First of all,
Someone should tell them that we make horrible tex mex in Indiana.
I spent the majority of the day wandering around my neighborhood. It's very easy to get lost still, so I did, repeatedly. The fun thing about getting lost in Paris is that there's a famous historical building around every corner, so today I accidentally went to the Sorbonne. I also bought a cell phone and went to the BHV to see if they have memory foam mattress pads. My sofa bed officially sucks, but unfortunately my apartment is officially too small for anything else. I need a chiropractor and a mattress pad stat. They didn't have one at BHV, but while I was there I bought some super exciting stuff like socks and scotch tape. Oooooh. Aaaaaah. You're so jealous.
On the way home I stopped for a Croque Italien, which is the Italian version of a Croque Monsieur. This is perhaps what will go down with me as the french's greatest contribution to cuisine. A croque is a ham sandwhich with grilled bread and melted emmenthal cheese on top. It is customarily served with green salad- so it's totally healthy, right? They actually aren't too bad when prepared the way I've seen them most places- as a sort of open faced ham melt with only one slice of thin bread and not an over abundance of cheese. However, today's sandwhich was different. This was a full blown grilled ham and cheese between two thick, buttery slices of french bread, then topped with more mozzerella then you would put on a pizza and a few slices of tomato. I'm pleased to say I didn't finish it, but it was insanely good. Then, just because there was no line and I was walking right by it, I went into the Notre Dame for a visit. It is so beautiful. Although it's kind of funny that all I could think about was finding signs of goddess worship, since I just finished The Da Vinci Code.
I've noticed some odd things about my neighborhood. For example, it appears to be nerd central. I feel that this behooves me as all of my friends are nerds. Come on, admit it, you know who you are. Within a two block radius of me I've discovered a "Starplayer" store, consisting mainly of Star Wars and other sci-fi movie figurines, a Japanimation store, at least two comic book stores. Then to top it all of I crossed the Boulevard Saint Germaine today and saw this:
A magic shop! You can only kind of see it in the left window, but there's actually a mannequin wearing a cape, holding a hat with a stuffed rabbit peeking out, with a trick rope draped over his shoulder and a trick scarf ensconsing the other, outreached arm.
I know I have mentioned that the street I live on is very narrow, but in a new twist, I feel oddly enchanted by the little old man that lives across the street. He is practically my roommate as his apartment is only a couple of feet lower than mine and directly across. I would have taken a picture, but I felt that was overstepping a line of pretending not to see each other. Every morning while I check my email and write inane posts he reads the newspaper or a book on a little stool by the window. I feel a little like Amelie, and I might be forced to say hello at some point. Unfortunately, I don't see any signs that he is a painter.
Finally, a word about French efficiency.
This is my washing machine. This is also my dryer. As a way to save space the french have combined the two into this compact little unit. Technically this is very efficient, but it takes about an hour and a half to wash my clothes and two hours to dry them. And these are not big loads, but rather more like sink sized loads at most. And I can't really say that it "dries" per say, so much as makes my wet laundry hot. At any rate, I have a feeling I'll be patronizing a laundry very soon. I'm really regretting the last minute choice I made to leave my collapsable laundry bag at home.
That's all for now, I have a wicked case of hiccups.
