You know you've been in France too long when...

- you step off the plane and the humidity you never noticed before hits you

- you find the keys on british keyboards are annoyingly in the wrong places

- you find yourself saying "pardon" and "excusez-moi" to Scot randoms on the street

- you find yourself even more eager than usual to talk to randoms on the street because they are a fellow native english speaker

- little signs on trains with catchy phrases such as "keep clear" become interesting to read

- you finish your meal and start searching for the nearest baguette to mop your plate with

ah the joys of the reverse cultural shock! Mais quand-meme c'est super bien de rentrer à la mère patrie :) euuhmm... what language was I just speaking there?

Tagathon Shmagathon

Danke Ken for the honour... errrrr... ummm... 5 "interesting" facts about myself... never thought it would be sooo hard!

- When I was in primary school my best friends and I took our imaginations to dazzling heights in the playground. The trees in our playground were not only alive and had highly original ungirly names such as Starlight and Shady but Shady could transport you to other exciting worlds when you jumped up and down by the base of her trunk... I also owned one or two magic horses and we frequently fought a formidable foe known as TheBloomyGrassThief.

- I am ridiculously squeamish especially when it comes to wounds caused by blades and broken glass... e.g nearly fainted whilst watching a very un-gory part of Edward Scissorhands earlier this year (when Edward strokes his creator's cheek) Lay on the bed and gulped down water whilst my Glasgow flatmates (rightly so) laughed at me

- And on a tangent from squeamishness I had chronic nosebleed problems from ages 3 to about 9. When I remember spending an hour or two most nights over the bathroom sink at the age of 4 with parents holding back my hair whilst I literally bled into the sink... loooooovely

- I finished a fantasy/sci-fi/teenageish novel when I was 14... (started it when I was 12) I say finished as I have actually made many attempts at such a work and never finish them. It comprises of a glorious 96 A4-sized pages in size 12 font and though I have tried rewriting it several times since then I just can't find an antidote to the romanticised metaphor-ridden idealistic drivel with that makes up the most part of it... even got halfway through a sequel... tant pis

- Oh and I reeeeally like marmite on toast!

humtiddlyumtum I feel I have too much choice for tagging so I pass the tag onto people who I hope will have fun with their responses - Frassle, Mac-ers, Trevor, Diana and Breakey the blogomniscient... will you rise to the challenge?!

blogged here today...

hmmmmm... snow-covered mountains at christmas time... :)

driven to blogging by bucket chucking in grenoble (glasgow style)

2weeks2weeks2weeks till I'm home!!!

Not that I'm not enjoying life here in Grenoble! This week has flown by what with 2 orchestra concerts avec this lovely outfit, what felt like a million rehearsals, spongebob square pants watchings, a fair bit of a tea, a bit too much chocolate, eating roasted chestnuts over a bin at le marché de noel, a wine tasting (at school of all places), advent calenders arriving by airmail, what must be worldrecordworthy long phone conversations to Ecosse, randomly playing for the 2006 version of this with lots of kiddy violinists, lots of very lovely classes, only a couple of slightly less lovely ones, beeeeeyoooootiful christmas lights... realising this again and again

smiley shiny smiley :)

Recherchez

I love reading my French Bible from time to time because occasionally I find phrases that simply translate better in french! Here's an example that I discovered just yesterday that I want to share with the internet.

Psalm 105:4 - in english (NIV)-
Look to the Lord and his strength; seek his face always.

- en français (new Louis Segond version) -
Cherchez le Seigneur et sa force, recherchez-le constamment.

I like the french better... because the verb "rechercher" - neatly sums up in one word, in a way that doesn't quite translate grammatically into english, that we're being asked to search after having already found Him, i.e re-searching/re-seeking. And it says to keep it up constamment; constantly.

I often forget to do that. After finding God in some awesome way, my natural tendancy is to get complacent... to subconsciously be like, ok so I'm fine now and don't really need God right now cos the fact that He sorted me out in that situation should keep me going for a while.
But right here in this verse, it tells me to do the opposite. To keep searching for God after I've found Him. Desiring more, wanting to know more... I want that to be the case and it can be sometimes, but I find it's a constant battle... especially for someone as naturally lazy as myself... I'm just so grateful that I have help! :)

P.S 1st December => Christmas is coming => AdventBlog has started