Return of the Queen

I'm baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaack (and not just a little excited about it)!

In 4.5 months la jeune fille Katrine will be heading back to France (Brittany, this time) to teach English for about 7 months. I am WAY excited, so much so that I've found it necessary to update by blog long before I set foot on a plane.

This time I'm going to bring a huge vat of oatmeal with me, since I learned on my first trip that oatmeal does not exist in France. I'm pretty sure I can't make it 7 months without oatmeal. Unfortunately, skim milk does not keep nearly so well as oatmeal, so I'm not going to be able to pull that off. Perhaps I'll make monthly trips to England to drink their milk. My figure skates are also coming with me, and I've already located a skating club in the area as well as checked to see what level of skating I would be in in France. Maybe I'll find an ice dance partner over there and we can compete for Azerbaijan or Kazakhstan or some other country with no skaters.

I'm also determined to get to Salzburg this time around, where I shall not be kept from dancing around and singing the entire soundtrack to The Sound of Music. All people willing to indulge me in this are welcome to come along. I'd love to see Denmark for my Scandinavian fix this time around, but my bank account is still recovering from that trip to Norway two years ago. I am not going back to Rome, because the rain scarred me for life. I will definitely get back to Provence, home of sunshine, warmth, the mistral, l'Institut, Mireille, and good hair days.

Update 5/2: According to the Chicago Tribune today, the exchange rate is currently $1.319 to a euro. I would be a very happy girl if it stayed like that--it never got below $1.42 or so when I was last there, and it got up to $1.60ish. My money is going to go a LOT further if this exchange rate keeps up.