I'm gettin' excited!

O.K. I'm getting sooooo excited.My trip is near. I just realized that this is the first time in 11 years that I will be off work for a month! A MONTH.When I think about being in Europe and not working for a month I start drooling, I can't help it. It's a natural reflex, like when your picking your face. I'll be able to wake up when I want, eat what I want, and do and see what I want.What a friggin concept. This is simply an exercise in kindness towards myself, how fantastic is that. The ol' pat yourself on the back European voyage. I'm looking for a slower kinder world, what about you? I think most people cram everyday of their vacation with things to do and I intend to....Kick Back and float.I have been taken over by a huge force.. French... I'm obsessed. I really should have been a spy. You know how they have to travel and blend in, knowing everything about a country it's customs, language etc.I am perfect for this, I throw myself into things and beat them til they whimper and die. How do you think I got the name Slamma, I slamm things....done! My Brother in law was sent to the Monterey language school and crammed with German to eaves drop on telephone calls.....I could do that. I'm obsessed with learning French! Hey I'm a mature, chubby woman, who would think I was a spy? I could getaway with so much, contraband to Bolivia, confidential data chips to Moscow, a quiet delivery some where in Bulgaria at dawn. I'm so undercover! No one would be looking for a chubby blonde/grey ! I wouldn't be able to tell anyone what I do for a living. I'd get strange calls at 3 am and then leave the house. There would be mud, exotic mud, from somewhere in the congo on my flip flops. Why doesn't the CIA just call me, I'm perfectfor this. I know how to make a great pot of stew, can sew a micro chip into my hem and diffuse a bomb. Back to my French. C'est tres difficile! I am studying 2-3 hours in the morning and 2 hours ce soir.I accomplished a 480 page workbook in about 2 1/2 weeks. God when will I get this. My mind is not accustomed to different languages, it's an American mind.....we don't have neighbors like Europe that cross over. Well, O.K> Mexico. My neighbor said "why don't you learn Spanish, you'll be in Spain" Ugh I hate Spanish, I want to learn a romantic language....I'm from Southern Cal...I hear Spanish all the time...I'm looking for exotic spy language here! So I went on a French Forum and met a really nice french girl named Gaelle, she wants help with her English, and I definitely need help with my French. So we are corresponding. She's really smart, I can just tell, I feel dumb when I write her, even though she says my writing is good. She did say she could understand what I was saying.....I felt as though I might be asking her for glue for my pasta, socks for the frog, and was there a rat in her purse... or something brilliant like that. Well, they do say that as you get older you need to use your brain, so you don't shrivel in the mind. It really helps me Gaelle, you are too patient avec moi! I am in count down mode now...My trip is 37 days....just to say it makes me salivate...Au revoir...