11.16.17

Is this the strongest beer?

A short one, as is tradition upon arrival.  

We like a mad scramble to gather the final items, shove it in the car, and then beat the LA traffic.  It sets the right tone, so we decided not to mess with that stressful start.  

To the airport in plenty of time, only to find that our flight was delayed by 1.5 hours.  Just enough time to find and feed H1 one handfed bite of something she normally doesn’t find offensive but now that it is in an airport it is highly offense.  

We went with cheese pizza.  

In line I was accosted by a huge man who just wanted beer.  He asked me where I am from and then said I’m from Sweden!  He needed THE STRONGEST BEER and his options were Miller Lite, Budweiser, Coors Light, and Golden Road Brown Ale.  I said go with the brown and he was so pleased with me, I GOT A FREE PEN WITH HIS NAME, NUMBER, AND you won’t believe this guys - IT HAS A LIGHT TOO!  

H1 was fed cut bites of margherita pizza after telling us that she didn’t like sauce and gesticulating at us with a sidewise thumb.  I hand fed her half a pizza and she snapped out of her violent antisocial stance within moments.  

Once on the plane, three of us went to sleep pretty quickly.  S decided she would stay up and catch up on her stories and ended up sleeping not a wink.  While hunger is my beast I must keep at bay, S’s is sleep - but with a 1 hour cat nap, she perked up and when we landed she was ready to roll out.  

Toilet or train - choose your own adventure.

The delay of our first flight meant that our connection would be tight, but when the helpful security officer moved us to the quicker line that had a log jam of 10 guys in suits trying to go through the metal detector, that really added spice to the day.  

KEY MOMENT: I had H1’s undies in my pocket because she wanted to change back into them after wearing the safety diaper on the flight.  Going through my rigorous pat down, the security guy feels them, asks me do you have tissues in your pocket and well, I had to tell him no, I have my kid’s undies.  He made me ball them up in my hand, held away from my body, and then get swabbed for chemicals.  H1 found this all hilarious upon hearing about it.

Running to the gate, the girls couldn’t have walked slower even after telling them to pick it up!  It’s one of those inverse relationships where if you tell them nothing, they will run - no matter how crowded or dangerous - they will sprint.  Tell them to hurry up, they will walk like they have 100 pound packs and are 100 years old.

We made it to our gate, and 40 minutes later, touched down in Paris.  30 more in a taxi, and we are in the center of Paris, on the Left Bank, in the Latin Quarter.  The girls knew this was their place when they saw the spiral staircase to get to the door and the stairs immediately inside the room.  My knees also remembered Europe well.  

Around the corner from our hotel, we gorged on crepes - well, H2, S, and me did.  H1 was hand fed the meal with a squinched up face the entire time.  We walked down the street a bit to catch a glimpse of the Pantheon in the dark with some winter decorations up on the streets surrounding it...

But folks, it just wouldn’t be another episode of BATBG if there wasn’t ice cream.  After being badgered for the entire dinner about gelato, we hit Amorino and got…

ICE CREAM #1 !

And now, I write this dispatch from the Latin Quarter with heavy eyes - see you tomorrow fellow barbarians!