Une de mes choses favorites!

Sundays are truly about my favorite day of the week (minus the fact that it preceeds Monday). This morning I slept in a bit and then forced myself to go for a run. It was a beautiful morning -- cloudless sky and a nice brisk temperature. I ran along the Seine and then found my way onto this little isle off of one of the bridges that ended up leading to the French Statue of Liberty! Unfornately, it was covered with empty beer bottles and other trash, but it was still quite a site (and yes, much smaller than ours...).

When I got back, Alain was watching the Australia-New Zealand rugby match, so I sat down and watched a few minutes with him. I really don't understand anything about rugby. At all. Except that it looks extremely intense, and I kept seeing guys walking off the field with blood streaming down their faces. Ick. I learned that the Coup du Monde for rugby lasts so long (over a month -- it started while I was in Biarritz, and the final match of France vs. New Zealand is next Sunday) is because it takes the players days to recooperate from a game. Doesn't that sound like fun?

Around 11:30, I went with Marilu to the marche -- which was wonderful. I think thus far, the market has been just about my favorite thing in Paris. It's so lively and full of the most amazing things I've ever seen. All of the produce is beautiful and fresh, and there are cheesemakers and boulangers and big stalls that have dozens of whole chickens roasting while they cook up pounds (excuse me, kilos) of potatoes in sauce pans as big as bass drums. And it smells just heavenly. Marilu took me first to the Portuguese stand where we bought a fresh half-loaf of my favorite Pain de Mais along with some crevette half-moon pastries and these little tarts filled with coconut (yum!!). It's great being able to try all of this Portuguese food along with the French stuff!

We continued on and she showed me all of her usual stops, and we got fresh fruits and vegetables and she bought some "pate" (pat-ay) for lunch (which I tried and actually liked! The one I ate was the pate du compagne and had apples mixed in to it). And we finished our tour with a stop by a florist where she bought a bouquet of roses and another of lilies -- and I now have a beautiful vase sitting on my dresser!

I spent the afternoon trying to be productive and getting my work done for the week! Which somewhat worked and somewhat didn't -- I'm currently still trying to be in the productive mode...and you can probably tell how well that's going. For dinner, Marilu cooked her delicious pasta with tomatoes and we had a wonderful dinner conversation about how animal noises are different in each language -- they couldn't get over what noise Americans say a rooster makes....and also talked about accents and Americans trying to speak French! It was lots of fun.

I should get back to finishing my theater paper for tomorrow! Yippee.

A tout a l'heure!