will WE play in Peoria?

I know that learning French is not a race. But I cannot help but desperately want to be ahead of Bill. And I want to be ahead naturally… without having to pour over books and study for hours on end.

Today my French lesson was with a teacher I’ve only had a couple of times before… and who is frequently Bill’s teacher. At the end of the lesson he told me that he thinks that the week of “intensive” lessons that Bill had this summer helped him to catch up with me and that now we are on the same level.

I should be happy for him that in one week he accomplished so much. And I am. But I’m annoyed that I didn’t accomplish more. While Bill was increasing his lessons over the summer, I had to decrease mine. It just is too hard to have lessons at the house with Kaitlyn around. It’s a little better than it was but it’s still not ideal. So all summer I only had one lesson. Maybe a lesson and a half… because for the 45 minutes that she had a lesson I had one too. But that is no match for a week of three hour intensive lessons.

I suppose I could ask to have a week of “intensive” lessons. But I don’t want that. I just want to wake up one day and be able to understand what they’re saying on the radio, be able to complete a sentence while speaking to Kaitlyn’s teacher, be able to answer the cashier if she asks me anything other than the one question I have come to expect. (“Avez vous un carte fidelite?” Do you have a frequent shopper card?)

I guess right now I should go do my homework.

Because Bill is, well, Bill, he had an extra computer taking up space in our little office. It was hard to even notice amid the plastic boxes of wires and parts.

That extra computer now has a purpose. To connect Kaitlyn with playhousedisney.com, noggin.com, sesamestreet.com, sproutonline.com…. All her favorite sites to play games. She even got to go to the store yesterday and pick out a new, small mouse. It’s pink, of course.

At some point since we moved here, Bill bought a copy of Windows Vista. I don’t remember when or why. But he did. And tonight he decided to load that onto Kaitlyn’s computer. Because he assumed that it would have the option of using it in English. But it doesn’t. (At least not until after he gets it all up and running then he can do something to change it… I stopped listening after he said it was in French)

Good thing that’s on Kaitlyn’s computer. First, she can’t read anyway. Second, she’s bound to pass us in the whole understanding French pretty soon anyway.

So I broke down and booked our weekend at Paris Disney tonight.

Turns out the woman at Carrefour saved us from buying annual passes with a boatload of restrictions… like most of the French school holidays are blacked-out. So then Bill started considering spending a lot more money to get the mac-daddy no-restrictions passes. And we haven’t even been there yet.

I convinced him that the money would be better spent upgrading in one of the Disney hotels. I don’t know if he was totally convinced, but he said it sounded good. So I booked it before he can change his mind. Hey, if we love it, we can always go back. And it will still be cheaper than that pass. How many times are we really going to take the three hour train ride to see Mickey Mouse? There is a heck of a lot more stuff here I’d rather spend my time and money on!

So we went to Carrefour to take care of this whole Disney pass thing. And we left with a bag full of stuff but no passes.

Turns out there are three different kinds of Disney annual passes. And the woman selling them could not tell us the difference between them. She turned her computer screen toward us so we could read the information ourselves, but the French just didn’t make sense to us. Either of us. We think the woman was trying to keep us from making some sort of mistake, which we do appreciate. But now we are still left trying to figure out what we’re going to do.

Maybe we should just pay the bizillion euros it probably costs to stay in the Cinderella suite or something …. and really go nuts.

As a surprise to Kaitlyn, we are considering spending two days at Disneyland Paris. But it seems the only way one can afford the trip is to be independently wealthy.

We’ve struggled to make sense of the website. We’ve read it in English, we’ve read it in French. In English the site quotes prices in pounds, so I switched to French just to get prices in Euros. If you try to say you are from the United States it refuses to quote any stay shorter than three days.

One night in the Disney Hotel right at the park entrance is like 860 Euros. That’s not even for a special room or anything! Even the mid-range hotels on the property is 600 Euros or so. Sure, it includes park admission. But it’s still hard to click on the “confirm” button. I just can’t bring myself to do it.

Bill managed to muddle through the website enough to figure out that it’s far cheaper to buy the annual passport as a resident of France than to buy even two days worth of passes into the park. Especially because right now Kaitlyn’s passport would be free. But good luck figuring out if you qualify for the special deal for residents.

So this morning we gave in and called. Well, I made Bill call because he was the one who figured out the whole annual pass thing. The toll-free number available for people calling from the US was busy. So we wrestled Kaitlyn away from the Slingbox and used our French phone to call the French version of a toll-free number. Here, it is the opposite of toll-free. It’s 15 cents a minute. And that’s not a Disney only thing. The French version of a 1-800 number is that it is an extra charge. I think it’s just to discourage people from bothering to call. It’s easier to enjoy your two hour lunch break if you don’t have pesky work keeping you at your desk.

He found out we should qualify for this special resident year pass. And we can buy them at…. where else…. Carrefour. So now we get to go to my favorite place… the least happy place on earth… Carrefour on Saturday!

I am becoming one of those people I used to make fun of. I am becoming one of those people who drives all over the area to find different foods. I am even starting a mental list of foods I want to bring back from the US when we visit. I mean… we live in France. Food capitol of the world. But the lack of cheddar cheese is a serious issue!

Today is exactly what I mean. I met a friend for lunch… strategically eaten downtown so that I could go to the Irish store. Yes, Grenoble has a store of Irish merchandise. You can go there to pay too much for a wool sweater, or you can go there to pay too much for “Irish” foods. They were all out of Shredded Wheat (and so am I… dang it!) but they did have molasses. I need it for a recipe I found for North Carolina style barbeque.

Someone told me another store I can go to to find black beans. There’s still another one where I can find Indian papadams. The store that has Grape Nuts moved them from the American aisle to the cereal aisle, which is why I thought they’d stopped carrying them. They also have Dr Pepper for those who crave that stuff. I need to go back to the Italian market I was told carries Philadelphia cream cheese. Luckily it is right near the veggie store with good corn on the cob. (and okra) If I ever come across a store with canned pumpkin I may faint. Then when I wake up, I’ll buy every can they have, no matter what it costs.

We are amazingly still working our way through the cases of microwave popcorn we got last fall. But Kaitlyn has eaten all the Pop Tarts sent to us just a few weeks ago. I have a couple boxes of Kraft macaroni and cheese stashed where I don’t think she’ll find them. (those were a thank you for bunny sitting) I used the last of my Bisquick tonight to make strawberry shortcakes. (I figured it was probably the last decent batch of strawberries we’ll get this year, so they deserved a special treatment.)

I have two jars of Miracle Whip in the pantry given to us by another ISE who got them from still another ISE who moved back to the United States. She’d gotten them in Germany. I’m afraid to open them because they are past their expiration date. But they are such a prized possession, I cannot bring myself to throw them away, either.

What’s on my list of things to buy in the US? Ranch dressing. So I can make buffalo chicken. And red pepper flakes. I cannot find those anywhere. I think canned pumpkin would be too heavy for the suitcase.

Only the very sound sleepers in the Grenoble area got much rest last night. The rest of us rubbed our bleary eyes and drank extra coffee after one very fierce storm blew through. And I think this is the first time I have actually watched a storm blow through the area.

At first, we could just see the lightning in the skies across the valley from our house. It was really a spectacular show… the lightning first would light up the sky just above the mountains straight across from us then it would light up the sky over Grenoble to our right. I don’t know if it is because we are high up with a wide view but I’ve never seen lightning do that before.

Then, Bill pointed out how we could see a cloud moving over the mountain directly across from us. I don’t know how long it took but pretty soon that cloud blocked our view of everything. No mountain, no city, no lights. Nothing. Just the trees outside our house blowing and bending in the wind… and debris flying all around. It was a little scary. I asked Bill for reassurance that there are no tornadoes in the mountains, but he couldn’t answer definitively. (he’s the scientific one in this relationship; he is supposed to know these things)

Since the lightning display got considerably less interesting when we became engulfed in the cloud, I gave up on watching and went downstairs for some water. Then it sounded like the house was under attack. Hail was beating on our tile roof and our metal shutters. It sounded horrible. And pretty scary. Then I was glad that Bill was home, even if he apparently isn’t the science expert I’d taken him to be all these years. We opened the shutters to look at what was making all that racket. Pea sized hail was bouncing all over the place.

Now, I have seen the movie Twister. First we had debris. Then hail. If the donkey from across the street had blown by our window I’d have known for sure we were being hit by a tornado.

I tried to go to sleep but it was hard given that the sliding glass door in our bedroom was open so that Bill could take pictures of the storm. This morning, I found pieces of that debris in my clothes. (our shelves that are the French version of a closet are right by the door)

When I took Kaitlyn to school this morning I saw that that bit of debris is nothing to complain about. The road was coated with leaves and twigs. (by afternoon our town’s street sweeper was out tiding up) The school’s playground was also quite a mess. A big tree in the middle of the schoolyard lost two huge branches. Kids were having fun sweeping up the mess with brooms. The teachers looked less thrilled with the clean-up.

Fortunately the forecast for the next week does not include any storms. Of course, that forecast does change frequently (often if you check in the afternoon it has changed since the morning). It’s not just fortunate so that the mess can be all cleaned up. It’s fortunate because I looked up the answer to my science question myself. And here’s what I found from NOAA:

MYTH: Areas near rivers, lakes, and mountains are safe from tornadoes.
FACT: No place is safe from tornadoes. In the late 1980’s, a tornado swept through Yellowstone National Park leaving a path of destruction up and down a 10,000 ft. mountain.

Now I have to find out if they have tornado sirens here… or if they just shrug their shoulders, eat a baguette, drink more wine and mutter …. c’est la vie.

Oh, isn’t it cute… Kaitlyn has figured out how to use the mouse on the computer. I thought her acquiring that skill would be liberating for me. No longer would I be trapped playing Mickey Mouse or Big Bird games while she gleefully cheered me on. No…. Kaitlyn’s ability to use the mouse means that she can play all by herself and I am free to do other things. Bill even created her own log-in to my computer so that she can’t accidentally erase stuff off my laptop. Great. Except that now if one of the other things I would like to do involves using my computer… I can’t. (notice he didn’t create her log in on his computer!)

Now instead of being used for writing, exchanging email or reading comic strips on line my poor PC is stuck cranking out Handy Manny music while Kaitlyn claps at her amazing ability to help Pat the Hammer when he is lost.

As Kaitlyn would say…. it isn’t fair!

This afternoon we met up with one of Kaitlyn’s friends and his little brother and Mommy at the town pool. It was our first trip there since we have a pool and since the weather hasn’t been especially conducive to swimming. (neither has the tedious task of removing the dead bugs and lizards from our pool when one does want to take a dip)

I was a little leery of going because I have seen a lot of skinny women walking to and from the pool. (I drive by it basically any time I leave the house) I was also a little leery of going on my own since I am not familiar with French pool etiquette.

First, it cost me nearly 5 Euros to get in. Kaitlyn was free.

Then, there is this little foot pool you are supposed to walk through on your way into the pool. There is one at each break in the fence so you have no choice. Theoretically. Kaitlyn chose to cling to the fence and edge her way along the cement as to avoid getting her feet wet. Given that the whole point of going to a pool is usually to get wet, it seemed funny to me. Of course, I walked through it knowing that I had no intention of actually getting into the pool.

There are actually three pools. Just like they have three levels of “kindergarten:” petite, moyenne and grande.

There is a baby pool which is what you’d expect. Extremely shallow. Small. Off on its own as to not disturb the others, I suppose.

La piscine moyenne* (*not the official name) is a decent size but only about 4 feet deep at the deepest point. Which makes it just about perfect for the swimmers moyennes. (swimmers Kaitlyn’s size) That’s where she and her friend donned their float devices and dove in.

The big pool I can only guess was pretty deep all around. There is a tall diving platform off which pre-teen after pre-teen jumped.

There is a sign up at the pool entrance letting you know that there is a dress code. No, it said nothing about women keeping their tops on, although everyone appeared to be doing so today. It reminded everyone that “traditional” swim attire is required for men. Which in English means: lots of old men wearing Speedos. Although now that I think about it… I would swear that the lifeguard had on surfer swim trunks.

If you need to put on your traditional swim attire, you can do so in one of the changing rooms. There is a whole row of them. There is also a coat check room (well, no one is checking a coat at the pool, but that’s basically what it is) where I guess you can leave your purse or man-purse. And unlike most places I go here, there were bathrooms. The mom we were there with said that on one of her first visits she sent her 4 year old to the bathroom… or thought she did. She saw a hole in the ground and knows that a lot of times here that is the facility so she sent her little boy in to tinkle. Then realized once he’d started that she’d just told him to pee in the shower. Hey, at least know I know there are actual toilets. Today, her younger boy decided to relieve himself alongside one of those foot bath things at the entrances. Note to self: use the Kaitlyn avoidance maneuver in future.

Naturally, no French experience would be complete without a snack bar. Because for people who don’t snack they certainly make it easy to, well, snack. And, naturally, the snack bar was complete with American pinball machines, foosball (how do you spell that?) and a cappuccino maker. I didn’t have enough money to get a cafe after buying Kaitlyn some ice cream. I wasn’t going to buy her any and thought I’d get away with it by telling her that there was no Sponge Bob Square Pants ice cream in the cooler. (she likes that one because it is one of the few without chocolate) The woman running the snack bar overheard and happily rushed over to show us that she did, indeed, have that ice cream. “Je comprends un peu.” Sure she does… she understands just enough to cost me 2 Euros and 10 centimes.

School…. day two.

This morning when I told Kaitlyn that she’d “get” to eat lunch at home with me today she said “aaaw.” I guess that French cuisine is better than hot dogs and French fries shaped like letters. See…. I serve French food.