Cold days spent cooped up at home lately. Not that I am complaining. I guess I am kind of a homebody!
I was really sick last night. I don’t know why, it was something I ate last night I think because I was the only one ‘hit’. MrB didn’t eat what I did when he got home, since, well, I was lying on the floor dying when he got home. So I was off to bed at 9pm with MissL. I wasn’t too sure if I should keep on nursing since I really wasn’t feeling to great, but after some searching online I decided to keep on nursing and for the moment it hasn’t had an effect on MissL. I am still crossing my fingers that I didn’t give her something nasty.
Yesterday we were on our walk MissL, Bandit and I, when we came across a rather frazzeled looking woman on a bicycle. She slowed down and we chatted just about the usual stuff when you don’t know someone for a few minutes, when the conversation took a turn in a strange direction.
Her: “Have you seen a cat around here?”
Me: looking around our neighborhood which is the complete countryside and wondering where this conversation is going “Um, no. Why, are you looking for a cat?”
Her: She goes into a really in-depth description of a cat, down to the color of its feet (some black, some white). I listen, but have not seen a cat, am trying to store this info somewhere in my brain in case a cat somehow scales our 7 foot tall gate, and it happens to be hers. They she says this, “Yeah, I lost my cat in July so I come around sometimes and look for it.”
Me: Thinking to myself, if you haven’t seen your cat since July in these parts, it is either dead, or has been adopted by someone else. “Yea, ok, well if I see a cat that fits that description I will check its collar and let you know…”
And off she rode, although she did stop to talk to my neighbors dogs on her way…
Maybe I am too much of a realist but I can’t help but think that if your animal, especially your cat, has been missing since July 2009, there little chances of finding it! And there is no longer a reason to be in a panic about it. But she was out there with her fluorescent vest, on her bike, muddy up to her knees, with binoculars around her neck searching for a cat gone missing 7 months earlier!
Today we stayed at home, cuddled up inside because it is cold out there!
This has been a weekend of lazy days.
Yesterday MrB slept in embarrisingly late, me and MissL spent the morning watching awful television (I wish we could get rid of cable, there is never anything on, it is super expensive and I just don’t see the point, but alas MrB like to watch soccer and the only way to see it is on cable…). Laundry was done, dishes washed, floors mopped, bathtub scrubbed…
Today was spent making new messes where we cleaned up yesterday. Sigh. Now I get to start all over again.
We did also go on a walk. And that is where the picture from above came from. Behind a big gate that is usually locked was all this junk, including… old gas pumps!
There is a chicken to be cooked for dinner tonight, leftovers to be turned into enchiladas (sort of, at least as good as I can make them out here in the land of poor to non existant Mexican food and supplies). I may even try to make my own stock, something that I have yet to try.
This week I am going to finish (finally, I know) my last Unit for my Young Learners TEFL certification, and then I am off to try to find some jobs. I am hoping to find some hours close to home. I am also going to try my hand at making my own laundry soap this week. I will let you know how that goes, if anyone is interested…
January 21, 2010
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January 26, 2010
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January 29, 2010
January 30, 2010
January 31, 2010
February 1-5 following. Whew, if I need any motivation to not miss any more days it is the time spent catching up!!
So I have now gotten TEFL certification. The regular old TEFL certification, did the Business English as well, and the Young Learners. I have spoken to some people and all I have to do now is get out there and start trying to find some jobs. But I think that I have become almost too, well, French. Afraid of a refusal. I mean I know that there will be some, and I know that it is just part of the game, but I am scared!
Every time I talk to a French person about quitting my job and teaching they are full of comments such as “Oh be careful! You have a nice job at the bank!”, or “And what if it doesn’t work?”, or “I would never do something like that!” or “Wow, that is risky!”… And it makes me kind of second guess my choices and ideas. (Although I guess the people that make those comments are the older generations. People our age or more likely to encourage me or at least have more positive comments!) I feel that the French are more then cautious when it comes to jobs and employment. When someone quits their job it is a huge deal. My in-laws have friends that worked for the same company. He got fired, and she decided to quit because of how they were treated. They went and bought a real estate agency and are now working selling homes. The way my in-laws talk about it is like they quit their jobs to pick trash off the moon or something equally crazy… I understand that people have a hard time finding jobs out here, and when you do finally land the CDI people don’t want to let it go for something “risky”. I didn’t really have a hard time finding my job out here. I may never find a job with as many ‘perks’, but I do feel like my previous job kind of used me. And the perks are great, but if you have to work long hours and for not that great of a pay for the perks, dosen’t it seem like the real advantage would be to have a slower life on a daily basis? The women that worked the same sort of hours as me (but for more pay of course) all had cleaning ladies, a nounou and a babysitter for after the nounou… With what I was paid, I couldn’t afford that!
I hope that I am making the right choices. Regular jobs can be found if this doesn’t work out, right?
So I know, I am way behind on the time in the movie field… The fact that I am a total homebody and had a baby not to long ago dosen’t help. Plus spending 10 euros to go see a film (for one person) seems a little outrageous to me, if I wanted a small snack and something to drink with that it would easily be double. When we lived in Paris and could walk to the movies we would go more often, but I have never really been a big movie go-er. MrB laments the fact that I haven’t seen the Star Wars movies nor The Terminator. I do like seeing a good movie, but sometimes they seem far and few between. And no offence to MrB but neither Star Wars nor The Terminator are movies that I would go out of my way to see. Neither appeal to me from what I know or have heard about them.
But last night, in the comfort of my own home, I watched Julie and Julia. And I really liked it. I remember seeing a Julia Child movie in Home Ec in the 7th grade. And I loved it. Her voice, her haphazard cake making (in the video she was getting up there in age and splashed way more rum into her cake batter then what was called for), she just seemed so happy. I loved Meryl Streep in her role. It wasn’t the movie of the year maybe but it was good, fun entertainment.
And that got me thinking along with a recent post over at Tongue in Cheek that I really need to work more on my cooking. It has gotten vastly better since I have been at home, but there is, as always room for improvement. So, I am going to start paying more attention, taking notes and starting a system to catalogue recipes that I like or want to try. I think that it could be fun, a good way to save some money hopefully (or maybe not!). And a way to spend some of my time!
The US Embassy in France is really great. I mean I do have low customer service standards after having so many deceptions in France, but really the Embassy out here is fabulous. Not only did they make and send MissL’s passport in one week, from the day we dropped all the paperwork off, but they also did the turn around on mine in less then a week too. From the day that I sent it to the Embassy! I put the envelope in the mail on Wednsday last week, so they got it on Thursday, and today the Chronopost delivery guy dropped off my new passport!
Now I can finally start really planning out trip to the States this spring. As in reserve tickets, because besides that, and getting spoiled by Grandma and Grandpa, there is not much else I want to do! Well, and eat out at some restaurants, but that falls into the spoiling catagory.
I am off to make some lunch and update my photos (all in one post I think), and make some flyers about giving English lessons in my village.
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A quick shot just before bedtime, as Mama forgot to pick up her camera today.
And I promise I will try to start taking photos of other things!
I think that she has the same Tic as her Mama.
Ever since I was a teeny baby (according to my parents), when I was happy or excited, I squeeze my hands together. It looks like this girl does the same thing.
She can make the most perfect pouty face.
Except that the sun is finally starting to come out a little it seems. I no longer feel like I am living under a rock 80% of the time. Which is really nice. My energy is back up and I am now finally used to being woken up once or twice, depending, a night. In the beginning I was feeling a little worn out, but I am used to it now and it is just par for course. I actually think I would worry now if I wasn’t woken up once a night. I’ve gotten to apperciate almost the 4am stirrings. I even sometimes thrown in some wash to get a super early start to the day…
I have basically completely switched over to cloth diapers, but I am short a few to really only use them. My turn around time is lagging a little. If I had about 6 more it would be perfect. But for the moment I still have some disposables that are her current size and too many to use them all just casually so for the time being I am supplementing with those when need be. Once I am through with that pack though no more disposables here. Except for when we are going somewhere. I don’t really want to have to carry the dirty ones around with me if I can avoid it.
MissL is finally getting used to her crib. She can lie in there for about a half and hour without getting too upset. She still sleeps in our room, which I really like, as I am her source of food! For the 4am wake up call it is really easy to nurse her back to sleep, as neither of us really has to do a lot. I wake up before she is full blown upset, so he hardly wakes up, and is quick to nurse back to sleep. If I were to put her in her own bed, she would have to get pretty upset for me to hear her I think (we have a baby monitor, but our two rooms are on different floors, so by the time I wake up, get out of bed and get to her it’ll take a few minutes). But, MrB has been talking about moving her into her own room, so we will see what the next few weeks holds…
I’ve been taking the once a day pictures religiously, it is the posting that is a little harder, but I have a new system set up so hopefully that will help.
We are also trying to sell my car to upgrade me to more of a family type car. We have to sell mine before we can buy the new one, and it has yet to go. I am crossing my fingers that someone wants to buy it here in a few days. I can’t wait to have a bigger car!
