Pacques.

As it has been established numerous times, France loves vacation and holidays. Now, starting tomorrow afternoon (Thursday) I am on vacation until Monday April 26th. Keeping this in mind, Easter was also this past Sunday, which merritted France yet another reason for vacation? Therefore, Monday was a holiday and France shut down as usual. I swear I have a job. So my usual three day weekend got transformed into a four day weekend. Not complaining.

My lovely friend Lisa, with whom I usually stay with in Montpellier, was moving out of her apartment this weekend, so we had two going away dinners at her place and packed up her room. It was another gorgeous weekend in Montpellier and spring had definitely arrived. By Easter Sunday, we were all ready for some celebrating. Katie hosted a lovely Easter brunch complete with decorated eggs, many egg dishes and an easter egg hunt. Everyone dressed for the occasion and the amount of color in her apartment (in terms of clothing) was disconcerting. Even yours truly wore a pink dress! (Later to be covered up in a long black sweater, a girl can only take so much color for so much time.)

Somehow, 8 o'clock rolled around and it was time to move on to Katie and Tom's apartment just down the road from the other Katie for a post Easter barbeque. After day light savings, it now stays very light out until 8:30pm, which allows us much more time to take advantage of the sunlight. The barbeque was great, but after about 12 hours of hardcore socializing, it was time sleep.

The next day was filled with planning. Planning for our vacation this weekend. Honestly, we just got back from vacation so we were all dreading the planning process again: plane tickets, hostals, itineraries, nights in airports, overnight buses, the whole nine yards. But finally, we sucked it up and booked all of our hostals and have almost booked all of our minor transportation routes. This weekend, I am going to Ibiza, Spain, for four days with Lisa to relax on the beach, Bratislava to meet up with Katie, then to Graz to visit our friend Susanna, then to Prague where I'll meet up with a friend from Hobart to visit Prague, Vienna and Paris. It's a loaded vacation to say the least. Then I'm back to Marvejols for four days, pack up all of my stuff, go down to Montpellier for a week and then it's back to the States!! I can't say I'm not excited...