fyi...

I'm not going to have internet access from tonight until March 8th - I guess that gives people time to catch up on the journal though. ;o ) Have a great week!

Daily Funnies...

French Fries = les frites (fries)
French Toast = le pain perdu (lost bread)
French Manicure = French Manicure (french manicure)

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Erin was buying her plane ticket home online through a French travel agency. When it came time to decide how she wanted it delivered, the first (and the only free) option was Websomethingorother which she assumed meant online so she selected it. The confirmation e-mail came five minutes later telling her she could pick up her tickets at the agency in the tiny French town of Websomethingorother (six hours away) the next day.

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One of the students here who doesn't speak French was at the bar the other night when she found out that she's been pronouncing 'beaucoup' incorrectly. Everytime she thought she was saying, "Thanks a lot" she was really saying, "Thanks. Nice Ass."

le meteo (French Weather)

The wind started blowing Friday night but it didn't occur to me that it was anything other than a bad storm. It continued blowing stronger, rattling the window shade outside and waking me several times during the night. Yesterday when I woke up, all the cars outside my window looked they had gone on a mass off-roading trip through the red Provence mud an hour away.

The wind was still blowing and skinny trees were tilting at violent angles outside the living room. Finally it occured to me - the Mistral. The Mistral is the infamous Provencal wind that blows right through you in the winter, coming down from the mountains at up to 70 mph and lasting up to 3 days. I asked Joelle if this was the Mistral and she said it must be. The winds reached 100 km/hour today.

But one of my professors said the Mistral, by definition, always comes from the north and in the weather report tonight they said it was sand carried up from the African deserts that made it rain red last night so is this something else?

Ugh - either way, I stayed home from the class trip to the Luberon today. It's a shame because I was really looking forward to it since it was described as Peter Mayle's Provence (author of A Year in Provence), but I have a cough and I don't want it to get any worse with the freezing weather outside. So, sorry - no pictures this week!