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Posts Tagged ‘Bright ideas’

Holiday bleatings

Posted in Random, tagged , , , , , , , on December 22, 2011| Leave a Comment »

December is my favorite month of the year because it is my birthday month, and because it features Christmas, Hanukkah and Kwanzaa – a holidaypalooza! No one gets any work done all month, people eat their body weights in cookies and candy, and parents have the chance to threaten their young children with the phrase, “Santa sees what you are doing right now.”

Christmas Eve is my favorite holiday because of the anticipation. Christmas Day has always felt like a let-down because the wait is over. It’s 364 days for the next build-up. But maybe that’s just me.

So, Christmas Eve = good; Christmas Day = kind of bad.

Here are other pairs:

Good: Bringing home and decorating a real Christmas tree.
Bad: Real Christmas tree needles that clog the ancient vacuum cleaner.

Good: Realizing a new Dyson vacuum cleaner with Root Cyclone technology might make a great Christmas gift.
Bad: Um … asking for a vacuum cleaner for Christmas.

Good: The boys are old enough to help decorate the tree.
Bad: They haven’t figured out the art of spacing.

Good: More quality time with the kids.
Bad: More time with the kids. (You know it is too much togetherness when you hear your son say, “Gideon punched me,” and your husband responds, “Good.”)

Good: Selecting the perfect presents for friends and family.
Bad: Wrapping all those presents and the bills that follow the purchase.

Good: Seeing a person’s reaction when she loves her gift. (Hi, Trish!)
Bad: Seeing the reaction when he doesn’t. (Hello, Ed.)

Good: Taking the kids to see Santa.
Bad: Knowing that the 5-year-old is not getting the computer he requested (!).

Good: Going to your first Hanukkah party.
Bad: Fleeing the Hanukkah party because your son has a meltdown because he doesn’t like the way his shirt collar feels on his neck.

Good: Unseasonably warm weather when the central heat has been acting strangely.
Bad: The kids deciding it’s OK to take off their clothes outside to better enjoy aforementioned warm weather.

Good: Having the time and inclination to make Christmas cookies.
Bad: The extra 10-pound reminder of why you shouldn’t.

Good: Deciding (well, hoping) that friends and family will forgive you for not sending holiday cards because you’ve been out of the country for three months and didn’t get your act together.
Bad: Feeling like a schmuck each time you go to the mailbox and see greetings from others.

Good: Singing Christmas carols as loudly as possible in a closed car.
Extra Good: Torturing your kids with your holiday singing after they’ve been torturing you all day with superhero noises.
Bad: There’s nothing bad about that … for you!

Good: Stop-motion Christmas specials such as “Rudolph, the Red-nosed Reindeer” (although I’m partial to “The Year Without a Santa Claus” because of the Miser Brothers).
Bad: Stop-motion specials such as “Rudolph’s Shiny New Year.” (It’s like the Scrappy Doo of specials.)

Good: The whole holiday season, in my opinion.
Bad: It’s almost over. Sigh.

Happy holidays to all of you!

 

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Vacation, all I ever wanted …

Posted in Random, tagged , , , , , on November 30, 2011| 1 Comment »

The Griswolds have nothing on us. Our European vacation was not quite as catastrophe-filled as theirs, but hijinks still ensued. Here’s a slideshow of the best and the worst.

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Love letter to Lacoste

Posted in Cultural differences, tagged , , , , , on November 23, 2011| 5 Comments »

Dear Lacoste,

It’s going to be hard to say goodbye. You’ve meant so much to me over the past 10 weeks. And although we’ve had our differences — I like to walk normally, and you like to try to break my ankles with your cobblestone streets at 60-degree angles; I like to sleep, and you like to let the clock tower chime three times every hour — we’ve gotten along splendidly overall.

I regret the time I cheated on you with Paris. I admit that I felt dirty in the City of Light. Yes, the week of having access to world-class shopping, restaurants, landmarks, artwork and entertainment was wonderful, but I thought about you the whole time.

You know I also cheated on you with Apt almost every weekend; L’Isle Sur La Sorgue on a number of Sundays; Fontaine de Vaucluse and Bonnieux four times; Avignon, Ménerbes and Lumières three times; Gordes, Ménerbes, Oppede le Vieux and Roussillon twice; Cavaillon, Carpentras, Coustellet, Saignon, Lourmarin, Nîmes, Aix-en-Provence, Marseilles, Milan and Turin once. But they meant nothing to me. I always came back to you.

You are like sleep-away camp for grown-ups. I enjoyed being a camp counselor and didn’t even mind being on call all day every day. I may never again have the opportunity to discuss a grade on a paper while scooping potato balls onto my plate at dinner. Or hear students coming back from the Café de France at 4 a.m. I love your isolation that enables and requires close connections with others who are also enjoying your charms.

You are intense. You are immersive. You are insulated. You required me to work closely with other professors on a variety of projects and field trips. I might not have had that chance otherwise. You required me to practice my stick-shift driving skills in rickety nine-passenger transit vans on narrow, winding roads. Never before have I had to fold in my mirror so that I could safely pass a La Poste vehicle on a dirt road built for one car. You required me to rethink my idea of space and material goods. I lived quite happily in a small centuries-old apartment with few personal items and no television.

You are not the sleepy, hilltop village everyone thinks you are. You are a locus for plenty of activity — much of it mental — that results in a life-changing experience.

While I have to say goodbye — I was actually cheating on Savannah with you — I want you to know that I won’t forget you. Thank you for everything.

Love,

Beth

Things I will miss about you:

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Standin’ in the doorway

Posted in Random, tagged , , on November 14, 2011| 1 Comment »

As my adventure in Lacoste comes to a close, I’ve been thinking about the future. I see this experience as a pathway to new ones — ones to be revealed later.

It’s probably why I’ve been obsessed with making photos of windows, doors and paths.

Here are some (potentially) postcard-worthy photos (finally).

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La pioggia in the Piedmont

Posted in Random, tagged , , , on November 8, 2011| 2 Comments »

Getting out of Lacoste is a little bit of a challenge. To meet up with 36-hour Tina in Turin, Italy, this weekend, I had to fly in this from Marseille to Milan.

Only 18 seats on that puddle jumper.

A train or a car would have taken about seven hours, so I dealt with it.

And a weekend with my friend was worth it. (I should rename Tina as we spent a whole 60 hours together this visit.) It rained the entire time, but we still had fun (eating, mostly).

I also had fun watching a little Italian television in our sweet 1980s living room.

Yes, that's red velvet.

 

Here’s what I saw on Italian television:

  • A “Starsky and Hutch“-style overdubbed show from the ’80s (to match the couch)
  • An infomercial where a woman in sparkling white pumps demonstrated the cleaning power of a vacuum cleaner. Look! It sucks up cigarette butts from an ashtray! (Why couldn’t she just dump the ashtray’s contents into the trash?)
  • An infomercial for a water-purifying faucet that comes in a variety of festive colors, such as burnt plastic.
  • Three men dressed in drag seated at a desk reading something off clipboards.
  • News delivered by women wearing lingerie.
  • No fewer than four channels devoted solely to cars.
  • A close-up shot of a man using a pencil carved from a tree branch as a pointer to read through each headline in that day’s newspaper.
  • A participatory talk show featuring the host dressed in a George Washington get-up.
  • A “Welcome Back, Kotter“-style high school drama featuring a fat, pasty Johnny Depp wannabe and a kid with too many teeth in his mouth.
  • “C’è posta per Te” (loosely translated as “you’ve got mail”), a Maury/Sally Jesse/Montel type of reunion show.
  • What can only be described as the “Understanding Art Channel.”

All of the above employed the production quality/values from the ’80s and ’90s. It was like a time warp.

Outside the ’80s bubble, plenty was happening in Turin. One of the biggest things was the SilverSkiff, an annual regatta on the Po River. It’s why Tina was in Turin in the first place. Unfortunately, she and the other rowers made the pilgrimage for nothing: The organizers cancelled the race because of the effects of the torrential rain.

We still had a great time, though. Here are some photos (not postcard-perfect, as usual) from the weekend adventure.

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Halloween, American style

Posted in Random, tagged , , , , , on October 29, 2011| 4 Comments »

Last year, Eddie and I made a big production out of Halloween. Three families got together to form the cast of the “Wizard of Oz.”

This year, I am sans family. Instead of being part of a big themed costume event, I wore brown, stuck a stick in the buttonhole of my sweater, and called myself a  — wait for it — Stick in the Mud.

That doesn’t mean I didn’t have the Halloween spirit or participate in a celebration.

The college I work for introduced the American concept of Halloween to the small medieval village in the South of France where the study-abroad program is located. If today’s turnout is any indication, the French folks in this area have really embraced the tradition. I think every French family within a 30 km radius came to celebrate with us.

Here’s a slideshow of photos from the event:

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It may not have been my usual Halloween, but it was unusually fun!

(And maybe now I can forgive the students for making me watch “Hocus Pocus” last night!)

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Flora of France

Posted in Random, tagged , , , on September 20, 2011| 2 Comments »

Lavender season is almost over. Harvest season is just beginning. Who needs flowers when you can feast?

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Fauna of France

Posted in Chickens, Random, tagged , , , , , , on September 18, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Anyone can post postcard-perfect pictures. (And yes, I will too.) In the past two days, though, I’ve been more interested in capturing critters.

A puny French version of the late Trish the Chicken

Puny Trish has a friend.

A literal version of "pigeonholed"

 

From birds to beasties (the praying mantis, that is, not me)

There's a whelk on that there limestone! (Say that with a Southern accent, please.)

Flowers? No.

Snails!

Apparently, if you put them in saltwater, the snails leave their shells. Then you put them on salad. Um ... yum?

Un escargot grand

Un escargot grand avec des amis

Next post: flora of France

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Peeping at Tom

Posted in Random, tagged , , on September 16, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Eddie and I visited Lacoste in 2006. I found out Tom Stoppard lived here. I took pictures of his garden. I hoped to casually run into him on Rue Saint Trophime. I went home disappointed.

Five years later, Tom has moved on. One of Lacoste’s local characters has a connection to Tom’s place, though, and I got to go inside. I saw what he saw and where he sat.

The starstruck aspiring screenwriter in me squealed at this: the desk where he wrote “Shakespeare in Love.”

I imagined him taking writing breaks to walk through his garden or lounge in his pool.

I imagined him eating brie on a baguette while sitting on his terrace.

That's not Tom.

I imagined him gazing up at the Marquis de Sade’s chateau, seeking inspiration.

I imagined myself writing this blog post as an ode to a former Lacoste resident whose work I appreciate. Sadly, this post won’t lead to any Oscars.

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Foyer, doux foyer

Posted in Random, tagged , , , , , on September 13, 2011| 7 Comments »

Home, sweet home.

This is my temporary home in Lacoste, France:

My street and apartment

I left my real home on Sunday with tissues stuffed in my bra to help me through the emotional experience of leaving Eddie and the kids. After many hours breathing recycled airplane air (three planes), wrangling suitcases (one large, three small), and enduring the wrath of Sue Sylvester serving as flight attendant on the longest flight, I made it to my final destination in the south of France.

It has been an action-packed 20 hours since I arrived. I’ll spare you the play-by-play. Here are the highlights:

  1. I live 10 feet away from the clock tower. It chimes twice per hour.
  2. It is scorpion mating season. Here’s one that won’t mate again.
  3. It is harvest season. Carl, another professor here, shows off the goods.
  4. The village’s hills will be assets as I whip my own assets into shape.
  5. The place has interesting little cubbies everywhere. Here’s a cool hobbit potty, for example.

One of the best parts of the town tour today was an impromptu peek into Tom Stoppard‘s former residence. I’ll share the photos later.

For now, though, je suis fatigué!

À bientôt!

 

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