Guidenapping

In Raymond Queneau's wonderful novel Zazie dans le métro (Zazie in the Métro) which I bought in Paris when I studied abroad here with the unique goal of reading it in the métro. Well, I did, and loved it, particularly for its kookiness. At one point in the novel, Zazie's uncle is giving Zazie a little speech about the Eiffel Tower and a group of tourists think he's a tour guide, and he accidentally carries out a successful "guidenapping" according to Queneau. He kidnaps the tourists and takes them on a tour of Paris, in which he continues to do just as he was doing with Zazie, mixing up various tourist attractions. 

Well, yesterday, I was sitting in one of my favorite parks outside of the Musée de Cluny (the Middle Ages museum) and noticed some Italian tourists desperately in need of help. So, I asked them in Italian if they needed help, and they immediately began asking me millions of questions about all the churches in the Latin Quarter. I recommended the Église Saint-Étienne-du-mont, and they asked me if I would mind showing them the way. I told them it was right behind the Panthéon, but apparently that didn't help, and I ended up taking them there. They begged me to come in with them and show them where Sainte Geneviève was (it's not hard to find—that's the main attraction there), so I did, then they asked me to take them to Saint-Germain-des-Près. Well, it was on my way (I was going to Grom, because the Berthillon line was just unbearably long...), so I agreed. They ended up taking pictures with me and giving me their Skype information. They said I should come to Rome and they'll return the favor and give me a tour! 

And that takes me to this morning. Well, I woke up to the sound of extremely violent sounding rain. Thunder and lightning outside. Also very hot. Basically, this is NOT my kind of weather. I might just stay inside until dinner. Either that, or I'll wait until it slows down a bit, so I can go outside and buy a new (not broken) umbrella, and then try to brave it. Actually, it looks like it's calming down now, but I'm doing laundry, and since laundry in Paris is quite the affair for me (it involves converting Celsius to Fahrenheit, using a drying rack, and worrying about the strange sounds the machine is making and why it sporadically stops working), I might just stay home today and read a book.

That was the end of the Berthillon line—around the corner from the actual shop. Yes, the line was about 3 times as long as it looks in this picture, and strangely enough, I actually decided it wasn't worth it when there was other good ice cream in the city. So I got a Sicilian granita from Grom, strawberry!