Today my transit pass stopped working. I was really confused because had bought it for the month, but apparently the 31st doesn’t count. I looked at reloading it but the smallest amount I could put on was one week at that was €40! what the heck France? The whole month was only €110! Well. I’m way too cheap for that sort of extravagance, so I decided to walk to the Musee d’Orsay. Despite being the coldest day I’ve seen this month, I’m still happy I took the long way to the museum so I could enjoy the streets of Paris one last time. The walk took me through les Jardins des Tuileries:

To the Seine:

Where I always stop to admire the locks on the bridges, and wonder about the people that put them there..

I arrived at my destination, where admission was FREE for Tuesday! It meant waiting in line for an hour to get in, but since it was my last day I sucked it up. In line, befriended two guys traveling from the USA. One knew a lot about art, and that helped me enjoy the museum more than I would alone. Unfortunately, you can’t take photos inside so I don’t have anything to share but it was pretty cool.

Look at those trees bend in the wind! Brrr.

After the museum, I went back to my apartment and finished packing my things. I showered, grabbed dinner, and the manager came by to return my damage deposit (€500! How happy am I to see that?). My stuff is packed and ready to go, and I think I am too, even if the only thing that’s allowing me to leave is the promise to myself that I’ll be back soon. Maybe I can find a way to visit D next year? Maybe I’ll eventually pursue my silly dream of being a single mother in Paris ;) Almost all of tomorrow will be spent on a plane, and almost of the time I’ll be annoyed because I feel like the flight home always seems 10,000x longer than the one going to my destination of travel. By the time I’m 1 or 2 hours from Edmonton every minute feels like an eternity.

At least I bought a box of macarons for the trip.

(Note: not sure why photos are coming up sideways; stupid wordpress app. Something to fix when I get home!)

I spent at least three hours in the cafe on Sunday. As usual every other place was closed, so I took the opportunity to fight with my resume. Besides, there were pancakes.

My resume needed an update. It hasn’t been touched in over a year and frankly, it just looked bad. The design was poor and it read like a list of foursquare check-ins for my life: “department of chemistry, May 2007″. After reading some resume tips in books and online, I made some improvements. I’m going home to my part-time job, and while I can live on that income, I’d like to have more ;) I’m looking for a full-time position within the company, but I would consider one outside as well. Or maybe full-time where I’m at plus a second part-time job on top. I know I said I wouldn’t do that because I got so burnt out with graduate school + a job, but I’m starting to think I’d really like to shake those student loans sooner than later. Unfortunately, what I owe is a huge reason why I even have to return home and continue working. If I was totally debt free, I could live on my savings and continue traveling for… Well, probably a whole year.

Of course I’d be broke at the end of it though, which would kind of suck.

Monday I went to the Louvre, mostly because I had become convinced that Charmaine would end our friendship if I didn’t become cultured. I stomped my way through like a child dragged against their will. There was beautiful and historical things:

I wanted to avoid the Mona Lisa, but I accidentally stumbled upon it:

Now, I know everyone says it’s not worth the hype, but it kind of was for me. Which just goes to show how weird I am since I didn’t even want to be in the Louvre in the first place.

I did eventually find something I liked though: there was an exhibit devoted to the history of the museum. It was awesome! They had a collection of original drawings for the design and profiles of all the influential people that built or visited the museum. It was really cool. I think the Louvre itself was far more interesting than the works it contained. I only saw a fraction of the content of the museum, and I felt it was overwhelming. Every painting and sculpture is interesting, but there’s 53875823781 of them assaulting your vision at once.

I went here…

And also saw two of these..

And pondered the oddity of shoving a mall up against historical museum. I love Starbucks, but it felt so ridiculous after Botticelli and Rembrandt. Can you imagine the Louvre 100 years from now? Maybe they’ll incorporate the consumerism into an exhibition of its own, leaving the shops where they are and giving tours, “after seeing the Mona Lisa, Americans found it necessary to reconnect themselves within their commercialized society by flocking to the franchises they all hold most dear…”

I treated myself to vegetarian pizza and called it a day.

I am so glad I am not in Spain. Or Germany or Italy or anywhere where I wouldn’t be able to communicate or understand what’s being said to me. Today I had to see a doctor, and my language skills — horrid québécois accent and all — saved me a whole lot of anguish in what was already a distressing situation.

I went to the pharmacy nearest my house and asked for directions to a physicians office. I asked if they knew any doctors nearby that spoke English, but alas, because it was a Saturday afternoon it would have been more trouble than it was worth. I was sent to a French doctor, who’s office was separated from the front door of my apartment by a single restaurant. Yes, I had walked by a doctor’s office every day for nearly a month and had no idea, because they don’t look like clinics at all here, they just look like residences. I asked the pharmacists if I could use their phone to call to make an appointment with the doctor, and they said I didn’t need one.

So that was pretty weird.

I walked to the doctor’s office, rang the buzzer and he let me into the building. I was ushered into the plainest waiting room I’ve ever seen, completely devoid of pamphlets on healthy eating and STD statistics, with only a stereo playing classical musical quietly in the corner. There was no one else there. No one. No old men coughing their phlegm and pneumonia all over everyone else. No children screaming about an earache. N o o n e.

The doctor asked if I had an appointment, I said no and he told me I had to wait. I settled into my chair ready for the mandatory 2 to 4 hour silent battle against my own malady until a physician was available. He told me he’d be ready in 10 minutes.

What?

I just wandered in to a doctor’s office without appointment, and thirty minutes later I was out with a prescription and a form to submit to my university health plan (my travel insurance is still through them) or government of Canada or whoever is going to reimburse me €50. My prescription was only €16 when I returned to the pharmacy, so the day cost me about $100 Canadian but it was so gloriously painless I would have paid double or triple that — which is exactly how I knew I was really sick: I’m way too cheap to shell out cash if I can conquer an illness at home.

So I spent all of yesterday and most of today fighting off a fever and watching MTV. Maybe not the most exciting or pleasant days of my trip, but I wasn’t at all unhappy. If anything I was grateful to have an apartment alone and no obligations whatsoever. Not having to call into work or worry about missed classes is a blessing when you feel like crap.

I think I’ve been on vacation too long because it’s starting to dissolve into normal life. If I blogged for a living it would be like I wasn’t on holiday at all ;)