À Paris!

Well, I made it to Paris. So far I've occupied myself with a lot of walking and eating, as well as art-admiring and generally making a fool of myself in French.
So...remember when I said that one of the first things I would do would be to see St. Catherine Labouré at the Chapel of the Miraculous Medal? And when I booked my hotel specifically because it's on the same Métro line? Well, I did make it on my first day here, only to find out that St. Catherine is "fermée" (closed) and the chapel itself is a huge mess due to construction, which will be ongoing until April.
So after being incredibly disappointed, I headed to Notre Dame, which sort of made up for everything. And then I took a 3 1/2 hour free walking tour, which was awesome, even though my feet were throbbing by the end because of my quest to defy the image of Americans in comfortable shoes.
Today I went to the Musée D'Orsay with a Colombian girl I met on the tour and felt like I wanted to stay all day. It was so strange to see paintings from the same artists, and sometimes even the same series of paintings, that I saw in Chicago the day that I left for Europe. I never would have imagined that I'd see so many Van Goghs and Monets in the same week.
And I intend to continue! I have two days left. Tomorrow I'll make my way to see the Sacré Coeur and hopefully go to Mass there, and then I'm planning on finding the cheapest Nutella crèpe. I rested today after the Museum because I felt like I was going to collapse, so I should be ready to take on the Sunday crowds of tourists tomorrow. I also might try to see Cluny, the Middle Age museum, and if it's sunny the Sainte-Chappelle. On Monday I think I may try to take on the Louvre until I faint from too much culture and beauty, although I'm trying to prevent that from happening by watching French Entertainment Tonight-type celebrity gossip shows.
Apart from that, I love where I'm staying. It's in a great location, right across from a church, and is surrounded by a ton of interesting shops and bakeries. I bought food to cook at home on the little stove here for really cheap and can thus justify spending my hard-earned paychecks on ridiculously complicated and delicious pastries.
I'm getting along surprisingly well with my French, although so far I've gotten away with speaking a crazy mix of French, Spanish and English most of the time. I enjoy being mistaken for a native Spanish speaker as I think, perhaps erroneously, that it is infinitely better than being recognized as American. Yesterday was crazy, though, as Spanish kept popping up everywhere in the most unexpected places, including a band of guys from Peru, Bolivia and Chile in the subway and French people spontaneously wanting to practice their español.
I will try to add pictures on here once I figure this out.