As promised earlier this week, I’m back with my list of the Ten Worst Things about Europe.  BE WARNED: THIS LIST CONTAINS PICTURES OF MY LEG AND ANKLE!  (This warning is mostly relevant to any of my readers who have traveled in time from the nineteenth century.  If you are reading this, sorry for lewd images, and also can I borrow your Tardis?).

10. Getting this bruise:

So I guess it’s kind of hard to see in that picture, but my first afternoon in Paris I was walking along the Rue Montorgueil (or as my non-French-speaking friends called it, the “Rue Mononmont…ugh, whatever”) and it was raining, like, SUPER hard, and I slipped in front of a bunch of skinny, smoking French people, and fell on my knee hard and it hurt like a motha, and the bruise is still there and going strong.  MERDE!

9.  Rain: This is a continuation of number 10, I guess, but it rained hard three days when I was in Europe and THIS WAS BULLSHIT.  Didn’t Europe know that it was me, Jackie, who was coming to visit it?  It couldn’t have held off on the rain for, like, one more week out of courtesy?  THANKS A LOT, EUROPE.  This would never have happened in California.* (On the plus side, I guess Europe does look pretty cool in the rain, see below).

8. Air France:  Ok, this one isn’t funny and I don’t have a pic, but basically those assholes stole 216 bucks from me and I hate them and am never flying them again.  It’s a long story but if you really care you can check out my Twitter from this morning lol.

7.  Hangovers: When I was last in Europe, I was twenty years old and could literally club all night and drink endless wine without any repercussions.  Now that I am thirty this is most definitely not the case.  I paid dearly for this concoction, for instance (but, my God, was it delicious):

6. These shoes: 

So this is also a result of #9 – the evil RAIN.  My friend T and I were walking in the rain in Toms shoes to the Louvre, which was ill-advised on many levels, and we had no choice but to stop at a random shoe store and try to find waterproof shoes in our size.  Sadly, the only shoes available in my size were these (though T picked up a decent blue/black glittery pair which she threw out – bad decision, T!).  Apparently, the French have tiny feet.  The worst part was that I had to wear the above shoes with these pants:

Not chic, guys.

5.  The number on this scale: 

Who am I kidding?  I’ve been too afraid to get back on this old horse.  No matter how much walking I did, no way it made up for this:

4.  Bugs: The bugs in Europe are surprising vicious.  I was attacked by one especially horrid one in the courtyard of the Florence Basilica, leaving me with these scars two whole weeks later:

What I’m really saying is, the bugs in Europe hate Jesus.  Yeah, that’s it.

3. Smoking: Look, we Americans may be fat with big feet and cover all of our meals with melted cheese, but at least we’re not constantly inhaling poisonous fumes and blowing them all over other people.  I swear, no one in Europe can go twenty seconds without lighting up.  I’m kind of allergic, so this is genuinely awful for me.

2. Hot guys: Too many of them.  There’s such a thing as an embarrassment of riches, Europe.  Though they’re all skinnier than I am, so that helped matters.

1.  Paper and Candle Stores: Ok, Europe, what the hell – do you want me to be INCREDIBLY BROKE?  YOU HAVE STORES THAT SELL JUST PAPER AND JUST CANDLES EVERYWHERE.  Just LOOK at this beautiful effing fan I bought:

I spent, like, twenty euros on this fan.  When, you may ask, am I ever going to use this fan?  NEVER, THAT’S WHEN.  But it is so pretty and made of hand-painted paper!

Also, LOOK AT THIS CANDLE:

It looks like it’s made of glass, AND IT’S A WAX CANDLE.  COME ON, ITALY.  IS THIS A JOKE?  I’M GOING TO LIVE IN A VAN DOWN BY THE RIVER AFTER THIS TRIP.

Don’t get me started on the soap stores.  I just didn’t go into them.  I would have had to declare bankruptcy if I had.

So, yeah, these are my top ten complaints about Europe.  As you might imagine, this was my face when I had to leave:

Love ya, Europe.  Never change! xoxo Jackie

*I am aware that it is actually a bad thing that it never rains in California.  I am not making light of the drought, which hopefully will be alleviated by El Niño.  Chill out, guys.  I care about the environment, GOD.