29 September 2008

Ypres

Browsing NYTimes.com this morning, I found this gem of a sentence:

Heretofore, my chief anxiety about traveling to France had always been that, at some point during my trip, I would be called upon to pronounce the name of the town Ypres.

You can read the rest of the article here. Let's just say that from the very first sentence, the article grabs you. (Caveat: You have to speak boarding school French to fully understand the article; the author resorts to peppering phrases en français throughout the text, to give it more of a je ne sais quoi.)

26 September 2008

Rethinking The Desire To Live In Northern France


You know it's going to be a long day when you arrive at work and have to squeegee yourself off. Rain rain go away, at least for the twenty minutes while I walk from home to subway and subway to work. Seriously, I am wet to the upper thigh.

But yet, I still can't bring myself to buy the silly rubber boots all the girls here wear. While certainly more functional than Crocs, they're equally funny-looking. Bets are on for how long I'll hold out.

12 September 2008

The Countdown

Well, it's coming down to the wire, folks. Two days until my birthday. Two days until the last year of a 2 as the first digit. I gave up long ago on pretending that I was still carefree, but still...thirty's in sight, just lurking down the bend, waiting to jump on me and smother me with its finality.

And so now it's time for the list. I've attempted this once before but didn't get very far. At the time, I thought I had all the time in the world to think of more things. Go look at that list. I'll wait. Do dee doo de doo.

Wow, I've accomplished, partially accomplished, or will accomplish the first four items! But for realsies, it's my turn to make my own list. No fair listing things I've already done.

  1. Put up as many of my CSA fruit and vegetables as possible for the winter.

  2. Succeed in making borscht this time.

  3. Make as many of my own work clothes as I can.

  4. Stay gracious and try not to snap at my mom when she forces her wedding ideas on me.

  5. Take a photography class, or work on my photography skills.

  6. Find another dance class I like, and attend regularly.

  7. Go to a country I haven't been to and where I don't speak the language.

  8. Talk to strangers.

  9. Put 6k into my retirement fund. Hey, I never said the things had to be interesting!

  10. Attend a European soccer game.

  11. Really blow a student's mind with my insightful and probing questions on intercultural awareness, leading them to requestion all they ever thought they knew about the world (aka, do my job).

  12. Figure out what to do about the "I want a registry!" "But we don't have any space for stuff." "But I WANT one!" dilemma.

  13. Spend a weekend with Frenchy and a borrowed under-one, just to see if we can hack it.

  14. Think up a really watertight excuse for when we can't hack it.

  15. Read Jude the Obscure.

  16. Have more than one professional massage.

  17. Take advantage of the free gallery talks at the Met.

  18. Learn to stop on rollerblades.

  19. Visit some New York wineries.

  20. Invite the couple that lives below us up for dinner or coffee.