Euros Ate My Dollars

I’ve always enjoyed coffee, since the days of my childhood when my grandmother would let me have small mugs poured from my grandfather’s coffee pot, up through the months of free frappuccinos when Brittany worked as a Starbucks barista. But I’ve never stayed as perpetually caffeinated as I’ve been able to in southern France.

This is partly due to the free coffee provided by our hostel in Nice all day (well, they SAY all day, but it’s really only until 8:00pm, which is when they irrationally close the lobby, and force you to find somewhere else to get your fix) and partly due to the French cafe atmosphere. What better way to spend your weekday afternoon than sipping cafe au lait on a city sidewalk?

Well, working for a living perhaps, but based on the size of the crowd that currently surrounds me in a random cafe in Aix-en-Provence on a Friday afternoon, the French seem to have found a way around this particular nuisance. I want to ask them how they do it, but my eyes are darting around far too rapidly at this moment to focus on faces, and I don’t need the French thinking I’m any more insufferable than they already do. Also, I dare not divert my attention from the task at hand, as it’s taking all my left hand’s resolve to maintain its steadying grip on my writing hand’s wrist.

In fact, that does it, I can already tell that it’s going to be impossible to read my own handwriting when I go to type this entry up. (Note from future self: it WAS impossible to read my own handwriting when typing this up.) I intended to write about the day we spent exploring Monaco and Monte Carlo, but instead, I will present the story in the style of that highest of arts, the graphic novel.

How Monte Carlo was SUPPOSED to go…

How Monte Carlo actually went…

There are probably a lot of things I should be writing about now, since we just surprised ourselves with the decision to break from southern France and catch a budget flight to Prague for Christmas. But sadly, Brittany’s laptop charger broke sometime last week, eliminating our reliable access to the internet/blog/world, and we have therefore become quite behind with our blog entries. We’re doing our best to get back up to speed…

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