The most wonderful time of the year, is it?

Well, Rebecca has some bad news. There's a chance I might not be able to go to London for Christmas after all. A pretty big chance. It breaks down like this: If I leave France, I won't be allowed back into the country without a valid visa or a carte de séjour. My visa is going to expire on December 14, so to go to London, I need a carte de séjour. But getting a carte de séjour is turning out to be a much longer and more complicated process than I thought. The main holdup is that all foreigners staying in France for over three months are required to have a medical exam with the ANAEM, and you have to have had this exam to get the carte de séjour. For whatever reason, the ANAEM seems determined not to give me an exam (Heather is having the same problem, so maybe they hate Americans). I have all the rest of paperwork I need for the carte de séjour, and right now I'm really hoping that I can get at least reci-passé. A reci-passé is proof that you are in the act of getting a carte de séjour and allows you to leave the country. If I can get a reci-passé without an exam, I think I may be able to go to London after all.

It's hard to be depressed about this, because I had really been looking forward to going to London, and I feel bad not giving Laura a definite answer about whether I can come or not. Everything is just so up-in-the-air right now, which is frustrating. It's difficult, but I'm really trying hard to not give up and to be persistent about getting a reci-passé. After all, in the words of one of my favorite Christmas movies (Home Alone):

This is Christmas! The season of perpetual hope!

In other, more immediate, bad news, I've been having dull aches and pains all over my body. I can't figure out what's causing them -- the cold weather, maybe? -- and nothing I do seems to relieve them for long, although hot water helps. Most of them seem to be in my joints, and my right hand is hurting the most, which is very bad because I'm right-handed. So I've been trying to get lots of rest, and I hope that that will eventually make the pains go away.