Chez Les Poulets
Posted on | May 29, 2009 | No Comments
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Loading ...Ce matin j’ai debroussaillé chez les poulets!
I know that sounds incredibly sexy if you read it out loud (assuming you can read French correctly) but it’s really not, I assure you. If you spoke français, you would understand that what it means is that I spent the morning with a scythe and some hedge clippers, clearing weeds out of the chicken coop, all the while cursing out the idiot rooster that kept hiding in the weeds I was trying to cut.
Often times, we have romanticized notions of far-off places, simply because of their lack of proximity to us, but the world is quite a bit smaller and more homogeneous than you might think. My first morning in Rodez, I purchased a local paper; upon reading it I discovered that the two front page articles involved the winners of the annual Miss Aveyron beauty pageant, and the record attendance at the local cattle show.
It was at this point that I realized I was not, in fact, in Southwest France; I was actually in Iowa.
Country life is something that is not, it seems, country-specific. The fundamentals are the same pretty much anywhere, I guess. I’ve spent the last several days becoming intimately familiar with gardening tools and their French names. I occasionally forget the days of the week, but I know the words for chainsaw, weedwhacker, and lawnmower by heart, I can go into detail explaining the difference between a bush and a shrub, and I know the French names for elm, oak, birch, maple, fir, and spruce. If the DELF were based around gardening, I could pass at the C1 level, minimum.
Also, living in the country has been pretty good for me. I don’t drink much, I eat well (I’m consistently getting Five Alive for the first time in my life), I have breakfast every day, and I get tons of exercise. I sleep better here than I have in ages. I’ve been here for three days and already lost a kilo, even though I eat like a horse. I swear, I eat more than the other three people in the house combined.
It’s also an interesting study in isolation. I went from having tons of literally round-the-clock friends in Antibes to being relatively alone. There are two American college girls here at the moment, but they’re leaving in a couple of days. My host (Agnès) ne parle pas anglais, so conversation is somewhat limited at the moment, as I build up my French; this gives me a lot of time to think things over.
It’s also the first time in a long time that I’ve been really single. For reference, the difference is that when single, you and your ex have stopped dating; when really single, you’re single and your ex has started dating someone else, so there’s no more chance of getting back together. This is a new thing; I’ve spent almost all of my 20’s in fairly long term relationships, so this will give me a chance to learn a little bit more about me. The downside is that unless some sort of fucking miracle occurs, by the time I leave here (in eight weeks) I’ll be on my longest dry spell since I turned 21.
And yes, I totally meant the joke about a fucking miracle.
Yes, I Suck, But I’m Still Alive
Posted on | May 28, 2009 | No Comments
(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...I disappeared, and it had nothing to do with machines. Actually, a lot has happened since the last time I posted; I have some things to update you on, so this will be a factual, non-sarcastic post. I’ll deliver something more in line with what you’re used to within a couple of days.
- Mandy and I broke up. Her heart is there, mine is here; that’s pretty much the whole story.
- I spent ten weeks in Antibes learning French, but I’ve left that behind for now.
- I’m now living about 20kms from Rodez with a family that speaks no English; it’s quite far in the country and there are no machines around that could kill me easily.
I have about two or three hundred pictures to upload of various things (Antibes, Nice, Cannes, Juan-les-Pins, Biot, etc) so I’ll do that tomorrow if I’m still up to it after wine-tasting in the village.
Also, should any of you want to get slightly-more-frequent updates about ninjas, robots, and bears on unicycles, you can find me on Facebook. (Just mention something about the blog in the request.)
J’Etais Malade
Posted on | April 9, 2009 | 2 Comments
(2.75 Total) Loading ...Learning French may seem like the most difficult task in the world, but I can assure that there exists another task so truly unyielding, so agonizingly difficult, so excruciatingly arduous that learning French pales in comparison. I am speaking, of course, of learning French under the influence of Dayquil.
There is no greater blow to one’s self esteem than robbing yourself of 50 IQ points with those two little orange capsules and then attempting to answer questions about appropriate usages of French verb tenses; I could liken it to having a leg amputated and then trying to play football (or soccer, for you Americans). I imagine I would sooner be able to understand the aforementioned vagaries of French shop hours than learn the true purpose of the subjunctive whilst trying to remember my own name.
I’ve been pretty under the weather for the last few days, which is a shame, since those days have had great weather to be under, whereas the days on which I’ve been healthy have been rainy. It’s also the reason I haven’t posted in a week; I’ve been too busy attempting to sleep with little-to-no success.
I’ve learned something through this experience, though. In the states, when you’re sick, you go to the grocery store and decide what you need by reading the boxes and labels; in France, you have to go to the pharmacy and explain to them what’s wrong, and they get what you need from behind the counter. Hence, before you go into a pharmacy, you need to be able to describe exactly what’s wrong with you, in French, which I wasn’t totally prepared for, so my pharmacy experience went something like this:
Hi, I have a sore throat.
Ok. Do you have a fever?
Huh?
A fever.
Oh, uh, yes I does.
Do your ears hurt?
Sorry?
Your ears. (Points) Do they hurt?
Uhhh, yes, they discomfort me.
How long have you had it?
Ummm… I believe since two days.
Ok, take two of these three times a day with food. That’ll be 11 Euro.
I also learned something else incredibly important, though it has nothing to do with France. Have you ever noticed that a lot of medications have that warning that goes something like “Take with food?” Doxycycline comes with such a warning.
Yeah, they’re not fucking around with that.
I realized this crucial piece of information as I was taking my morning coffee, and had to bolt out of the cafe to spend five or ten minutes dry heaving in a parking lot. I’ve always just ignored those warnings, since nothing really seems to bother my stomach. If you had any idea the types of things and their quantities that I consume on a regular basis, you would understand that. I can, for instance, metabolize such various things as titanium, anti-matter, kryptonite, and a large portion of the menu at Waffle House. (I believe Burt’s Chili may actually contain the first three items.) This superhuman ability may actually be part of the reason that the machines are targeting me first, since a large portion of their exoskeletons are constructed from titanium and anti-matter.
I am, at last, feeling better, and on top of that, I actually took some pictures of this town last weekend. I’ll post them presently.
Open Up Shop
Posted on | April 1, 2009 | 3 Comments
(3.20 Total) Loading ...I’d like to talk to you about something serious for a moment, if I may. When I say serious, I mean something more mysterious than the intricacies of a woman’s heart. Something more sought after than the meaning of life. Something more feared than the inevitable destruction of our planet at the hands of invading machines.
I’m talking, of course, about the vagaries of small-town French shop hours. This is a problem that even I, with my incredible brainpower and amazing dedication, have been unable to crack, despite two and a half weeks of intense scrutiny and/or getting drunk and complaining.
For starters, obviously, nothing is open here on Sundays, at all. Perhaps in a larger city, one could acquire things like food on a weekend, but here, some planning ahead is required. We’re fortunate enough, in our town of 85,000, to have one solitary market that’s open on Sundays, but it’s neither the largest nor the cheapest. (Luckily for me, it is the closest.) Even during the rest of the week, all of the grocery stores close at 8:00, and good luck actually buying anything after 7:30.
This past Monday, I went looking for a haircut, which turned out to be a colossal mistake. Les coiffures (stylists) are only open from Tuesday to Saturday, pas d’exception. Alors, I ended up walking around much more than I planned, and I got lost somewhere on the Cap d’Antibes, which happens to be the most expensive place in the world for property. I guess rich people just get home-delivery of the haircuts.
One of my favorite lunches comes from the Turkish Kebab place a few doors down, so I went by for lunch today, only to be heartbroken upon discovering that they’re closed on Wednesdays.
There’s a beverage shop on the Place Nationale, just a block or so from my school. I like to go there and grab a beer (that doesn’t cost three euro) to go with my usual lunchtime takeaway, but if I don’t get there before 12:30 (morning classes let out at 12:20) the proprietor closes up to go get lunch for himself, leaving me depressingly dry for my afternoon classes.
No man should have to live this way.
A Free Grammar Lesson!
Posted on | March 28, 2009 | 1 Comment
(3.43 Total) Loading ...I haven’t been posting enough, I know. Being at school for eight hours a day is killing my legendary sense of humor, and continuing to speak English is starting to confuse me anyway. I had actually planned to spend the day today taking pictures of Antibes and Juan-les-Pins, but it’s cloudy for the first time since I got here.
With that in mind, rather than talk about something that isn’t a complete waste of your time or just plain stupid, I’m going to engage in my favorite activity in the entire world: talking about how awesome I am. This should give you an idea of who I am and what I believe in, because there have been a few comments recently that lead me to believe that some people just aren’t getting it. So, I believe that…
…the majority of Americans don’t understand how or when to use a semicolon; do you see what I did there? There are multiple ways to separate two independent clauses; however, the semicolon is my favorite; it’s just so efficient.
…The Scorpions’ Rock You Like A Hurricane is the greatest song ever written, with the possible exception of Safety Dance by Men Without Hats. The former is best for singing along and playing air guitar, and the latter for dancing.
…there is no sensation on this earth more pleasurable than putting on underpants fresh from the dryer, and then sitting around in those underpants while drinking coffee. Please note appropriate uses of ‘than’ and ‘then’ in that sentence.
…talking about myself in the third person will make Bryan sound way cooler. How it would be possible for Bryan to be any cooler than he is now is completely beyond him, but it took Bob Dole from being a crotchety old politician to a crotchety old man hyping penis pills, which actually creeps Bryan the fuck out, when he thinks about it.
…champagne is best consumed in a hot tub, straight from the bottle; if we’ve learned nothing else from Diddy, let’s hold onto that. For best results, keep some hot naked ladies on hand; strawberries are optional.
…I’m totally better than you. The exception is if you’re Mr. T, in which case I’d like to thank you for reading, and I’ll gladly accept your pity.
…Cosmo’s quiz was, like, totally wrong. I can’t be an O’Malley; I’m at least a Sloan. If you tell anyone that I read Cosmo or watch Grey’s Anatomy, I’ll deny everything and turn you over to the robots.
…Fellini is overrated. That’s right, I said it. Anyone who says they understand 8 1/2 is full of shit. 2001: A Space Odyssey made more sense, but I probably think that because of all the robots.
…every human should practice the robot; I’ve got mine down. When they take over, knowing their dance will help me fit in.