Crème de la crème

EDITED [to add]: Despite all the raving below, I miss B more than I even enjoy being here. He is muh Boo.

I wish I had the time and talent enough to describe everything I have experienced since leaving Paris… as Mia says… AHHH-MAY-ZIIINNGG!

We got into Le Creusot around 9am on Monday morning and went directly to the technical center to begin testing. We had pre-tests scheduled for that entire day in order to determine various parameters for the formal and documented testing the rest of the week… very impressive facility and employees. We went to the Cafeteria (similar to K&W but with French cuisine) for lunch and experienced many faux pas during the meal. The day concluded at 5pm, and Jean Philippe gave us a quick tour of the town before dropping us at La Petite Verrerie.

Meghan and I walked up to a nearby restaurant (below).

We were unaware that they do not serve dinner until 7pm so we enjoyed an appertif (basically a two shots of cognac that you sip on) as we waited.



It is less expensive to order a “menu” (basically a combo) rather than an individual entrée. So I began with a French style chef salad with this spicy mustard tasting vinegarette, followed by a local fish plate, and concluding with crème brulee... over a bottle of wine from the burgundy area… AHHH-MAY-ZIIINNGG!

Tuesday was extremely stressful at work. I made numerous mistakes and felt like an ass. Not to mention we had a four course meal (with wine) for lunch, so I was tired and tipsy… which means the French got a little taste of Bitch Nasty Hannah. Ehhhh, needless to say I spent the rest of the day kissing ass after showing mine when I became overwhelmed.

Recap of lunch:
Salmon spread on toast
Salmon salad
Spanish fish dish
Assorted cheeses (holy cow… amazing)
Assorted fruits
Lots of wine

We were so filled from lunch that we didn’t even eat dinner that evening. We did get to drive to the top of a hill in order to see out over the city and Jean Philippe took us to his sister's bakery where I bought fabulous handmade chocolates (most made with liquor as well).








Wednesday testing went smoothly and I felt much better… despite all my screw ups the previous day. Lunch was had at a local Chinese restaurant where I put a bunch of vegatables, beef, chicken, and shrimp on a plate to be cooked in the Wok in front of me. As I began to eat the beef, my collegue, Eric, said, “You like the Kangaroo – you know the one that hop?” I thought it was all coming back up. We concluded for the day at 4pm so we could travel to Chalon St. Marcel (~30km east) to visit the INCREDIBLE AREVA plant located there. Our steam generators from the Salem outage were procured from AREVA Chalon. The town of Chalon was absolutely beautiful, and once again I had the best dinner of my life.








Foie Gras (some sort of liver), but tasty as long as I didn’t smell it as it went in my mouth

Saint Jacques (local fish)


Coconut milkshake, tiramisu, ice cream, and pie (best dessert I have ever eaten in my life)


All washed down with two bottles of local wine and an after dinner drink that tasted like drinking straight Jack.

Below is a picture of our friends and colleagues here... from the left, Jean Philippe, Tomas, Welty, and Eric. Notice Eric's man purse... they all have them, and they are adorable. I absolutely have loved my time with these guys. They are fabulous hosts.



Below are some of the other dishes served...

C'est la Vie

I made it to Paris… minus a train ticket, a scarf, my dinner, and two and a half precious hours. I suppose US Airways values all of the money AREVA puts into their company, so they gave me a personal phone call Saturday afternoon to let me know my flight was delayed two hours. Ehh, I have never had any luck when I am flying, so it was to be expected. I met Meghan in the Philadelphia airport (my arch nemesis... Philly, not Meghan :), had a couple beers, and was off to France. I had my window seat that I always request and my flying mate was a French girl who looked to be about 8, but spoke as though she was 15. The first thing she told her father across the aisle was, “She is not French.” I said, “No dear, not even close.” I tried offering her gum and striking a conversation, but all I got was a finger waved in my face… “no, no, no”. After an hour she was asleep, lying on my shoulder, and for some reason it really touched me.

About two hours into the flight, at approximately 1 am EST I thought I was going to lose my cookies. I started sweating and my saliva became extremely thick. I had to wake the poor child up in order to make it to the lavatory, only to have my legs feel like jello and fall to the ground. I sat in the lavatory for about 30 minutes before someone asked me to come out. It happened once more on the flight before I fell asleep until about 6 am EST. I have no idea what came over me… motion sickness? Something I ate? Ehhh….

While in the Charles de Gaulle airport I realized my train ticket for the next morning to Lyon and Le Creusot was on my refrigerator in Lynchburg, VA. I am a pure bred genius. I called the travel agency and they said there was nothing they could do until my local office opened at 8am EST on Monday… 2pm in France and six hours after my train was scheduled to leave. Ugh.

I didn’t let it stop me from hopping into a taxi and taking Paris by storm in the eight hours I had. Let’s see, it went a little something like this…

Arrive
Taxi
Espresso
Hotel Check in
Espresso
Notre Dame
Crepe
Espresso
Louvre
Espresso
Metro
Eiffel
Metro
Sacre-Coeur
Metro
Espresso
Escargot
Wine
Metro
Hotel
Internet
Sleep for 4.5 hours
Espresso
Breakfast (fabulous for continental)
Gare de Lyon
Scarf stolen
Can’t communicate with the billets office to explain I left my ticket… have to buy a new one.
Spend thirty minutes trying to determine which train is mine out of the thirty in front of me.
Get on FIRST CLASS. So nice.

Before I left we had a family weekend with Mags and Josh at the Bobcats game and setting off our rocket we got Josh...

Groove Weld

The weekend came and went faster than seems reasonable, but B and I thoroughly enjoyed our Valentine's Day.

Being the Diva I can be at various moments, I love to be picked up from work. I cannot explain it, I just do. So Billy took me to work and picked me up from work on Friday, and when he picked me up he had a fabulous collage of quotes on a homemade card for me in the glove compartment [he knew I would dive in there once I got in the car to grab my sunglasses]. He also included a smaller version for me to keep in my wallet, as I love to keep little tokens of joy in there. Later he took me to Vinny’s for dinner and we watched 13 Conversations About One Thing together (no good, btw).

Saturday we spent the day running errands, filing taxes, and he had an interview late that afternoon, so I set up a mini scavenger hunt for him. Saturday was a designated "H&B party night", so naturally he couldn't be wasteful and had to finish his beer first.

I took him on an adventure to the XXX store (toys), the gas station (white chocolate), the ABC store (passion fruit vodka, Jose, and Jim) and back home for a cookout with me. After each clue and at each stop, he went in and asked the person working, “Do you have anything for Billy Arrington?” Then the person would reach behind the counter and hand him a little bag of goodies.











It got a little cold outside once the sun went down, so we went inside for our own dance party!

We also went out for the third time in Lynchburg, and actually had a pretty good time. We chatted up a few ladies in the bar, laughed a lot, and went home. Ohh we also decided to turn each other's name into an acronym while we were enjoying the ABC store goodies.

Sunday was pretty lazy. We watched Vicki Christina Barcelona… highly recommend it!

We also received our wedding invitation from Joe and Andrea, and we CANNOT WAIT for the wedding. The night before the wedding we are all going to see Dave Matthews Band at the Verizon Amphitheater. Their beautiful invitation is below...

Why, you ask? HAAAQUET

the better part of what i said
was still in my head
but you thought you understood
how could you
when i had yet
to completely
speak

my mind

I can be so odd sometimes which is why I really love my Boo; not only does he tolerate my oddness… he celebrates it! [ohh, and he is rather odd too]

Anyway the latest in my Quest for Enlightenment & Tolerance [here forth HAAAQUET, pronounced HA-ket, Hannah Audrey Austin Arrington’s Quest for Enlightenment and Tolerance], has landed me in church every Sunday. This Sunday I will be attending the Beluah Baptist, and I will probably visit a different one until something sparks my interest. Billy suggested that we dress as a homeless couple and drink some wine before we go in order to have alcohol on our breath.

“Why,” you ask?

I have no clue either, but I let Billy’s ideas run wild and acknowledge them with a simple “Hmmm, that’s one idea.”

I am also taking piano lessons.

“Why,” you ask?

Yeah, I have no clue about that one either. I bought a keyboard off of Craigslist about a year and a half ago in order to start a band with my roommate, Ashley, who had bought a guitar. Neither of us had ever played either, but it was a good idea, trust me. After Ash taught herself how to play “Hey There Delilah” by Plain White T’s on her guitar and my keyboard was used for late night jam sessions, they have only managed to be useful in collecting dust. Therefore I thought lessons were now in order.

If Billy is anything outside of 100% man-licious, it would be resourceful. Last night we were making buffalo chicken wraps and barbeque chicken wraps for dinner. On the way home from swimming at the Y, I realized we didn’t have any barbeque sauce, so Billy stopped at KFC, ran inside, and returned to the car with about 8 barbeque sauce packets. He is something.



I am probably going to send him on a scavenger hunt to inappropriate places for V-day. I am excited about what he has up his sleeve for me.



Speaking of me...


The Nautilus



Continued Growth : Throughout its life, the Nautilus continually grows, adding new chambers, new dimensions to its life and structure

Adaptability : The Nautilus easily adjusts to extremes of pressure by changing the water and air pressure in its chambers and it can live at immense depths

Durability : The Nautilus has survived and thrived for millions of years in the face of profound changes in the world around it

Distinctiveness : Inside and out, the Nautilus presents an appearance all its own: outside, a creamy white shell and wavy brown lines; inside, a lining of mother-of-pearl

not for naught

It's so much easier to let people be themselves.

I mean, I have a hard enough time trying to make changes in myself. Why would I want to change another person?

I think many people are so accustomed to others wanting changes in them, that they hear it from EVERYone, even when it's not really there.

I don't want you to change. I never did. I love you as you are. You never scared me-- I was fascinated by you! You are the breath that brought me back to life.

Relax. Be yourself. Truly.

Joie de vivre

UPDATE: The [only] other young person in my group will now be going to France with me!

My supervisor came up to me this morning to ask me if I mind traveling to France alone because he was not sure how much help he could really provide since I have been the only person working on this. Since I originally wanted to go alone anyway, I was thrilled, gave him the peace sign and went on with my work. This got me thinking about the other woman and coincidentally young person in my group. She is an exceptional engineer AND she seems like a really cool person (I haven't been able to get to know her because we are both bogged down with work and she lives over an hour away). Anyway, so I approached my supervisor with my thoughts about her accompanying me on the trip, and 8 hours later.... SHE IS GOING WITH ME!

Our hotel appears to be right in the mix of things (just a few kilometers from the Louvre and the Eiffel right on the Seine), so I guess we will just hop on the Metro and see it all in one day.


Ibis Hotel (in Paris):

Our hotel in Le Creusot is in the two pictures below:

My mom will be here in two hours!!! We are going to go out to dinner on the river tonight at the Depot Grill or at this awesome tapas place DISH. Tomorrow we will probably hit the market and do some biking. Tomorrow night I am going to cook Parmigiana-Reggiano Fillet Mignon then we are going to go see a band at Cattle Annie's!!!

Il vaut mieux faire que dire.

We just returned from a fantastic weekend in Charlotte.

Recap...


Friday:


Met up with all of Theta Tau at Wild Wing Café


Went over to Manan and Tim’s for some Cranium


Thought a Grey Goose Celebration would be a good idea.

Saturday:


Decided Grey Goose would no longer be my alcoholic drink of choice.


Went to Maggie’s alumni game at Queen’s (she is freaking good… she amazes me)

Hit up Joe’s Engagement Party… FUN FUN FUN

Watched my first UFC fight and actually enjoyed it – outside of the cauliflower ears

Caught up with Tiff and met her friend Trena

Sunday:

B went to play golf so I worked on my presentation.

Started to bore the shit out of myself with my presentation so I googled The Office and Office Space quotes to make myself feel better

Went to my first formal Pi Gamma chapter Theta Tau meeting.

Presentation went pretty well.

Was very impressed with the leadership (per usual), not so impressed with the chair positions’ effort thus far (per usual).

Gathered Maggie, Billy, and Ice up to take them to Joe’s house for a Superbowl gathering.

Watched the new episode of The Office, gave it a B-.

Overall, I would say we had a great weekend!

In two weeks I head to France, my first time in Europe. My time will be filled with work but I am so excited to be going over there. Originally my manager was going to travel with me in order to coordinate global design meetings with his counterparts while I am performing the testing; however he could not work those out to coincide so my supervisor is traveling with me instead. He probably is one of the best engineers I have ever met – a true problem solver at heart and extremely innovative in doing so. Thus, I am extremely happy that he is going now.

Itinerary

Saturday, February 21st
17:50 Depart CLT for PHI
21:05 Depart PHI for CDG

Sunday, February 22nd
10 :25 Arrive in Paris, France - Charles de Gaulle International Airport
Take RER into Paris
Spend the night in the center of the city at the Ibis Hotel

Monday, February 23rd
TGV to Le Creusot (~ 3 hrs south by car, 1.5 by train)
Pre-testing for Mk-BW product at Technical Facility
Spend the night at the Hotel La Petite Verrerie

Tuesday, February 24th thru Friday, February, 27th
Testing

Saturday, February 28th
TGV to Paris
13:00 CDG to PHI
18:10 PHI to CLT

The last couple days I have spent “researching” (term used VERY loosely… googling would be more appropriate) the country. They are obviously the most energy independent country with almost 90% of their power coming from nuclear; however I was completely unaware of their top-notch healthcare system. Two of my top three policy issues are taken care of in France…. Hmmm, French classes here I come!

On the other side of things, I am a co-dependant mess. Okay, not exactly, but I feel bad leaving Billy in Lynchburg for more than a week while I put my mark in France. He is a strong, strong man, but I feel like I dragged him to Lynchburg and now I am leaving him here. I know it is silly, but I just feel bad. At least Valentine’s Day is the weekend before so I can spoil him and show him how much he means to me. I really need some ideas of special things I can do for him!

Mama Christi comes this weekend. I hope for it to be mostly relaxing with bike rides and city markets trips in between.