Tonight, despite being a snow day at work, which resulted in the office being closed, I went to a macaron making class that Chris got me for Christmas. The snow storm wasn’t as bad as everyone anticipated (because New Yorkers are neurotic and over hype everything weather related), but despite that, only five out of eight participants who signed up for this class showed up. That was fine by me because that just meant we had more personalized attention, more space, and most importantly, more macarons to take home.

Before the class began, the students and I made some small talk with the pastry chef, who is from a small town in Brittany, France. I knew he was French, which was clear from his very thick accent, so I asked him where he was from in France. As soon as he said Brittany, I said, “That’s the place where kouign amann originates!” He laughs and says, “Wow, you know that!” He then proceeds to tell us how annoyed he is when he meets a lot of Americans, who just assume that because he is French, he must be from Paris. “That’s like when Americans travel and they tell people they are from the U.S., and people were to respond, ‘oh, you’re from New York City!'”

People say the dumbest things in this country.