Lisa's visit!

Hello, everyone!
I got back yesterday from my Germany Tour '08. It was AMAZING and I can't wait to share it all with you. But before I do that, I'm going to tell you about Lisa's visit to Avignon which rocked.

Unfortunately, Lisa had a difficult time getting here to the 'non. Lots of stuff with plane complications and trains and cell phones and all of that but, in end, Lisa made it here safe and sound and only approximately 18 hours behind schedule. Woohoo!

Lisa arrived on Saturday afternoon. First thing we did? PASTRY. What was the first one she had in my town? A sancristain. Those ones are freaking out of this world. Then we giddily headed back home to settle down to lunch and exhaustion.

Lisa's a little surprised that 1) I dont' really eat cheese and 2) I don't have a bottle of wine sitting at my house all the time. Ahh! For a hot sec there I was vegan and so cheese is just something I don't buy anymore and I don't buy wine except for when I'm going to someone else's house. I like to drink soymilk. So I'm not really French? Nope. But we got Boursin and some Cotes du Rhone to have a Frenchified lunch.

We walked around town and went to the palace and it was beautiful. Went to the MakeOutCenter of the City because that's what French people here do. The amours walk to the otp of the Jardins de Papes and go and make babies. Makes for an interesting walk for families and little kids. We saw the city, waved to the Pont d'Avignon, and headed to Robyn's for the amazing soiree she had organized.

A night of chaos ensued with Lisa, me, Robyn, Nicole, Emily, and Amy. Robyn made an AWESOME dinner with an aperitif, a main meal, dessert, wine, AND cheese and it was awesome. Hours and hours of talking and eating and laughing and everything. I am SO GLAD that my friends here have met my sisters and that my sisters have met my friends. The joining of the two worlds, you might say. And I think it has gone splendidly!

On Sunday Lisa and I did a list of things that are awesome to do on Sundays here because they are FREE! WOOHOO. We went on the Pont d'Avignon and sang the eponymous song, freaked out some tourists. We went to l'Ile de la Bartelesse and checked out the city and the palace, and, yeah, we took the little tourist train around the town.

Then Lisa and I went to her birthday dinner at a nice (unfortunately, tourist-y) restaurant right by Place Pie.

This is the part where I tell you what we ate!
Lisa had duck with a honey glaze, pureed carrots, and red wine. I had chicken in a tomato sauce, mixed salad, and french fries (random to have french fries on my classy plate, but whatevs)

Then we met up with my peeps at Lalogene and Amy convinced us to do... karaoke! It was at karaoke where I finally got up the courage to pledge my undying love to the DJ. We started out with a rocky relationship but something akin to amour has grown between us... he has the voice of a freakin' French ANGEL and he can slow down time with his rendition of "The Show Must go On." We have an agreement - we speak with our eyes when I request "I Wanna Dance with Somebody" and we bring the house down with whatever song we do harmonies on. Ahhhh, Mr. DJ, I do not know your name, but I know that we are connected.

On Monday Lisa and I had a lazy day. We went to the Palace because we had free tickets (something for free in France!? You gotta be kidding me!) and so we wandered around and went "ooh la la" at all of the old stuff. K, then we passed out for a supah long nap. Woke up for dinner and Melting Potes! Oh man, Melting Potes is getting better and better. I have to remember that going to it means that 1) I speak french 2) I see my friends 3) I meet new people.

Ok, Lisa and I were leaving for Munich on Tuesday morning with a flight at 7:00 from Marseille. Ladies and gentlemen, this is IMPOSSIBLE to do unless you are very very close to Marseille. And I am not. So Lisa and I arranged with my friend, Emilie (hear that!? I have a French friend named Emilie!) who comes to Melting Potes now with her friends. Woohoo! more opportunities to speak French and hang out with cool French girls. Then Emilie took Lisa and I to her awesome apartment in marseille (arriving at 2:00 am) to get up at 4:30am to get to the airport! How amazingly nice is this girl? She chauffeured us, had her stay at her apartment, AND took us to the airport. Incredible!

Then Lisa and I set off for a whirlwind tour of Germany. The memory card that has my pictures of Dachau and Salzburg is acting whacky and might be broken. This is making me SO SAD. As in, I might not have any pictures from those two places and ahhhhhh that stinks so much.

Am going to work on the posts of everything else from the past week. It's been PACKED and it has been AMAZING and I am all smiles right now.