Pimping a Mercedes in Normandy

We decided to rent a car and go on a little trip to Normandy this past weekend, and by that I mean rent a Mercedes and drive for about 1000 km. The Mercedes part was not my choice- if I'd had my way, the rental car woman would have given me an old Ford tempo with a broken back door like I used to have, because I was pretty nervous about taking on France by road. I have become quite the city girl in the past 9 months and the thought of driving around ROUND POINTS and driving the highways in KM and not MILES freaked me out a little.

Picking the car up went fine and I was driving through Paris to get back to my apartment to pick the girls up when I somehow ended up on a street from which it was NOT possible to make a left. I'd missed the Rue de Rivoli and was headed north, convinced that I wouldn't be able to go left until I hit Brussels, when Reamur-Sebastopol swooped in and saved the day. We piled in and drove up to the Normandy coast, stopping at the D-Day beaches, Mont St. Michel, and the Bayeux Tapestry, paying French highway tolls all along the way.

The only other glitch to the weekend was the fact that I seem to be going blind. We had only gone about 15km when I realized that I have to squint to see the signs in the distance. This is very upsetting news for me because I have always prided myself on being the only one in our family who doesn't need lenses to distinguish shadows and now I am just like everyone else. I can't help but think that getting glasses this summer is only the first step in an aging process that begins with the eyes in July and ends with having a hip replacement before coming back to France at the end of August.


On our way back to Paris, we stopped in Rouen for lunch. I can honestly say that I don't know why everyone on the face of the planet isn't falling over themselves to move to this city. We loved it, so much so that Kate mentioned wanting to live in France after her 2 1/2-year stint in Togo and that was a fun moment during lunch because my Mom's eyes almost fell out of their sockets and into her big salad as she said "WHEN ARE YOU GOING TO START YOUR LIFE???"

We've got a couple more days together before they go back to their respective continents and then I've got a two-day break before Goldfest and the Sunshine Band '07 bust in. And June just keeps on rollin...