2010 Troisième Partie

This is the third part of this entry and a continuation of this entry.

September.
H told me I had to be ready with my passport and a week's worth of clothes because he had a surprise for me. The hubby, being a bad secret-keeper, inadvertently gave me an idea where we were going while playing Assassin's Creed... Gaudy yet marvelous VENICE! 

Wonderful, strange, beautiful Venice. (Pic by H - who Skyped to tell me he wanted credit :p)

Our shelter (and that of the templar knights centuries before us), the Luna Hotel Baglioni.
15 steps away from Piazza San Marco and 2 steps away from the nearest gondolier!

The Basilica at the Piazza San Marco.

We HAD TO do the gondola ride. We just HAD TO.
And at 85 euros, this was the cheapest we could find. So tacky it's cute :)

But it wasn't a trip strictly for us two... you see, mom and my brother, who went to Italy the day after the wedding, had scheduled a trip to Venice too! 

Faaaaaaaaan-tastic!

But only for a day. And then it was back to H et moi, just walking around Venice, discovering the different quarters on foot, and discovering THE BEST DAMN PIZZA IN THE UNIVERSE. I swear. We went to an old trattoria that was in the guidebooks, but it was nothing compared to this. When we get some spare money we plan to go back for the pizza alone.

Historic and expensive restaurant with owner who looks like Al Pacino (according to RoutardVenise) ---
nice, but not the BEST DAMN PIZZA IN THE UNIVERSE

Romantic trattoria next to the canal, pas mal - but still not the BEST DAMN PIZZA IN THE UNIVERSE 

THIS! This slice from a little shop in the Jewish quarter is the BEST DAMN PIZZA IN THE UNIVERSE!

And then a few weeks later, we saw my family again in Paris, where mom stayed to celebrate her birthday.

Coming out of the Musee De L'Armee at Les Invalides... Because mom is such a Napoleon groupie.

At the lower chambers in Chateau Versailles. Because mom is down for all things Marie Antoinette.

Lined up for La Musee du Louvre at 8am. Because Mom is a Renaissance junkie.

And we all love cake. (Pic from JJ. Merci encore pour la gateau!)

And then we saw Stomp at the Casino de Paris! The only theater experience in Paris that we can share because there's no dialogue :)

October.
The air was growing chillier by the day, so I tried to warm our hearth with my own cooking - with mixed results. I was beginning to grow into my role as a housewife, something I never would have imagined for myself years back. The pressures of office life were replaced by the pressures of not knowing how to operate kitchen machinery.

After months out of French class (I went in December of 2009 but I hardly learned because I kept getting text messages from clients) I was back in Alliance Francaise - this time in Paris. I had a new reason to go outside, now that I was less tourist and more... I dunno, hobo? It was a fun change of pace, I would go to class in the afternoon and have dinner ready by the time H came home. 

Again, a picture from JJ who had bagels with me at the AF courtyard.

But my slow learning curve was a HUGE problem, and it stressed me out that my classmates knew how to conjugate while I could only drop nouns. My only consolation, aside from the obvious benefits of learning French, was what H said - that I was a student in Paris, and a lot of people could only dream of doing that. Well, it's not cooking class, but I'll take what I can get :) It helped a lot when we drove up north to see his grandparents. 

Met his grandfather who couldn't travel for the wedding.

Saw the magical Picardy coast in Saint-Valery, the charming houses of Le Crotoy, what was left of Joan of Arc's prison...

and the northern boundaries of France...

And learned more about his family's old history.