I'm in Lyon, but...

...read this first.

So I’m writing this on the TGV train from Paris to Lyon, and I’ll post it once I have internet service.  The flights from DC to Charlotte and Charlotte to Paris all went well.  We got to Paris by 6:50, and once we got through customs and found our baggage (the fastest I think anyone has ever found their baggage in the history of airports and suitcases and their long relationship together) and down to the train station it was only about 7:45. We spent 3.5 long hours sitting in the station listening to an unbelievably annoying alert noise whenever an announcement was made – so roughly every three to five minutes.

But the main reason that this blog post couldn’t wait is because Emily and I spent a good ten minutes giggling (perhaps more than necessary given the 22 hours we’ve been awake at this point) after a certain string of incidents occurred as we tried to board the train. First there was a good deal of confusion figuring out which coach was ours involving a French train attendant laughing at us and a panicked Asian lady frantically demanding (about half a dozen times) if we knew where she was supposed to go.  But the laughing French man finally dragged us onto the train and up to the second floor of the TGV.  We thought we were set.  But we were not.  Barreling down the train corridor into the compartment for luggage (where Emily and I were trying to heave our bags as another woman and her daughter tried the same) came an Australian family.  There was nowhere for them to go, but this did not stop Mummy from shoving her stroller through the automatic sliding glass door into our corridor – which is clearly blocked by four women with enormous suitcases.  Apparently sliding glass doors are not fans of strollers – or perhaps babies – and the door continuously began shutting on Baby Australia.  No one was fazed by this (Mummy simply kept shoving the doors back open every time they almost squished Baby), and the whole crew kept marching forward, into us where they promptly got stuck, because French train corridors seem not to be built to fit both strollers and Giant Emily Suitcases.  Meanwhile, Toddler Australia is being told to get behind his “Mummy” and Daddy Australia is huffing and puffing at everyone and the stroller is stuck and Mummy is telling Daddy, “I can’t move forward! The stroller is stuck on this bag!”

For some reason, our English with American accents was too much for Family Australia to handle because our repeated attempts to offer suggestions, such as, “Please back up and we will move our bags and we can all be merrily on our way” fell on deaf ears.  Their solution was to keep pushing, but in the meanwhile, stand directly in front of the only shelf where Emily and I needed to put our luggage so this whole situation could be ameliorated.  Remember that Simpsons episode when Marge is in Australia and orders a coffee over and over and the Australian bartender only hears her say “beer”? Well apparently when you say, “Please back up,” Australians hear, “KEEP COMING AT FULL SPEED AND WE WILL SOMEHOW ALL FIT IN THIS TINY SPACE AND THE SLIDING DOORS WILL ACTUALLY NOT SQUISH YOUR BABY AND PLEASE, PLACE YOUR TODDLER DIRECTLY UNDER MY 50lb SUITCASE AS I SWING IT UP ONTO THE SHELF ABOVE HIS HEAD.”

Also, the guy in front of us is reading a porn magazine.

Dearest Abena, you missed a lot when you stayed down on the first floor of Coach 5.