will WE play in Peoria?

How pathetic is this: the highlight of your week is going to a new grocery store. It isn’t just a trip someplace you haven’t been. It’s an event. It’s what my life has come to.

Today another ISE wife, her kids, Kaitlyn and myself turned the day into a new grocery store adventure. They came over for lunch…. I grilled hot dogs… they brought home baked cookies (chocolate chip, so Kaitlyn ever so politely said “eeeew.”) … we hit the tourist office (not for grocery store information) and then to the ultimate. The new store. It isn’t even a new store. Just new to us.

It wasn’t the biggest store I’d been in. You couldn’t do your weekly shopping there. (no flour, pretzels, ice cream or soda) But I’d like to try. It had the best produce I’ve seen anywhere. Huge sweet potatoes. Okra. I don’t even know how to cook it but I almost bought some just because it was there. Luckily, I was taken over by common sense. The seafood counter didn’t reek like the back alley a block off the beach. The meat was all in a butcher case to be freshly cut. Nothing pre-packaged.

I asked Bill if I’d have made such a big deal about a new grocery store in the US. Would I have called up a friend and said “ooh… there ‘s a new Harris Teeter down the street we just have to go… come for lunch first!” No. But he says I would have happily made an event out of checking out a new grocery store. Although in the “old” days, that lunch would have meant eating out.

The Fete du Bois (festival of wood) was this weekend at Chamrousse. (the ski resort) Someone told us it’s a good activity for the kids. So we went. I don’t know that we will put it on the calendar for next year.

                        We looked up the program online. Like a lot of things online here, there was not a great deal of information. But it did appear that there would be lumberjack competitions and some sort of sheep herding competition today. (dogs, not lumberjacks, would be the ones herding the sheep)

                        The first thing we came across was the pony rides. Always a must-do for Kaitlyn. I was surprised to see that they actually gave the kids riding helmets, given how non-safety-conscious things seem here. I was even more surprised when the woman asked us which one of us would be holding the pony during our jaunt. Uh, what? Bill is the paparazzi so I got to hold the horse. The girl showed me how to hold with one hand on the strap next to his face and hold his rope with the other hand. We walked up the path she pointed to (she said to go “haut”… well on a mountain that is about the only way one can go). The path, by the way, was the area in between tents and tables set up by vendors. So we walked this pony up the path until we figured we’d gone about as far as we were supposed to for our 3 Euros. One of the pony girls walked up behind us with her pony-mess-scooper and told us no, keep going. Ok. So we turned around and went more haut. Then the pony started head butting me. He just kept smacking his head into me. I made Bill take over horse-holding. The pony didn’t stop. So we figured he thought it was time to turn around. So we did and he stopped hitting Bill.

                        After a stop at the playground, we thought we’d wander and check out more of the booths set up. One had an old machine that, amazingly, didn’t even particularly interest Bill. That was next to the sheep-shearing booth. There were piles of the fairly freshly shaved wool on a table; I guess so you could see what it felt like. It looked disgusting. I may never wear a wool sweater again.

                        Finally we found what looked like the lumber jacking area. There were about ten giant logs lined up in a row in an area behind some temporary fencing. A small set of bleachers was on one side. Nothing was going on. Oh, we arrived at lunchtime. How much wood would a lumberjack chuck if a lumberjack could chuck wood? None, if it’s lunchtime in France. Lunch seemed like a good idea.

                        We found a restaurant with seating across from where the chopping would be taking place. The waiter asked us if we could come back in a half hour. Seemed perfect, it would put us there right when the competition was getting started. (I saw a time on a poster in a shop window) So we went back to the playground to waste time.

                    After patiently waiting our 30 minutes we returned… hungry. We sat down and waited. And waited. And waited. Even for France, this was ridiculous. But looking up and down the row, all the cafes looked just as busy; it appeared we were lucky to even have a table. So we waited. And waited. And waited some more. Finally we had to flag down a waiter passing by after taking the order of a group that arrived well after we did. The service didn’t speed up, but at least the lumberjack competition got started to watch. In theory.

                    As soon as the emcee would yell something into his microphone (why do so many people think that you need to put a microphone in your mouth? Do they not understand that its role is to amplify your voice?)… anyway as soon as the emcee would yell something into his microphone, everyone who’d been sitting at the cafe rushed to the edge of the terrace and blocked any chance I had of seeing. Not that there seemed to be that much to see. Random people who’d signed up in the morning were just chopping wood as fast as they could. I can see that in the winter in my neighborhood. Those big huge logs that were all lined up? They didn’t appear to have any purpose whatsoever, other than being obstacles.

                        When we finished eating and finally managed to get our check, we gave up on the fete du bois. But not without another pony ride. This time, I made Bill hold the pony while I took pictures. I wasn’t taking any more chances.

                The summer sale ended yesterday. In France, stores are only allowed to have sales two times a year. It’s all regulated by the government.

                    I checked out the sales and most of what is marked down is the seasonal stuff stores don’t want to get stuck with… they certainly don’t want a big pile of tank tops in November… so they put it on sale when they are allowed to in July.

                    So I wondered, what price is it today? The day after the sale?

                    I found a tote bag I’d wanted to get on sale but hadn’t. I hesitated to buy it, then when I went back, they were out. Doh! Today I went to a different location of that same store. They had plenty of the bags left. If I’d gone to the store yesterday, I’d have paid 15 Euros. Since I went today, I paid 30. Yes, the price went back up. And, yes, I paid it since I was so mad at myself for not buying it when I should have. Lesson learned!

                Tout le monde etait a Annecy aujourd hui!

                That’s how you’d say it was packed in Annecy today… everyone, or “all the world” was there. And that’s about right. It was way too crowded. Obviously, everyone who had gone to the fireworks show last night decided to mill around the old town and shop and check out the market… same as we did. Bill and I both dislike crowds, so today wasn’t nearly as enjoyable as yesterday.

                For lunch, we tried to find a place mentioned in the Rick Steves book. I think we were looking right at it, but the address didn’t match so we thought it was the wrong place. Interested in speed at that point, we picked a pizzeria. It brought slow French service to a whole new level. The people sitting next to us sat down after us and got served before us. All of us had ordered pizza. When ours arrived, mine wasn’t what I’d meant to order. It wasn’t bad and if it had been served quickly I’d have probably not even really cared. But since it was painfully slow and wrong… I wasn’t happy. I couldn’t be sure that the mistake wasn’t mine so I just ate it. Besides, even if I was sure the mistake wasn’t mine, I didn’t want to sit there another 40 minutes waiting for a fresh pizza just to prove a point. We weren’t the only unhappy ones. The couple next to us had to order coffee three times before the waiter brought it.

                    It was interesting, a group sat at a table behind us and I could easily listen to their conversation. They were obviously American. It seemed that the young couple are living somewhere in the area and that the other couple was her parents and they had their younger daughter with them. (Yes, I have taken liberties filling in a few blanks) What struck me was the way the couple I think live here were trying to explain the menu to the parents… talking about what’s a regional specialty and the like… then trying their best to order in French (they sounded even newer than we are) while their relatives just pointed and ordered in English. I wonder if we sound like that to anyone listening?

They say you learn something new every day. Well, here’s what I learned tonight:

1. you can sit too close to a fireworks display

2. you can sleep through a fireworks display

3. you cannot explain a fireworks display

                The reason we spent this weekend in Annecy was because today is the annual fete du lac… which includes a giant fireworks show. We had no idea how giant until we saw it.

                Bill bought our tickets for the fireworks online. We were in the third row. That was good because a lot of the show involved ground displays… or in this case lake displays. That wasn’t so good because about halfway through the show we realized that we were being pelted by tiny bits of ash from the falling fireworks. It also wasn’t so good because it meant that the fireworks were especially loud. Kaitlyn doesn’t like loud. (which is funny, for such a loud person)

                She was so looking forward to seeing the display. When it started she crawled on my lap to make it easier for me to cover her ears. But not long after, she said she was ready to go back to the hotel. We couldn’t just leave. For one thing, I think that the announcement as the show started was telling us all to stay in our seats for safety. Of course, the announcement was in French so I can only guess. (The announcement thanking the sponsors was given in four languages. The one that seemed to concern personal safety… only in French.) She finally moved to Bill’s lap and while he covered her ears she covered her eyes… and actually fell asleep. It wasn’t the soundest slumber, but there was some definite dozing going on.

                    That seemed especially amazing given the scope of the show. The designer (is that what you call it?) is apparently quite a big name in fireworks displays… he’s done shows for the Olympics. I read that in the program. He orchestrated the most odd and amazing fireworks show I’ve ever seen. Odd because it went on for about 15 minutes without any fireworks. Just lasers. Odd because every so often the announcer would read a poem (in French). The poems were also in the program and about halfway through I realized that was the gibberish interrupting the program. Amazing because I’ve never actually seen a fireworks display match the music it was set to. Normally music is played but it’s just noise to accompany the noise. This one was unbelievable. The pace of the music was all over the place… from the Mission Impossible theme to Celine Dion to classical music to dance music to Some Day My Prince Will Come. And the fireworks matched it all. Amazing because of the sheer number of fireworks used. At one point in the show, I turned to Bill and said “how will we know it’s the finale?” Because the display for each song was as huge as what we’re used to being the finale. Well, when it was the end, there was no questioning it. The finale probably used as many fireworks as the town of Cary uses for its entire July 4^th show. Sometimes the sky was so bright I had to close my eyes. (Kaitlyn’s eyes remained closed while she slept through it all)

                Lastly, you cannot explain a fireworks display. The program tried to. The show was called “tout feu, tout slam.” I was anxious to hear the English translation. “all fire, all slam.” Thanks for nothing. In all four languages of the pre-show announcements, the word slam was simply slam. The program said something about slam being 1980’s music in the United States. But there wasn’t a single 80’s song in the whole show. I’m sure it made perfect sense to someone…. else.

                Whatever Bill paid for the tickets was worth it. And I’m already figuring we need to go back next year.

                    A day at the lake in the summer. It’s not something I think I’ve ever done. But when you put the lake in the Alps, it’s more appealing.

                    We came to Lake Annecy for tonight’s big fireworks show. We decided to make an entire weekend of it because it seemed relaxing. And for our anniversary. Not exactly the romantic getaway I’d always imagined for our tenth, given that Kaitlyn was along, but that’s ok. And it’s the only “vacation” slated for this month. We couldn’t let a month go by without going somewhere! Annecy is only about an hour and a half from us (about 30 minutes from Mont Blanc), but we drove up last night. I’m so bad at getting up and getting going in the mornings, Bill figures we have a fighting chance of doing stuff if I start my day at our destination.

                    After breakfast, the plan was to rent bikes to ride around the lake (which I think sounds wonderfully scenic) and then go swimming. I figured we’d get the getting dirty part of being at the lake out of the way today, when we still have a hotel room and shower available for clean up.

                    Earlier this week I went online to find a bike rental place. There were at least half a dozen. So I figured they’d be all around the lake, easy to find… no need to make note of addresses. Lesson learned: write down addresses even if you think you won’t need them. We started by going to one of the rental places mentioned in my Rick Steves tour book. They had plenty of bikes and bike trailers for kids, but no tandem for a child that hooks onto the back of an adult bike. We thought that was what we wanted for Kaitlyn, so we figured we’d find another shop. There have to be plenty of them. I’d picked up a flier at the hotel for a shop we headed toward. It didn’t look super close on the map, but usually those tourist maps make everything look a little farther away than it is. Usually. Of course, not this time. We walked something just shy of forever way the heck around the lake until we found the place. (Oh, we passed another one on the way. I’m still not sure why we kept on going past that one) They didn’t have the hook-on bike either. But by then Kaitlyn was pooped from all the walking and all she wanted to do was to sit in the trailer. So that is what we rented. And where did the bike path around the lake go? Right past the first place we passed like an hour earlier.

                    The bike ride was scenic, although it didn’t go exactly along the bank of the lake like I’d expected. It did for a while then went a bit inland. Still, I enjoyed it. It reminded me that bike riding is an activity I actually enjoy and that I should figure out how to stuff my bike into my car and go to where it is flat in Grenoble to ride around on the paths along the river. I’m not biking on this mountain. Although after biking in Annecy, I can say I have biked in the Alps! We went for about an hour… or what would have taken an hour if we hadn’t stopped at some place with blow-up bouncy things for kids to jump on. After eating lunch at a little lake-side cafe, we got back on the path to return the bikes. Kaitlyn fell asleep in the trailer. Dozens of people we passed pointed and stared at her; it was starting to really annoy me until I realized they were amused at her napping.

                        We dropped off the bikes then had to find a public bathroom clean enough to use as a changing room to get into our swimsuits for the beach. It took a couple of tries and was still a rather frustrating experience.

                    The beach was pretty packed with people. Vendors were set up along the sidewalk with everything you’d need for the beach: sandwiches, drinks, beer, cotton candy. A guy in a sombrero walked around hollering about something called chi-chi’s… fried bread. Well, fried pain au chocolate… which is like a croissant with chocolate on the inside. I like chocolate, I like croissants and I like fried food but the combination did not sound good. The beach itself was half grass, half rocks. On the upside, there were lifeguards. The paddle boat rentals are in a different area, so we were off the hook for one of those. After peddling a couple of hours along the lake, I was done with anything resembling exercise for the day. I did go in the lake with Kaitlyn, but she was the one doing all the swimming. I was just trying not to freeze. I thought that after being in the sun the water would feel good, but it just felt cold. After a while I switched with Bill and he, too, thought the water was a little too chilly for any extended swimming.

                    On the way back to the hotel I made a very important discovery. The canvas bag I tossed our sunscreen, flip flops and the like into is way too small to haul all our lake or pool junk in. When you add three beach towels, it is just impossible to carry. Looks like a shopping trip is in my future!

                    I thought I’d treat myself to a little television during my lunch today, since I wouldn’t be forced to watch JoJo’s Circus or Sesame Street. Problem is, it seems that Disney, Sprout and CNN are about the only channels that program actual shows in the middle of the night. It may be lunch time here, but since I’m watching my brother’s tv in California, I’m watching choice 3am shows.

                    I picked CNN and sat down to eat. They were doing all-out coverage on the bridge that collapsed in Minneapolis. It was interesting… until….

                    They said they’d finally been given permission to air an answering machine message left by a 10 year old on the school bus that nearly plunged with the bridge. That crossed the line. I do not need to hear the terror in the voice of a young child in the midst of a crisis. In tears, I rushed across the room and changed the channel. It may be a long time before I watch CNN again. That was not right. That was wrong. All wrong.

Do I look like I speak French? I must… until I get that “gads, I’ve no idea what you’re saying” look on my face that I think I’ve got nearly perfected.

                        This morning when I took Kaitlyn to her last day of summer “camp,” the director struck up a conversation with me. Mind you, she did this after greeting me in French then Kaitlyn in English. Then she turned back to me and just started carrying on and on in French. I think she told me something about practicing her English to go to Australia or England… and I’m most sure that she told me one time on her way back from Canada she had an 11 hour layover in England so she ate and found the food to be horrible. The food, apparently, is her only hesitation about going to England. At least, I think it is.

                        Once Kaitlyn was off playing, I figured I’d better tend to one more activity that is nearly impossible with Kaitlyn along. A haircut. I wandered into the hairdresser I’ve been to the last couple of times and asked for an appointment. Je voudrais prendre un rendez-vous, sil vous plait. Then I did my patented pointing to my gray hairs. She asked me when.. I said today. She asked me morning or afternoon. I don’t know how to say either. So I sort of shrugged and in English said it didn’t matter. Then I was fairly sure she told me to sit and wait while she cut some man’s hair, so I sat. She didn’t laugh or shoo me out so I must have understood.

                            While cutting my hair she tried to strike up a conversation. I guess she figured I’m now a regular-enough customer for her to recognize me so she might as well chip away at trying to talk to me. I managed to tell her we’ve lived here since October and will stay between 3 and 5 years. She repeated it back to me the way I should have said it… but it meant she got the idea. Which is how my end of conversations usually go anyway. At one point, she started asking me about le prochain fois cutting my hair plus court. (shorter) This time, my mis-translation allowed me to make a firm answer… and luckily so. I thought she’d asked if she’d cut my hair shorter last time I was in… she was proposing to do that next time. Fortunately, I had said no quickly. Then worrying that my “non” was too abrupt, I tried to explain that mon marie prefere comme ca… pointing below my shoulders to indicate how Bill would like me to wear my hair. I hope she understood that just above my shoulders is the compromise that’s kept us married for ten years now.

                        I finally escaped there.. after trying to ask if she’s open next week so that Kaitlyn can get her hair cut and finally see again. Then I wandered down to a little knick-knack store/ice cream shop/coffee place/restaurant (perhaps it’s spreading itself a wee bit too thin…) in hopes of finding a bag in which to carry my French books. There I managed to bludgeon the language once again when the shop keeper asked me if I was looking for something in particular (yes, something on sale) and I answered her with the wrong verb conjugation. It may not sound so horrible, but it felt really horrible. I hate feeling stupid. I didn’t find a bag the right size and tried to scrape up what was left of my pride to say au revoir, merci, madame on my way out.

                    Some days I really REALLY wish I hadn’t dropped French in college when it got too hard! Darn university, allowing us to take literature and films in translation to fill our foreign language requirement!

                A much-awaited e-mail hit my in-box today… the last thing we needed in place to give our planned Christmas vacation the real go-ahead. We’re putting together a ski trip with another family. They have twins a year older than Kaitlyn and the girls all get along great and the grown ups all get along great so we thought it would be, well, let’s say great, to take a trip together.

                Today’s e-mail let me know that the girls are now officially signed up for the special kids’ ski-school… all day every day of our vacation.

                I told Bill and said “can you believe it… we are going to spend Christmas in the Swiss Alps!”

                And he said “It’s cool. Of course, we do live in the French Alps”

                It’s still hard to believe.

This isn’t exactly how I thought I’d spend the day when I imagined it ten years ago… when Bill and I got married. That’s not to say this was a bad anniversary, not at all. Just an unexpected one, I guess.

                                Kaitlyn is spending her days this week at her little summer “camp” where she plays games and is immersed in French and is thrilled that the snacks don’t automatically involve chocolate. Especially good on a stormy day like today when at home we’d have ended up flopped down watching tv and wearing our pajamas until, well, let’s just say late.

                                So after my French lesson this morning, I called Bill to make an anniversary lunch date.

                            We headed downtown to a Chinese restaurant we like, then opted to try out a different one a couple of doors down. It had scallops on the menu and that lured us in. After the entree (appetizer in the US) and after our rice was delivered, the power went out.

                        My first reaction was to think “well, he was using the cappuccino maker and that probably put too much strain on the power supply.” The waiter/owner had the same first reaction that we’ve come to have at home: he ran to the fuse box. (we know this because the fuse box was, naturally, located in the midst of the dining room) We were both wrong. We just had to do what I used to consider normal: we had to wait.

                            I don’t know how long we sat there nibbling on our rice. Bill started to think he was going to have to call his boss and let him know he wouldn’t be back to the office at all this afternoon. Eventually, the power came back on… although a few switches still required flipping in the fuse box. Once the lights were back on I could hear the sizzle of food cooking and… voila!.. my scallops arrived. (They were fantastic, by the way. We have a new favorite Chinese restaurant.)

                            After returning Bill to the office, I headed to the mall. I don’t need anything… well what I need is some summer pants but I’m not going to find them here in the racks of slacks for tall, skinny women. But without Kaitlyn I figured I’d take advantage of the chance to just browse.

                        I’d finally found a store with a shirt I wanted and before I could buy it… the power went out. The best part of it was, several of us just continued to shop in the dark. I milled around the shop, re-checking out the selection I’d rejected on my first go-around. When the lights still weren’t on… but other stores in the mall were bright as could be… I put the shirt back and headed out. I don’t know if the power ever came back on in that section of the mall.

                            The last stop of the day was back at home. And the power was out here. Luckily I started carrying my house key on the same key ring as my car key so I can’t forget it. Kaitlyn and I went in the front door and she rushed to the refrigerator to check the food… then made the announcement that the light was out. I’ve wandered out to the fuse box twice tonight to restore our power.