Um…did I do that right?

OK this happened last week, but today I have a good internet signal so I can write about it.  Last weekend Scott & Mentanna asked if some of their friends could stay with us, so as not to be in the path of Gustav.  We have an extra room, so we said sure.  And began frantically cleaning the extra room, because it has been my running headquarters for several weeks now and before that was sort of “storage” for anything else that didn’t have a place, so walking from the door to the back corner required acrobatic ability that would turn Nastia green with envy.

I am always nervous about being a hostess, because my family did not do much “entertaining” while I was growing up and I’m really not sure what to do.  I mean, I know to put clean sheets on the bed and hide the junk that was previously strewn about, but that’s about all.  I forget that Jake & I are weird, so we never have ice in the freezer and we only get a few Spanish stations on our TV.  Of course I think of things a bit too late (would you like ice?  Oh wait, we don’t have any…I invited French people to my home and didn’t even bother to attempt to procure some coffee for them, what kind of idiot am I?), but in reality I think it turns out OK.  I have a sound roof on a house that is not in the direct path of a major storm, and at the time that was the most important thing.  When I invite people over for dinner, we may not have ice for drinks (oh wait…forgot those too…we almost always drink water…) or side items, but the entree is decent and the plates are clean.

Anyway, Mikael and Alice just moved to Lafayette, Louisiana from Paris (the real one, not the one in Texas).  Mikael is teaching French in an elementary school.  They had only been here 3 or 4 weeks when they had to evacuate because of Gustav.  It was really neat to talk to them about the differences in our cultures, and I think we were able to help each other a bit – we explained why you would want to call it a rooster instead of a cock, they told us to prepare to eat a lot of pork (we are mainly poultry eaters).  We told them to make sure they experience Chick-fil-A on their tour of American fast food, they told us to not expect any hamburgers in France.  They sampled authentic Tex-Mex, tasted homemade ice cream at my family’s Labor Day celebration, and explored Ft. Worth and Dallas (although Jake & I were lame at giving them pointers, because we are homebodies and also very boring).

We had a lot of fun hanging out with them…and now we have our first French friends!  Without even leaving the house!

P.S. You can see a pictures here, but the text is in French so good luck.  I hope they said nice things about us…