Conversations in my head.

See, you all have no idea how many times I’ve pulled the computer over and started to blog. I mean seriously it’s no mean feat. It requires heating pads, perfect and strategic placement of pillows, moving the cord to keep the laptop plugged in as the battery only has a two hour life and blogging takes longer than that. After all that is the reason I have a laptop isn’t it, so that I can work comfortably anywhere.

Then when all is ready and I have the laptop and I’m sitting comfortably, all I manage to do is mindlessly surf the web for an hour or two and then I’m completely zapped of all energy and motivation.

I have a series of blogs started and in various states of completion that you all may never see. They start out as conversations in my head, things I‘d share with you all if I had the energy and motivation to sit down and write for you, and then I do start writing and half way through the story, the thought train is derailed and there they sit in half finished word documents, scattered across my desktop like broken and abandoned toys that even Santa has forgotten about.

So now I’m sitting here, with season 5 of the Gilmore Girls on for background sound (thanks Ky) while I type this and simultaneously browse eBags for a fun look at new purses… Seriously when did that happen anyway, I used to NEVER be a purse girl, backpacks were more my speed and now I just love them, shoes and purses, when did I turn into a girl?....See what I mean, I’m so easily distracted.

First I wanted to, yes a little late I realize, say Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you all. I didn’t make Christmas cards this year, but that’s not different from the previous couple of years, I haven’t made cards for a few years. But this year we found some French Christmas cards and we bought them, and there they sit on the counter in front of me, knowingly mocking me, waiting to be written and addressed. Let’s face it, they know what I know, that those cards are most likely destined to be packed away and come back to the states with us.

Then I would like to thank you all for the great birthday wishes left on our phone machine…

(Yes the answering message is in French, just trust you got the right number and leave a message. The message is still in French because the instructions to the phone are in French and I haven’t felt compelled to spend an entire day translating said instructions just so I can figure out how to record my own message, so we use the message that came with the phone. Yes the height of laziness, but hey, think of it as very exotic and metropolitan.)

Anyway thank you Gudino’s for the truly great birthday message and wishes, it was very nice to hear all of your voices. And thanks also to the Barbers for the song, seriously, the Barber family does the best singing of the birthday song I’ve ever heard, all on key and in harmony and everything, really guys, I’d record it and sell it. It was fabulous.

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My car is in the garage and hasn’t been moved in a few weeks, hence why I really have nothing to write about. Not to say that I haven’t left the house in weeks, but S drives me places. The manual transmission in the Mercedes absolutely kills my back. So I make grocery lists and we go to the store together.

The shopping goes something like this. I point S in the direction of the first 3 or 4 items on the list and say “I’ll meet you by the eggs” I proceed in the direction of the eggs and when I arrive S has pretty much completed the shopping. He then goes toward the bread, or whatever few items he has left to grab, and I waddle toward the checkouts where I arrive to find S waiting for me at the handicapped checkout lane. So why do I go with him? Well in case there is a question about a brand or something (men must be carefully supervised when grocery shopping is involved) and besides it’s my exercise for the day. (How pathetic is that!)

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Anyway, the due date is January 30th but I know for certain, I will not go that long. I know it’s going to be sooner than that. Don’t ask how I know, I just know. Actually yesterday S’s mom told us that when she worked in the maternity ward in a hospital there was always a baby boom right around the full moon. So next fool moon for us is January 14th, that’s next Saturday. So I’ve pinned my hopes on that date and that knowledge has also gotten me in gear to get the last thing I needed for the hospital stay. I was required to purchase a hair dryer, I don’t own a hair dryer because I NEVER blow dry my hair, so I had to go out and buy a cheap one just because it is on my list of things to bring. Do not even ask why I’m required to have one, just trust me, they have their reasons and you really do not want to know.

I filled a whole regular sized suitcase with all the things on the list. I have to tell you that I’m going to feel rather silly taking a suitcase that size to the hospital, like a typical woman that always over packs, but in this case I have no choice, everything in that suitcase is on my list and it’s required. I will be kept there anywhere from 4 to 6 days, depending on how everything goes and how everyone is doing. I think I can opt out at the end of 3 days if Jr. and I are stellar patients and if I can prove that the nursing staff is making me insane.

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S has some very important meetings all this week, there are people coming in from all over the stinkin planet for this and he’s in charge. Needless to say he’s a bit stressed about what will happen if I go into labor during the week. He has provided me with a long list of phone numbers just in case he doesn’t hear his cell phone ring. But I told him not to sweat it, it’ll be the 14th. God, I hope it’s the 14th, I’m tired of this. Although, I have yet to meet my new doctor and I don’t have an appointment to meet him until the 17th. So, yeah a bit of a down side to this whole having the kid on the 14th thing.

I swear though, if I go to the 30th (or later……Oh my god!) I’ll be absolutely bonkers by then!!!!

Last visit to my old doctor was on December 27th and measurements at that point brought the baby’s weight to 3.6Kg (7lbs 14.9ozs.). All is well with Jr. and he has made the turn and is in position. I speak to him regularly and try to convince him that it’s time but apparently he is not quite ready yet. He’d like to put a little more meat on his skinny little frame no doubt.

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Well, that’s all the news from here, just more boring pregnancy and baby news, but that’s my life these days. Wait until the baby is born and all I post is cutesy anecdotal baby stuff that will drive you all to quit reading my blog all together.

"Idealism is what precedes experience; cynicism is what follows. "David T. Wolf

I think I mentioned that I had received an invitation to attend a reception in downtown Toulouse for the US Ambassador to France for this last Friday. It was a formal event that I would just as soon pass up for the one huge reason that I am, well, huge and I would have had to go out and buy a formal dress that fit my current size and that I would wear only once, it seemed like a waste of money.

Anyway, everybody I spoke to was like ‘you have to go’ and ‘wow what a great opportunity’ so I vacillated for days between yes and no. I even had S block out the time in his schedule. Then I came up with a brilliant idea; let’s find out who this guy is. So in true Missy fashion I googled the guy to see what I could find out about his Excellency Craig R. Stapleton.

The first article I found was this one which I admit is a bit biased but informative none the less. It turns out that he’s a Bush crony that only got the ‘prestigious and highly coveted ambassadorship to France’ because he (A) Garnered the most cash in private contributions toward the re-election campaign and (B) Is married to GW’s cousin Dorothy who is also a huge Bush contributor.

The State Department Bio makes him sound so much more respectable, but only because it omits the more unsavory aspects of his political and familial ties.

Now maybe I’m really naïve, but I thought ambassadors were supposed to be altruistic and peace minded people with service to their country utmost in mind. Someone to actually help patch up the current relationship between France and the US, you know what I mean. But no, this is not a man of diplomacy, wisdom and discourse to follow in the rich tradition of other former ambassadors to France like Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and James Monroe. No instead, this is just a rich real estate fat cat who garnered himself a cushy job in Paris for a few years by giving, and getting all his friends to give, big cash to the republican party and specifically the Bush re-election campaign. I was so disappointed. Needless to say, we didn’t go to the reception.

But you haven’t even heard the real kicker yet, one of the sites I found lists him as a Democrat. I’m pretty sure there are substantial grounds for blacklisting him from the party.

Driving…Snow…

I’d been home most of the day; the weather for the last few days has just been pure crap; nothing but cold and rain. But then around noon I looked out the window to the west and there were these very dark heavy clouds, they were headed this way and they looked like snow. Snow! I can just tell from the look of the clouds. Suddenly I’m energized, time to get out and drive. I love driving in snow, especially that first snow of the season.

I go out to the car, pop in a Christmas music CD and start driving, I head for the center of town where the Christmas decorations are already hung and lit. It’s Saturday so of course traffic is madness with all the Saturday shopping going on and also the start of the holiday shopping season. As I drive aimlessly the clouds are getting closer and darker and more ominous and I just feel more giddy and excited.

Then it happens, the clouds have finally arrived over head and it starts to just pour down….rain…yeah rain…Oh yeah, it never snows here.

I head home and stop at the grocery store for fois gras and a baguette. If it would just sleet a little I could sustain the mood, but no just more cold pouring rain. Oh well, maybe in a few weeks. At least the fois gras is good. Have I mentioned that I love fois gras.

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In other news, I received an invitation in the mail today to a reception in down town Toulouse to meet the US Ambassador to France. I knew it was coming, I had been asked by the US Consul in Toulouse for my home address. It’s cause I’m on the AIT board. How cool is that, I get to meet important people. Well, I would get to meet important people, except that…see this is a formal event and I won’t go out and buy a 200€ dress to fit over my current size, that I will only ever wear once, for a one night event. But it was cool to get the fabulous invite.

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OH MY GOD IT’S SNOWING!!! Don’t worry I’m not getting back into the car.

Mocking Potential

Saturday night was the AIT/FEU Thanksgiving dinner dance. (Americans In Toulouse/France-Etats Unis) (France-Etats Unis is another club in Toulouse, this one made up of mostly French people who actually want to meet Americans and practice their English on them.)

We haven’t attended an AIT event in a very long time, but since I’m on the board now it seemed like something I should probably attend. Mind, the idea of a ‘traditional’ American Thanksgiving prepared in a French restaurant was just too hard to refuse, I mean think of all the mocking potential.

First of all, I’m not much of a social butterfly, I mean you know me, I love a great conversation with someone who actually has something to say, but socializing just for the sake of meeting people – most of whom I would not actually choose to speak with on a normal day – just not something I enjoy or am good at. So usually when we attend these events we find a nice place to sit in a quiet corner and enjoy our meal, maybe a little dancing and some people watching.

Not so Saturday night, now I don’t want to compare it to a Hollywood entrance or anything, but when word started to circulate that Missy Walters had arrived, people were coming at me from everywhere. Since I’m the membership coordinator, I’m usually one of the first contacts that people have with the club; the first name they hear. New members wanted to introduce themselves face to face, old members wanted to lodge complaints face to face, total strangers wanted to know how to join and discuss what AIT activities they might enjoy and some total strangers just wanted to touch ‘the belly’ and ask when I was due, weirdos. I ended up with a pocket-ful of cards and slips of paper with people’s e-mail addresses and notes about what they wanted.

The French restaurateur I believe was appalled by the fact that the meal would not open with a salad and would not be served in courses. So instead of doing it the American way he tailored the event to make us more civilized. As we sat down (at 9:00 pm, mind we’d been there since 7:30) our aperitif glasses were taken away and a salad was set down before us. It was your typical French salad, greens accompanied by two large slabs of fois gras. We Americans all became very silent and a bit frightened at that point and began to look around for the moron who might actually have asked for fois gras or served it at their Thanksgiving table. But it turned out to be the restaurateurs’ sole idea. Mind I love fois gras, but we all began to wonder what the next ‘course’ would bring; no family style service here. When our actual thanksgiving dinner plates arrived they were arranged in the traditional French artistic style. Two thick slices of turkey breast covered in a thin white sauce that I suppose was meant to be gravy, and several ‘molded’ side items.

There was a perfectly round disk of sliced sweet potato (one disk), a muffin tin sized mold of something that mildly resembled stuffing, except that it was crunchy and dry but not too far off the mark in the taste department, an oblong mold of something white and very light in texture that no one ever identified and a tablespoon sized bit of cranberry sauce.

Cranberry sauce is a very expensive import, you can get it in some of the mega stores, and you get a 4oz glass jar for about $2.50, so it was served sparingly.

There were these very hard and dry bricks of what we all agreed must be cornbread, but served without any honey or butter to un-brick them.

I ate my entire salad and fois gras, fois gras is very filling thank goodness, and so I was able to get away with just nibbling at the turkey course.

The white molded stuff was distinctly flavorless, I thought maybe it was like a mashed potato mousse or something, someone else suggested it was cauliflower, someone else said celery, one man said he knew that it was a regional French vegetable that resembled a beet. Anyway, we all at least tried it, but no one finished it since we were unable to establish what it actually was.

The restaurant owner, unsure what wine to serve with this horrid collection of things, provided us with a nice red and a chilled white and plenty of ice water, which was a real treat. (Ice water is never served in France, even McDonalds only puts two or three little cubes in their cokes, the French don’t do ice.)

The next course was the dessert. The pumpkin pie was served swimming in cream (not whipped) and a slab of chocolate mouse or cake or something. Dessert isn’t dessert without chocolate. The man across from me commented that it was a pie and it was made of pumpkin, but it definitely was NOT pumpkin pie. He was right.

Anyway the evening was completed with a DJ that played nothing but French and/or American Disco all night; you can see what a party it really was. The only true upside was that we didn’t have to endure any football games.

Le Flic

Civil unrest, riots, fires and violence; the news over the last few days is chock full of this stuff.

On Sunday S and I took one of our patented Sunday picnics. We pick a small town - people are always telling us ‘Oh, you just have to go to [insert name of small village] it is just the most beautiful little village in France’, and yes all these small towns are quite charming - and we visit it. Then we find a nice overlook outside of town and have a picnic.

The town, this time, was Cordes sur Ciel. Which means ,‘Cordes in the sky’. Which is supposed to be a comment on how close it is to the heavens or something. Anyway it’s on a hilltop north and west of Albi.

It was a cute little medieval village built on the top of a not very tall hill. Full of its own history much of it having to do with the Count of Toulouse and having been one of the first bastides in the Languedoc region. It was basically a medieval city founded to encourage growth. The sovereignty built the center of town and surrounding lands and shops were given to individuals who promised to build up agriculture and commerce for that town and therefore also for the kingdom; a way of creating instant roots for the kingdom. Of course this initial founding is followed by years of religious wars, royal wranglings and of course plagues; things that seem to be a part of most of the medieval cities of this region.

Anyway, the town was charming and the surrounding lands are vineyards for the Gaillac wine region. We ended up having our picnic inside the van as the weather here has finally turned cooler. I think it was 48° outside when we ate at around 1 p.m. S found us a nice hilltop with a view of vineyards and freshly planted wheat fields. We enjoyed some tomato salads with mozzarella (my favorite) and bread and wine (I had water). It was a fabulous outing.

The oddness was in the drive, it was only a short drive from Toulouse, maybe an hour and in that time we saw 5 Gendarme patrols pulling vehicles over for inspection. Now, they looked just like the patrol that pulled me over to inspect my paperwork that one time, but they were looking for something specific. I daresay they were looking for North African/Arabic/Muslim looking men driving vehicles that could be concealing materials used in the making of fire bombs.

The torchings began in Toulouse, and a few small surrounding cities, on Friday night and have continued for about 4 nights. The rioting is small scale and confined to one of the southern neighborhoods, which as you might guess is the tenement area to which all of the North African/Arab/Muslim/disenfranchised/angry youths have been relegated. News says that to date 140 cars have been torched in town and several bins near government buildings have also been set on fire. Thus far the police have managed to use tear gas to effectively disperse crowds and keep the violence contained.

Today I read some recent interviews with some of the arrested youths that have appeared in ‘La Depeche’. These kids describe plans to draw police into the tenement complexes and then ambush them with fire bombs. These are kids of 19, 16 and even 8 years of age who say they have nothing so therefore have nothing to lose. Local officials feel that these kids are just out to imitate what they’re seeing on TV that is happening in Paris. Whatever their reasons they seem quite determined.

I drove into town today to meet someone for lunch and there are Gendarmes everywhere. There is one group stopping vehicles coming into our little town. Nothing has happened here locally and I suppose they want to keep it that way. But in the heart of Toulouse there are patrols at major intersections and even at some minor intersections that lead to neighborhoods that are predominantly Arabic.

So to answer all of your questions, we are fine. The newspaper interviewed the mayor of Toulouse who assures everyone that things are under control and that they expect to see an end to violence soon. Religious leaders are taking responsibility for these youths and measures are being put in place to settle disputes ‘honorably’ though what that means is anybody’s guess. It’s a very long term problem that has been going on for years and will continue for years to come, for a variety of reasons; each only serving to add another complication to an already complicated issue.

You know I've heard, in the past two years, many people refer to this group as 'Arabs', said much in the same way people of the 50's and 60's would have said the word 'nigger'. It's really sad, this country does not believe in affirmative action type laws because it would then be reverse discrimination in the hiring process, so therefore these groups have no protection or legal rights to jobs.

We had tea in this adorable little teashop off one of the main streets in town once, a while back, and it was run by an Arab gentlemen who told us of being harassed by the cops all the time, pulled over because he drove too nice a car for an ‘Arab’, being stopped on his way home because he didn't fit in the neighborhood he was driving in. He even had to pull some tricks to buy a house in the neighborhood he bought in. By the time the neighbors and seller realized who had really bought the house it was too late to back out. But over the years the neighbors have not accepted him and his family, but have at least let them be.

Yes, these people have a genuine beef, but the answers are hard. No one can really see a solution that is going to fix all of the issues. The French simply do not like the North African/Arab/Muslim people and I think that it's primarily a religious thing. The French are predominantly Catholic and have little understanding, patience or empathy for the dress/beliefs/lifestyle of these foreigners in their midst. Not to mention the whole nationalistic/this-is-our-country-so-learn-our-language-and-start-to-look-like-us issue that any US minority will tell you they also encounter.

The origins of the problem go way way back but now the problem has been and will continue to be aggravated by the EU opening borders. As more of the newer EU member countries are Eastern European and therefore predominantly Muslim and they're coming to Western Europe to find jobs these clashes will grow worse. Add in that unemployment among the French is 13 to 15% in parts (over 20% for Muslims) no one is willing to give a perfectly good 'French job' to a foreigner no matter how qualified they are.

So there you have it, my thumbnail analysis of a problem so vast that no amount of burning or rioting will fix it, and one that the French are perfectly willing to keep ignoring once this unpleasantness settles down.

’Thar she blows!’…again.

So, I’m watching the ABC Nightly News last night – the Monday night news, as we get our internet news one day behind – and I listened to a story that, well, that poor S was sorry I’d heard I’m sure, because it set me to ranting. I’ve waited until this morning to write about it, however, so I would have a chance to organize my thoughts and cool off.

The gist of the story was that black New Orleanians are complaining that Mexicans are ‘swooping’ in and taking all the Katrina cleanup jobs. ::Gasps:: No!

Yeah, it seems that Mexicans are coming in in droves and stealing good jobs from under the noses of poor and destitute blacks. And the Mayor of New Orleans, for one, thinks that the government should be bussing those blacks that were originally displaced by Katrina, back into New Orleans so that they can do some of these jobs.

Now, let me first state that the Mexicans coming into New Orleans do not appear to be needing the government to bus them in for these jobs. No they seem to be arriving MIRACULOUSLY on their own. Yup, under their own steam and initiative they saw where the jobs were and they have arrived from all over the damn country to do these jobs. No government arranged transportation, no one spelling it out for them ‘Hmmm, Katrina, disaster, rebuilding…hey, that sounds like they might need people down south to work, let’s go check it out’. Nope they figured it out all on their own AND figured out how to get themselves down there, it’s amazing isn’t it, they provided their own damned transportation too. However, all those black folks seem to need big billboard sized sign posts pointing to the jobs, oh, and transportation from Uncle Sam.

Let’s face it, they are belly aching about someone doing and getting paid to do jobs that they DON'T WANT to do, just to have one more ‘poor pitiful us’ thing to bitch at white people (and Mexicans) for. Yes, these are shit jobs, basically shoveling shit and other debris from streets and houses, rebuilding homes and businesses, hard physical labor, back breaking sweaty work, possibly hazardous to your health work, sun up to sun down work…you get my point… it’s just too much like work to be worth it.

Oh, and one more little thing, no one has provided them with apartments or trailers or housing of any kind, no these men are living in tents. Yeah, they brought their own housing too. These are people who actually WANT to work.

Will whoever is nearest please reach over and give those folks one almighty BITCH SLAP for me.

Thanks, I feel a bit better.

Beaujolais Nouveau

At one minute past midnight on the third Thursday of each November, from little villages and towns like Romanèche-Thorins in Burgundy, over a million cases of Beaujolais Nouveau begin their journey through a sleeping France to Paris for immediate shipment to all parts of the world. Banners proclaim the good news: Le Beaujolais Nouveau est arrivé ! “The New Beaujolais has arrived!” One of the most frivolous and animated rituals in the wine world has begun.

By the time it is over, more than 65 million bottles, nearly half of the region’s total annual production, will be distributed and drunk around the world. It has become a worldwide race to be the first to serve this new wine of the harvest. In doing so, it has been carried by motorcycle, balloon, truck, helicopter, and in the past by Concorde jet, elephant, runners and rickshaws (never by messenger pigeon though) to get it to its final destination. It is amazing to realize that just weeks before this wine was a cluster of grapes in a grower’s vineyard.

Half the fun is of course knowing that on the same night, in homes, cafes, restaurants, pubs, bars and bistros around the world the same celebration is taking place.

Well, maybe not as much celebrating going on the world over as in France, but you get the idea. In Toulouse almost the entire downtown is closed off to motor traffic and bars and restaurant, all over the vast network of narrow streets and ally-ways, open their doors for an all night drink-fest. Now if you think red wine can pack a wallop of a next day hangover, imagine the hangover from wine so new it practically tastes green. Yeah, boy let the party begin.

This year the event falls on November 17th and the drinking begins at midnight. I give you plenty of advance notice and invite you all down to participate, since I cannot drink, it will amuse me to taunt you the next day. It’s always all about me, isn’t it…

I’m sure Dante outlined a circle for you…

“This is going to be a big boy” the doctor says, smiling sweetly as he puts away his tape measure.

I can’t think fast enough in French to retort ‘Hey, unless you’re giving birth to this baby, keep those types of happy comments to yourself buddy’. So instead I must satisfy myself with giving him my best ‘We are not amused’ glare. This only makes him chuckle and I mentally Google Dante’s Divine Comedy and search for just the circle of hell in which he will spend eternity…

It is becoming increasingly difficult to slide behind the wheel of my car comfortably, not to mention the contortions I must go through to get back out. The real bummer is that if I scoot the seat back just one notch I can get in and out much easier, but I cannot drive because my feet can’t reach the friggin pedals. God it sucks to be short.

As I was dressing the other morning I was thinking back to my first pregnancy 20++ years ago and remember how thankful I was not to be pregnant in the height of a desert summer. Mind I gave birth at the end of May and we had probably been enduring temps well into the 90’s and higher since mid April, but still it could have been so much worse. I could have had to endure the worst of the June – August heat in my ‘big as a house’ state.

Then I found myself once again grateful for the good timing of this pregnancy. As it is I find it hard to breathe now and cannot imagine enduring heat and high humidity at 8 and nine months pregnant while carrying around an alien that insists on kicking and growing up in to my diaphragm, making breathing freely an ever increasing treat.

However, as I was mulling these thoughts over the other morning and trying various contortions to reach my feet so I could put my socks on, I was struck by this thought, that in the past few winters I have become increasingly fond of wearing tights to keep warm in the cold outdoor breezes. The visual of what contortions it would take to accomplish that feat were frightening. I’ll just be cold thanks.

Finally, I leave you with this amusing visual:

S comes home at the end of the work day to find a disturbing trail of debris strewn across the floors of the house. A pencil, an unopened piece of mail, several paper towels, assorted bits of laundry (clean and dirty) and other odd mementos of a day spent tidying up the house. As he picks up each piece of flotsam and follows the trail he eventually comes upon me sitting on the bed watching the Gilmore Girls on DVD.

He holds up the armful of items and asks in a puzzled tone ‘what happened here?’

‘Stuff I dropped during the day and couldn’t bend far enough over to pick back up’ I say shrugging.

Yuck it up folks…

I take issue...

So my question is this. In The Da Vinci Code (which I love and have read 3 times) I find one glaring and rather insulting error. See, the book discusses the true nature of the Holy Grail and the fictitious group sworn to protect it, the Priory of Sion. As we read the book we find that the Sacred Feminine is a large part of what the Priory honors and protects. So my question is this, why is it that in the book the four Sénéchaux, including the Grand Master himself, are all men? Why are there no women privy to the great secret when the Priory claims to worship and protect the secrets of the true grail? Is Dan Brown implying that women can’t be trusted to keep a secret?

Just one of those random thoughts that woke me in the middle of the night…

Oh, yeah, now I remember!

Ok, ok, so we’re back in good old France. There were several ‘home sweet home’ moments upon our arrival, some less pleasant than others. Lets see it started with…

…Our arrival… when we found that once again the water heater/heater was no longer working. See, that means that after 15 hours of airports and flying there was no nice welcoming hot shower to enjoy and the temp inside the house was a balmy 64 degrees. We spent about half an hour trying to re-light the pilot to no avail and ended up just turning on the oven and burners to at least warm the kitchen and office. We wound up boiling water for quick baths, just to get the travel germs off of us.

Then of course was the inevitable refrigerator moment when I opened said fridge to find nothing, well nothing except some very chunky milk and cream and some tomatoes that had reverted back to a green color that seemed to be growing hair. Of course we arrived home on a SUNDAY which you know means that nothing was open to rectify the empty bad refrigerator problem. There was however a conveniently located and OPEN Shell gas station where we were able to purchase some emergency supplies i.e. bread and milk.

But of all the weird unpleasantness, the bug carcasses were probably the most bizarre. Apparently the spider spray that I use is very strong and lasts a good long time and the fact that no one was home for several weeks to sweep up the carcasses means that they were just piled up against the walls, in corners and hanging about the ceiling. Yeah, the house was one big bug tomb…I guess that that’s a bit of a grim description.

On the other hand, I had forgotten certain pleasant aspects of life in France. First of all I love how polite and courteous drivers are. No one is in such a big fat hurry that they’d just as soon run you off the road than give up one car length to let you in. I’d forgotten how cut throat California driving could be.

The pregnancy thing was an especially pleasant surprise to return to; where as in the US if you even look like you might be considering hinting that you might need special treatment or assistance due to your condition, people give you that ‘Hey you got yourself pregnant so deal with it’ look. In France people bend over backward for pregnant women, from special parking and grocery check out lines to some of the nicest most chivalrous men you’ve ever met.

I was in the grocery store on Monday trying to restock the house, when I found myself in the soda aisle looking for Pepsi – And let me say that if shelf real estate is any indicator of market share, Pepsi is floundering big time and even I can’t save them. In the pop aisle the Coke is stacked four shelves high and about a meter and a half wide, where as the Pepsi has two upper shelves and only the width of a six pack. (Well eight pack really; Pepsi in a desperate bid to get their product out there, is packaging their cans in eight packs, buy 6 get two free.) As I reach up for my pop, mind I don’t have to lift my arms higher than my shoulders, a man springs up next to me, lifts the pop off the shelf and deposits it into my cart with a smile. I have the same experience in the bottled water aisle, where I was trying to decide whether to buy the 6 pack of 1 liter bottles or the six pack of 1.5 liter bottles. Before I’d formulated a decision there was a nice man to ask if I needed help putting the bottles in my cart.

I can feel feminists all over the country flinching at this very moment, but I’ll tell you, it’s nice to see chivalry at its finest.

It’s good to be home for many other reasons too. Well this is enough for now, I have a pile of mail to get through and bills to pay and I must contact the insurance company about repairs to the house. The roof was fixed in our absence. (Yes imagine that, the landlord actually discovered that there was indeed a leak in our roof!) Now the repairs to paint, plaster and wallpaper must begin so we can began buying baby furniture and setting up the baby room. The initial repair estimate has come in at 5,200.00€, will have to look and see what our deductible is on that.

I also must get busy sweeping up bug bodies – eeewww.