Tomorrow....

I leave tomorrow! My flight is at 9:00 am from LAX to Houston, Texas, then from Houston straight to Paris! I arrive in Paris at 8 am on the 20th! I am SO EXCITED and so completely terrified! I still have a lot of packing and getting ready to do, but so far, so good. I overslept today because I stayed up SUPER LATE into la nuit last night transfering files from my old crappy laptop to the shiny new awesome one I bought at Black Friday sales after thanksgiving. I still have yet to set up the new ipod because I had to wait until all my music was on my new laptop, which only just finally happened last night. I'm going to go eat, shower, then bring my laptop into this room of my house (the only one with internet), and attempt to download itunes and set up my ipod and all that jazz. While it's downloading and doing its computer thing, I will put all the piles of clothes into my suitcase and finish packing. Hopefully.

I watched a french movie last night while I was packing and transferring files and I felt better about my understanding of the language than I expected, but it was also a movie I'd seen before. Many times. In fact, it's one of my absolute favorite movies ever, it's called Jeux des Enfants in French but in English it's Love Me If You Dare. I like the French title much much more, but they both work well for the script and the acting is sooo great! Not to mention the music, the entire soundtrack is different versions of la vie en rose, and the cinematography and special effects are incredibly artistic, touching, funny, weird, and basically, unlike any other movie. I think the director also did Pan's Labyrinth (why is that word so hard to spell?) but I may be lying, and I've never seen that movie so I don't know.

I'm getting funny emails from Parismus, the Sorbonne student organization, inviting me to outings and get-togethers. In fact, if I sent a 5 euro cheque to some gastronomer, I can come to their truffle eating party! La truffe! I can't decide whether that's awesome or super odd, maybe a bit of both. I don't know whether I'll be attending this truffle-fest, but the group will be a good way to meet people I hope. And make friends with the real-live-native-french! Along with all the Americans and whatever other nationalities will be on my program, I definitely want to make friends with some native French students so my experience isn't completely touristy and cliche of "an American in Paris." Wow it is raining so hard here! In LA! Rarely ever does it rain, and very very rarely for more than one day in a row, but here we are on the second of six predicted days of rain and it's floodingggg out there! My pool might just spill over. I always forget that LA is not just a desert, because that's how it feels usually, but also on the outer borders of a tropical region and near a mountain range --- makes for some funky weather! Well, bring on the rain, we could certainly use it! Take that California drought!

Ok I need to go caffeinate myself now, and eat challah toast.

EDIT: This ipod shiznit is taking farrrrr too long.
Also, Annie was here over the weekend, just for a day, as her mom was visiting her old high school bff in Redondo Beach and Annie tagged along to see me. It was very fun and nice to see her, as always. I'll miss that rascal when I'm abroad! Highlight of visit: we baked a blueberry and blackberry crisp/cobbler, i introduced her to Bones, we made awesome nachos, and she helped me decide what to pack. I think she's a keeper.