Le Fromage

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My goodness how the time flies when all you do is eat cheese and drink wine. I am approaching the end of month one in Chambéry, fat as a Christmas goose. I have joined a gym to counteract the effects, but the food here is just so damn GOOD. Suspiciously good, even. I'm going to be spoiled rotten--my lean cuisines may not cut it when I get back.

My French is....improving? I'm asking you, because I really don't know. I suppose it can't be UNimproved, but there is a first for everything. The more I learn, the more I realize I have yet to learn. And the longer I am here, it becomes more apparent that I am a long ways away from fluency. Nonetheless, I have learned some pretty fabulous words. Here are my top five thus far:

béni-oui-oui = yesman

klaxonner = to honk (car horn)

chuchotements = whispers

griçant = shrill

métro-boulot-dodo = daily grind

Also, look up the word for "seal." That will be fun for you. Got any cool french words you want to share with me?

Almost forgot-- went to a "ren" fair last week. I use quotation marks because it should have been called a ren-tarded fair. What a disappointment. Here I am gearing up for costumes and giant legs of mutton, and it turns out to be just a bunch of amateurs doing a pretty half-assed job. They had publicized this thing to make it look like the second coming, and when we got to the old town, we had trouble finding even one event. And no mutton chops. The one redeeming thing happened later in the day when we grabbed a coffee at a cafe. Behold, there were a bunch of older ladies totally decked out--including really bad, unnatural looking wigs. Think little bo peep at 60. Also, the staff of this particular cafe had been made to wear these awful costumes--they looked like the 9.99 Halloween special from K-Mart. We're talking fake velvet and shiny poly-blend onesies. Holla ho.

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