Rue Montorgueil: In which our heroine slogs the streets of Paris with camera in hand

Okay, so it wasn't quite that bad.  In fact, slogging is hardly an appropriate term, but how often do you get to use that in every day conversation?  My point exactly.

I went out this afternoon to take some photos of the aforementioned Rue Montorgueil.  Our landlady, while here checking on our internet, asked us if we went to the local supermarket, and then asked if we knew Rue Montorgueil.  We said yes and she said, "Well you know everything then!"  That's kind of what it feels like.  The street is mostly closed off to all but local traffic and pedestrians treat it as glorified sidewalk.  It bustles with cars, vans and motos in the morning, as the businesses open up and get ready for the day, but the rest of the time, driving down it is about as efficient as driving down the road directly in front of Pike Place.  Don't waste your time.

The entrance to Marche Montorgueil

The green, wire work arch, with gold letters reading Marche Montorgueil marks the entrance to what is probably the only street in Paris that one needs to survive.  It is lined with restaurants (French, Lebanese, Chinese, Japanese, Turkish, Italian, fast food), cafes, bakeries, butcher's shops, cheese shops, wine shops, pharmacies, a couple of supermarkets (though they really only supply what you can't get everywhere else on the street), newstands, flower shops, the list goes on.  Just this side of the arch and outside Montorgueil, sitting rejected and lonely, is a Starbucks that yearns to be allowed to hang with the cool kids.  Tough cookies.

Typical French cafe

Most, scratch that, all of the restaurants down Montorgueil have outdoor seating.  Most of them have surprisingly formidable protection against rain and inclement weather, which has been put to very good use lately.  Just after these shots were snapped, I sat down for coffee, watched the clouds roll in and the rain pour down.  Makes for good people-watching.

Pharmacy

In need of some ibuprofen to dull the pain of too many baguettes? Go searching for a neon green cross.  Sometimes they even flash in interesting and exciting patterns.

Outdoor displays from several different shops

Sidewalks are covered in the displays and cases from all the various stores.  Last night, Nick and I watched the butcher take everything down.  The very large, l-shaped refrigerated case that sits in front, fully on the sidewalk, was slid in front of the section of case housed inside the actual building.  Platforms under the outside case were picked up in three pieces and stowed behind the counter and the door was pulled down in front.  When open, the store is at least double its closed square footage.  No pictures though, they were closed when I walked by today.

Cheese shop!

The French buy, sell and eat lots and lots of delicious cheese.  Need I say more?

Our breakfast cafe of choice

Fruit and vegetable stand

Yum!

Mmmm....

If you're really lucky, after a day wandering down Montorgueil, drinking coffee and wiping the drool off your chin as you walk through wine shop after Greek importer after vegetable stand after, after, after...you end up, at home, with a delightful dinner like this.

Bon appetit!

PS For a more, er, French tour of the street, Nick's coworkers told him about this music video which was filmed down Montorgueil.  Be forewarned, it does feature women wearing nothing more than selectively placed black bars, but there's nothing crude, assuming you can handle French techno.

Lazy Weekend

We had a nice quiet weekend.  Went on some long walks close to home, up on Montmatre, saw the best view in the city (not the Eiffel Tower, in case you're wondering), ate some delicious food, crepes, curry, steak and all together too much crusty bread; I would have given a lot for some serious pain killers last night for the jaw.

Interesting tidbits for all, with delightfully cryptic, earmarks for those who I know will enjoy them particularly:

For the Tam-Flam:  Nick and I stumbled upon a cafe called the Pink Flamingo Cafe; didn't have a camera but may go back just for you.  Also, ordered a g&t yesterday and it came with gin in one glass and tonic, ice, and lemon in a separate small carafe.  Mix your own, to your tastes.  Genius!  I've seen this a few times. Tanqueray also seems to be the favorite here, silly Frenchpersons.

For my dearest illusion:  You are not allowed to come to Paris/France.  At least not without a giant bottle of ibuprofen and an ice pack for each side of your face.  That said, I found an art supply store the other day.  Ooh la la!  It was beautiful.  I really wanted to pick up some pastels, because I managed to come to Paris with the only medium that I find consistently disagreeable...but at 1.5 to 2.5 euro for a stick, I decided to hold off, though it saddened me greatly.

Brotha Z:  I saw someone who could have been your twin in Jardin du Luxembourg the other day.  Leastwise, if you had a twin with rather blondish hair.  The way he was sitting in the sun with his head tipped up, it looked like it could have just been the light and made me do a double take.  I do this all the time with different people.  It's like my subconscious is looking really hard for someone I know.

D Ele:  I found our hotel from sophomore year in high school.  Not a bad location, definitely missed out on some good night life.  Unfortunately, I rarely have the energy for night life here...by the time the French deem it appropriately late to begin living, I'm pretty much ready to go to sleep.  On the upside, I get to watch the city wake up all the time and that's pretty awesome.

For Z Lace Lady and others:  Here are pics from our trip out to Chantilly last weekend.  It's a quaint little town with a chateau formerly belonging to some member of French nobility and a racetrack, reachable by commuter train from Paris.  The weather was drizzly bordering on rainy, blustery and miserable with some deceiving moments of sun (most of these were while we were deciding whether or not to take an umbrella, of course).  

Chateau de Chantilly

Stables, but a likely looking chateau to the uninitiated

Turns out that what we thought was the chateau, was actually just the stables/horse museum.  The man loved his horses.  The chateau itself, after having been destroyed during the Revolution, was rebuilt and now houses a very nice art gallery and museum.

The man himself, Henri d'Orleans

  The surrounding area is filled with gardens, parks and lots of little byways on which to amble about; originally we went mostly to walk about in the quiet, but the weather put the kibosh on that.

 The museum in the chateau was also home to a very few examples of Chantilly lace, a handmade lace that is created using bobbins and a pillow, set up like this.  Through some miracle of time and patience that I will never truly understand, you get things that look like this:

This, is not bobbin lace.  But I wouldn't mind if it came home with me.

 

I'm not dead yet!

But I did greatly enjoy our adventure to a French cemetery last week.  One afternoon, I was getting antsy and in need of some peace and quiet, so Nick dragged me down to the metro and we went to find the only place in the city that we were pretty sure would actually be quiet:  a cemetery.  I don't recall the name, suffice to say it was not the more famous one (wherein reside Oscar Wilde, Jim Morrison, Eugene Delacroix, among others) but it was a wonderful bit of history, culture and was largely calm aside from the crunching of rocks under our feet and those of other wanderers.

I was intrigued at what seemed to be a moderately purposeful separation of Jewish graves from Christian graves.  It seemed to include both old burials and new and got fuzzy around the edges, but there was definitely some sort of delineation.  We didn't have time to check out the entire cemetery and I haven't learned any more about it.

Many of the small mausoleums had the most beautiful stained glass in the walls and above the altars.  Some were very well kept with happy, living flowers inside, some were broken, dusty and grown over.

A long row of old mausoleums.

This was one of the most beautiful little mausoleums.  Unfortunately, it was
tucked up closely to its neighbors, so a full picture was impossible.

Ugh.  Blogger's layout is being temperamental with layout again...I will have to learn to more skillfully manipulate.  Later.

Agh! The typos in this are embarrassing...

French Mythbusters: Episode 1

Let's be frank.  Americans, and the rest of the world, have some strong preconceived notions about the French. As with stereotypes the world around, these are mostly nonsense, but periodically have a grain of truth to them (see again "stereotypes").  In order to help me order some of my thoughts and observations, here follows some common "beliefs" and my responses to them.  I realize most of the people reading this blog are level headed and worldly enough to know better than to take these stereotypes without a grain of salt.  However, we are all influenced, however subtly, by these things we have heard until we have a chance to change our perspectives first hand.  Here are some of my first hand experiences to tide you over til you get to yours.

1. The French are rude.  Well, fine maybe not everyone...the Parisians are terrible though!

My last trip to Paris made me a firm believer in this one.  Was I here long enough to have enough interactions for a decently rigorous sample size?  Of course not.  Also, I think I was probably 15, clearly the peak of worldly wisdom.  

A portrait of Nick that we stumbled upon.
(Not related to this post in any way.)

So far, the people here who have been helpful, kind, respectful and friendly far outnumber those who have not.  Admittedly, I speak a little more French than I did before and I have gotten better at faking it in any language.  The key is not to address people first in English or to have the first words from your mouth be, "Do you speak English?" even if you're saying it in French.  It's a pretty basic thing when you stop and think about it.  How would you feel if someone walked up to you and started speaking in a language you didn't understand while in your home country, automatically expecting you to comprehend what they're saying?  Or asks if you speak their language, without first even saying hello.  I'd be miffed too.

I've observed this a few times in comparing the interactions and reactions that Nick and I get from waiters.  Nick, at first, would frequently start out by asking in French if they spoke English.  When I'm in a foreign country, my English gets strange accents and I feel very odd talking in my native tongue.  When I did the talking to waiters, I prefaced with many apologies and began blundering my way through some French.  Though I'm sure they all understood Nick much better (most of them do speak English) there was a subtle shift in demeanor and a generally more pleased vibe when we would attempt some French first.

Here, I think is the more interesting bit that is really what leads to many tourists' misunderstanding of the French.  The expectations on what a waiter should be in France, Paris at least, is completely different from the perspective of most Americans.  Furthermore, most travelers encounter more waiters than they do any other representative of the culture they are experiencing.  Here there be problems.

Old church (Eglise St. Eustache), new mall (Forum des Halles)
expansion being built (also Les Halles)
(Still not related to this post.)

A French waiter should, ideally, see to all of your needs, while leaving you completely alone.  They should be respectful, efficient, knowledgeable and a largely unseen part of your dining experience.  This perky, "Hi, howya doin', I'm Shelly and I'll be your server for the evening, please ask me anything and feel free to tell me your life story," vibe that is sometimes taken too far (in my introverted, anti-social opinion) in the States, just doesn't compute for most French people.  French waiters aren't rude when they don't smile at you or talk much, in fact, you'll notice it's exactly how they treat everyone else.  They are working to serve you a meal, not to socialize. I for one, wholeheartedly love this particular French quirk.  Most of the waiters I have seen are the most hardworking individuals I've encountered here and they are completely courteous and helpful.  Because they approach their job so professionally, I never feel bad interrupting them if I need something.  It is their job and they take it as such, so you never get those subtle vibes that you are imposing on their social time.  

An added perk, all taxes are included into the price of the meal and there is no requirement to tip.  Meals look much more expensive here, but by the time you take that into account, it's pretty close to the same.  

Well, that got a bit off topic, but moral of the story is thus:  The French are about as rude as anybody else who lives in an enormous city where they put up with the noise, sights and smells of a gajillion* other people every day.  Of course, I'm making no claims to fully understand all the ins and outs of a culture that I've only spent two full weeks experiencing.  I'll probably need at least another week for that...

*again, this is a technical term

Bastille Day

Well.  I sat down to begin writing up a shiny new blog post on Monday, only to be interrupted by a skype call from my father.  No worries, blogging can wait (that word is too silly to represent any occupation that could be taken seriously, anyway).  Mere minutes into said phone call, just after he has gotten his microphone working so that I can actually hear him, the call is dropped.  Now, Skype has enabled me to freely (financially and easily) communicate with people anywhere from two feet to 5,000 miles away over the course of the last four years or so.  I consider it their right to drop a call now and again.  I told Nick to stop sucking up bandwidth and went on with my life.

Two days and one new modem later, we have internet again as well as a working phone line.  If you tried to contact me and couldn't, that would be why.

Anyway, adventures of late have included  Bastille day, Chantilly Chateau and racetrack, Musee D'Orsay and generally bumming around Paris, eating food and drinking wine (it's cheaper than mineral water).  The weather has been positively dreary and, by all accounts, no different than Seattle or the rest of western Washington.  Ranging from 70-80 degrees fahrenheit with a humidity you can basically taste, it's been surprisingly close to Costa Rica.

Bastille Day did dawn bright and sunny (according to Wikipedia this is always the case).  Nick didn't feel well, so I went down to see the military parade along the Champs Elysee by myself.  I saw a bit of the hustle and bustle, but soon realized that I would have had to get up a lot earlier to see much more than the backs of the people in front of me.  I decided to cut my losses and run, with the thought that most Parisians watch the parade on tv from the comfort of their own couches anyway.  Here are some photos that I snapped while trailing down the empty streets behind the other crazy people as we wound our way up to some sort of view.

People queuing.  I'm not sure what they call it in France.

Empty streets

People, behind people, watching people watch other people in snazzy uniforms.

Rockin' some shakos.  

A mostly empty street; a rare sight in Paris.

"Mon dieu, is Francois still in the honey bucket?"

After my brief foray out, allergies or bug hit me pretty hard.  Unfortunately, Nick and I both spent most of the day inspecting the insides of our eyelids, rather than taking part in national festivities.  By all sounds through the windows, it was quite a party by evening and early morning.

Also, blogger is getting right, left and center confused, so hopefully the pics look alright.

An unfortunate truth.

French baguettes and TMJ really don't mix well.  So much jaw pain...

He has no idea what he's in for.

Linguistic Escapades: In which there are few pictures, many words and a very happy language nerd

Yesterday, I spent wandering through the malls, metros and midways of Paris intent on several missions. (Today, my feet look upon me as no less than a gulag jailer and have been begging for reprieve.  They didn't get it.)  I needed to get a new power supply for my laptop.  Nick and I have been making do with one between us for many moons now, little did I know that he planned to take his laptop to work every day for the duration of our stay.

We live within about a ten minute walk of Les Halles.  Formerly the central market place for Paris, it is now a multi-level, underground, labyrinthine commercial center (ie mall) which exists on top of an even more confusing, sprawling and enormous metro station.  I'm fairly certain that somewhere buried deep in the deepest, darkest corner of the whole thing, the Minotaur is still hanging around and cursing that France doesn't have Netflix.  Picking up a power supply was fairly painless though.  I'd seen the place I was going before and got in and out pretty quickly, if not particularly cheaply.  I did experience my first linguistic snobbery for this trip while checking out.

When I walked up to the cashier he asked me something that I didn't understand.  My go to response is, "Je parle un petit francais," or "I speak a little french," (don't judge me for my spelling) because I can frequently understand people, it's just producing language that is hard.  Regardless, the gentleman didn't give me the time of day.  He rolled his eyes, bagged my purchase and generally sent me on my way feeling inadequate and burdensome.  Joy.  It was not how I had hoped to start my day.

Luckily, later while on a mission for the "tourist" market, Rue Mouffetard, I stopped for lunch and had a much better experience.  I was able to let my waiter know that I spoke little French, to understand the French he spoke to me and had a delicious meal of chicken tikka massala.  I cannot thank that waiter enough for his patience, especially given that he was extremely busy and did not have a lot of time to be helping foreigners.  I got my bill during a quiet moment and was even able to inquire, in French, how to request the check.  Another gentleman stepped in and exuberantly explained it to me for which I thanked him and then walked off down the street with my brain flooding with the endorphins of a successful multilingual interaction.

This has nothing to do with the post.  I'm just trying to break up all the words a bit.  Brains like visuals.

I have no idea if this happens to other people, but when I get the opportunity to communicate with someone while speaking another language, no matter how broken or stilted it may be on either side, I walk away with my head and heart lit up like hot air balloons in the dark.  It is perhaps the most amazing natural high that I know.

After lunch, I headed for Rue Mouffetard, which my guidebook says is where locals send tourists , while they send travelers to Rue Montorgueil.  The street that we live on turns into Rue Montorgueil in about two city blocks and it is the most beautiful, messy, wondrous market street.  It will get it's own blog post soon, but I needed vegetables and wanted to see the more "picturesque" market at Mouffetard, just for something different.

Perhaps it was because I did not get there until later in the afternoon, but even had I had my camera, I probably would not have taken many pictures.  Mouffetard was picturesque in a sterilized, clean, empty and particularly boring way.  While Montorgueil is constantly crawling with Parisians, Mouffetard was rather empty and felt like a diorama that had been set up for show.  I did stop at a stall and get some vegetables for dinner.  This time, my cashier was a kid, I'd guess 15 or 16.  He said something, I told him that I don't speak much French and then asked if he spoke Spanish or English.  To both he laughingly replied no and then, through gestures, the French I know and his providing words when I couldn't quite remember them, I managed to explain that I am here because my husband is working, I do have two bags with me and thank you very much for your help.  The lights went off in my head again as I wandered off.

Tomatoes and rosemary from the stand, fresh bread from a bakery and a can of beer that I plan to use in chicken tomorrow, again left by our Norwegian friends.

I've used Spanish a couple times when people didn't know English.  In truth, I would rather speak Spanish than English and will sometimes ask about that first.  I had one poor gentleman speaking both English and Spanish to me.  Apparently, in my faltering French, I had unwittingly slipped in some Spanish, but I think he could tell that part of my accent was English.

 Right now, my head is a complete unordered mess of words, accents and grammar bits, so if these posts are even remotely intelligible in any language at all, I'm counting it a net win.  We won't even talk about spelling.

La vie parisien

First things first, I decided that the blog needed an updated look to go with it's new locale.  I think I'm liking it.

Today, I'm taking it easy.  The creeping crud that I was battling on Sunday was greatly improved by the following morning, but it's clear that all the new bugs are having a field day with my immune system.  I also spent almost the entirety of yesterday out walking about and exploring, so between the two, today seems like a good day to spend getting caught up on some blog posts, writing some lesson plans and resting.

Being a die-hard traveler rather than tourist, I can be terrible about taking pictures.  I loathe being one of 25 people in the same place, taking the same, blatantly inartistic shot just to end up with a low quality photo of something I could have a better representation of on a 25 cent postcard (though granted, in Europe it would probably be at least 75 cents).  However, in the interests of those at home, I will be trying to take a few shots of the more interesting and less commonly photographed things.

Like our apartment for instance.   There is a narrow, dark, winding staircase which smells of mildew and old wood, leading up to our surprisingly spacious, two bedroom flat, on the 2nd floor (European style: ground floor, 1st floor, 2nd floor).

This is the entry way; it hasn't yet become become 

a foreboding passage to the other world.

The flat itself is, as I mentioned before, is quite comfortable, if a bit confused about its decorative purpose.  The dining room is dominated by this erm...interesting piece of art:

  

While generally maintaining a much more classic feel throughout the rest of the space.

 While poking around the other day, I made a $5.00 discovery.  In the bottom of this antique heating device (I feel woefully ignorant about what I should call it.  Fire place? Wall heater? Miscellaneous producer of radiant energy?) is hidden a secret stash of boozy items: what looks like sake, a raspberry liqueur and a bottle of plums, very drunk on brandy.  None of the items was in and of itself that exciting, but unless this is a common European storage place for the household liquor (and if so, why keep the other five bottles of alcohol in the kitchen?) it looked very much like someone was trying hard to hide it.

The rest of the flat is not particularly interesting, though I can say that a furnished apartment in Paris far outstrips renting a furnished apartment in Nicaragua.  The cookware is a dream!  All good, heavy bottomed pots and pans, nice sharp knives, tart tins, mixing bowls, ovenware and no scorpions randomly walking in to dine.  But at a price difference of $4,500 a month, some dinner guests with extra legs were probably par for the course in Nica.

More pictures:

The second bedroom

Living room, with fresh flowers and a Norwegian copy of Cosmo, courtesy of the previous tenants.

Our view looking toward Boulevard Bonne Nouvelle to the north.

You'll have to pardon some of the crummy photography.  My point-and-shoot has seen all the humidity, sand and salt that it can bear and I'm still learning Nick's camera.  Anyway, I'm going to divide up some of today's thoughts into a few different posts, so that will be all for this one.

It's never too early for a parade.

It's four o'clock in the morning here in Paris and, still working through the joys of jetlag, I've been up for about two hours.  I'll go back for a nap here in a bit, and hopefully end up actually getting up at some hour more reasonable by local standards.  In the meantime, I thought I would throw some thoughts out into the ether.


Nick and I arrived in Paris around 1100 hours, without any events more interesting than our delayed flight.  Through the miracles of melatonin, I actually caught about four hours of sleep as we cruised across the Atlantic and wasn't too much of a zombie as we caught a taxi and arrived at our rented flat.  The landlord's rep was an accommodating middle-aged gentleman who stumbled through English as he walked us through the quirks and tricks of our new digs, which are quite comfortable, though stylistically reminiscent of something I would call, "Picasso's acid trip meets crocheted pot holders."  Pictures will be forthcoming, but if you can't wait, check it out here.


We muddled our way through the rest of the day, poking around, unpacking, napping and finally collapsing at four o'clock, only to wake up in twelve hours.  Saturday, we got up very early, made breakfast and a list of things to do before setting out to see what we could find.  Our mission included power adapters (adaptateurs), groceries and monthly metro passes.  It turns out that the street we live on runs straight down to the Seine, near the Louvre (about 20 minutes walk, if that) and is a bustling market street, replete with cheese shops, butchers, fruit stands, restaurants, cafes, boutiques, shoe stores, natural markets and everything else you could want.  I have no doubts, that I could spend my entire trip within ten blocks and not get bored, if I chose to.  We got to walk around and watch all the shops open, the markets put out their fruit and the street cleaners at their work, because really, very few people should be up at seven o'clock on a Saturday.


We killed time, waiting for shops to open by eating le petit dejeuner (breakfast) at one of the earlier opening cafes.  A hot drink of your choice, orange juice and bread or croissant for 7€.  It was delicious.  While my life revolves primarily around food and drink, I will spare you the details this once and come back to the fabulous nuances of that simple meal in the future, as it was a more eventful day. 


In spite of fighting some airline acquired bug (sore throat, fever and nausea), we found our way to a metro station and purchased our passes, got some staples for the kitchen and goodies to make a lovely dinner and then came home for a nap.  While our spirits have been willing to overcome jetlag, the flesh is weak and fighting the creeping crud doesn't help.  About three hours later, we struggled out of our comas and set out to find a place to buy electrical adapters.


We had our sights set on the seeming French equivalent of Best Buy (though we hoped the prices were not all as outrageous as those indicated online), but on our way, we passed a small hard/houseware shop that we decided looked promising, and probably cheaper.  We wandered in and while we didn't see anything immediately, it became clear that we should probably whip out some of our killer French skills and ask.  Luckily, being foggy from a cold, exhausted from jet lag and very dizzy (as a result of time-change induced rescheduling of taking some medications) helped to minimize my inhibitions, so I boldly walked up to a gentleman, with a strong, "Bonjour," and what ensued was something of a tag team effort between Nick and me, all in French which communicated our needs, with a surprising lack of confused looks from the store employee.  We got what we wanted, paid, and walked out the door feeling quite accomplished, all missions successful for the day.


(I'm going to keep writing and hopefully assure you that not all posts will turn into the Slightly Mediocre American Novel.)


My last trip to Paris (six odd years ago) left me feeling very self conscious of not knowing French and with the general impression that the linguistic snobbery that Americans believe to be true of Parisians was no myth.  So far this trip, I have been overwhelmingly impressed with the Parisian's willingness to help a person fumbling for French and what I have seen and experienced of the culture, I love.  I'll elaborate on this more later, but right now, I am very happy to be where I am and am already dreading the day I have to go home. 


Finally, regarding the title of the post.  Again, four o'clock in the morning, Nick and I are both up fighting jetlag and the Parisians outside are making a, presumably, normal amount of racket at the restaurants and bars out on the main street.  They are quiet most of the day, but party hard toward the wee hours of the morning. Closed windows keep the noise out quite well, but it's been warm, so we've opened them.  After chuckling together about the raucous sounds of laughter that sound like nothing so much as a hysterical monkey, a huge clattering, along with whooping, shouts, whistling and singing begins.  Upon investigation out the window, we discover that there is an entire cavalry parade, complete with sparkling covers, polished sabers and flowing cloaks, going down le Boulevaard de Bonne Novelle.  At four in the morning.  It lasted for about 15-20  minutes, and all we can guess is that it has something to do with upcoming Bastille Day festivities.


Anyway, now, after all of that nattering on, I will post this and leave you to read it (perhaps in installments?) at your leisure. 


Au revoir y hasta luego!  

Rebirth!

Hey guess what!  I'm back!  With two whole years since I returned from Costa Rica with nary an international trip in the duration, the wanderlust has struck hard and I'm finally able to satisfy it.  Nick and I leave today for a summer long trip to Paris.  He will be working at his company's Paris office, training up some fresh, Parisian, software newbies and I will be spending my time in any and all adventures that I can stumble upon.

The great part about it all?  We're renting a large apartment (we have to have options to put up other coworkers who come to visit) in the center of Paris and food, lodging and transportation are all on the company's dime.  For both of us.  I don't know how I got this lucky, but I plan to thoroughly enjoy it.

We're currently sitting in Sea-Tac, staring out the window at the fog as it sucks up each departing airplane, while we await a delayed flight.  As we attempted to log in to those handy-dandy, self-check-in kiosks, they informed us that our "original flight was delayed," and we would "miss our connecting flight."  These cheerful salutations were followed by that inspiring statement, "all flights are booked for today and tomorrow."  Luckily, with the assistance of a very accommodating airline rep (whose help we may have gotten illicitly by inadvertently stepping around the long, agitated line for "Additional Services") we seem to be all set up.  Here's hoping it's all smooth sailing from here.  I can handle a lot of unexpected travel inconveniences, but air travel is my least favorite category.

For now, I'm signing off to better observe the immense grayness that is the Seattle sky, but look for adventure updates and stories as I try to overcome Spanish vowels and trilled Rs in favor of speaking eloquently through my nose.