Thanksgiving was perfectly delightful. I ended up having two Thanksgiving dinners! Laura's parents are in town, but her Dad had some other dinner engagement last night, so I had a vegetarian Thanksgiving dinner with Laura and her Mom. We had lentils, beets, potatoes, green beans, and a whole bunch of other stuff. Laura was a little sad because she had really wanted pumpkin pie, but they had not been able to fine canned pumpkin. The store "Thanksgiving" in the Marais was sold out of it.

The first dinner was around 6:00. Then I was invited to K's, where we had "un Thanksgiving europeen" with her French roommates G. and N., along with P, and V-M. Katie had not been able to find a turkey, so we ate "pintade," which is apparently guinea-fowl. It was good. We also had sweet potatoes (with orange and ginger, which I really liked), wild rice with almonds (P's family recipe), cornbread, and brussels sprouts with lardons. And for dessert, pumpkin pie! K. and P. had found canned pumpkin at a store called "The Real McCoy." The pumpkin pie led to a lengthy discussion about the French word for pumpkin, and what was the difference between "citrouille" and "potiron." Nicolas consulted a French-English dictionary that translated both words as pumpkin, but the French dictionary insisted that a "potiron" is bigger than a "citrouille." So there you go. The rest of the dinner conversation was a lot about Thanksgiving memories. It reminded me of another nice memory of Thanksgiving with Jesse's family--waltzing with Stefka while Jesse's uncle played the piano. And that made me really excited for my trip to Bulgaria with Jesse and Stefka, which is now only three weeks away.

I asked K if I could bring some pie home to Laura, who had gone to bed early because she had to be up this morning at 6:00 for a trip to Belgium with her parents. When I got home, she was awake. I told her I had pumpkin pie, and she got right up and ate it. I think it was 11:30, so it was even on the holiday itself.

I went to Amsterdam for the weekend. I left on Saturday and got back yesterday. I had ordered my train tickets online and they were supposed to be delivered to my house, but they never arrived. So I called SNCF earlier in the week, and they said, “Well, the tickets were mailed the day you ordered them.” And I said, “OK, but they never got here.” So I was told to go to the train station with my reservation number and my credit card the day of. I was not told that I would have to re-purchase tickets and wait a month to be reimbursed until I got to the train station on Saturday morning. The man at the train station started out being all superior and said that I should have just come to the train station to buy the tickets, since I live in Paris. After I made a big fuss about how inane the SNCF reimbursement issue was, he wanted to be friends. I guess my performance of indignation was French enough for him.

The impetus for the trip was that my friend Rich was visiting Amsterdam, along with his friend Michael. They were staying at the Golden Bear Hotel. Rich had gotten an international cell phone for the trip, which was smart of him. (I still haven’t bought a French cell phone, but I think such a purchase is very likely in the near future, possibly after my December travels in Eastern Europe.) I had some trouble getting a hold of Rich on Saturday, so I wandered around the city on my own for a while. I managed to call him on Sunday morning at 10:00. As he did not quite sound ready for the day, I said that I would call him back in the afternoon.

While I was walking around on Sunday morning, I passed the Bible Museum (Bijbels Museum) and decided to go in. I was very glad I did. The collection was fascinating, primarily because it was so eclectic. Inspired by one of the former owners of the house who had been obsessed with building a model of Solomon’s Temple, the museum houses several models of Solomon’s Temple, plus a model of the Tabernacle in Jerusalem that housed the Ark of the Covenant. There are also Egyptian artifacts that the owner had collected, to elucidate the time the Israelites spent in Egypt. When I was there, the museum was hosting an exhibition called “Rembrandt and the Bible,” with some eighty etchings of biblical and quasi-biblical scenes by Rembrandt. There is a garden with biblical plants, and a room by the garden with biblical scents. The basement houses a multimedia exploration of Bible publishing. My favorite aspect of this was a set of bookshelves designed to depict the Bible as a library. You could open some of the books and see images inside. The Plague of Frogs from Exodus had a whole bunch of little rubber frogs inside it. The story of Joseph from Genesis had a bright swath of amazing technicolor fabric. And the book marked “Creation” had a mirror inside, which was just too cute. What makes the collection eclectic is that they have also opted to show some of the features of these two canal houses, including two seventeenth-century kitchens and a number of eighteenth-century ceiling paintings of mythological figures, by Jacob de Wit.

When I got out of the Bible Museum, I met up with Rich and Michael for stir-fry at “Wok and Walk.” We decided to make our way south to the Heineken Brewery, because I had heard that the tour there was good. But on the way we ran into a parade. Now, while I was walking around in the morning I had noticed an unusual number of children dressed in festive attire, so I had deduced that it was some kind of holiday. It struck me as early for Saint Nicholas, but it was indeed the “Sinterklaas” parade. The strangest thing about the Sinterklaas parade was that the majority of participants were done up in colorful Renaissance costumes and blackface, portraying Sinterklaas’s problematic sidekick, Zwarte Piet (Black Pete). Apparently Zwarte Piet does much of the gift wrapping before he and Sinterklaas travel by boat from Spain, or perhaps Turkey, to the Netherlands. Upon their arrival, Zwarte Piet gives candy to good little boys and girls, but stuffs bad children into a sack to bring them back to Spain, or perhaps Turkey. Later that night in a gay bar we saw a fascinating music video called “Sinterklaasboot,” which I managed to find on youtube.

The parade ended shortly after we got there. So we proceeded to the Heineken Experience, which was pretty great. Michael kept pointing out that it was basically a two-hour Heineken commercial. But for ten euros, we got three beers and a fun tour. The highlight of the tour was the seeing the bottling process “through the eyes of a bottle,” which meant standing on a platform that moved and viewing one of those films that is designed to make you feel like you’re on the roller coaster. Or conveyer belt, as the case may be.

On Monday, I met up with Rich and Michael around noon, and we went out for some very tasty pancakes, followed by a trip to the Anne Frank House. I had not been excited about the Anne Frank House, because I thought it would be depressing. And it was depressing, but it was possibly the best-designed museum I have ever experienced.

By contrast, the Sex Museum (Venustempel) was a total mess. It could be much better organized. A lot of the exhibits are kitschy, which sometimes works really well and sometimes doesn’t. The kitschy Marilyn Monroe exhibit is interesting, and there is a silly “Sex through the Ages” exhibit, which we thought was a lot of fun. But the kitschy prostitution exhibit was just bad. Obviously the collection is heavy on kitsch and photographs because it’s geared toward stoned frat boys. There are some really interesting objects. If they would label them correctly and display them more effectively, they could do a better job of engaging historians of sexuality…and maybe teach the horny frat boys a thing or two along the way. It was definitely worth a visit. For three euros, it’s worth a visit even if you aren’t studying history of sexuality. Possibly more so if you aren’t.

For dinner on Monday we had an Indonesian Rice Table, which was really, really good. My train left around 1:00 Tuesday afternoon, so we had time for brunch and some shopping before I headed back. By the way, across the aisle from me on the train was a guy with a very large bag of pot. He rolled a joint on his tray table all the way through Belgium. No conductor said a word to him, and Customs didn’t stop him.

I arrived back to learn that the money I wired on Friday has not yet arrived in my French bank account. My French bank told me today that if it isn’t there tomorrow I should contact my American bank. But since tomorrow is a holiday in the US, I decided to call today. They were so patient and helpful and pleasant on the phone. To be fair, my French bank teller today was also very patient and very sympathetic.

I gave my presentation on Chapter 3 of The Politics of Friendship in seminar today. I was saying to Laura that if I had known we were only going to get to Chapter 3, I probably would have signed up for a later chapter. But it was kind of fun.

And now I have to write my paper for this conference in Poland next week. I am supposed to email it to the conference organizer by Friday morning. I am not sure that will happen.

Well, I turned in my ACLS application, so I feel good about that. If nothing else, at least I have a chapter to show my advisor. Onward to writing the paper for the conference in Poland!

Today I got my residency permit. The last hurdle was the medical visit, which consisted of sitting in the outer waiting room before being called to the inner waiting room. Then they call you into a room where you take your shirt off and wait for them to call you for the chest X-Ray. Running the chest X-Ray today were one male doctor and one female doctor, and they were having a blast. (I think they were mostly laughing at people's names and how incapable they were of pronouncing them.) So then you go back into the inner waiting room and wait for one of the other two doctors to read your X-Ray results and take your blood pressure. The doctor I had said, "Everything is fine, but you have a weight problem. You need to see a nutritionist." And I guess my reaction was not sufficiently grateful or excited or something, because she then said "You're going to have back problems and knee problems. You'll see." So she gave me the chest X-Ray to keep, but I left it on the table, and she brought it out to the waiting room to give to me. (I didn't leave it on purpose, but really, what am I going to do with this chest X-Ray?) And then I went down the hall to stand in line to get my carte de sejour.

There were two people in front of me. The woman giving out the cards got really angry with the first person in line because she had said, "Check the front and the back of the card to make sure everything is right." And I guess the girl did not check carefully enough for her taste, because she yelled at her to check it, and said a couple of words in English to drive her point home. So when she gave me my card I looked at it for a very long time and read my address aloud undermy breath before I told her it was OK. She was pleased with me.

I called STA Travel in Evanston about my return flight to Chicago the other day, and the person I spoke to was so nice. It really made me miss American customer service.

Now I'm really tired and I'll probably actually go to bed at a reasonable hour tonight.

Everyone I know in Paris has a cold. Our household is drinking lots of tea. I'm really glad my mother made me buy cold medicine at Happy Harry's Discount Drugs. Happy Harry's was recently bought by Walgreen's, so the "Premier Value" line of generic products were selling at severely reduced prices when I was in Delaware this summer.

I have been working on fellowship applications for next year. The one that is due on Wednesday requires a chapter. I have eleven good pages and nine bad pages written. The maximum they want to see is 25 pages, so I feel good about the possibility of finishing.

I have also done a lot of procrastinating. Last night Laura and I watched The Name of the Rose. I had read the novel but I don't think I've ever watched the movie before, at least not in one sitting. It was long, and more violent than I thought it would be. I was a little disappointed that they didn't really explain how the library is organized, which was my favorite part of the book. But I guess that might have been boring for most viewers.

Youtube is fabulous for procrastinating. I found the Reading Rainbow "Teamwork" dance number. I sent it to my friend Sheila first, but now I am linking it here to share the joy. I first saw the Reading Rainbow "Teamwork" musical number when I lived in Northampton with Dottie. It must have been around Thanksgiving, because I went to Sheila's for Thanksgiving dinner and I just would not stop singing the Teamwork song. Because really, isn't Thanksgiving all about teamwork? Teamwork to baste the turkey, teamwork to set the table, teamwork to wash the dishes, teamwork to play 500, teamwork to unload the Alaskan crab from the dry ice. Oh, now I'm conflating my Thanksgivings.

I've been a free agent for Thanksgiving for twelve years now, because I've lived far enough from my family (and had little enough money) that they don't expect me to come home. It's nice to spend Thanksgiving with other people's families. I have gotten lots of different things to eat, things like Tofurkey, Jell-O Pretzel Salad, flourless chocolate cake, and the aforementioned Alaskan crab legs. And I've experienced lots of fun digestive activities. I have fond memories of reading David Sedaris stories aloud with Sheila's family, playing cards with Laura's family, and sneaking cigarettes in the garage at the lake house with Leanne's father. Last year I spent the entire weekend hanging out with Laurie and Dave and their family--we went bowling, we had tapas, we saw Rent at the movie theatre, we played Pictionary.

The French don't celebrate Thanksgiving (they have subtler ways of memorializing colonization) , so I will be a little sad when next Thursday rolls around. Maybe we will plan to have our own renegade version.

Last night I went out to a bar called Planète Mars with Laura, Josh, Katie, and Gabi. We randomly met two of Josh’s friends who are art dealers. (Josh lived in Paris three years ago and is back until the end of this month. He attends our seminar.) Josh kept trying to persuade me and Laura to drink more and stay out until after the Metro stopped running. Even though it’s very difficult to convince me and Laura to continue drinking, somehow he managed to do so. The three of us stopped for a sandwich at this place where the two proprietors knew an awful lot about the recent elections in the U.S. After we ate, Josh got on the night bus and Laura started trying to hail a cab. This woman who was standing on the corner making no effort to flag down a cab got all pissed at us and said (in French) “I was ahead of you.” And we were like, “OK. Whatever.”

Today I had a phone call from my advisor (codename: The Belgian Waffle). He is locked out of his Northwestern email account because he didn't change his password in a timely fashion, so he hasn’t received any of the three emails I have sent him in the past month. It is a very good thing that I looked up his number in the “pages blanches” and left him a message yesterday. He asked me how I was liking Paris and he invited me to have lunch with him in a couple of weeks. He started out trying to think of places that would allow us to meet in the middle, but he clearly did not want to sacrifice cultural capital for geographical convenience. I told him that it would be really nice for me to discover a new part of Paris and that I would be happy to take the Metro to Oberkampf. He seemed really relieved that he wouldn’t have to slum it with me in the Latin Quarter. Seriously, it sounded like he wouldn’t want be caught dead there.

I told him I’m working on grant applications, and the ACLS deadline is coming up. He offered to read my proposal, even though it really all depends who is on the selection committee, and did I know who was on the selection committee? Because that’s really what matters. And he applied for one external grant and didn’t get it, but then he applied for an internal grant and got that one. And then he asked me if I was in touch with his other advisee, and could I send him the other advisee’s email address if I have it, or email the other advisee and ask him to get in touch with the Belgian Waffle?

He also advised me not to try to bring pot back from Amsterdam, which may be the single best piece of advice he has ever given me. Because I was totally planning to transport marijuana in a train across two international borders. Then he said, “If you must have it, you would be better off trying to send it through the mail.” A fountain of wisdom, this man.

At tonight's rehearsal for An Ideal Husband, the director and two of the actors decided that it would be brilliant for the butler to speak the stage directions that describe each character upon their entrance. So now I don't just stand there doing nothing the whole time...I stand there doing nothing most of the time, except at the very beginning when I describe the decor. And then I walk up to actors frozen in tableau and describe their faces, bodies, clothing, and personalities. It's Oscar Wilde meets Thornton Wilder!

I'm the only person who thinks my Wilde/Wilder joke is funny, aren't I?

My old professors keep showing up in Paris. It’s nice that they all want to see me, even though my advisor, who currently lives in Paris, doesn’t seem particularly interested. Last night J.D. was visiting, before heading to Angers to check up on Notre Dame's study abroad program there. The President of the Notre Dame Club of Paris had sent an email inviting everyone to meet her. He and I were the only two people who showed up. So I hung out with my prof and her 15-year-old son Nicky and the ND Club president. Poor Nicky had to sit through our conversation about the libertine novel and pornographic performances in eighteenth-century France, when he was clearly tired and just wanted to go to bed. And J.D. was so excited to talk to me about my dissertation because she is an eighteenth century specialist, too. The Club president kept saying ridiculous things about "Pollacks" in Dublin, and how he voted in Virginia by absentee ballot but he didn't know who either the Republican or the Democrat was, so he just voted for the Independent. It was kind of hilarious. But J.D. referred to me as a "distinguished alumnus" of the French department, and she kept telling me she was proud of me. So it was a good ego boost. It’s also kind of funny that she remembers me as being on top of things when I was a student of hers, when in fact she was constantly calling me out for being a slacker. Except for that one time when I wrote a paper for her and she called me at home to tell me her reaction to it. That was a little scary, because I got this voicemail that went, “Hi, Dan, this is Professor D. I just finished reading your paper and…(pause, pause, pause)…I loved it.” Also, I was her research assistant one summer and I showed up in the middle of the afternoon one day and was just like, “Yeah, I drank a lot last night so I didn’t feel like getting up this morning. But I have a key to the office, so I’ll just work until 8:00 tonight.” She and her secretary made fun of me for a long time over that one.

This event was at Corcoran’s Irish Pub, on rue Saint-André des Arts. I went up to the bar and asked for “un Gueen-NESS, s’il vous plaît,” pronouncing it like I thought a French person would, and the bartender said, “Oh, un GUIN-ness.” I can’t win.

Tuesday night was my first rehearsal for An Ideal Husband. I am going to be playing Mason, the butler. P. was not able to come to rehearsal, so it was just me and the French students. The director had us all recite English tongue twisters individually. I was clearly the best at that exercise, since I was the only native speaker of English in the room. I had been sort of hoping to pick up some French theatre vocabulary, like “cross downstage,” but I haven’t yet. I think either French theatre people are more plain-spoken, or this particular group is not well-versed in rehearsal language. (I'm leaning toward the former, because the French were never big into raked stages, which is where we get upstage and downstage in English.) The weirdest thing about this production is that no one has any idea where or when the performances are going to happen. It’s going to be sometime in March or April, and probably somewhere at the Ecole Normale Supérieure. But I had fun, and I liked everyone.

I went shopping at Franprix this week. I shop at the Franprix often. It is my second favorite store in my neighborhood, after Picard les Surgelés, the frozen food store that has inexpensive frozen gourmet meals. Franprix is a really cheap supermarket, where things are marked “Prix Choc!” (Shocking Price!). Laura and I have been especially enjoying the flavored ice-cream cones that come in a package of four for 99 centimes. So far we have tried Tiramisu, Cappucino, and 3 Chocolats. We are probably going to get Crème Brulée next. Sometimes there are crazy people shopping at the Franprix, but they don’t seem to be dangerous.

Tonight I went to see Samuel Beckett’s Oh, les beaux jours! (Happy Days), starring Catherine Samie of the Comédie-Française as Winnie. Winnie is buried up to her waist in dirt during Act I and up to her neck in Act II. I went with VS, and we ran into P. and K. there. I really enjoyed the show. The actress was fabulous, and the staging did a good job showing how Beckett’s minimalist project could work. There was a moment in the first act when Winnie picked up an umbrella and opened it and swung it around. Because there was so little movement in general, that moment was spellbinding. I’m much more familiar with the English text, which includes a lot of citations of British poetry. I only noticed one joke about using the classics to pass the time, so I’m guessing Beckett didn’t translate most of those references. The one other quibble I had was that I didn’t feel like Willie was a threatening presence at the end, My vague recollection is that the stage directions say he’s reaching for the gun at the end, but in this production he was reaching for Winnie in a tender way. Regardless, it’s nice to have a good Beckett experience to take away the painful memories of two looooooong student productions of Waiting for Godot when I was in college. Well, one and a half, since I left the second one at intermission. Because really, if you didn’t enjoy the first half of that play you know you’re not going to enjoy the second half.

Shall we go? Yes, let’s go. But we can’t go. Why not? Because we’re waiting for Godot. Oh.