Day of Rest-Day 89-April 8th, 2018

I woke up around 8 AM today and my first task of the day was going to the doctor’s office. I felt a bit better, but had a slight headache. Waking up this morning kind of felt like waking up with a hang over. I got changed and ate my breakfast. I decided to skip the coffee this morning, since the caffeine wouldn’t help my headache.

Right before I headed out, Andre asked me if I was going to the doctor now. After some confusing French conversation, I figured out he was offering to drive me there. I couldn’t say no to that. We headed to the garage and into the car. I told him the address and the nearest tram station. The only issue was that the road the doctor’s office is on, is only for the trains and not cars.

Additionally, Andre was not familiar with the street names. I had to give him directions, which is a difficult task when you don’t know the French verb for turn. I was trying to tell him to turn left by the BU office, but he thought I wanted to go there. He said we must go to the doctor’s office. It was a very confusing ordeal and I just told him a random street corner was the office. He dropped me off, I said thanks, then walked the five minutes to where the doctor’s office actually was.

When I got the office, they had me fill out a bunch of information and then I went to the waiting room. The receptionist didn’t have great English, but I used a mix of French and English to get my point across. Plus, I’m sure the doctor would have good English.

After a ten minute wait, I got called into the doctor’s office. I was surprised to learn that the doctor’s level of English was similar to the receptionist. Fortunately, I had came prepared for this situation and memorized how to explain my fall and some of my symptoms in French. I was trying to explain that I felt like vomiting, but she didn’t understand the word. I had to pantomime the act of vomiting, then she understood. It was pretty funny. She made do the basic checkup tests afterwards like taking my blood pressure and walking in a straight line.

This went on for about twenty minutes, then she told me that I was fine. She gave me a symptoms list and told me to come back if I experienced any of them. This mainly included intense headaches and vomiting. She never outright told me I did not get a concussion, but I can assume I didn’t.

My symptoms list she gave me, in French of course

On my walk home from the doctor, I stopped at Monoprix since they are open until 1 on Sundays. I mainly needed to get tissues, but I decided to treat myself and get a jar of peanut butter. Fortunately they had Skippy.

This was the largest size they had

Once I got back home, I told Anne-Marie and Andre what the doctor said. I then proceeded to spend the next six hours doing absolutely nothing. I watched two episodes of White Collar and two episodes of the Sopranos. The doctor did say I needed to rest up, I was just following medical orders.

At some point during this, I made myself a delicious peanut butter and jelly sandwich for lunch. Anne-Marie saw me grabbing an apple from the fridge and gave me a piece of cake to have with lunch. I am really loving this special treatment from A-M and Andre. I need to hit my head skiing more often.

The Cake

A few more tv shows later, it was dinner time. I made myself the usual meal of sausage and rice, and it hit the spot as always. I want to experiment with adding beans next week in an attempt to make red beans and rice. While I was eating, I made plans to see the film Ready Player One with Nick and Harry later.

After I had cleaned up my dinner, it was nearly time for the movie, so I headed out. Harry and Nick beat me to the theater and we bought our tickets. I had read the book the movie was based on, so I was pretty excited for the film.

The movie ended up being great and I enjoyed a lot. It differed a bit from the book, but I thought the creative liberties taken were justified. There were also a bunch of Back to the Future references in the film, which was a plus in my book.

For most American films playing in France, they usually have one showtime in English a day with French subtitles. The highlight of these films in English are that some of the jokes don’t always translate well into French. There was one joke in the film that Harry, Nick and I were dying at. We were the only ones laughing in the theater, so I figured the joke didn’t make sense in French. I’ve had similar moments in the theater when I saw Black Panther.

After the film, I parted ways with my friends and headed home. I took some time to type up this blog post and called it a night. It was nice to have a lazy Sunday to relax.