My night as a kitchen wench...

...went pretty smoothly.  I stayed til about midnight, mostly washing dishes.  My wish to stay in the kitchen was surprisingly respected, and the Mom even offered to let me go at 10 but I told her I could stay (since my plans did not ever actually happen, but I'll let her think that I'm just so darn generous).  The Boy was helping, and really excited to do so for some reason, so he would take plates out and bring me dirty dishes and I pretty much chilled by myself all night (which sounds bad, but is massively preferable to watching the kids or mingling with French people).  He even tried to marry me off to a 30 year old, pudgy family friend.  Successful night if I do say so myself.

Julien is apparently not talking to me, which has its pros and cons, the pro primarily being that if he doesn't ever talk to me again I will have saved about 70 euros by not having to buy his Christmas gift, the cons including but not limited to the fact that after Connie leaves he his 50% of my friendship base in Paris.

Speaking of Christmas, though, I'm starting to get a bit depressed about it.  Paris is really pretty, they get really into it here, but everyone is going home except me.  This will be my first Christmas without my family, and all my friends are leaving town.  I've considered making a little tissue paper Christmas tree on my wall (or maybe adopting some sad little sapling, Charlie Brown style) and wrapping empty boxes to look like presents, but I wonder if that would just make me even more depressed.  And to top it all off, there is no such thing as a Starbucks Peppermint Mocha in Paris, and my "Chocolate Viennois avec un shot d'espresso" is disappointingly nothing like a Chocolate Truffle.  Instead my favorite boissons chaudes de Noël have been replaced by the over-sweetened and under-caffeinated Mocha Praliné and Latte Noisette Caramel.  The French like their holiday hazelnut, apparently.

Lies.