Second chances all around

I bought my ticket last night, so I know I arrive in Toulouse on December 6th. I'm actually using the return part of my round trip ticket from September, which I didn't get to use because of the visa delays. Back in September, Delta told me at first that I couldn't change my ticket because it was "too deeply discounted" to begin with. I called back a week later just to double check, and they said that in fact I could change the date if I paid some extra fees (fine by me). They also said I could just call back when I knew my travel date. But last night when I called, the woman tried to tell me the ticket had only been valid 30 days. I calmly said "But that's not what they said the last time," and I got to listen to the entire loop of Hold music while she tried to figure it out. Finally she came back and said it was going to cost $400. I don't think she realized what a steal that was for essentially a one way international ticket. It makes my round trip cost closer to $900 or so, but that's not that outrageous anyway. There are better deals to be had, for sure, but I'm happy with how it turned out.

The point of all that was to point out that it's not just in France where you get a different answer every time you call. I think France deserves a second chance in that respect. The next time it seems some French office makes their policy by shaking an 8-ball, I should think of Delta, and how I never would have gotten a ticket so cheap (except studentuniverse.com) if I had listened to them the first time.

The second second chance that is well deserved comes with a tangent, kind of.

First, has anyone ever heard of Mary Kay or Avon being sold in France? I'm a complete Mary Kay devotee and I avoid at all costs (haha, pun) buying make-up in France if I can wait to buy Mary Kay from our neighbor. I think between September 2006 and today, I spent a grand total of 14 euros on make-up. I had to buy some more powder because I was desperate, so I got something at one of those perfume chains. I feel like there's either Dior, Lancome, Yves St Laurent, and other high-end pricey cosmetics, or it's grocery store Maybelline or Cover Girl (wait, is Cover Girl sold in France? you get my drift). Is there a middle ground in France?

So I went over to my neighbor's to order my years supply ("Two of that one, another of this....") and I got to chat some with her son. He's 25, but I haven't known him much since high school. I went to school far away, and then France, etc, etc. We used to carpool in middle school and I always thought he was a bit of a loser. He wore his pants low and was too cool for school. Guess what he does now: he works for an investment company and teaches/coaches debate at a local community college part time. He got into debate and began to win awards, which led to him being the TA, and now he teaches the course. He finished school and tonight he was recruiting some friends to be judges at a debate tournament this weekend. I just remember him playing "Gangsta's Paradise" every morning when we carpooled to school and I was in 6th grade.

Which leads me to realize that I should give people the benefit of the doubt and a second chance more often. True, Gabe was not a star student in middle school, but being a badass at one point in your life doesn't mean you can't get serious later and have some great achievements. He really seems to have gotten his life together and is much more articulate than what I remember. Debate club will do that.

I told my neighbor and her son about the Pacs B and I signed and explained that it made things official and was viewed like marriage in some ways; taxes, for instance. Gabe then asked me what my husband did for a living. I tried to not bat an eye, but no one's called him that before with me. I use boyfriend and fiancée alternately when I talk about B. It just surprised me. I'll avoid my speech about how I don't like the connotations for "wife".

And a funny detail about Gabe, he had a girlfriend a few years ago (I think 3?) and things were going well when she left to study abroad for a bit in France. He said she hasn't been back, or at least not for long. They finally broke up when she decided she wanted to stay in France indefinitely.

Now what'd she know about visas and carte de séjours that I didn't?!?!