Happy Armistice Day, here in France. Happy Remembrance Day, there in Canada. Happy Veteran’s day, in America. Happy Whatever the Damn Day it is Where You Live today, November 11th, 2008.

So why such a congratulatory exclamation, you ask yourself? Well because it appears that I actually have a life, from time to time. How is this proven? Well I’ll tell you of course, because that’s what I do. I like to recount life experiences that shape me, metaphorically of course because if I put curves onto myself I think I’d become anorexic and.. well yeah.

I hosted a friend of mine last night here who wanted to visit the city and see a movie. He’s a really funny, energetic, football-playing, dreamy German boy named Kevin. He arrived late Monday afternoon after missing his train and having to take a bus into town. Speaking of Monday, it was basically a total flop. So many things went wrong that I wanted to start to drink as it was stressing my anal retentive ways out. Firstly I went to school unknowing that it was a holiday, and thus didn’t work, which messed up my plan to meet Kevin at the train station. The teachers at the other school were all in a fuss about the holiday, and then also I kept going to stores that would eventually be closed and thus hampering my ability to find things I needed. Bref.

Anyways he arrived at the train station, and as always there was the awkward “I’m not sure it’s you so I’m afraid to approach you” kind of tension, as I wasn’t sure if he had arrived on time in bus, and then also because I figured he would have a hard time recognising me since I was wearing my work clothes and looked quite posh. He found me, and off we were to get train times and see the city and get some food. Against better judgement on my part , we agreed to go home and I’d cook him something like pasta (God save us all). Why is this against my better judgement? Well for starters, I can’t cook very well, and secondly I knew that Johannes would be there. We arrived, and I started to cook and clean and then I eventually got dinner on the table and it wasn’t bad. I even got some compliments, so whoohoo with coming through on the clutch. For the first time I didn’t burn the cheese sauce, yuppie!

So we talked, and luckily since Johannes had some tutoring session to go to he was out of the flat for some hours. It gave us a lot of time to talk and just learn some stuff about each other and what we are doing in our lives. We are both a little bit philosophical, but he’s got at least 100 points on me in the “I am how I am, and if anyone doesn’t like it, then fuck them” category. I’m so heinously jealous of people like that. As I said, I care far too much about what other people think, and it’s truly a curse. Shortly thereafter, Johannes returned home and became once again omnipresent.

Attention please, momentary side-note coming… Don’t get me wrong, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Johannes is a very nice guy, but golly there are some very strange things about him. He’s omnipresent and when I say this I mean, seriously omnipresent that it’s creepy. He sort of just stands there without saying something, then says something that’s “funny” and chuckles to himself. What bothered me most about this? Because quite frankly I had a guest and since I’m a decent host I was totally monopolising the attention of the host, and then when someone else puts a damper on that I start to get a little catty. There are other reasons why it’s irritating, but it’s mostly just the omnipresentness. To be fair, whilst his family was here, I completely left them alone (due to familial and linguistic reasons), and I certainly didn’t hover and jump into conversations. End rant.

So Kevin and I had planned to go to the cinema to see the new James Bond Film, Quantum Solace which was playing at Pathé Lumières down in Saint-Pierre. I’m not a huge fan of action films, nor James Bond, but Kevin was super excited for it, so I got the show-times ahead of time and we eventually left to go watch it. This film was translated into French. That bothers me. I don’t want dubbed movies, they are tacky, they bother me, and although I’m in France I don’t need to see a bloody American film in French; if I want to see a French movie, I’d see a bloody French movie. Anyways, it was dubbed and that pisses me off, but it was a good film. There were some details that were quite implicit and I didn’t catch, cause it was in French, but I seemed to understand more than Kevin and the omnipresent-one. Oh yes, that’s right ladies and gentlemen, he weaseled his way into coming to the cinema, and of course I am too much a gentleman to say “fuck off” and forbear someone from joining us. I’m a bitch, yes it’s true. Needless to say I had to turn a deaf ear to the loud breathing noises coming from my cinema sitting parter, who I know and will remain nameless for the sake of not embarrassing, but then also had to neglect to smack someone’s arm for taking up too much space in the seat. I’m just saying, and I’ve already established that I’m a bitch.

Walking home in the rain made me bitter, and I made it known. Apparently I’m funny, but I seriously don’t try to be. Got home, and I offered hot cocoa to my guest who politely declined, but there again until 01.30 was the omnipresent one stalking and awkwardly standing there trying to weasel into conversation and not going away until I explicitly said “Time to go to bed, out you go; shew shew” I became increasingly disturbed by this.

The morning after I woke up at 08h00 as expected, did my “stuff” to get ready for the day and waited for the tired wanderer to awaken from his slumber in the sofa of the salon. It didn’t happen until nearly 11h00 and thus tardiness was set in motion from that moment. I cooked omelets for my guest and we had tea and such, omnipresent one hovering at all times. I actually was a total bitch and told him that I didn’t have enough eggs to make him one, but “thankfully” he doesn’t eat such. After eating a freakishly chocolated pastry that Kevin bought, I rushed him to the train station to catch his train home. I was so afraid that the omnipresent one would follow, but I would have snuffed him right away since he’s a slow walker and we were late. We arrived with fifteen minutess to spare, and I waited with him until we parted our separate ways for home. It was a lovely 24 hour period, dampened by certain members of the omnipresent awkward club.

Key highlights include walking home in the rain, sharing a broken umbrella, running to the train station, all French-communication, and seeing very fit half naked people prancing around my flat (clearly doesn’t include omnipresent one!!!) I think I did pretty well, and I just gotta say, when it comes to me hosting, I’ll fuckin’ clean up cause I’m fabulous like Brie Van de Kamp/Hodge from Desperate Housewives. I will explain how I’m anal-retentive in future entries.