DOOMSDAY.

It seems the world will not end today.  But it almost ended yesterday with the earth-shattering news...

MAUREEN GOT HER CARTILAGE PIERCED….AT A TATTOO PARLOR.

SCANDAL IN THE O’CONNOR HOUSE.  On the scale of rebellious acts committed by my sisters and me, this definitely ranks up there.  The sad thing is I’m not even kidding.

Best reaction: Patricia, speaking to me. “I’m surprised, but not shocked.  Of the four of us, Maureen would be the one to do it.  I mean, I definitely would not, Erin DEFINITELY would not, and you could hardly get your ears pierced at all so…”

(Whatever, Trish.  I’m way more of a badass than you think.  So what if I was too grossed out to get my ears pierced until the summer before my freshman year of college?  So what.)

Other great reaction: My dad, at the dinner table. Erin, Patricia, and I are giving Maureen crap about her piercing escapade, but my dad is clearly confused as to what we are talking about.  

Me: “Wait…does Daddy know?” 

Maureen: “Oh…no.  I got my cartilage pierced.”  

Daddy: (shrugs and makes the face he makes when girl things happen and there is nothing he can do) “Oh!...ok?”

Maureen...going rogue.

Notes from our road trip, day 1.

Current town: Charlottesville, VA (staying at Mary’s house—thank you, Mary!)

Overrated: Skyline Drive, Shenandoah Park

Best town name so far: Shartlesville, PA (“They must get a lot of shit for that”—anonymous car passenger)

My very own victory garden.

Well, well, well.  Hello, readers.  It certainly has been a while.  Though I am quite settled into a perfectly lazy summer (perhaps the Last Real Summer as a Not Real Adult), soon enough I will return to H-town for my final year of school.  (Coming soon on the blog: Kelsey and Claire Roadtrip to Houston!)

First installment of What I Have Been Up To This Summer:

GARDENING

Call me a grandma, but every summer I do love working in my vegetable garden.  Am I a particularly good gardener?  No.  Somehow we only ever get three beans at a time.  (Makes for some great three bean salads though, am I right, family??) (stole that joke from my mom…)  Anyways, every year, we struggle against the garden-invading deer.  As some of you may know, our part of New Jersey suffers from an over-population of deer—the normal, ugly, hungry, stupid kind.  I always put up this humungous fence around my garden to keep them out, but by the end of the year, the netting gets all torn and tangled and terrible.  It’s a big pain in my butt.  So this year, I decided to do some research on other ways to keep deer out.

Yes, I actually read this book.

If you are looking to keep deer out of your garden or yard, I can highly recommend Outwitting Deer, from the author of Outwitting Squirrels, Bill Adler Jr.  He has many interesting suggestions, most of which involve concocting large amounts of solutions of eggs, sriracha, garlic, old socks, etc.  I didn’t really consider any of those options any more favorable than putting up the large fence, so I chose one of the simpler deer-invasion-preventers—Irish Spring soap.  Apparently deer hate the scent of good old Irish Spring.  So I go out to my garden every week or so, with a potato peeler and two bars of soap, and shred it around the perimeter of my garden.  (I’m aware that I appear crazy to neighbors and passersby).  Now our entire yard has a fresh, clean smell, and (so far, knock on wood) the deer have stayed away.

I admit that at the beginning of the summer, I was a little worried to leave the fate of my tomatoes, beans, and cucumbers in the hands of Irish Spring alone.  So I also bought a jug of DEER SCRAM.

When I first saw it I thought it said DEER SCREAM, which was a funny thing to imagine.

DEER SCRAM is an environmentally friendly mixture of 39% dried blood (deer blood, I presume.  Outwitting Deer man says that deer stay away from the smell of their own blood because it makes them fear their own mortality.  How he knows this, I am not sure.), 51% other meat meal (yum), and the rest garlic and chives.  As per the instructions, I sprinkled this liberally a foot and a half away from the edge of my garden (and have reapplied after heavy rain).  We now have a ring of dead grass where I spread the DEER SCRAM, but the mixture seems to have contributed to the keeping-deer-away effort, so I can’t complain.  

FOUR BEANS.  It's a miracle.

What is NOOOOOOOO?

Don't do this to me, Alex.  Get well soon.

Lookin' fly as ever.

A Father's Day lesson.

My dad and I observed Father’s Day today by changing a tire on the Jeep.  This morning while driving, I had heard a clicking sound on the right side of the car, consistent with the speed of the tire revolutions.  After a small amount of detective work back at home, we found the culprit. 

Rogue bolt.

So my dad showed me how to change a tire.  (He has actually shown me this before several years ago, but I didn’t pay very good attention then.  This time, however, I was a good student and even feel as if I can troubleshoot other related problems that may arise with a flat or damaged tire.)

HOW TO CHANGE A TIRE IN NINE EASY STEPS

Step 1.  Find the jack and the spare tire.  (The jack was in some secret compartment in the trunk and the spare tire was under the car.)

Step 2.  Take the rod thing with the square end, stick it in the square hole (located somewhere in the trunk), and loosen the spare tire that is under the car.  The spare tire is attached to this cable that slowly lowers the tire down to the ground as you spin the rod thing.  Magic.

Step 3.  Take the jack and find where it needs to go under the car.  My dad said usually it’s pretty clear where it should go.  On the Jeep, there was a spot for it on the axel.  Then use the rods plus wrench thing to jack up the car so the offending tire is just a bit off the ground.

Expertly positioned.

Step 4.  Use the wrench to loosen the lug nuts.  I’m kind of remember my dad saying to loosen the lug nuts and then do something else, and then completely remove the lug nuts and the tire…But I can’t remember that in between step…hopefully not too important.  Anyways, take off the bad tire.

Jim removes the bad tire.

 JIM’S IMPORTANT TIP #1: DO NOT LOSE THE LUG NUTS.

Lug nuts.

JIM QUIZ #1:  What do you do if you lose the lug nuts (if, for example, a car zooms right by you after you had removed the lug nuts and sent them scattering all over the place)?

CLAIRE ANSWER, attempt 1: Call AAA.

JIM: Pretend there is no AAA.

CLAIRE ANSWER, attempt 2: Take lug nuts from other tires?

JIM THE PROUD FATHER: Take one lug nut from each other tire.

Step 5.  Do not step on spare tire with bare feet because it is dirty.

Gross.

Step 6.  Take spare tire and line up the holes with the screws on the wheel.

Step 7.  Put on the lug nuts.

JIM’S IMPORTANT TIP #2: TIGHTEN EVERY OTHER LUG NUT SO THE TIRE ALIGNS CORRECTLY WITH THE REST OF THE WHEEL.  Do this multiple times (with the wrench) until they are all tight.

Jim tightens the lug nuts.

 *If you lost all the lug nuts and already retrieved a lug nut from each other tire, put those lug nuts in every other hole in order to balance out the stress.

Step 8.  Go back to the jack and lower the car down to the ground again. 

Step 9.  Use the cable/wrench contraption to raise the offending tire up below the car.  Put the jack and all the other stuff back where you found it.

CONGRATULATIONS, YOU HAVE REPLACED A TIRE...on Father's Day no less!

If I were alone, I still probably would have called AAA and had them do it.   But I’m sure it’s good to know how to change a tire myself, in case I were ever trapped in that pretend world with no AAA. 

Thank you, Daddy, for imparting your wisdom, today and everyday.  Happy Father’s Day—you are the best.

CLASSIC JIM QUOTE, said again today during tire change: “It understands force!”

(Usually, he precedes that with “Must be German”, but I think because we were working on a Jeep, he omitted that part.  Maybe next time on the Benz.)

Welcome back to New Jersey.

Today, a creeper driver of a Garden State Waste truck slowed down and honked at me while I was cooling down from a run.  I refrained from flipping him the Garden State Bird.   But it reminded me of that (terrible) joke—“Jersey girls aren’t trash…trash gets picked up.”  Rrrrrrrrrr.

Otherwise, it has been really nice to be back home.  The past two weekends have been marathon graduation celebrations, which means I ate a ton of delicious food and desserts.  Which also means I will be running and going to the Y and only eating vegetables everyday this week.  Hopefully no more run-ins with Garden State Waste.  He won’t be so lucky next time.

HOME TOMORROW.

But somehow it doesn't feel like my last day in London.  Maybe because I'm not packed.  At all.  Currently investigating all methods of procrastination (posting pictures on Facebook, writing in this blog, gonna go make some food, then take a bath, etc etc).  I think it's gonna be a late night.

The near future.

This afternoon: Going out to dinner at Daphne’s (apparently it was Princess Diana’s favorite restaurant).  Looking forward to a very nice meal!  I’m going with a family from Villa that also moved here last summer.  I got in touch with them in January and I’ve really enjoyed getting to know them.  So we are going to Daphne’s for a goodbye dinner and to celebrate American Mother’s Day.  (They celebrated Mother’s Day in the UK a while ago…) (Happy Mother’s Day, Mommy!!!)

This week: MY LAST WEEK OF WORK.  WHAT.  WHEN DID THIS HAPPEN.  I’ll be sad to say goodbye to several of my coworkers, but otherwise…I’m ready to start something new.

Saturday: Will arrives!

Sunday: We are off to Spain!

June 1: HOME

June 3:  The beautiful and smarty-pants Trish graduates first in her class.  She has done well to emulate her most distinguished older sister.

I can’t believe my time here is almost over.  Mixed feelings, but mostly just ready.  I plan on writing a recap/general-things-I-have-noticed-about-London-and/or-architecture.  Also, I will have to decide on the fate of this blog.  To blab or not to blab…

Best Mom in the world.

The return of British Will.

(Not that he went anywhere.  I just haven't talked about him in a while.)

Today at work, British Will popped over to my desk and we discussed some drawing that I was working on.  On my desk, I had a bag of Nuts Royal (mixed nuts—walnuts, cashews, etc--from a grocery store called Lidl).  He took the liberty of stealing a handful, which he then ate, and quickly made a terrible “these are disgusting, I am going to die” face and sound.

“Ugh, where on earth did you get these?  The dumpster?”

Umm, excuse me, British Will?  I was about to respond when he laughed and said,

“Get it?  ‘Dumpster’?  Very American of me, right?”

He had himself really cracked up over this, but I was just sitting there trying to figure it out.  If my mind hadn’t already been occupied with “What the hell, British Will, the Nuts Royal are completely fine”, I think I still would have missed his comedic use of the word “dumpster.”  I expressed this to him, and he assured me that dumpster is, in fact, a very American word and it was, indeed, very funny that he used it.  Yes, British Will, you are a riot.  (Ha ha, get it?  Riot?  Very London of me, right?)

Fantastic news and an update.

A while back, (September 15, 2011, to be precise), I wrote a blog post called “We like wine.”  In it, I described the wine goblets that Ashley and I purchased at a thrift store.  While we certainly drank lots of wine from these goblets, we were not sure if a goblet could hold an entire bottle of wine.  I said I would report back when we found out.  Well, seven and a half months later, we finally conducted the experiment.  I am pleased to announce the wonderful results—our goblets do indeed hold an entire bottle each and with room to spare.  Cheers to that.

My goblet and empty bottle

Ashley's goblet and empty bottle.

Cheers.

Somehow, the time here is quickly winding down.  I have just eleven days of work left!  I know I have left many fun stories and experiences unrecorded here (like the story about the time I was running along the canal and saw this mom dragging along two small children and a baby in a stroller and one of the kids was screaming and bawling and as I ran by I realized the mom was smoking pot…her way to deal with it I guess.  Or the time at the grocery store with Kelsey, when I must have forgotten where I was and picked up a bag of pre-cooked spaghetti noodles and said/yelled, “BRITISH PEOPLE ARE SO LAZY” and then got a few dirty looks.  Or the time I was taking a surprise trip to Houston, but got bumped off my British Airways flight.  This is actually a good one.  When British Airways is bumping you off a flight, they try reallllllllly hard to keep you very uninformed.  And when you ask nicely for a little bit of information, they give you a voucher for 3 pounds and say, “Why don’t you go get a coffee?”  And then they get all surprised and offended when you say, “Why don’t you tell me what’s going on here instead?”  And then when you and the “customer service” agent get into a bit of a heated discussion about why no one knows why you don’t have a seat on this plane when you booked your ticket months ago, she hands you off to another “customer service” agent who doesn’t appreciate your angry snark.  When that discussion progresses and you are provoked into saying things you don’t normally say and the “customer service” agent condescendingly tells you to “please calm down, miss”, you get a sudden flashback to a time when your dad was a basketball coach for your sister’s middle school team and he was loudly letting the referee know what’s up and the ref said to him, “you need to calm down, sir” and your dad replied, "I AM CALM!"  Fortunately, you are not escorted out of Heathrow Airport by the bobbies, but British Airways does bump both you and a sobbing 14-year-old girl who is traveling alone.  At least they reimburse you and upgrade you to “World Traveler Plus” on the next flight.  (That was beginning to feel a little bit like a terrible British Airways version of "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie".  Sorry.)  (In spite of my travel woes and with a little more cash in my pockets than I expected, I had the best Beer Bike trip ever.))

Ashley and I are feeling pressure to do all the London things we haven’t gotten around to yet.  We made a “London Bucket List” google doc that we spend a lot of time updating while we’re at work.  We made some good progress on it this past weekend, going to the British Library and the Brains exhibit at the Wellcome Collection.  (I found out that I really don’t have the stomach for brains.)  On the way back from the Wellcome Collection (which is a neat little museum I had never heard of before), we ducked into a pub to get out of the rain.  There happened to be a very important soccer game on (Sheffield versus some other team also from Sheffield...so we gathered).  We were so glad we stumbled upon this.  The guys watching the game at that pub were like little boys on Christmas morning.  It was a hilarious thing to witness.  I have never seen anything like it.  Watch this video.  Be sure to watch the guy who first appears at :18.  I particularly enjoy when he falls to his knees at :25. 

Then later that night we went to a place called Dalston Superstore (which is a nightclub, not a superstore).  I’m sure this will come as a shock, but clubbing is not exactly my thing.  But somehow, Ashley and I were both in the mood to go out.  So we did.  And it was hilarious.

Claire: (shouting over the music) YOU KNOW HOW YOU SAID THIS USED TO BE A GAY CLUB?

Ashley: (shouting over the music) YEAH.

Claire: (shouting over the music) I THINK IT STILL IS.

It was.

Luckily, we have a three-day weekend this weekend, so we’ll have time to cross more things off our list.  (Thank you, Early May Bank Holiday!)  That’s all for now, I think.  I’ll end with a really good, but pretty inconvenient way to crack yourself up: give British people pumpkin bread.  They just do not know what to do with it.  At all.

We are watching NCIS again.

GIBBS DRINKS OUT OF JARS.  WE DRINK OUT OF JARS.

I am procrastinating.

Claire O'Connor

Preceptorship Report #4

April 23, 2012

HAHAHAHA JUST KIDDING.  Not my preceptorship report.  But it should be!  Because it’s due in under 4 hours.  AND THIS IS WHAT’S ON MY PAGE.

Excuses: St. Paddy's Day in Dublin.

(Two posts in one day??!! This can't be real life.)

Trip summary:

Ashley and I went to Dublin for the weekend of St. Paddy’s Day and it was a ton of fun.  I was expecting it to be the same level of wild as Mardi Gras in New Orleans, but (thankfully) it wasn’t quite that.  It was, however, definitely where I met the most Americans outside of America (we also met Catherine and her boyfriend Pat, but we planned that).  The highlights were our visit to the Guinness Storehouse (which had lots of special things going on for St. Paddy’s Day--and much more free Guinness around than usual), our visit to Kilmainham Gaol (really, really interesting.  A great way to learn about modern Irish history, which may be a description that makes it sounds like a boring place to visit for some people , but I thought it was really good.  I wish my family had gone when we were in Dublin because I think my dad definitely would have liked it.  I left that place pretty convinced that the British were just major, major assholes.), and our trip out to Howth, a town on the Irish Sea (we had the best calimari I have ever had IN MY LIFE, plus the town was just really pretty).  All of these places were the recommendations of our gracious host, Tatiana, whom it was also a pleasure to see!

Two bizarre instances of family resemblance:

1.  At the pub we went to for lunch on St. Paddy’s Day, our bartender looked like my Grampie.  Not his face, but the rest of his body could have been Grampie’s.  He had what we call the “Grampie legs” and the same arms and same way of walking and standing.  It really caught me off guard.  

2.  On our last day, we had a little trouble finding the bus stop for the bus that would bring us back to the airport.  I asked a policeman for directions and we talked for a minute or so.  As we walked away, Ashley was like, “That was really weird.  He looked like he could have been your brother.”  Which I thought was funny because, as the policeman and I were chatting, it crossed my mind that he was an attractive guy.  So maybe that was some subconscious vanity coming out there.

Something delicious:

Guinness with blackcurrant liqueur.  Try it. It's like drinking a cake.

Excuses: Edinburgh.

This past weekend was my first weekend in London with just me and no visitors since JANUARY 4^TH.  I’m not complaining at all—my weekends have been full of lots of great trips and fun visitors.  But it was really nice to just chill and do nothing more than general housekeeping all weekend.  I did a ton of laundry and I cleaned our entire apartment …I hadn’t realized we were living in such filth.  I’m currently being overcome by fumes of cleanliness…something I’m apparently not used to. 

During my weekend of nothing-ness, I had grand plans of writing an extensive post for each of my adventures from the past few months.  But I think I need to be honest with you, my faithful reader(s), it is quite likely this will not happen.  Instead, I’ve decided to limit myself.  Here are three small parts of my trip to Edinburgh, the next installment of my series of excuses for not being a faithful blog updater.

1.  Driving

…was terrifying.  If you are accustomed to driving on the right and are planning on driving from London to Edinburgh and back over a weekend, TAKE THE TRAIN…or fly.  If you do decide to drive, TAKE THE M1 THE WHOLE WAY.  DO NOT LISTEN TO YOUR GPS.  ONCE YOU PASS DURHAM, IT WILL INSIST YOU TURN LEFT AND TAKE A ROUTE THAT ACTUALLY LOOKS SHORTER.  IT IS NOT SHORTER, BUT IT IS MORE TERRIFYING.  It reminded me of the last time I ignored directions from a person who knew what she was talking about (the time my mom told me how to get to JFK to pick up Will from the airport—stay on the Belt Parkway, she said.  But the GPS (his name is Watson) wanted me to turn, turn, stop passing the turns.  I finally turned so Watson would shut the hell up, and as a reward, he decided to take me through streets of burned out cars and used auto parts shops where people were just out on the sidewalks staring at the conspicuously vulnerable white girl in a red Jeep.  I will never drive in the city again.)  Granted, on the way to Edinburgh, there are fewer burned out cars and more of these beauties:

Hard to see, but it's a hairy Scottish cow.

It actually wasn’t so much the being on the left side of the road part that was really scary.  It was more that the roads have no shoulder, are extremely narrow, and the other cars are all going really fast.  Driving out of Edinburgh, I got passed by six cars.  And I wasn’t going THAT slowly.  My mom would have been pleased by the speed I was going.

2.  My first hostel experience

…was interesting.  Our hostel was a converted church, so that was kind of cool.  Ashley and I had a funny thing happen.  We went downstairs to the girls’ bathroom to brush teeth and get ready for bed.  Ashley opened the door to the bathroom and a guy wearing just a towel was brushing his teeth.  He was way more startled by us than we were by him.  I figured the guys’ bathroom was full or something, and he had come down there to brush his teeth.  Whatever.  We made to back out and just let him finish, but he sprinted out the door with a mouth full of toothpaste.  As we walked in, we were like, “whatever dude, he at least could have spit.”  Then we noticed ladies underwear strewn on one of the sinks and a lady (who was presumably the owner of the underwear) hop back into a running shower.  I was brushing my teeth by the time I realized we had likely just interrupted something.  Ashley probably gathered this a little faster than I did.  About a minute later, the girl emerged from the shower, fully dressed, and walked out.  Ashley and I turned to each other and burst out laughing.  Just as Ashley was saying, “AWKWARD”, the girl came back into the bathroom.  Yes, it was awkward.  We all kind of looked at each other, and then Ashley and I went back to brushing our teeth.  The girl collected her things and then left for good.

3.  The city

…IS BEAUTIFUL.  I really loved it.  We climbed up Arthur’s Seat, this dormant volcano right next to the city.  Really, really beautiful.  And there are Westies EVERYWHERE!  Westies on every kind of paraphernalia you can imagine.  I was tempted to buy it all.  I was also sorely tempted to buy a real kilt for someone who would probably wear it.  But real kilts are expensive.  Sorry, Will.

Another thing that was really nice… the air there was sooo clean and fresh.  Ashley and I wanted to bottle it up and bring it back to London.  Get ready for some TMI…after an extended stay in London, your boogers will be BLACK.  It’s gross. 

Conclusion: The trip was TOO SHORT, but still tons of fun.  Edinburgh is definitely on my list of places to return to!

Excuses, a preview.

Our car broke down in the French countryside.  (Preview of posts to come.)

Happy, happy spring.

In hono(u)r of the second day of spring...(click here) 

After living in London, I have an entirely new appreciation for this song (and springtime, and summertime, and heat, and the sun).   I’m sure the Beatles were talking about UK weather blues.  The winter wasn’t that cold—it was just really dark and extra blah.  Ashley and I diagnosed ourselves with SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder—really, doctors…I hope you got a good kick out of that acronym), but we feel it slowly lifting.  The sun doesn’t set at 4:00 anymore and that is a beautiful, beautiful thing.  I think our attitudes are changing too, because we’re realizing we aren’t actually going to be here forever and we need to make the most of the time that’s left!   I wouldn’t mind canceling British Daylight Savings (they call it British Summer Time) though.  I’ve enjoyed being just 4 hours ahead of the East Coast and 5 hours ahead of Houston.  But our time changes this weekend so it will be back to the normal time difference. 

I still plan on writing posts about our trip to Edinburgh, Maureen’s visit, and our trip to Dublin last weekend…it will happen...eventually…

A real life Slytherin!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2117194/London-riots-Jamie-Waylett-jailed-years-riot-rampage.html?ito=feeds-newsxml

100 points from Slytherin...

...and two years in the clink.

“’I have no clue where that came from, that’s the honest truth.  I didn’t loot nothing, I didn’t do anything stupid, but I was there.'”

I feel like the defense missed the opportunity to make a strong case for him being under the influence of the Imperius Curse…

It's ok, Joey.  They got him.  It's ok.

Not an excuse.

Saturday was a really nice day, so I went for a run along the canal.  About halfway to the park, on a road next to the canal, I noticed a big group of people gathered around an area cordoned off by police tape.  A line of people were shoulder to shoulder, on their hands and knees, creeping forward very slowly down the street.  I’m kind of embarrassed to admit that my first thought was that this was some kind of protest or hipster demonstration, but then I realized these people must be looking for something.  My thoughts quickly moved on to other things, and the whole police scene was gone by the time I was running back that way, so I didn’t think of it again…

…until yesterday, when I  read in the paper on the tube that the headless and limbless body of an EastEnders actress (EastEnders is a popular soap opera here) was found IN THE HACKNEY SECTION OF THE CANAL ON TUESDAY AFTER HAVING BEEN MISSING FOR A WEEK.  That is where I was.  Pretty sure that’s what the police scene was all about.  It is likely that I ran by her body somewhere.  Really freaked out.  So, so thankful I did not actually see it.  Ugh.  More classy times in East London.  

Excuses.

Hello friends/Mary (who may be the only one who reads this anymore—thank you, Mary) (unless Uncle Pat?  Are you there?  I drove successfully on the left!  I even parallel parked.). 

My excuses for not writing:

1. I went to visit Colleen in Dijon. 

Dijon was FABULOUS.  Colleen and I had such a nice time.  As at all quality O’Connor family gatherings, we planned our days around what/when/where we would eat.  I think we would both agree that this was a successful strategy.  Colleen is becoming a master French chef (toast+caramelized onions+goat cheese+honey=masterpiece). 

Besides, of course, catching up with Colleen and enjoying many meals and bottles of wine at her apartment, the highlight of the trip was definitely the wine tasting we went to in Beaune, a little town near Dijon.  The little old man who conducted the tasting was a total character.  He would say things like, “Black truffles are like a Latin lover, except they won’t get you pregnant.”  Or “To find a husband, you must have a good wine cellar.  If you do not, you will be alone.  My wife has a friend in her 60s—no prospects, no relations, no wine cellar.  She will end up alone.”  Or “Without wine, you cannot have Mass.   So we can thank the great Catholic Church for bringing wine to the world.”  The other two wine tasters were this nice French couple—the wife understood English, but the husband did not.  Luckily, our lovely host was able to conduct the wine tasting in both English and French, and even more luckily for me, he definitely loved showing off his English.  So while there was always someone who didn’t quite understand what was being said, it was more often the French dude than me. 

We didn’t have to pay anything for the wine tasting itself—it quickly became apparent that this guy just loves wine and telling people about wine and sharing it with them.  We tried 16 wines (6 whites, 8 reds, “the best sparkling wine in the world”, and another champagne—all from Burgundy) plus crème de cassis (a specialty of the Burgundy region).  He had us write down our impressions of the wine, and then he would tell us about each one.  My notes are pretty hilarious to look at (and get a little bit sloppier as we reach the mid-reds.)  “#1.  Tasty, white.”  But when our host started saying things like, “this wine brings you to a moss-covered forest after an autumn rain, and then you may get a hint of limestone,” Colleen and I suddenly understood the world of wine.  I was totally in that mossy forest.  Anything he said, we tasted.  And it was wonderful.

We spent four hours with this guy.  At the end, the French couple bought A TON of wine.  They must have spent hundreds of euros.  Probably just getting their week’s worth.  Colleen and I got a more modest two bottles each.  (I definitely bought the moss-covered-forest-after-rain wine.)  Our host was so sweet as we were leaving, telling us to come back and “bring your boyfriends and your next husbands!!”  Not sure how many lovers he thought we had, or if he thought we were already married…Anyways, he was the best.  I will certainly bring my husband there, although apparently I will have to put together a good wine cellar first, or else I’ll never have a husband to bring.

So Dijon was awesome.  Colleen showed me all the sights, which are marked by a trail of owls (!!!! owls everywhereeee) on the sidewalk.  Because of this famous owl carved into the side of the church there that everyone puts their left hand on it to make a wish as they pass, there is owl paraphernalia everywhere.  It was difficult for me to not buy every owl in sight...I may or may not have bought an owl stein…

I was super impressed with Colleen’s French!  You are good, girl.  I enjoyed being her mute, deer-in-the-headlights friend while she spoke to the people of Dijon.  When we went to the fruit and veggie market, Colleen was talking to the grocer, who at one point looked at me and then said what I knew meant, “She has no idea what’s going on, does she.”  Am I really that obvious…

Dijon=major thumbs up.  Thank you, Colleen!!

Next time, on Excuses For Not Writing, Claire, Ashley, and her cousin Ian risk their lives on a marathon road trip to Edinburgh.

The end of the episode.

Gibbs just got home and Fornell was wearing an apron and cooking dinner.  Gibbs just put his finger in the sauce and Fornell swatted his hand away.  Then Fornell made up a nice pretty dish of food for Gibbs.

GIBBS + FORNELL = CLAIRE + ASHLEY