I think I'm my own brand of homesick.

I decided to do my laundry today.

I think.

I don't know if I did it right.

I know, I know: what kind of idiot doesn't know how to do their own laundry?

This kind.

I've done laundry for years in the U.S. It's so simple. You put clothes in, add detergent, then push a button, and voila, laundry. My current problem is that here, the washing machine has about 25 settings and 6 buttons. Okay, the settings are labelled -- we're good. But the buttons... I pushed the on button, and I think that's all I needed to do. But now, the machine has added water and just seems to be spinning my clothes, then stopping. Spinning, stopping. Spinning, stopping. Is this common for front-loading machines? I hope so.

The dryer, I think I remember. Open door, insert clothes, choose setting, push on. If the washer ever stops. What do I do if it doesn't!?

Today, I feel like I'm a bad load of laundry. I know I've been here less than a week, but my plan was to learn French as quickly as is humanly possible. I wasn't going to let myself fall into the "silent period." I was just going to talk anyway. I now realize how difficult that really is. I've stopped speaking. Period. I'll say "oui" every now and then, but for the most part, I just nod or listen. I don't even feel like I'm understanding as much as I was when I first arrived. Most things seem to go right over my head. It's frustrating for me because I'm not even letting myself try. I'm just sitting there like a lump nodding my head. I don't like it at all.

I'm really stuck on this laundry thing. The dang machine has been running for over an hour now. I was all excited because it was spinning, but now it's full of water again. Can anyone explain this?

Tonight we had turkey with some sort of orange breading on it as well as salad and potatoes for dinner. It was quite good. Yesterday, Anne-Michele bought some sort of soda-making machine, and I tried the soda today. It wasn't half bad. Not as good as the real stuff though.

I need to practice French more. I started reading the Junior Harry Potter, and it's taking forever. I'm actually trying to understand all of it, which is a bit difficult as of right now. All I want is to talk. Ugh.

Maybe today is just my day for bad laundry.