Kitty in my bed, flowers on my doorstep

This weekend, my host family's daugter(L) came to visit with her husband(B) and two children. I wasn't expecting them to arrive until Saturday but their car was sitting in the drive when I returned late Friday night. I ran into the daugther and caught a glimpse of her husband when I got up in the morning. Later that day I found this little fella in my bed:

Well actually its a girl named Lilu, she belongs to L&B. She was a sweetheart but a bit of an attention hog. We were invited to dine with my host family that night. We went down a little before eight to sit, talk, and drink champagne. We met the little ones V and M. V the yougest child resembled a cherob and is an American, M was very shy but would offer us some snacks without speaking and hide behind her dad. L&B lived in New york for three years and we were informed they loved Americans. B had a lot of questions for us like what we liked about France, what we missed and if we drank beer. He said something like:  J'aime "Blue Moon" mais on ne peut pas le trouver en France ( I like blue moon but you can't find it in France), and the middle of dinner put on the strokes (If you know me well, you know I saw the Strokes at age 14 and have loved Fabrizzo ever since). We had north African cuisine that consisted of couscous, vegetables, chicken, lamb, and spice with red wine and cheese plate of course. Followed by dessert with Pyrenees, hazelnut, and rum infused dried cranberries and golden raisins. It was extremely tasty and everyone was really nice.

So yesterday was Valentines day. While my American friends and I were missing our american valentine's day traditions and celebrations, a kind friend left some tulips on the doorstep for my housemate and I. They are very pretty and made my day.

List of things learned continued:

14. I don't know how I left this out but you usually have to pay for public bathrooms, 20 centimes. If you're a lady this is not worth it at all, unless you  are about to pee all over yourself but even then I am not sure. The toilettes, if you can even call them that are awful.

15. I haven't really found that many inexpensive things besides bread. Make up, even our cheap brands are outrageous, a tube of rimmel mascara will run you about 15 euros.

16. When receiving change the cashier doesn't want to touch you! haha, they usually want  to place the change down on the counter and let you struggle to pick it up instead of placing it in your hand. I'm not sure what this is about because I know those centimes have more germs than I do.

17. I haven't learned what french cheeses I like besides the ones I ate in the states. All the types I've tried have been unsatisfactory or smelled like a toilet bowl.

18. The French should learn how to use goat cheese (chevre) and sometimes mustard(spicy brown) in moderation.

19. Sauce blanche is  ranch, and all the Kebab sellers think it is the best thing ever.

20. A majority of the food here is sweet or sweeter than what we have in U.S. Ketchup is one, toothpaste?, soda, chips and fries are less salty. Vending machines contain two types of chips the rest is candy, cookies, brownies, pastries, etc.

21. Valentine's day is not as commercialized as it is in America.