I'm currently huddled in an upstairs bedroom while movers pack our stuff into boxes to be shipped overseas. Last night was a hectic scramble of taking everything out of cupboards and disassembling furniture to prepare for this moment and now if you're reading this I'm probably on an airplane back to my homeland.
A few days ago I was sitting on the couch and noticed a sharp pain in my elbow. It was like a prick of a needle or something. Naturally, I added pressure to the elbow by pushing down on it in an attempt to explore this new found pain in my body.
"Ouch. Ow... Hmmm, that's new. I wonder what that's from?" Pushes harder. "Ow!.. ow!.. hmmm, strange." I moved my elbow a few centimeters over to a new location. "Ow. Ow... okay that's enough of that." I stop leaning on my arm and rest it in my lap. That's when I notice that it had been sitting on my frayed phone charger. "Oh shit! I must have been getting a shock or burn from the exposed wires?!?"
I've had that charger for about 6 years now and it's been frayed for at least 2 of them. It was the charger of my previous cell phone but the charger still works despite its poor condition. I guess it's time to toss it now before I accidentally burn the house down in my sleep.
Two days ago we moved a bunch of furniture over to a fellow expats house who decided to make France their permanent home by signing a local contract.
We finished up in the afternoon when all of the restaurants had shut down between lunch and supper. She recommended that we get pizza from a vending machine down the street. It sounded strange to us but she explained that the restaurant makes the pizzas daily and freezes them and then loads them into the machine which heats them up after they are ordered.
It's a pretty novel concept and I was actually quite curious to check it out.
You make your selection and payment using the touch screen and 3 minutes later your hot pizza is delivered to you via a small slot below.
Surprisingly, it wasn't bad. It was definitely better than fast food style pizzas like Pizza Hut and Domino's. The ingredients were fresh and a decent quality. I wouldn't do it regularly but it definitely works in a pinch.
It's our last few days to experience French pastries so we have been trying to load up on them while we can.
We bought a few desserts from a new patisserie in a neighboring town. My wife got something called a "Mango Explosion" and I got a chocolate opera cake.
We also got a box of 12 macarons, another quintessential French delicacy that will be missed back home. These ones weren't as good as Laduree but still very delicious and not nearly as expensive either. I wish we knew about this place two and a half years ago.
Well, it looks like the movers are all done packing.
It's crazy how much stuff you can accumulate in such a short period of time.
I like to think of myself as a minimalist but as you can see, that certainly is a lie. The boxes say it all.
