Perdu à Paris

Salut tout le monde!

No, I haven't really been lost in Paris... but considering how much I've been doing and how little I've been updating people, I might as well be, haha.  Also, it appealed to my sense of alliteration which I stole from Laura before she left.

As a recap, the end of finals went well, I worked my way through the organization of some closets, and did a lot of packing (all very hectic).  I managed to barely get moved out of my room (with a substantial amount of help from Adrienne and Shaun) before I had to leave for the marathon.  We (Sarah, who was driving, Matt, and I) wanted to get a pasta dinner the night before we ran, but Lenox, MA seems to be too ritzy in the Italian sector for a cheap, carb-filled meal.  After giving up on that, we tried to go to an Asian restaurant that promised us we'd live forever if we ate there, but apparently they didn't open until the next week sometime.  I mean, come on, since when do you offer someone immortality and then tell them you're not open until Wednesday?

In the end we decided to look for something in the next town over.  Upon entering the developed area, we saw this nondescript brick building that lacked any kind of windows and had a sign out front with Chinese characters on it and the word "Restaurant"... we decided it looked sketchy enough that it was probably cheap. It was upon entering the place that we discovered that the words above the Chinese had actually been written in the English alphabet (they had been completely illegible) and said the name of the place.  I forget exactly what it said, but it involved "Luau"... it was a Hawaiian-Chinese restaurant?  That was exactly what it was, and the inside of the place was gigantic and was completely painted as a gigantic Hawaii-themed mural (no windows remember) and the lighting was dim and the music was quite soothing.  It was all very surreal, and almost a little creepy, but they served us lots of inexpensive, not completely terrible, lo mein.  None of us could quite get over how weird it all was, but there was one more twist...

When we got our fortune cookies at the end of the meal, Sarah had something that seemed like a fairly standard fortune, not even one of the cop-out ones that gives you advice, but both Matt and I looked at our papers and read: "Digital devices run on analog circuits" or something to that effect.  WHAT THE HECK???

Anyway, early to bed, early to rise that night, nice and refreshed to go run.  It certainly got warm, but could have been a lot worse, and basically, I had a blast.  Running a marathon was a lot more fun than I had expected, even after I had gotten used to spending that much time running!  I finished in 4 hrs, 43 min, and I'm pretty dang pleased with that.  I also have these awesome dog tag things that say my name and that I'm a marathon finisher.  So, lot's of fun, and I recovered fairly quickly... being completely capable of dragging my bags to the airport the next night.

Speaking of that packing... that was also hectic, especially with reorganizing the fourth floor closet to remove the stuff belonging to the German House GRTs and make room for the mini-fridges.  I was too tired to do stuff Sunday night... so I increased my cultural knowledge by watching "The Breakfast Club" for the first time with Shaun and Ashley D.  I then somehow managed to get stuff done the next day, despite some set-backs, and again with help, and made it to my flight in plenty of time, although if my mother stumbles across this blog (hi Mom?) and decides to ask me how early I left for my international flight, she might be appalled.

I like flying trans-Atlantic from Boston.  The flight is only slightly longer than going to Washington, but I get a full meal and refills on after-dinner tea or coffee.  Maybe I was just famished, but Aer Lingus food was pretty good.  I listened to some great accents, people-watched in the Dublin airport, and fell asleep on the second flight (without even trying!).

So, that brings me to CDG airport in France... and here I will stop for now, having given you all such a large bit of un-illustrated text to digest.  (There ARE some pictures from the marathon at least on facebook)
Watch for the next installment, coming soon, about my first week in Paris :)   + pictures this time maybe.

Erin

P.S. There are fields of COWS right next to the Dublin airport... I saw them through the plane window.  Oh my gosh Ireland is beautiful!  Still really want to go there sometime.

P.P.S.  I guess the title was even further off the mark than anticipated, as there isn't anything about Paris in here, but whatever.