recepisse (or however you spell it) today. It was one of those weird French interactions where the fonctionnaire became nicer and nicer the longer I was sitting there, with absolutely no connection to anything I said. Has anyone else noticed this? Like when you arrive at a French person’s house (when you’ve been invited) and it takes them maybe ten minutes to warm up?

Yesterday I got my lungs scanned, you know, where they make you take off your shirt and everything (last year they let me keep it on). But it wasn’t really that weird. The tech was on the other side of the room looking at a screen. So, yay, now I have another extraneous set of lung x-rays. But it was nicely just in time for my appointment at the sous-prefecture today.

I’m going to Bar le Duc again this afternoon. Oh yeah and I bought some boots.

So for the translation I suggested 8 cents/word to the school and they said no problem and now they have to get approval from the university, or something. But I might get to do more than one, which would be a fantastic source of income if I enjoy doing it.

I also thought I’d add that I’m currently addicted to Tegan & Sara‘s new album. It seems a bit more like their earlier stuff but better than their earlier stuff was, if that makes any sense. At first I was disappointed it wasn’t more like So Jealous but I’m way over that and now I love it.

Their myspace if you want to listen. The Con (the song) might be my favorite right now but it’s really hard to say.

Or I guess it’s €€€. I got paid today. And I arranged to do a few extra hours this fall with some different students. And I was offered a translation job. I’m not sure how much to charge. I’ve done some internet research and I think I’m going with 5�� a word because that seems to be on the low end. Still that makes for an awful lot of money on a big project. I think for once in my adult life I can actually feel financially stable.

Yeah I don’t really know. Not a whole lot. Doris and I have been hanging out–we saw a French movie Wednesday night (Deux Vies Plus Une, not too bad) and an English movie last night (This Is England, it was excellent). Today we went to a harp concert at Doris’s church. It was also very nice. The time changed. I’ve got my medical visit Tuesday and my appointment at the sous-prefecture Wednesday, so that works out well. Maybe they’ll be on top of things and I’ll get my carte de sejour not too long after. It would be nice to get the CAF, I’ve kind of forgotten about it. I’m thinking of buying some shoes.

found a cheap bookshelf at Casa. Voila:

The shelf was super cheap but that box there was ridiculously expensive.

Well I wandered into a new store today and finally found a tablecloth of the right size that I like. Also I got a fruit bowl and a candle. V. exciting. Here you can see the vast improvements implemented on the one side of the room:

Lovely, right? The other side though could still use some help, namely, some sort of shelf.

Met some more anglophones last night.

I am aware that when I posted that it had been four weeks here, it had only been three. Somehow I was convinced it was four. I think I was in my own world where time wasn’t functioning normally. Because clearly it wasn’t four weeks until this Thursday just past.

Tomorrow: role plays and the opening scenes of Airplane! which must always be written with the exclamation point (unlike Yahoo). Also, I think there’s an English night at the bar….

Any good advice on how to dust off a Macbook screen (or any glossy screen really)?

It got cold here. Like maybe 32 degrees. Not horrible, but certainly beyond the little blazer I took with me to Lorraine this week. I’m thinking of going to look at coats or sweaters and boots and maybe buying one or two of those three items. Was that confusing? But I also want to think about buying some things to spruce up the apartment so I should hold back some. I got this little wicker basket/drawer thing and it is surprisingly awesome. I mean I had my suspicions that it would be awesome (so I bought it) but it has exceeded my expectations. My rug hasn’t come in yet, or they haven’t called me about it, I’m getting impatient.

My week was nice, though. Wednesday night M and I went out with R (Swiss assistant from last year) in Nancy and had wine fondu, which I’d never had before and was yummy. Then M and I spent the night at her little brother’s and came back some time Thursday, where we ate dinner with her parents and then pretty much just vegged. J showed up Friday and we made tacos, quizzed each other on capitals and random song tests, and got drunk. The Old El Paso taco kits that are easily buyable here are not as bad as I feared–the taco seasoning is decent. But the salsa is almost ketchup-y. Also the guacamole I grabbed was terrible. So I said I’d bring back some real stuff after Christmas. We’ll see if I remember. Also some of M’s friends came over during all of this but I don’t think I ever learned their names. They were quite nice though. More of M’s friends showed up on Saturday and I DID learn their names, and they were also nice. Anyway then J and I watched the rugby with his dad and step-mother. I don’t know that I’ve ever paid much attention to a rugby game before and it made me cringe. It’s like they just jump on each other in huge piles and see where the ball comes out. The only other notable part of the trip was the obligatory visit to La Boheme.

Tomorrow it’s back to the grind. Well it’s not really a grind yet is it–two days of teaching. At some point I will have a normal workload, I promise.

with M. Was brother’s birthday the other day. Facebook reminded me. Am bad sister.

I had a nice evening with Ms. A. G. of Jersey, formerly Southampton. We met at the statue on the Place d’Erlon, then went to a bar maybe forty meters away. We watched people and explained why they could not, from their appearance, be English or American. It was great fun, I’ve never included anyone else in my personal game before. On my walk home a man walked past me and said “Wow, vous êtes tr?ès bonne madame,” at which point I did my normal programmed brush-off, and then I realized, yeah, I AM. And I’m glad you had the courtesy to say vous when you told me as much. Right on.

In normal news, I had a good day of teaching, torturing students with TH practice and making them say words like “thistle,” “slithering,” and — worst of all — “sleuths.” Yeah, I said it.

Ma?�ana voy a ir a Bar le Duc para visitar Marion.

(Was that correct?)