Back to our regularly scheduled programing

I've got some catching up to do, eh?

Well here's what you all missed while I've been away:

Home for the holidays!
Yes, after I finished my teaching contract in Korea, I spent a glorious 2 months back home in sunny Florida visiting my family. It was the first time I've been home and not been scrambling to find summer employment and can I just say: how relaxing! In celebration of this, I've decided to never seek seasonal work again, ever. It's so much better to seek seasonal relaxation, don't you think? We celebrated my favorite food holiday, Thanksgiving, and exchanged Christmas gifts a month later. I drank delicious American beer and ate popcorn with my mother daily. Heaven. Here are some highlights:

Me and the Sibs at the beach! I love Florida in the winter!

"Gemblo" the family game of strategically placed glittering bacteria 

No explanation needed?

Dad made everyone new tie-dye for Christmas!

Fáilte go hÉireann
In January I left the homeland to visit my girlfriend in Ireland. There we did important Irish things like visiting the Guinness Factory in Dublin and walking in muddy rain boots through green fields of sheep. Also this other important thing known as Meeting the Girlfriend's Parents. Of course, her family was so warm and welcoming and we drank a lot of tea while discussing the weather!

The Guinness factory was a little pricey but totally worth it for the panoramic view of the city at the end of the tour. (Of course, I'm showing you the beer, not the view. The beer is still important! 

We drove around the Ring of Kerry one day and stopped frequently in tiny towns for refreshments and leg-stretching.

Cobh [pronounced "cove"], a small southern coastal town near Cork. Historically it has been visited by many great ships, including the Titanic!

More of the Ring of Kerry. It was winter when I was there but still so green!

And of course, we took advantage of some traditional Irish pizza. This one had full strips of bacon, none of that bacon bits crap.

Famille Francaise et al
In February I traveled to France to visit a few friends and my French host-family from '04-05! It felt strange and familiar to be back in the land of cheese and wine. I loved catching up with friends from college and gorging myself on Parisian pastries and chocolate. I spent a week visiting my host parents and, as luck would have it, two of my host-brothers had just come back from living abroad. Barni has been living in South Africa and is dating an Italian girl, and Coco was back from Mexico and skyping his Mexican sweetheart every night! Foreign girlfriends are clearly a trend! My host dad has finally retired an my host sister had a baby soon after I left! What a lot of big adventures, eh?  We did a lot of sightseeing while I was in Paris, as my host-mom says I'm her "excuse" to be a tourist.

Astou was a glorious hostess while I was in Rouen. Highlights included stealing sand from a construction site through a fence with a spoon taped to a pole, and befriending French cats. 

Chantal and me at La Piscine, an old pool turned into a museum near Lille.

View from the top of the Musée d'Orsay, which I finally visited this time! I loved it. We arrived early one Sunday morning only to discover that the first Sunday of every month is free! What luck!

Chantal and Coco in a Brasserie in Lille. We treated ourselves after a morning spent hauling Coco's furniture down 6 flights of stairs and over to his new apartment. 

Visiting with a very pregnant Célestine, who recently gave birth to a beautiful baby boy, Ulysse. It was freezing and we weren't allowed into the park of the Château de Versailles (they were afraid of people falling into the pond) but we snapped a pic outside.

Another great thing that happened was a little mini-reunion of my old friends from my French high school when I lived there. They have barely kept in touch with each other but one of them came in 3 hours from out of town to have coffee with us. The more people I meet the more difficult it is to keep in touch with everyone, but then there are moments like this, where we come together after 7 years and It's as if nothing's changed. We spent the afternoon laughing and chatting about nothing and everything and what started as an early afternoon coffee morphed into a whole evening together. And the most amazing part? We hardly talked about high school at all! Contrary to my fears, our friendship has grown and matured as we have and it is no longer confined to a specific year in a specific milieu. How cool!

Can you guess where I am now?