Parle vous francais?

In the last 24 hours I have slowly and randomly realized what I forgot to pack. I went to CVS on the way to the airport to buy Claritin D which I then left in the car. Among some other forgotten items were my Paris guide book (Sorry Kate!), my rosaries for Medjugorje, oh yeah... and I FORGOT TO LEARN FRENCH!

I really did assume I would do fine knowing how to say "Parle vous anglais?" but it doesn't work when the answer is "no, madame." It's not so hard reading signs since French and Spanish share the same Latin roots and my Spanish reading skills are totally on point. I was able to scramble out enough French words and finger pointing to order 2 crepes with sugar and a bottle of water just outside of the Lourve this afternoon.

The Lourve was just a quick pit-stop in an introductory sight-seeing walk that my dad and I took today after trying to catch up on some much needed sleep. Starting at the Arc de Triomph, we headed down the Champs Elysees to the Lourve, crossed over the Seine to the Notre Dame cathedral where we sat in on the last half of a French-spoken service. By then, the crepes weren't enough to hold off our appetites, so we headed back to the hotel and ordered dinner in the room. Hooray for all the English-speaking staff who answered the in-room dining call. A gigantic BOOOO for the horrible exchange rate that causes that sandwich to be 28Euro. Even with a handy-dandy employee discount card a 14Euro sandwich is still $20.