How my Trip to France will change me (probably)

Pretty long title for a silly joke.

Blake is still in France. He, that is, I, wrote this back in September, or maybe October, who can say? Anyway, Blake has some ideas of how his trip to France will change him. Hopefully he hasn’t done anything since writing this to get cancelled. If you know Blake, that is to say, me personally, buckle up for these shifts in behavior.

I’m going to not-so-casually throw “bon mots” around

My father already does this, by saying “beaucoup” when saying there will be a lot of something, which IS what beaucoup means. We also say “santé” when clinking drinks instead of “cheers” or “prost”.

I’m going to become a nuisance with my sprinkled French word. I’m going to bless drinks, greet and leave friends with strings of incomprehensible French, and probably use casual, non-curse words in French to substitute English swearing. The tough part will be maintaining these infuriating habits and making sure I torment my friends and family long enough that they appreciate when I stop.

Expect more French history influence in my TTRPGs

If you’ve ever sat at my table while I ran a D&D game, you know that I put in as much Irish history and folklore as possible. I already run a Monster of the Week game set in a fictionalized Northern Virginia and utilize that Appalachian influence. After my trip I’m going to make every Elf French coded. I will probably also utilize incorrect French to indicate a player’s character doesn’t understand an NPC’s language.

And why shouldn’t I do this? French history is expansive and exciting. And since I’m staying there with my parents my Dad will fill me in on all the COOL history and none of that stuffy “school history” they teach for tests.

Describe food as “French adjacent”

This will mostly be a comedy bit. My plan is to say this for food like fried chicken, cheeseburgers, and Hot Pockets. Anything that seems as un-French as possible. Maybe it only makes me laugh, but that’s enough for me. At least for this terrible joke.

I will also refuse to eat in any American French restaurant as it “simply won’t be the same” then I’ll take a drag on a cigarette that just appeared in my hand. Unfortunately the allure will be shattered when I start coughing and spitting because ew, cigarette.

Actually I don’t know where any french restaurants are in my city. Let me take a quick look.

- time passes -

What!! There’s a place called “Le Pigeon” on Burnside?? That’s hilarious, I gotta check it out!

The Return/A Teaser

After this post I’ll be back in the States, or “D’es Etats Unis” as my French brethren call it. I’ll be getting back to flash fiction, satirical articles, movie reviews, and soon delving into the podcast portion of Substack! Looking forward to life settling down and bring able to deliver top quality product to my fans!