Getting a French Visa (Bureaucracy Is a French Word)

I'm on the loveseat back at home, the fan blowing cool air in from outside* and one of the twelve bottles of nutritious Mirror Pond Pale Ale I purchased on my way back into town by my side. The good people at the French consulate in San Francisco issued me my visa earlier today, an utterly harrowing experience despite the fact that they were all very nice about it. What can I say about it...hmm...

1. The essence of bureaucracy is checking things off of lists. I had gone in there with an entire script prepared about my weird program of collaboration between the UC and the Sorbonne and how I'm totally covered for housing, I swear, because I have a place I'm renting, and blah blah blah...the guy behind the plexiglass just twitched with boredom and asked if I had my next form ready as he stamped the first three.
2. That said, each thing on the list has to be right. The letter from my insurance company didn't have the right phrasing ("covered while traveling abroad," not "covered while living abroad"), so the bureaucrat sent me to an internet cafe down the street to buy an international student ID card which, for some reason, solves the problem.
3. Parking garages in downtown San Francisco cost more than flying to Paris...almost.

My advice? If you're going to France, for fun or to study, try to do it in 90-day chunks so that you don't have to have a visa.

* The blistering heat wave kicking the central valley's ass is completely skipping we on the coast. And that is RAD.