In Belgium, like Holland, people use bicycles a lot to get around. Brugges, Northern Belgium.
Sunday, April 29, 2007
Lone Bike
In Belgium, like Holland, people use bicycles a lot to get around. Brugges, Northern Belgium.
Saturday, April 28, 2007
Lacemaker
Belgian lace is a common product of Brugges. This photo was taken in front of a lacemakers store.
Thursday, April 26, 2007
John Butler
From a rocking Australian band called the John Butler Trio. They played a short set at the local bookstore in Lille, France
Sunday, April 22, 2007
French politicians have fake suntans
There are some upcoming presidential elections round the political corner, and - as with any modern democracy- this translates to a lot of talk time. What is quite singular about the French democratic process is the sheer number of candidates that put themselves forward. The road to presidency is littered with hitch-hikers holding 'Elysée' placards. While most of them will become nothing more than roadkill (circled by media vultures - just go with me on the lonely desert road political bandwagon, vultures picking the bones of the politically dead imagery ok?) it is this system of supersaturation that resulted in Chirac winning the last lot of elections. With the vote split amongst a large number of candidates, the two candidates whose heads were peeping up a little higher from the pile of political carcasses were from the centre right (Chirac) and the far right (Le Pen).In April we had the first round of voting for the Presidential elections.
In May it will be down to 2 candidates, Nicolas Sarkozy and Segolene Royale
Sunday, April 15, 2007
The lost art of sleeping in
I protest! Ok, so I've never been someone able to sleep in to a great extent.
My mother would tell you differently but even in the halcyon days of life as a university student, unless I tried really hard I couldn't sleep much past 10.30am. This, amongst my slacker intellectual peers, was regarded with some horror. And despite what the old adage may say, the early bird does not always get the worm, more often what (s)he gets is the job of cleaning up the beer cans, bottle tops and cigarette butts. While those days of excessive post party clean ups are long gone now, and I don't regard that with any sense of nostalgia, and 10.30 is a bit late to be laying about in bed, 7.30 is still too early to be up on Sunday.
It's an unusual sleeping pattern for a period of unemployment (I've had one before, I'd hoped it'd be my first and last combined). Generally the panic and stress keeps me up until the early hours of the morning, and the depression keeps me under the covers until the mid morning. But no, here I am, up bright end early every single day. Not that its changed anything. Last week I got interviewed and subsequently knocked back for a 2 week high-school graduate level job as a data entry person for wetland biodiversity studies. Financially speaking it wouldn't have made any difference, it WAS only two weeks, and it was a hell of a difficult commute to get out there, but I was still angry. Probably because I'm looking for any excuse to be angry. Otherwise I'm just being knocked back from the usual - admin assistant, bilingual assistant. Mostly I'm just looking forward to heading back to Australia at the moment. Should give my body clock something else to think about at least...
My mother would tell you differently but even in the halcyon days of life as a university student, unless I tried really hard I couldn't sleep much past 10.30am. This, amongst my slacker intellectual peers, was regarded with some horror. And despite what the old adage may say, the early bird does not always get the worm, more often what (s)he gets is the job of cleaning up the beer cans, bottle tops and cigarette butts. While those days of excessive post party clean ups are long gone now, and I don't regard that with any sense of nostalgia, and 10.30 is a bit late to be laying about in bed, 7.30 is still too early to be up on Sunday.
It's an unusual sleeping pattern for a period of unemployment (I've had one before, I'd hoped it'd be my first and last combined). Generally the panic and stress keeps me up until the early hours of the morning, and the depression keeps me under the covers until the mid morning. But no, here I am, up bright end early every single day. Not that its changed anything. Last week I got interviewed and subsequently knocked back for a 2 week high-school graduate level job as a data entry person for wetland biodiversity studies. Financially speaking it wouldn't have made any difference, it WAS only two weeks, and it was a hell of a difficult commute to get out there, but I was still angry. Probably because I'm looking for any excuse to be angry. Otherwise I'm just being knocked back from the usual - admin assistant, bilingual assistant. Mostly I'm just looking forward to heading back to Australia at the moment. Should give my body clock something else to think about at least...
Monday, April 09, 2007
Ardennes horse
The Ardennes is one of the oldest breeds of draft horse originating from the Ardennes area in France/North Western Europe.
Saturday, April 07, 2007
Thursday, April 05, 2007
Kites in Berck Plage, Northern France
21eme Rencontres Internationales de Cerf-Volant (21st International Kite Festival)
This is an annual exhibition of kites that takes place in Berck Plage, Northern France. Entrants from around the world have an opportunity to show off their spectacular kites and compete in kite flying competitions.
Wednesday, April 04, 2007
Easter at Meert
Meert, one of the nicest gourmet dessert shops you're ever likely to find
Lille, France
Saturday, March 31, 2007
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
Socialite
Owning a dog in France is like obtaining an open pass to converse with any and all strangers you meet on the street. Whether you want to or not...you have little choice in the matter. While his little cocker eyes don't fool me for a second, they seem to work wonders on all passers by that either have a dog, had a dog, want a dog or are quite simply insane. Being, as we are, in France, this figure is somewhere around the 98.3% mark.
Heron fishing
A lucky fluke that I was paying attention to the heron when he lunged for a fish! Lille zoo, France
Monday, March 26, 2007
Monday, March 19, 2007
Friday, March 16, 2007
Good dog, bad dog
My boyfriend, master of the poorly thought out idea, lived up to his reputation this weekend and got a puppy on the spur of the moment. Zero preparation in the apartment, shoes and cables and dvds lying about as we leave the house with no intention of getting a dog...and come back a lot poorer with an armful of canine...
Thursday, March 15, 2007
Thursday, March 08, 2007
Monday, March 05, 2007
It's all about the meme
Monday, March 05, 2007
During a recent game of trivial pursuit (ahem, French junior edition that is - look, some of the questions are actually a bit HARD, alright? Stop looking at me like that!)
So I learned, while I was (cough) happily losing (because being an only child does wonders for social development), that in Les Miserables (the written one), Fantine doesn't sell her pretty locks, like in the version musicale, but rips out her gnashers to sell instead. I guess a bald aria is easier than a gummy one.
So, in the spirit of cultural learning, here's a book meme from her
Except that I changed it.
A little.
Because I just can't help myself.
Italicized = books you want to read
Bold = books you've read
Strike = books you wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole or wish you hadn't
* = never heard of it
+ = on your shelf
During a recent game of trivial pursuit (ahem, French junior edition that is - look, some of the questions are actually a bit HARD, alright? Stop looking at me like that!)
So I learned, while I was (cough) happily losing (because being an only child does wonders for social development), that in Les Miserables (the written one), Fantine doesn't sell her pretty locks, like in the version musicale, but rips out her gnashers to sell instead. I guess a bald aria is easier than a gummy one.
So, in the spirit of cultural learning, here's a book meme from her
Except that I changed it.
A little.
Because I just can't help myself.
Italicized = books you want to read
Bold = books you've read
Strike = books you wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole or wish you hadn't
* = never heard of it
+ = on your shelf
1. The Da Vinci Code (Dan Brown)
2. Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen) (possibly +, I can’t remember)
3. +To Kill A Mockingbird (Harper Lee) (honest, I will one day)
4. Gone With The Wind (Margaret Mitchell)
5. +The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (Tolkien)
6. +The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring (Tolkien)
7. +The Lord of the Rings:
8. +Anne of Green Gables (L.M. Montgomery)
9. +Perfume, Patrick Süskind
10. +
11. +Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Rowling)
12. Angels and Demons (Dan Brown)
13. +Harry Potter and the Order of the
14. * A Prayer for Owen Meany (John Irving)
15. Memoirs of a Geisha (Arthur Golden)
16. +Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (Rowling)
17. On The Road, (Jack Kerouac)
18. The Stand (Stephen King)
19. +Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (JK Rowling)
0. Jane Eyre (Charlotte Bronte)
21. + The Hobbit (JRR Tolkien)
22. +The Catcher in the
23. Little Women (Louisa May Alcott)
24. +Winnie the Pooh, (AA Milne)
25. +Life of Pi (Yann Martel)
26. +The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Douglas Adams)
27.
28. The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe (C. S. Lewis)
29. East of Eden (John Steinbeck)
30. Tuesdays with Morrie (Mitch Albom)
31. Dune (Frank Herbert)
32. +The Wind in the Willows, (Kenneth Grahame)
33. *Atlas Shrugged (Ayn Rand)
34. +1984 (Orwell)
35. The Mists of Avalon (Marion Zimmer Bradley)
36. *The Pillars of the Earth (Ken Follett)
37. The Power of One (Bryce Courtenay)
38. Captain Corelli's Mandolin, Louis de Bernieres
39. +Tess Of The D'Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy
40. *The Alchemist (Paulo Coelho)
41. The Clan of the Cave Bear (Jean M. Auel)
42. +Stranger in a Strange Land (Robert Heinlein)
43.
44. *The Five People You Meet In Heaven (Mitch Albom)
45. +Robinson Crusoe Daniel Defoe Stupid, stupid, stupid. Blah.
46. Anna Karenina (Tolstoy)
47. The Count of Monte Cristo (Alexandre Dumas)
48. +Gullivers Travels (Jonathan Swift)
49. +The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck)
50. *Clarissa (Samuel Richardson)
51. +The Poisonwood Bible (Barbara Kingsolver)
52. +A Tale of Two Cities (Dickens)
53. *Ender’s Game (Orson Scott Card)
54. +Great Expectations (Dickens)
55. +The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald)
56. +Farenheit 451 (Ray Bradbury)
57. +Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Rowling)
58. The Thorn Birds (Colleen McCullough)
59. +The Handmaid’s Tale (Margaret Atwood)
60. *The Time Traveller’s Wife (Audrew Niffenegger)
61. Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)
62. *The Fountainhead (Ayn Rand)
63. War and Peace (Tolstoy)
64. Interview With The Vampire (Anne Rice)
65. +Far From The Madding Crowd (Thomas Hardy)
66. One Hundred Years Of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)
67. Don Quixote (Miguel De Cervantes))
68. +Catch-22 (Joseph Heller)
69. Les Miserables (Hugo)
70. +The Little Prince (Antoine de Saint-Exupery)
71. Bridget Jones’ Diary (Fielding)
72. Love in the Time of Cholera (Marquez)
73. Shogun (James Clavell)
74. The English Patient (Michael Ondaatje)
75. The
76. +Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl
77. +Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh
78. The World According To Garp (John Irving)
79. *Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer
80. The Plague (Albert Camus)
81. Moby Dick (Herman Melville)
82. +Of Mice And Men (Steinbeck)
83. Rebecca (Daphne DuMaurier)
84. Middlemarch, George Eliot
85. +Emma (Jane Austen)
86. +Watership Down(Richard Adams)
87. +Brave New World (Aldous Huxley)
88. *Nightmare Abbey (Thomas Love Peacock)
89. +Animal Farm, George Orwell
90. *Kane and Abel (Jeffrey Archer)
91. *In The Skin Of A Lion (Ondaatje)
92. +Lord of the Flies (Golding)
93. *The Good Earth (Pearl S. Buck)
94. The Secret Life of Bees (Sue Monk Kidd)
95.
96. +Magician, Raymond E Feist
97. *White Oleander (Janet Fitch)
98. A Woman of Substance (Barbara Taylor Bradford)
99. *The Celestine Prophecy (James Redfield)
100. Ulysses (James Joyce)
Retracing old steps
It was my first time back in Paris since we'd left definitively about a year ago. Whereas once I was cynical enough to be rolling my eyes at the enchanted tourists, I was myself finally able to appreciate it again for the city that it can be. The edges of bad memories of being pushed and shoved about in the metro softened by observing people actually being courteous, by not riding the peak hour lines or times, by not having to be anywhere at a particular time (except for the train station Anne, except for the train station... :p)
It wasn't only the harsh memories that got a bit fuzzy, but the general layout of several areas also. Doesn't help when you lose your Paris pocket map book either and you're relying on a department store map that thought putting in names of metro stations was less important than inserting very large not to scale images of where their store was located. Still, enough tourists seemed to consider that I looked like I knew where I was going well enough to ask for direction. So the reason for the visit was nothing more than an escape from solo boredom. Ben had a training course (can we say free hotel room with breakfast?) so rather than sitting about bored and pretending to keep busy for a week, I figured I might as well dust off the camera and take a tour. And get free breakfast.
It wasn't only the harsh memories that got a bit fuzzy, but the general layout of several areas also. Doesn't help when you lose your Paris pocket map book either and you're relying on a department store map that thought putting in names of metro stations was less important than inserting very large not to scale images of where their store was located. Still, enough tourists seemed to consider that I looked like I knew where I was going well enough to ask for direction. So the reason for the visit was nothing more than an escape from solo boredom. Ben had a training course (can we say free hotel room with breakfast?) so rather than sitting about bored and pretending to keep busy for a week, I figured I might as well dust off the camera and take a tour. And get free breakfast.
Saturday, March 03, 2007
Eclipse series
I only have a 200mm lens so this isn't as good as a lot of other peoples i've seen with longer lenses. I set up my tripod and went outside every 15minutes or so during the eclipse; I started with about 1/60 shutter speed for full moon and dropped down to 3sec for eclipsed moon
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
Dunkerque is not just in Scotland
On a weekend, late in February, I was initiated into my first carnevale, Dunkerque style. First lesson is that too much fluro, fake fur and feathers is never enough . And what a happy coincidence, for the sake of narrative flow, that they all start with ‘F’.
Men dress like women, women dress like, well, caricatures of women. But ultimately, anything goes as pirates and maidens parade through the main streets jeering the onlookers safely watching from above, calling them the ‘cuckolds on the balcony’. Not actually knowing where we’re supposed to be going I placidly follow the two metre high umbrellas and sea of flowered hats.
‘So why are we stopping now’
‘Herring toss’
‘Ok, the what, now?’
Comprehension dawning as I see vacuum sealed packets of smoked herring sailing in gentle arcs overhead. Panic dawning as I realise the crowd , like so many rabid seals, really want the herring. Wanna know another thing that starts with F? (this is where I should mention that, despite being able to deal with pretty much anything bar scuttling giant cockroaches, I have a phobic reaction to anything resembling a mosh pit, to anyone I trampled in my blind panic to get out…move faster next time).
Anyhoo, aside from the mini breakdown, I actually had a pretty good time (assisted by my good friend alcohol). It wasn’t carnevale proper, which happens sometime around mid February, but rather one of the smaller suburban celebrations, which start in the Dunkerque region sometime in early January and finishes at the end of March.
Men dress like women, women dress like, well, caricatures of women. But ultimately, anything goes as pirates and maidens parade through the main streets jeering the onlookers safely watching from above, calling them the ‘cuckolds on the balcony’. Not actually knowing where we’re supposed to be going I placidly follow the two metre high umbrellas and sea of flowered hats.
‘So why are we stopping now’
‘Herring toss’
‘Ok, the what, now?’
Comprehension dawning as I see vacuum sealed packets of smoked herring sailing in gentle arcs overhead. Panic dawning as I realise the crowd , like so many rabid seals, really want the herring. Wanna know another thing that starts with F? (this is where I should mention that, despite being able to deal with pretty much anything bar scuttling giant cockroaches, I have a phobic reaction to anything resembling a mosh pit, to anyone I trampled in my blind panic to get out…move faster next time).
Anyhoo, aside from the mini breakdown, I actually had a pretty good time (assisted by my good friend alcohol). It wasn’t carnevale proper, which happens sometime around mid February, but rather one of the smaller suburban celebrations, which start in the Dunkerque region sometime in early January and finishes at the end of March.
Faces of pont neuf
Pont neuf is the oldest bridge in Paris and these carved faces (mascarons) are caricatures of the tradesmen common to the period when it was built(late 1500s)
Retracing old steps
It was my first time back in Paris since we'd left definitively about a year ago. Whereas once I was cynical enough to be rolling my eyes at the enchanted tourists, I was myself finally able to appreciate it again for the city that it can be. The edges of bad memories of being pushed and shoved about in the metro softened by not riding the peak hour lines or times, by not having to be anywhere at a particular time (except for the train station Anne, except for the train station... :p)
It wasn't only the harsh memories that got a bit fuzzy, but the general layout of several areas also. Doesn't help when you lose your Paris pocket map book either and you're relying on a department store map that thought putting in names of metro stations was less important than inserting very large not to scale images of where their store was located. Still, enough tourists seemed to consider that I looked like I knew where I was going well enough to ask for directions. So the reason for the visit was nothing more than an escape from solo boredom. Ben had a training course (can we say free hotel room with breakfast?) so rather than sitting about bored and pretending to keep busy for a week, I figured I might as well dust off the camera and take a tour. And get free breakfast.
Parfumerie
Part of a perfume display in the Galeries Lafayette, a popular and chic boutique store in Paris
Lafayette dome
The Galerie Lafayette was built in the late 1800s and inspired by Byzantine architecture. Paris, France
Metro
Old style metro entrance designed by Hector Guimard, a famous art nouveau architect. On a gloomy winters day in Paris, France.
Dunkerque is not only in Scotland
So what look was I going for here, in the end ?
On a weekend, late in February, I was initiated into my first carnevale, Dunkerque style. First lesson is that too much fluro, fake fur and feathers is never enough . And what a happy coincidence, for the sake of narrative flow, that they all start with ‘F’.
Men dress like women, women dress like, well, caricatures of women. But ultimately, anything goes as pirates and maidens parade through the main streets jeering the onlookers safely watching from above, calling them the ‘cuckolds on the balcony’. It’s a tame insult alongside the bawdy shanties that would make even a sailor blush. Not actually knowing where we’re supposed to be going I placidly follow the two metre high umbrella and sea of flowered hats.
‘So why are we stopping now’
‘Herring toss’
‘Ok, the what, now?’
Comprehension dawning as I see vacuum sealed packets of smoked herring sailing in gentle arcs overhead. Panic dawning as I realise the crowd , like so many rabid seals, really want the herring. Wanna know another thing that starts with F? (this is where I should mention I have a phobic reaction to anything resembling a mosh pit, to anyone I trampled in my blind panic to get out…move faster next time).
Anyhoo, aside from the mini breakdown, I actually had a pretty good time (assisted by my good friend alcohol). It wasn’t carnevale proper, which happens sometime around mid February, but rather one of the smaller suburban celebrations, which start in the Dunkerque region sometime in early January and finishes at the end of March.
On a weekend, late in February, I was initiated into my first carnevale, Dunkerque style. First lesson is that too much fluro, fake fur and feathers is never enough . And what a happy coincidence, for the sake of narrative flow, that they all start with ‘F’.
Men dress like women, women dress like, well, caricatures of women. But ultimately, anything goes as pirates and maidens parade through the main streets jeering the onlookers safely watching from above, calling them the ‘cuckolds on the balcony’. It’s a tame insult alongside the bawdy shanties that would make even a sailor blush. Not actually knowing where we’re supposed to be going I placidly follow the two metre high umbrella and sea of flowered hats.
‘So why are we stopping now’
‘Herring toss’
‘Ok, the what, now?’
Comprehension dawning as I see vacuum sealed packets of smoked herring sailing in gentle arcs overhead. Panic dawning as I realise the crowd , like so many rabid seals, really want the herring. Wanna know another thing that starts with F? (this is where I should mention I have a phobic reaction to anything resembling a mosh pit, to anyone I trampled in my blind panic to get out…move faster next time).
Anyhoo, aside from the mini breakdown, I actually had a pretty good time (assisted by my good friend alcohol). It wasn’t carnevale proper, which happens sometime around mid February, but rather one of the smaller suburban celebrations, which start in the Dunkerque region sometime in early January and finishes at the end of March.
Thursday, February 22, 2007
Friday, February 16, 2007
Picking up the pieces
So, how does one get back into blogging after such a long estrangement?
It's true my neglect has been woefully flagrant, so I prostrate myself at your feet and shed walrus tears and fling pages from my journal (yeah I have one of those, for all the stuff I'd regret saying later) in the air. It's all very dramatic and european cinema-esque. It's in black and white. There are long curtains blowing in the wind. Someone is screaming 'Stelllllla' in the background, there are probably bleak moors and will o' the wisps somewhere off screen. You getting the picture? Good
Flip back to the normality channel, even if the reception is godawful.
I've had an odd sort of time since we were last here together. I've lived in that place where plans and actual events are so far removed from each other that they could safely contemplate having offspring (what would they be called then? Nostalgia?) What lofty plans I had included moving into the new apartment round mid December, getting the first part of the renovations out of the way over the next fortnight, having a jolly good time in London for New Year, getting a temp job as soon as possible to keep the cashflow up, and launching myself back into the job search fray.....
[enter reality]
What ACTUALLY happened went something along the lines of a one month delay before we got the keys to the apartment, being stuck out in the sticks at my boyfriends parents place, my boyfriends mothers sister trying to commit suicide on New Years eve, my boyfriends mother having a mini mental breakdown and deciding to make me the fall guy for many of her little psychological problems (and my aren't there an awful lot of them it would seem), me running off to stay with my gran to get the hell out of the firing line (the fact that my gran is 94 and a little potty herself is another story, but hey, at least it's my own family), having to move into the boyfriends sisters place until key day, no I have not found a job yet thanks very much, we've only just completed the major part of the renovations, and one of our neighbours here practices The.Same.Synthesiser.Piece.At.Full.Volume.Every.Single.Day.
Still, could be worse right?
And I did have a jolly time in England
While I'm on the subject though, let me tell you a little about the realities of the employment market in France. It's in a terrible state. To give you an example, there are about 13 environmental jobs on offer within my region at the moment, 8 of them are for work experience (as part of uni courses here, students have to do a stint of work experience at a related organisation, which is technically a good idea, though it's heavily exploited as free labour by lots of organisations as they basically get free quasi qualified employment for months at a time, I've even seen cheeky 'seeking work experience trainee for one month july-august. Apply within' signs on shop front windows - i.e. retail. In other countries it's called a summer job. And it's paid. And it's how students get beer money.
So we're down to 5 (my mathematical talent is wasted I tell you, wasted). One of those is for a director. One is for a 'youth placement' (there's always some stupid age restriction - and it's never for someone who's 31), so we're down to 3. One needs qualifications I can't fake, the other needs a car. Neither of them tell you how much money they're going to pay (it's 'negotiable'). So that leaves 1. Which is sort of only vaguely related to my qualification. Which I'll send off an application for after I've finished ranting here. But considering the hundreds of applications I have sent and the one interview I've ever got, don't bother crossing your fingers.
'So what are you going to do about this' I hear you ask? (or maybe it's the Greek chorus)
I honestly don't know (sorry, you might have been expecting something more proactive). As a first alternative, I'm applying en masse for a lot of jobs in the UK, which may lead to nothing, but at least they've got a lot more on offer over there, and their applicant profiles more flexible, you can have a 'related degree' in a variety of fields rather than 'you have to have completed a bridging course in Faff module 15/b between August and December 2005 and have 6 years professional experience as a dictator of a small African state and be under 25 on the 6th of June and/or under 30 if you receive a pension for losing a leg in the Crimean war. Not to overstate the point or anything.
It's true my neglect has been woefully flagrant, so I prostrate myself at your feet and shed walrus tears and fling pages from my journal (yeah I have one of those, for all the stuff I'd regret saying later) in the air. It's all very dramatic and european cinema-esque. It's in black and white. There are long curtains blowing in the wind. Someone is screaming 'Stelllllla' in the background, there are probably bleak moors and will o' the wisps somewhere off screen. You getting the picture? Good
Flip back to the normality channel, even if the reception is godawful.
I've had an odd sort of time since we were last here together. I've lived in that place where plans and actual events are so far removed from each other that they could safely contemplate having offspring (what would they be called then? Nostalgia?) What lofty plans I had included moving into the new apartment round mid December, getting the first part of the renovations out of the way over the next fortnight, having a jolly good time in London for New Year, getting a temp job as soon as possible to keep the cashflow up, and launching myself back into the job search fray.....
[enter reality]
What ACTUALLY happened went something along the lines of a one month delay before we got the keys to the apartment, being stuck out in the sticks at my boyfriends parents place, my boyfriends mothers sister trying to commit suicide on New Years eve, my boyfriends mother having a mini mental breakdown and deciding to make me the fall guy for many of her little psychological problems (and my aren't there an awful lot of them it would seem), me running off to stay with my gran to get the hell out of the firing line (the fact that my gran is 94 and a little potty herself is another story, but hey, at least it's my own family), having to move into the boyfriends sisters place until key day, no I have not found a job yet thanks very much, we've only just completed the major part of the renovations, and one of our neighbours here practices The.Same.Synthesiser.Piece.At.Full.Volume.Every.Single.Day.
Still, could be worse right?
And I did have a jolly time in England
While I'm on the subject though, let me tell you a little about the realities of the employment market in France. It's in a terrible state. To give you an example, there are about 13 environmental jobs on offer within my region at the moment, 8 of them are for work experience (as part of uni courses here, students have to do a stint of work experience at a related organisation, which is technically a good idea, though it's heavily exploited as free labour by lots of organisations as they basically get free quasi qualified employment for months at a time, I've even seen cheeky 'seeking work experience trainee for one month july-august. Apply within' signs on shop front windows - i.e. retail. In other countries it's called a summer job. And it's paid. And it's how students get beer money.
So we're down to 5 (my mathematical talent is wasted I tell you, wasted). One of those is for a director. One is for a 'youth placement' (there's always some stupid age restriction - and it's never for someone who's 31), so we're down to 3. One needs qualifications I can't fake, the other needs a car. Neither of them tell you how much money they're going to pay (it's 'negotiable'). So that leaves 1. Which is sort of only vaguely related to my qualification. Which I'll send off an application for after I've finished ranting here. But considering the hundreds of applications I have sent and the one interview I've ever got, don't bother crossing your fingers.
'So what are you going to do about this' I hear you ask? (or maybe it's the Greek chorus)
I honestly don't know (sorry, you might have been expecting something more proactive). As a first alternative, I'm applying en masse for a lot of jobs in the UK, which may lead to nothing, but at least they've got a lot more on offer over there, and their applicant profiles more flexible, you can have a 'related degree' in a variety of fields rather than 'you have to have completed a bridging course in Faff module 15/b between August and December 2005 and have 6 years professional experience as a dictator of a small African state and be under 25 on the 6th of June and/or under 30 if you receive a pension for losing a leg in the Crimean war. Not to overstate the point or anything.
Thursday, February 15, 2007
Red house reflected
I walk past this house a lot, it's on my dog walking route. Marcq en Baroeul, France
Monday, January 01, 2007
Thursday, November 23, 2006
So, I have this crap job
We all know about it. We have all rolled our eyes as I ceaslessly whine about it. But my crap job is one thing. Finishing my crap job and then having to go on to explain to someone else how to do their crap job is more than I can be bothered with.
Enter the local post office.
I have a package, the slip of paper tells me. And because I'm irresponsable enough to have a crap job during the day and can't dally about waiting to receive packages at home, much as I'd like to, I have to move my butt down to the post office, wait in line with the creepy smelly muttering man and get it myself.
Enter the local post office clerk
'I can't find it today, you'll have to come back tomorrow'
'Well, what's the delay?' Impatient stare
'Delay?' Don't know my arse from my elbow expression
'The delay'. Jabs paper pointedly. 'This says I can pick it up today'
Looks at paper ineffectually 'Well, we don't know if it's over here or' waves absently 'over there'
'Over there' obviously being some vague cosmic dimension where parcels and socks sit about in transit.
Well, here's a clue, it's not over here is it...
'Besides, well, there's no follow on. And a 'postal parcel?', I'm not really sure what that might be...'
'At a guess I'd say it might be a PARCEL. That comes from OVERSEAS (he's actually listening with some interest at this point, almost as if he's learning something. Neurons making connections. Parcels come by the post. Genius.) 'Probably AUSTRALIA' (the mere fact that it could be from Australia and there is any possibility that it might be from my best friend and that some clueless moron is standing between me and a parcel from said best friend is making me ever so homocidal and twitchy)
Australia seems to be a clue of some sort, so I stand, drumming fingers, as waves of smelly muttering come festering through my senses, waiting for the arse and elbow man to figure it out.
But he doesn't.
I can say many positive and negative things about France. But their Post Offices suck, period.
Enter the local post office.
I have a package, the slip of paper tells me. And because I'm irresponsable enough to have a crap job during the day and can't dally about waiting to receive packages at home, much as I'd like to, I have to move my butt down to the post office, wait in line with the creepy smelly muttering man and get it myself.
Enter the local post office clerk
'I can't find it today, you'll have to come back tomorrow'
'Well, what's the delay?' Impatient stare
'Delay?' Don't know my arse from my elbow expression
'The delay'. Jabs paper pointedly. 'This says I can pick it up today'
Looks at paper ineffectually 'Well, we don't know if it's over here or' waves absently 'over there'
'Over there' obviously being some vague cosmic dimension where parcels and socks sit about in transit.
Well, here's a clue, it's not over here is it...
'Besides, well, there's no follow on. And a 'postal parcel?', I'm not really sure what that might be...'
'At a guess I'd say it might be a PARCEL. That comes from OVERSEAS (he's actually listening with some interest at this point, almost as if he's learning something. Neurons making connections. Parcels come by the post. Genius.) 'Probably AUSTRALIA' (the mere fact that it could be from Australia and there is any possibility that it might be from my best friend and that some clueless moron is standing between me and a parcel from said best friend is making me ever so homocidal and twitchy)
Australia seems to be a clue of some sort, so I stand, drumming fingers, as waves of smelly muttering come festering through my senses, waiting for the arse and elbow man to figure it out.
But he doesn't.
I can say many positive and negative things about France. But their Post Offices suck, period.
Wednesday, November 15, 2006
bookworm gossip
It was with girlish glee that I whipped the latest Susanna Clarke book off the english language section shelf at my local bookstore. And with adult cynicism that I balked at the price and put it right back. For those not in the know, she's the author responsable for the weighty tome Jonathan Strange And Mr Norrell, which you've either read, think it might be a good read, heard about or are totally put out by the excessive weightiness and small printy-ness of the project (go on, read it you chicken). Anyway, it's a book I can recommend (this blogs just full of them lately) for anyone who can deal with excessive footnotes. They're good footnotes, though. There's practically another book hidden in them. It's amazing to believe it was her first work, and you get the impression of someone with a mind so ready to explode with ideas that if she doesn't get as many of them out as possible they'll be scraping her cerebellum off the paintwork.
Anyway, her latest work is 'The Ladies of Grace Adieu', and as soon as I get around to my next online shopping spree, I might be able to actually review the story, rather than its potential super-dooper qualities. 23€ for a medium sized paperback, however, is a whole other story.
Anyway, her latest work is 'The Ladies of Grace Adieu', and as soon as I get around to my next online shopping spree, I might be able to actually review the story, rather than its potential super-dooper qualities. 23€ for a medium sized paperback, however, is a whole other story.
The wonders of modern technology
So in todays wonderful world of advertising...a deodorant that lasts 48 hours. Either aimed at what my ex professor of botany called the 'unwashed masses' (ie anybody generally not studying science and particularly not studying botany, and more particularly arts students) or technology is getting in early for the day when the water shortage is acute enough to prevent our daily Western world ablutions. Alternate theories, anyone?
Tuesday, November 14, 2006
Feeling in need of a movie suggestion? Well you've come to the right place. The right place for someone who doesn't mind reading subtitles that is. And if you're one of my regulars (do I have regulars?), I know that you're that sort of person, you dear thing.The Labyrinth of Pan is yet another amazing film to come out of the studios of Mexico (there must be something in the water over there) but the first I've seen in the fantasy genre. There are two stories happening in parallel, the gruesome reality of wartorn Spain during a civil conflict, and the (also somewhat gruesome) fantasy world of a young girl who must pass three tests to return her soul back to the fantasy world that she has been told she belongs.
The whole package is superb, and it would be a shame if it is just a small blip on the foreign film scene, competing against the schlock out of Hollywood. Check out http://www.panslabyrinth.com/ for more info.
Wednesday, November 08, 2006
Beer and global warming
One Welcome Week Off, and I'm floating happily in my zen bubble, 10 minutes back, and it's 'hand me the spanner Pierre, so that I may beat them all to death'. Aka life in the public service. Except it isn't exactly the public service, it's something vague like 'affiliated public servants'. Only the French could sub categorise government administrative divisions. And be earnest about it.
Did I say I wouldn't rant about work? If so, I must have been on drugs. First day back and I have no desk. Again. I should explain that I have not had a personal desk space since, well, I arrived actually, and have been instead shunted from 'oh (s)he's absent today's ' spot with my sad little intray trailing along behind me every other day. A rubber stamp. A few pens. A stapler. Bear in mind I have a 6 month contract, it's not like they hadn't been warned. Anyway, I almost had a free desk for 6 whole weeks and refused to ever move again. So they waited til I left for a week. And someone nicked Stapley. The Bastards.
So, first day back and not only is my desk gone, but so's all my stuff. No one knows where it is. Typical. But I have a sort of second home, a pseudo work area. It's upstairs. In a draughty corridor. Next to a scan machine. Pressing the green button and scanning hundreds and hundreds of dusty documents. I don't kid myself - there's so many years worth here because I'm the only sucker that they've found to do the job in years. In keeping with job thats only fit for the work experience kid allowances, I've sat by doing the odd puzzle while I wait for the machine to go through periodically painfully long reboots, or sometimes mysteriously short ones...you never know actually. Only to be told off. I flat out read a book in sheer desperation. Only to be told off. So I figured...music. A discrete set of headphones, only my ears are being distracted, I don't have the aura of a person who is avoiding work. But, (and I inhale deep and calming breaths as I think to myself 'only 5 more weeks'), my ears must remain unplugged. I have been categorically informed. To listen to the glorious cacophony that is the workman on the other side of the wall with wailing buzz saws, jack hammers and an idiot who whistles while he work, but doesn't know any tunes.
Anyway, beer.
In the usual time honoured tradion of not planning anything, the day trip to Brussels involved a late start and aimless wandering around some craptacular suburbs to find a particular restaurant listed in some 'a list of good restaurants in Brussels that none of our reviewers have ever actually been to but that look ok from the outside'(that may or may not be open, and may or may not be some covert mafia headquarters). Also went to a brewery - Cantillon, the last brewery in Brussels that still relies on spontaneous fermentation to brew their beer. This was once the standing method before beer production became highly industrialised. As a consequence their beers take years, rather than weeks, to produce. While brewing would normally be underway in late October, the unseasonally mild temperatures meant a delayed start - not only for this year, but many previous years as well. During a month where I've never seen global warming discussed so frequently as a fait accompli, we were witness to yet another small consequence.
Since that warm and balmy heyday of oh, a week ago, winter seems to have recalled who's the boss (and it's not Tony Danza) and temperatures have plummeted to such an extent that Western Europe, as in the entire Western part of Europe, as in - that's a hell of a lot of countries, almost succumbed to an entire power blackout on Saturday night. As in total. I'm having trouble getting my head around that one.
Still, at least you'd have been able to see the stars...
Did I say I wouldn't rant about work? If so, I must have been on drugs. First day back and I have no desk. Again. I should explain that I have not had a personal desk space since, well, I arrived actually, and have been instead shunted from 'oh (s)he's absent today's ' spot with my sad little intray trailing along behind me every other day. A rubber stamp. A few pens. A stapler. Bear in mind I have a 6 month contract, it's not like they hadn't been warned. Anyway, I almost had a free desk for 6 whole weeks and refused to ever move again. So they waited til I left for a week. And someone nicked Stapley. The Bastards.
So, first day back and not only is my desk gone, but so's all my stuff. No one knows where it is. Typical. But I have a sort of second home, a pseudo work area. It's upstairs. In a draughty corridor. Next to a scan machine. Pressing the green button and scanning hundreds and hundreds of dusty documents. I don't kid myself - there's so many years worth here because I'm the only sucker that they've found to do the job in years. In keeping with job thats only fit for the work experience kid allowances, I've sat by doing the odd puzzle while I wait for the machine to go through periodically painfully long reboots, or sometimes mysteriously short ones...you never know actually. Only to be told off. I flat out read a book in sheer desperation. Only to be told off. So I figured...music. A discrete set of headphones, only my ears are being distracted, I don't have the aura of a person who is avoiding work. But, (and I inhale deep and calming breaths as I think to myself 'only 5 more weeks'), my ears must remain unplugged. I have been categorically informed. To listen to the glorious cacophony that is the workman on the other side of the wall with wailing buzz saws, jack hammers and an idiot who whistles while he work, but doesn't know any tunes.
Anyway, beer.
In the usual time honoured tradion of not planning anything, the day trip to Brussels involved a late start and aimless wandering around some craptacular suburbs to find a particular restaurant listed in some 'a list of good restaurants in Brussels that none of our reviewers have ever actually been to but that look ok from the outside'(that may or may not be open, and may or may not be some covert mafia headquarters). Also went to a brewery - Cantillon, the last brewery in Brussels that still relies on spontaneous fermentation to brew their beer. This was once the standing method before beer production became highly industrialised. As a consequence their beers take years, rather than weeks, to produce. While brewing would normally be underway in late October, the unseasonally mild temperatures meant a delayed start - not only for this year, but many previous years as well. During a month where I've never seen global warming discussed so frequently as a fait accompli, we were witness to yet another small consequence.
Since that warm and balmy heyday of oh, a week ago, winter seems to have recalled who's the boss (and it's not Tony Danza) and temperatures have plummeted to such an extent that Western Europe, as in the entire Western part of Europe, as in - that's a hell of a lot of countries, almost succumbed to an entire power blackout on Saturday night. As in total. I'm having trouble getting my head around that one.
Still, at least you'd have been able to see the stars...
Wednesday, November 01, 2006
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