Allô?

Today I had a ginourmous Eureaka moment. I can have telephone conversations in French. NO WAY.

Phone conversing in another langauge is hard. You can't see the other person, thus can't see his or her facial expressions or gestures. Oftentimes, my ears decide to be hard of hearing or I just mix up words*, so this complicates things futher for me.

I experienced a horrible horrible telephone catastrophe back in March. I was ordering a pizza. The pizzeria dude wanted me to order two pizzas, but I only wanted one. Later I discovered it was a 2-for-1 deal, but I didn't understand that at the time. After the awkward convo ended, I wasn't exactly sure how many pizzas I had just ordered. On my way to pick it/them up, I sniffled a little bit and shed a few tears. I was really embarrassed and upset, because I had been studying French forever and had all this trouble ordering a frickin pizza.

But I guess there's been a veeeerrry gradual improvement in the success of my telephone conversations. My 75% comprehension became 80%. And 80% became 85%. And so on.

And today, when I was talking to someone about getting my newish purse replaced because it developed a mysterious hole, I started to actually whine a bit. But it's not my fault! I whined. I swear the hole just came out of nowhere. NO it's not from a lighter, I don't even smoke! I didn't get my way. They won't give me a new purse. I was grumpy when I hung up. But a second later, I realized that this was progress. Before I couldn't order a pizza on the phone. Now I can grump someone out on the phone. Go me.

* I recently was very confused when my roommate and her boyfriend were telling me about this delicious chocolate mousse that comes in a glass jar (un pot en verre). I understood it was delicious chocolate mousse that comes in a green jar (un pot vert). Just trust me, my brain hurt really hard after this conversion. I make mistakes like this all the time.