Grèves, Grèves, Grèves

what is a grève? it's a strike. and in this case, a big one. a little bit of background: the french government is trying to raise the retirement age, and a lot of people are really unhappy about it. this has been going on for weeks, usually just messing up the buses/trams/metros a bit, making it a little difficult to get places, but otherwise it hasn't affected me all that much. now, however, it is getting worse. for one, school is cancelled until further notice. i have heard there has been some rioting, flipped cars, stones thrown through windows, and more.. though i haven't actually witnessed most of that myself. i have seen large groups of people protesting though.

i was especially sad that the university is being affected today because i was supposed to have a meeting with chris and christine this morning. what would have been so special about this meeting? well on top of just checking in with them about what classes i have chosen to take, i believe i was going to get to sign papers to make it official that i want to stay the year. yes, you heard that right. i definitely want to stay the year. for those of you who knew that before i did, congratulations. nathan and dad: you know me too well. for those of you who were hoping you'd get to see me before june, sorry about that, i guess you will just have to come visit me!

in other news. it is starting to get pretty cold around here. which means i reallyyy need to find some boots and a warmer peacoat soon. at least i've already got some scarves though :)

on a lighter note:
oh and i finally stayed out all night saturday night, which was a lot of fun. as i may have mentioned before, buses and everything here stop running by about 12-12:30, and start up again about about 5 am. so basically, if you want to get home in between that, you better be able to walk, bike, or be willing to call a cab and pay. well i spent the night hanging out with friends. we ended up spending most of our time at this one bar/club with some interesting choices of music. we hung out for awhile though in one room, and though the music wasn't all that good, we enjoyed ourselves anyway. after awhile, though, we decided we'd like some different music, and started to head out. which brought us to the front room, where some normal music was playing! so we ended up spending a long while there as well, with highlights including tik tok, american boy, barbie girl, and even the macarena (yes we did the dance. oh, and we even managed to get a bunch of people to copy us. it was amazing). around 3 am we decided we were done there and headed out. fairly soon we ran into a couple other people in our program and started chatting with them, along with a number of french people. when our friends decided they were heading elsewhere/home, we realized that we didn't really feel like paying to get home, and 5 o'clock wasn't all that far away anyways. so we chilled like bums next to hotel de ville until the metros would start running again to take us home. occasionally random people would come up to talk to us for a bit, and one of my friends kept getting cigarettes bummed off of him which was pretty funny. i have to say, it was a fun night, but definitely couldn't do it all the time.

yesterday, patrick, kirstin, and i decided to make an american breakfast. well lunch i guess. it involved biscuits, hashbrowns, sausage, omelettes, and a couple sauces.

biscuits

hashbrowns

gravy?

omelette :)

sausage!

making our own buttermilk.. because it doesn't exist here

let me tell you, the omelettes, hashbrowns, and sausage worked out wonderfully. loooveedd that sausage. but the rest? well the biscuits were a bit burnt due to us forgetting them in the oven. both batches. yes both. whoops. they were also just kind of boring.. not really sure what they were missing.. maybe also because we made our own buttermilk?, but i must say i prefer my bisquick biscuits. it was a good effort though. and the sauces? well kirstin's vegetarian sauce was ok.. kind of strong on the spices though. and the non-vegetarian one? well it was supposed to be gravy, but there wasn't nearly enough grease. and then something just wasn't working. not really sure what, it was just kind of bizarre. overall the meal was pretty good though. and definitely fun to make. plus then we wandered out into patrick's 'backyard' which had a cool view.. but i forgot my camera for that.