I’ll Be An Orphan For The Next Week

My parents are leaving today to fly to Seattle, Washington and from there are going on an Alaskan cruise. They will be gone for about 10 days, returning in the wee hours of May 29. Keep them in your prayers while they are gone – that they will have a safe trip and a fun time – it’s important to have fun – it is vacation after all.

They have lots of interesting experiences planned – glass blowing, visiting Captain Phil’s grave, going on a crab boat, going dog sledding. I’m anxious to hear all about it once they return. When my parents are both out of town I kind of feel like an orphan. I suppose there is some comfort in knowing they are a phone call away if something happens and when they are on vacation/out of town, I always have a slight sense of uneasiness until they return. So, maybe you should keep me in your prayers too – ha!

Speaking of vacation, my big trip to France is coming up in just eight weeks! Eight weeks! That is so hard to believe! I think I put my deposit down for this trip the first week of August last year; so, I will have been anticipating this big adventure for almost a whole year by the time I head out. The anticipation leading up to the trip has been a lot of fun and I can only imagine how amazing the trip itself will be. The sad part is that once I arrive the time will fly by and the next thing I know it will be time to come home. Hopefully I will make a lot of memories and have a lot of amazing experiences in my two weeks in France.

In a post I wrote a while back, I debated about switching hotels for my first night in town. The hotel where I had my reservation is about seven or eight miles outside of Lyon and the hotel where I had to meet my group the next day was closer to the airport. I debated for all this time about keeping my original hotel or changing to the one where I will be meeting my group on July 18 and just this week changed my hotel to the meeting location. I am a little apprehensive about being in Lyon by myself the first night – as far as finding a place to eat, etc. and felt I would be more comfortable at the other hotel where (hopefully) there will be other Americans from my group. With any luck, I will be able to meet a few of the people on that Sunday and eat dinner with them and get to know them a little bit before we start our big adventure the next day.

I will still have a room to myself and therefore be able to have some quiet time before I spend the next week rooming with a stranger and the week after that rooming with my snoring dad. I feel good about this decision and more at ease. I think I am getting more anxious in my old age! I booked through my travel agent, the lovely Elaine, and she was able to get me a better price than the touring company offered me so I was really pleased with that. It’s now only about $30 more than my original hotel and let me tell you $30 isn’t a drop in the bucket compared to what I’ve already spent, so I think I’m okay with it.

I can tell it’s getting close to time for the Tour de France just by the traffic that has come to my blog recently. Jim Brickman is still this week’s (and every week for that matter) number one read post, but the second place post usually varies from week to week. This week and last, the second most read post was “Dore Holte, Who Are You?” This is the post I wrote about Dore Holte, that crazy guy who runs along the cyclists during the mountain stages at the Tour De France. The Tour of California is on this week and I’ve been watching it in the afternoons when I get home. Yesterday towards the end of the stage I saw him running up the hill with moose antlers on his helmet. It absolutely made my day. So, I don’t know if folks are searching after seeing him at Tour of California or if they are getting anxious for le Tour and just doing searches on him, but nonetheless traffic has been high for my Dore Holte post. I sure hope that guy is in France come July because I have about a million questions for him. If you have a question for him too, then put it in the comments. If run into him while in France, I’m going to interview him for my blog – provided I can meet him without appearing like a stalker anyway.

My French lessons in the car continue and I’m going to have to cut back on the number of days I spend on each CD. I still have two more that I haven’t even listened to yet and want to do some reviewing as well. I still think the CD with the songs has worked best for me, but I figure that’s because I have a good retention rate of songs I learn. I should be able to get by with the little French I know while I am there. I’ll obviously let you know for sure once I put my language skills to use.

I suppose that’s all the news or non-news as it were for today. Hope everyone has a great Thursday!