I’ve got to work on posting more often. Cuz man, these are long. Sorry. Here goes:

Man, this has been a busy week. Last week, one of my brother Eddie’s friends from his summer job called me to tell me that she was in Paris, and wanted to see if we could hang out. Thursday ended up working out. It was also Amanda’s birthday. So after I picked Evelyn up from the Metro station near her hotel, we went up to Sylvana and Amanda’s.

We pre-partied there for a bit. Amanda’s boyfriend Alex had a bunch of his friends come over. We drank a little, and Sylvana had made Pico de Gallo, which made my heart happy. We fianlly made our way out, we walked down the hill to a club. After dancing for a little bit, someone decided we should go to another club, and we tried to go to the dance club at the Moulin Rouge, but they wanted 25 euro per person to get in. We all agreed that since the other club was free to get in, we were going to go back there.

Finally around 4, we decided to leave. Some of Alex’s friends offered to drive us home so we didn’t have to get a cab. That meant a hike all the way up the hill, and halfway down again. And Evelyn wore heels, so they clicked the whole time, it was pretty funny.

Friday was my first bad legs day. Maybe from the hike up and down and up and down Montmartre, or just everything catching up with me, but I could barely walk to the bathroom without my legs killing me. I spent most of the day watching movies, laying in bed. I did have to make a trip to McDonald’s to get the last minute details settled with my trip back to the US. The stairs sucked just a little, and I was happy to make it back home and put my legs up.

On my way home, there was a smoothie shop that I had been avoiding. I finally gave in, and got one. If you come to France, do not be fooled. Do not buy smoothies here. It made me cry. Almost as much as the so-called Mexican food spices.

Then there was the quick trip home. Oh man. Nothing about getting this whole paperwork ordeal settled has been easy.

Let’s start with leaving Paris.

I took the train out to Charles de Gaulle airport. My itinerary from Orbitz gave no indication of which terminal I was leaving from. So at the train station, there was an information booth. I asked the lady there, and she had no clue which terminal Lufthanza flew out of, so she said she thought it was Terminal 2. I took the bus to Terminal 2, no sign of it at all. I finally asked someone at a ticket counter, and he told me to go to Terminal 1. So I get onto a different bus, and head off to Terminal 1. Then everything came to a standstill, nobody was moving. Turns out, some idiot left a bag on the bus, and you know what that means, bomb scare. So we had to sit and wait until the police came, took the bag, and blew it up. After half an hour, we finally got going. You may ask, why didn’t I just walk to Terminal 1? Mostly because it was about a mile away. And there is no pedestrian access way.

So yay, I finally make it to terminal 1, about 1 and a half hours before my flight. I wait in line forever, and about 45 minutes before my flight was set to leave, they pull me to the front of the line. And then, the lady told me that there was a problem with my ticket, and that I had to go to a different desk for them to sort it out. So I went to the ticket desk, and she asked me why the lady sent me there. She’s French? I dunno. It took almost 20 minutes for them to sort it out.

I guess I should just be happy it got straightened out. I don’t know what happened, they never spoke loud enough for me to hear. Now I was on my way to the security screening.

By the time I got to the security screening, my flight was boarding. Of course the guard at the screening wouldn’t let me pass by everyone, he said I had to wait. So I did, and thank god I made it, but they closed the door not even 5 minutes after I got on.

That was the worst of it. There were some small problems transferring in Germany. But then it was a looooooooooooooooooooooooong flight from Frankfurt to LAX. And I really didn’t get too much sleep on the flight. I did watch cheeseball movies though.

On the flight home, I started getting really excited about actually going home. About being in California, and seeing my family.

My parents picked me up with my brother, and we went to the Dodger Game. And I got a calendar, yay! Not sleeping had started to catch up with me, and then there was a huge fire in Venture which had started to set off my allergies. But I was still happy to be at the game, and happy to be hanging out with my family.

After the game, I went home, slept in my own bed. Which was nice. My body was a bit confused, I kept waking up starving. But I got up in the morning, had breakfast with my grandma, and told her some of my stories.

I then met up with Crystal and Mikey, and had lunch with them and my brother at Chili’s. It was awesome, but my stomach has shrunk so much, I barely was able to eat much. But it was soooo good. And it was so nice to be able to spend time with Crystal and Mikey, and of course my brother.

I conned a field trip to Victoria Gardens, and we went and saw Brandon. And then we went and did a little shopping, and I stopped by Macy’s and saw Jeff. He looked good, that was really nice for me to see.

And after all the running around, I went back home, and we were having a family barbeque. My mom made her potatoes, but sadly I had to pass for fear of my stomach’s reaction, and had steak and cantaloupe and garlic bread. That was heavenly though.

I went shopping with my mom, and got Mexican spices, yay! And a couple of other things (my crack, aka Orbitz bubblemint gum).

And then it was to bed. I didn’t want to completely exhaust myself on this trip, the worse thing I could do is wear myself out and make myself sick.

Monday was the day that I came home for. We went out to the embassy and I got my stupid visa. It took like 15 minutes. I guess when I have to fly 28 hours for something, I want dancers and clowns. Or at least jugglers. After getting the visa, we took Eddie home (he lives less than a mile from the consulate), and I got to see his apartment. His bedroom is bigger than my whole apartment. It’s ok, I’m in Paris, so I win.

The flight home was pretty uneventful, but my allergies were getting worse. I think that that going from Paris to California to Paris and spending all the time on the plane was just too brutal for my poor sinuses.

I got back home here in Paris, and took a little nap, and then went to babysit Christopher. And then back home. And bed. Wednesday was pretty much wake up, babysit, and then come back home. Sylvana came over for a while, we watched DVDs and hung out. I felt too icky to drink (what is that?). Then sleep.

Thursday I had to go out to Nanterre to take a placement test. Intermediate. Of course. I get no chance to actually speak French here. Everyone wants to talk English to me. But apparently everybody is placing in the intermediate. So I guess I don’t feel so bad.

I am still exhausted, Friday I can be a bum. I just have a few things to take care of in the afternoon. My sinuses are still screaming at me.