And Finally, the Tour

Finally, after a week of delaying, I got my place in decent enough order to post some pictures without (too much) embarassment. But before we get to the peep show (and there is a money shot, so to speak), here's a quick summary of the day:

Since I no longer had any fixed meetings to attend, I let myself sleep in a little bit wednesday morning, and then dragged my ass over to the Centre to be productive. I caught up a bit on some blogging, did a non-insignificant amount of dépannage (trans. "un-breaking" or "repair"), and helped a professor with some rather involved A/V work for her language class. It was one of the more uneventful days I've had, but certainly not light. I think I got out of there around 6.00pm.

I took advantage of the remaining sunlight to make a quick run to the nearest supermarket (named without irony Champion) and got some more basic stuff (e.g., milk and water) as well as some housekeeping and toiletry items I needed. For the small handful of things I needed, it seems like hardly worth the trouble to wait in line when I saw the mess and the cashiers. Apparently, EVERYONE does their shopping on Wednesday, or some such. Thankfully, there was a guy in front of me in line with a fantastic butt, and that gave me the courage to wait in line to buy my stuff.

After all of that, I pretty much got home and started working on blog stuff and took care of some email housekeeping that I had neglected while Val was in town with me. I also made some spaghettoni aglio e olio with shallots, but it wasn't my best effort. After all of that uneventfulness, here's the photos I finally took of my place. The first (left) is a shot from the entrance to my apartment. Roomy, no? Well, I didn't have any illusions going into this. Any place described as a "studio" by European standards is going to be small. On the upside, I do have my own bathroom and kitchenette, which is a step higher than a lot of residences.

Here's one side of my closet......and here's the other! I'm actually pretty happy with the closet space. After buying the necessary clothes hangers (cintres in French), I managed to get all my stuff in there with a fair bit of extra room. Note that there's a big empty space up top. I'm thinking of getting some cheap IKEA storage boxes to make better use of that area.

Voilà my desk / table. It's not very easy to see, but about 2/3 of that is a desk area, and 1/3 is a little detachable table, that you can pull away for some attempt at proper dinner seating. It's actually a rather well-designed table, with a small shelf that runs the entire underside of both tables for little things like unused computer cables, sunglasses, and even my laptop, if I needed the table space.

Ah, the kitchenette. This is probably the least pleasing aspect of it all, although I'm just relieved that I didn't have to share my foodspace with anyone else. There's a small fridge underneath the counter, as well as a cupboard. I suppose that the cupboard should be for storing dry goods and the shelf above the kitchen would be for plates, but I need my foodstuffs close at hand when cooking. Besides, all I have for table/cookware is a melamine plate, a melamine bowl, a glass, several forks, one spoon, no knives, one chef's knife, a wooden spoon, a saucepan, and a couple of small frying pans. Also, please note that the stove is ELECTRIC. I did not come all the way out here to cook on an electric !@#$ing stove. OK, enough venting. I feel strongly about food preparation.

Here's the bathroom. It's small, but it's mine and I have no complaints.

And, finally, my bed! The mattress is some cheap kind of foam, but it works. Mind you, it's a far sight from the sweet queen-size box-spring mattress I left with Shayna back in Chicago. Shayna, don't forget that I get that back when I return!!

So, after all of that, I sit down to start typing this up, and what do I see? Ta Daaa! A praying mantis! I won't sleep alone tonight, after all! I decided to grant the little guy clemency from my "you trespass, you die" rule for bugs, and let him conduct his Dance of Bug Death with the lightbulb. This was probably because by then I had already opened a bottle of wine and had two large glasses, so I was feeling pretty good about the world.