chocolate

Would you believe that today is the first day that I've allowed myself to walk into a chocolate store? There was really no other appropriate way to end a beautiful evening wandering around the at once quaint, metropolitan, ornately Baroque, liquidly Art Nouveau cobblestone streets of Bruxelles. I am utterly enamored by the city, but I have to keep reminding myself that Tom and I have found the ideal place to live, and that Bruxelles really has nothing to do with me besides this little love affair I'm having with it. I knew it was just up my alley when I strolled by chance into a photography reception and enjoyed photos of local architecture over a free glass of wine. Better yet, I found a luxuriantly flamboyant 6-euro scarf and stores selling every Belgian beer glass I could want, and I was able to pass as a local en français. There are just enough freaks in Bruxelles to make me feel at home, and the population is much more international and sophisticated. I'm going to have to get over being raised in San Francisco, where Caucasians are a minority, right quick if I'm going to survive a year in little old Mechelen.

Ran into Eddy Mariën and an interesting Dutch fellow named Richard, son of Gerard de Waart, attempted to adjust to the European standard clavier for a few hours, signed the paperwork on our rooms for the year, visited the French ice cream maker, browsed some bookstores, and still feel like I haven't accomplished anything today. Gotta escape this damned Yale mindset before the slowness of European life drives me batty.

Milk chocolate with rice pieces at Leonidas = Nestlé Crunch + crack. Nobody to share it with = major bummer.