Last night in the Back Bar at Old Ebbitt Grill, a suity man (but then they were all suity men) offered to buy us not a drink, but a shrimp cocktail. Beside him at the bar were eight or so dazzling, giant, dare-I-say-jumbo shrimp, resting delicately on a bed of ice scooped onto a sterling silver platter. He prepared each one with spicy cocktail sauce and handed one to each of us.

They were-- by far-- the best shrimp cocktail either of us had ever tasted.

And Melica clarified by saying that a lot of times you might say that the shrimp cocktail was the best ever tasted, but every single one of those shrimp could only pale in comparison to the meaty, sweet-but-spicy, perfect shrimp we were enjoying right then and there.

Perhaps you should still never accept candy from strangers, but now I think I'd have to go the other way on shellfish. Particularly in June.

I finished Paris to the Moon last night before bed, lingering over the last essay in the same way that I sauntered along the Seine on the close of my 30th birthday. And now Paris chimes inside my mind like a cliche of which I never grow tired. I swim in nostalgia.

"Walking out into the pure violet and gray light of the place de la Concorde at twilight in December, [we] had it to ourselves. The Concorde at Christmas at five o'clock has as many subtly distinguished shades of gray as a pair of flannel pants painted by Manet."

"The entire tower turned on, twenty thousand or so small flashbulbs that had been wired to the tower went off at once, blinking hyperfast. The tiny constant explosions of the little bulbs made the tower look as though it had been carbonated, injected with Seltzer bubbles. It was a beautiful sight. 'It looks like champagne,' Luke said, and we laughed."

I remembered Joanne telling me about her months in Paris studying at the Sorbonne-- how she used to take busses around town rather than the Metro so that she could gaze at la Tour Eiffel during the ride. I thought of the curly, vintage Metro signs, the curved, tiled station walls, and how I tried to persuade Erika to call it, "Monsieur Metro," much like Laine calls the DC Metro, "Mr. Metro." And then I started to sink deeper into my white sheets with yellow daisies and wonder what airfares to Paris are like in July.

But perhaps I'll be content to pass the evening with a beautiful Fitzgerald short story, wait impatiently for my magical, digital, oh-so-Parisian package to arrive surprisingly from Houston when I least expect it, and slip into a sleep animated with a sunny walk among the talking chairs of le Palais et le jardin du Luxembourg.

Perhaps.

Speaking of retribution, B is parading as his very own very-important-person-on-an-insane-deadline tonight, with mere hours to correctly prototype the look and feel of training module that has taken a hopeless development team months to screw up. He called me tonight-- all fired up about his new hardass status at work-- while picking up some beer to supplement this evening's overtime.

I wonder how I missed making that a component of last night's success.

There is nothing like a 1:00am Kinkos run to make you feel like you're back in college. Arlington Courthouse isn't exactly 15th and High-- with the heavenly pizza smell of the cruelly-closed Flying Tomato hanging tauntingly in the air-- but it served my very-important-person-on-an-insane-deadline purpose tonight.

B and I hung up hours ago and he was on his was to bed. An extra early hours ago, actually, since he's on Central Daylight Savings Time. Me? I'm still doing a little editing, a little updating, a little last-minute preparing, a little packing, a little ironing. I've got a bit of vengeance, a bit of retribution, and a bit of glory to seek tomorrow.

Tomorrow is all about DeMilles and close-ups.