris before, but the burgers here have square buns, and in lieu of ketchup there was some white condiment ominously named "Frites Sauce," and the mcnuggets look like they're made with actual chicken.  However, I felt as fat and full of self-loathing as I usually do when I eat McDonalds, so in that respect, the experience is truly universal.  

For the past few days, in random, quiet moments, I have heard what can only be described a robot sneezing somewhere in the house.  Today I discovered the source:  air freshener that spits bursts of vanilla freshness into the air at will.  Glad that's solved.

Anyway.  Today was pretty quiet too, though I did have a nice walk around town.  Finally found the church, which you wouldn't think would be that hard (given that they're usually the tallest things in town), but this one was kind of short.  It was locked, so I guess I'll have to wait til Sunday to see inside.  On my way back, I stopped at a little souvenir shop, because this 1 mile squared town inexplicably gets enough tourist traffic to warrant a souvenir shop that is open every day.  I bought some post cards and some random stuff for friends and family.  On the way back to the house, I saw this cool little restaurant:

Super cute!  I didn't take many pictures today, so here's a picture of my lunch:

It looks so balanced and healthy!  Usually I don't eat fish, but this kind tasted like the kind Grandpa makes on Fourth of July, except not breaded.  Also, I tried some grapefruit syrup with Pellegrino-- delicious.  I think I'll try the lavender with that tomorrow and see if it's better.  Adding sugar to flat water just isn't that appealing, but bubbles will probably make every flavor of syrup taste better.  

But yeah.  I didn't do a whole lot today, which was fine by me.  Haribo and I sat on the couch while I wrote postcards.  Haribo is the best.  No matter how awkwardly or frequently I pick him up, he doesn't bite.  He even partially consents to be held like a baby sometimes.  

Aww, how can you not love him???  After dinner, Edith, Nico and I sat at the kitchen table for literally four hours talking about differences between the U.S. and France.  From what I understand, France has seriously  got it going on when it comes to education.  However, distribution of wealth, if possible, is worse than ours.  

That's all for today!  Tomorrow I embark on a quest to find the fabled windmill that this town is apparently known for.

So they tell me I'm not a real American because I don't like sweet drinks.  They are pretty sure that we all guzzle giant polar pops all day.  The sugary beverages they offer me at every meal aren't soda, however.  Edith and Nico have a huge collection of flavored syrups; they have mixed berry, lemon, grapefruit, strawberry, etc.  Today I tried the violet (as in the flower) flavor:

It was still a little sweet for my taste, but it was a cool thing to try.  Like drinking a flower.  But anyway, today was pretty chill.  Edith and Nico went to work around ten or eleven, and I hung around the house and went for a walk through the town.  I found the cemetery, which is gorgeous:

It was really big for such a small town.  Many of the people buried there were born in the 1800's, and multiple generations are all buried together.  I was surprised by how elaborately decorated most of the graves were.  Almost all of them look like they are visited regularly.

But after that adventure, I just came back to the house and read for a while.  Something a little strange: they leave all their doors wide open while they're home, because it's a crazy safe area, I guess (like I imagine Canada to be, lol).  I'm used to always having the doors closed and locked when I'm home alone.  While my hosts were at work, I left one door open, but it still made me nervous.  Sitting outside was nice and tranquil, though.  They have an outdoor living room:

I sat on the couch and read the Screwtape Letters in the afternoon.  It wasn't a terribly eventful day, but after the constant business and socializing from the last few days, I'll admit that the quiet time was welcome.  

And this is not related to anything, but I just want to say that their bathroom is 100% adorable.  I'm jealous of the pretty tiles.

Until tomorrow!

Olive Festival and Chinese Buffet

Today was cool.
For some reason, even though I'm exhausted, I wake up at 7am and can't fall asleep again.  Jet lag doesn't make sense.  My hosts slept a couple hours later than me, so I went outside and had tea in their outdoor living room and read a book.  When they awoke, they joined me, and Edith asked if I would make the American version of brownies to bring to lunch at her parents' house.  After rifling through her pantry, I found ingredients that somewhat resembled what one would use to make brownies in the states.  The cocoa powder had banana flavor, but you do what you can with what you have.  I gave up trying to convert the recipe into grams and improvised, and Edith gave me a bowl of almonds to crunch up and throw in the batter.  She picked them from her parents' yard:

Obviously, few almonds wound up in the brownies, because it was a pain in the ass to crack each one and dig the nut out of the center, but it was cool.  They taste sweeter than the ones that come pre-shelled at the grocery store.  On our way to her parents' house, which is gorgeous, by the way,

Edith drove up onto the sidewalk and ran into the bakery for thirty seconds to buy a couple of baguettes, and then we were back on our way.

Edith has a convertible, so I got to have the experience of driving 80 miles per hour through the winding roads of southern France with the wind in my hair.  Lunch was lovely, and the pan of brownies was treated as a strangely alien object at lunch, but everyone took seconds, so they must have thought they were pretty okay.

After that, Edith took me to an Olive Festival in a neighboring town.  It was a lot like Chocolatefest in Long Grove.  There were tons of artisans set up all over the town with products they'd made from the first olive harvest-- oils, soaps, lotions, etc.  I bought a few soaps.

Then we came home and I had a narcoleptic nap on the couch until Nico asked if I wanted to go get Chinese food and tossed the cat on my lap.  We drove to Avignon and enjoyed a Chinese buffet-- pretty standard, and exactly the same as American Chinese food.  It was a fairly awesome, relaxing day in general.  My French comprehension is inexplicably 20x better than it was on day one.  That first night, I stared into space for most of dinner, because I was hard-pressed to catch even one word out of every 300, but today, I actually had a vague idea of what they were talking about 30% of the time.  Not exactly an impressive achievement, but I was proud nonetheless.

Now it's time to sleep.  Bon soir!