mardi, juin 26, 2007
La Petite Fleur Pressée
Sorry for the quietness from over here lately, things have been heating up- very much in the figurative sense, in the literal sense it has been raining and 15 degrees for the last three weeks and I am very much starting to look forward to summer holiday time (more about that soon) which is all too rapidly approaching. Summer holiday approaching too rapidly, what the hell is wrong with me? Well, precisely because so much has to get done before then! Actually well before then. By mid-July actually, when I'm heading to a conference to present all sorts of results that I don't have yet! Help!
Anyway, what's new over here? Well, we had Luke and Catherine come and visit us from Scotland last weekend, which was of course very lovely, and included a trip to the Quai de Branly Museum which is tipped to be renamed the Chirac Museum if he manages to stay out of jail- a far-from-sure bet actually! Since his reign ended the police have been sniffing very closely around his now-much-less-impressive backdoor. I'm assuming his now-less-impressive-that-the-President's-residence- but-still-no-doubt-on-the-bourgoise-side-part of town is less dog-shit covered than our humble street, else that sniffing would be highly unpleasant. Oh yes, we have a new President here, for those of you not up on your World News. Monsieur Sarko is now The Man With The Impressive Backdoor in these parts.
In other news, my ankle is now almost back to new, and I am back to running on it, in training for a run with some work friends in a team with the lamest name ever in the history of running teams- Les Petites Fleurs. The Little Flowers. I know. On that note...
Anyway, what's new over here? Well, we had Luke and Catherine come and visit us from Scotland last weekend, which was of course very lovely, and included a trip to the Quai de Branly Museum which is tipped to be renamed the Chirac Museum if he manages to stay out of jail- a far-from-sure bet actually! Since his reign ended the police have been sniffing very closely around his now-much-less-impressive backdoor. I'm assuming his now-less-impressive-that-the-President's-residence- but-still-no-doubt-on-the-bourgoise-side-part of town is less dog-shit covered than our humble street, else that sniffing would be highly unpleasant. Oh yes, we have a new President here, for those of you not up on your World News. Monsieur Sarko is now The Man With The Impressive Backdoor in these parts.
In other news, my ankle is now almost back to new, and I am back to running on it, in training for a run with some work friends in a team with the lamest name ever in the history of running teams- Les Petites Fleurs. The Little Flowers. I know. On that note...
dimanche, juin 03, 2007
Victoire à Roland Garros
I remember when I first arrived here, I asked someone about the French Open. Oh, you mean Roland Garros, they replied. Noo-o, I said, I mean the French Open, l'Open Français, l'Ouvert de France... No, they said sternly, there is no such thing here, there is only Roland Garros. Now, I am no huge tennis fan, but I had never heard of any damn Roland Garros, so I figured the french were crazy enough to have never heard of their own French Open. Until yesterday, when I found out in person that Roland Garros and the French Open are, in fact, the same thing!
We had tickets just to the outside courts, so no Lleyton cheering for us (he was playing yesterday but on one of the centre courts), but we were lucky enough to catch Jonas Björkman beat a spanish guy called Hernandez, even though I was horrified to realise half-way through the match that the blue jeans I had paired with my yellow top in order to show my national pride (and Alex next to me had a green shirt so we were ready to cheer for Australia too, don't worry!), anyway, I realised when I was sitting down that of course the jeans weren't as visible as my RED BAG, putting me in a yellow and red outfit, rather than a yellow and blue clad swedish supporter, when Jonas was playing a SPANIARD! I almost had to leave the match in shame, but instead decided to call out some encouragement in swedish to leave no one in doubt about whose side I was on.
Aside from that hitch (and our now rather lopsided suntan/pinkness from sitting one way in the sun all day!), we had a fantastic day. Tennis is really fun to watch live! Much better than on TV. The match went on for almost 3 hours, but it wasn't boring for a minute, and the good thing with the outside courts is that they're really small, so you always have a great view, and are really close to the players.
Furthermore, Australia and Sweden alike were lucky to have us there, since we obviously brought a lot of luck- every match we watched had a result in our favour! After Jonas (actually before), we saw a womens doubles match with an Aussie (a Miss R. Stubbs) who we cheered to victory, and ended the day by seeing a mixed doubles team including an Australian bloke beat an all french team. Ha! And of course, although we weren't there for him, we like to think we were not entirely uninvolved in Lleyton's win.
Jonas happy with his win, and you can see how close we were (no zoom) and how small the stadium was!
Being interviewed by EuroSports afterwards, again no zoom, we were right there, so cool!
The Aussie girl (we think the one with the hat) being shaded by the really cute and hard-working ball-garçons et filles.
That's yellow and blue and green folks, NOT RED.
We had tickets just to the outside courts, so no Lleyton cheering for us (he was playing yesterday but on one of the centre courts), but we were lucky enough to catch Jonas Björkman beat a spanish guy called Hernandez, even though I was horrified to realise half-way through the match that the blue jeans I had paired with my yellow top in order to show my national pride (and Alex next to me had a green shirt so we were ready to cheer for Australia too, don't worry!), anyway, I realised when I was sitting down that of course the jeans weren't as visible as my RED BAG, putting me in a yellow and red outfit, rather than a yellow and blue clad swedish supporter, when Jonas was playing a SPANIARD! I almost had to leave the match in shame, but instead decided to call out some encouragement in swedish to leave no one in doubt about whose side I was on.
Aside from that hitch (and our now rather lopsided suntan/pinkness from sitting one way in the sun all day!), we had a fantastic day. Tennis is really fun to watch live! Much better than on TV. The match went on for almost 3 hours, but it wasn't boring for a minute, and the good thing with the outside courts is that they're really small, so you always have a great view, and are really close to the players.
Furthermore, Australia and Sweden alike were lucky to have us there, since we obviously brought a lot of luck- every match we watched had a result in our favour! After Jonas (actually before), we saw a womens doubles match with an Aussie (a Miss R. Stubbs) who we cheered to victory, and ended the day by seeing a mixed doubles team including an Australian bloke beat an all french team. Ha! And of course, although we weren't there for him, we like to think we were not entirely uninvolved in Lleyton's win.
Jonas happy with his win, and you can see how close we were (no zoom) and how small the stadium was!
Being interviewed by EuroSports afterwards, again no zoom, we were right there, so cool!
The Aussie girl (we think the one with the hat) being shaded by the really cute and hard-working ball-garçons et filles.
That's yellow and blue and green folks, NOT RED.
