another lovely day in france pour moi. nick had class at 8:45 this morning, so i was left to my own devices for a few hours. i had every good intention of getting up at 10 to go running along this beautiful path by a nearby river…but when the alarm went off i was still quite groggy, and the thought of putting on running shoes and shorts and heading out into the cold and walking over to the park just to go running and then walking back (or even running and walking back) just didn’t sound appealing. so it didn’t take much convincing by my body to keep me in bed and hitting the snooze button until 11:45.
at that point, i had to get up because nick was due back from class at 12:30 and we had plans for the afternoon that i needed to be ready for. so i got up, showered, and was eating breakfast and trying to understand french tv when he walked in. we ate some more, and on a totally unrelated note, i must say that i am in love with jam and cheese from la vache qui rit on fresh french bread! anyway.
we headed out through the city and north up a long hill. at the top was the domain de la marguerite, a site that has ruins from a village settled in the 2nd century b.c., and a great view of the mont st. victoire, which is a few kilometers north of aix. clouds obscured the highest point from view, but it was still impressive, and the view of the town below was beautiful. hopefully we’ll get a better view of the mountain on thursday, when we go to climb it.
nick had another ballet class at 4:05, so we came back to aix and i tagged along to watch. it was a bit strange to be sitting silently on the couch watching the ballet class but not being able to talk to any of them, but i still enjoyed it. there are some very good dancers in there, and nick has also gotten a lot better in the past 4 months. i think i’m going to go watch another class tomorrow night.
after class we picked up bread and potatoes and chicken and came back and made a very american dinner of fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and corn. nick’s friend melissa, another rotary scholar studying in aix, came over to eat with us. she is from louisiana and was really cool. thankfully, they made it an english-speaking night. 😉
finally, another shameless plug: be sure to check page du jour for today’s picture of nick and me and the mont st. victoire! the page even has a new web address–http://www.pagedujour.net.
