Stir crazy

Snow has been falling solidly here in my little corner of France, and unfortunately I'm not likely to be able to pull a fast one and pretend I can't get to work - I can see my office from my window.

The flat hunt continues: I've spotted a couple that are relatively expensive, but the money I'm saving this year is starting to mount up a little bit, so I figured why not? I prefer to have things pre-planned, so I can move straight in and start looking for a job, another prospect I'm actually rather looking forward to - I really enjoy bar work, it's what I'm good at, so the chance to go back to it is exciting. I'm good at plenty of other stuff, but the tips aren't quite as good, although the hours are better and one doesn't usually end up at a casino having breakfast most nights.

Or perhaps you do, in which case I'd love to work in your office.

So it's on to more applications, which are incredibly boring but sadly necessary. I'm currently just making enquiries, because a CV sent now for a job in August is a little too keen, even for me. It'll get put to the top of the pile now, because I've got some good experience, but the top of today's pile is the bottom of tomorrow's and the waste-paper lining of August's. So, like a cash-strapped doctor, we must have patience.

I've got another two students for sunday afternoons which is brilliant, a boy and a girl, so I'm looking forward to meeting them. The snow continues to fall and is about 10cm deep; not much, especially not compared to Aberdeen, but the local government here don't appear to have gritted or salted the roads - so consequently the roads are an absolute nightmare. I don't have sensible shoes for this kind of weather at all; at least not here - back home I have heavy, steady hiking boots that would be wonderful. But I wasn't expecting it to snow here, and so I left them at home - and by the time they get here, the snow will be gone. My advice to third-year-abroaders is, then, pack for literally anything.

My father and brother come back from their trip today, so I hope their journeys are safe and they get in okay. He's taken loads of photos, and it would be hard to find anywhere so vastly different from here - camels and outdoor pools and sand all against a backdrop of azure skies. Here all is skeletal, cold, with white snow against a glowing grey sky providing the background. All the same, we'll see sun before long and I'm looking forward to the spring. Not the summer so much, but certainly the spring.

I've done my good deed for the day and would invite all readers to do the same; a great friend of mine from Aberdeen is hoping to raise money to go to Morocco to build a school, presumably because she felt that being bright and beautiful were not sufficient qualities in a person. She is a shining example and consequently makes me feel like I should do more helping people and less writing, so please donate to her page here and send her off to do some good.

I finally watched Bienvenue Chez les Ch'tis, and I absolutely cannot recommend it enough, especially if you need reminding that even sometimes the French are confounded by the French. The part of France closest to Blighty apparently speaks as though its inhabitants have had top-quality painkillers injected into their jaws. This, of course, is in direct contrast to England, where everyone speaks the Queen's English - nowhere is this more true than in London, our capital city:

Well, I think that's perfectly clear to everyone.

No?

Alright, what about this chap:

The clips above are from the film Adulthood, which is well worth a watch, and the second is a guy called Doc Brown who's just amazing.

Alright, so perhaps we do have some dialects.

In any case, Lille and Calais have a very, very strange accent. I wish I'd known that when I first went with my father and spent what felt like hours trying to understand the very friendly but utterly intelligible butcher. Mind you, that struggle directly led to me improving my French and coming here so, as they would say:

Mershi.

The return plan

Another week over. I've got a week to decide whether or not to re-apply to the British Council and find myself journeying off to some other corner of France to teach more English. I'm finding it very tricky to decide; I'm really too old as it is - at this rate I'll be graduating in 2015 with around £30 000 of debt, which is such a large number I might need to go and lie down for a bit.

If I wasn't so confident that this time abroad and the skills I'm learning will ensure me a decent job, I'd be a hell of a lot more nervous. I'm still on the old fees, back in the days when Scotland was cheaper than England and the education of an equal level. Now - I'm sure I don't need to tell anyone reading this - it's £9 000 a year, in bonnie Scotland or green and pleasant England. A three year degree, like the one my sister is doing, is going to land her with approximately the same amount of debt as me. Incredible. Utterly incredible.

In any case, I'm really struggling because, as I said, I am way too old to be thinking about spending another year abroad and putting off graduation, but on the other hand - looking at my finances for next year is a deeply unpleasant prospect. Flat prices are higher than ever, and the only downside to this year abroad is that my ex-flatmates now have new flatmates. Such is life; I can hardly expect them to turf out someone who's been a close friend for a year just for me. So I repeat my plea; if you know of anyone moving out then I implore you to get in contact.

I did some more work with Sketchup today, and at one point managed to accidentally turn my model inside out. Obviously the first reaction is fear and surprise, but after realising it could be undone with a simple command-z, I spent fifteen minutes trying to recreate the effect. My curiosity will one day be my downfall, but perhaps it illustrates my scientific bent. A comic by XKCD illustrates what I'm trying to say:

The mouseover text, which unfortunately you can't see here, says "How could you choose avoiding a little pain over understanding a magic lightning machine?" I wholeheartedly concur.

I've spent quite a happy little day messing with Excel and making graphs in the morning before clambering around my soon-to-be-moved office trying to find the electric sockets for the room plan I'm making. I found a tool that measures things and fear I may have gone slightly overboard; my latest draft is a mess of numbers that are only understandable if you zoom in to about 2 000%. 

I've got the weekend off this week, and it's come as a bit of a shock. My student is out in Abu Dhabi (I know, poor guy) so I have two days off, and I'm really not sure what to do with them. This is where I hope my readers will come in. Amy has suggested a tearoom just outside Paris, which I'm quite excited about, but what else can you suggest? I have a whole weekend, so if you can recommend a little corner of Paris that you've stumbled upon let me know - comment below or tweet me; @jonodrew.

A Friday tune, because I suspect there's snow billowing outside your window. Have a wee bedroom dance. You can't help it.

Winter is coming. Look busy.

A soirée last night and a housewarming tonight; life is hard but someone has to live it. The champagne flowed like the conversation; it was French and everyone was holding one. Including me, which stunned me most of all. Hosting was enormous fun; I can see why my sister is into it. Introducing people, circulating, sipping bubbly and talking about n’importe quoi, which I wish had an English translation. It’s sort of everything and nothing. I hope somebody who speaks French can enlighten me if there is, in fact, an actual translation.

Of course this morning was something of a comedown; no hangover, but a return to the office. To a certain extent it’s because I want to wear a tux every day, and when you look like I do in a tux :

You’ll understand why I’m keen to break it out more often. But such is life; unless I become a jazz singer (unlikely), the next James Bond (more unlikely), or a penguin photographer (actually...) I shall not wear it very often. Goodnight sweet prince. Back to the armoire you go.

You’ll notice I said armoire there and not wardrobe. That’s because I momentarily forgot that the word wardrobe existed. I don’t know if this is a good sign or not; I fear that when I come back I shall cut an odd figure, wandering round my house and shouting

“What do you call this? A placard?”

“Describe it.”

“It’s got cups in it.”

“That’s a cupboard.”

“Oh. So what do you call...”

And so on ad nauseam. I actually suspect this may be symptomatic of something more serious; I managed to buy some chocolate biscuits from a vending machine and then walk away with my change but without the calorific goodness. Honestly. I’ve started to lose it completely.

I’m still trying to work out a topic for my year abroad paper; it has to be ethnocentric - some difference or similarity between the UK and France. I wanted to do it on linguistic markers used in lying speech, but that’s getting more and more complex - and since I’ve just posted it, I’m not even sure if I can still use it. If you have any ideas, do let me know, because I’m currently scraping the very bottom of the barrel.

One final thought as I go - I’m looking for an internship and a flat for next year. Finding either is proving immensely difficult, so if you know of anything going in either field, do please let me know.

I will show appreciation in all sorts of exciting ways.

Tomorrow is Champs d’Elysee and the Christmas Markets, so be ready for a veritable avalanche of photographs. I will also be going to Cartier to laugh in their faces.

Although at this rate I’ll buy something and then leave it in the shop.

Where our hero does normal Sunday things, and frets that they're not exciting enough to be blogged about

            Weekends have been a little weird for me since I arrived, because I agreed early on to tutor in the mornings on both Saturday and Sunday. You’ve already met my student and we’ve already spoken of him, little more needs to be said of him for today save that his animated Vesuvius is off-the-charts cool and rather blows my experiments with baking soda and vinegar out of the water.

            But aside from that journey – and I have to say, for all the protests of my body and despite the local gravitational field that exists over my bed and is four times stronger than gravity has any right to be, it is a fantastic stroll – I have been preoccupied with very little of anything at the moment. I’m sinking money into Amazon’s coffers at a quite incredible rate, and seem to be on a bit of a reluctant hero/magic theme, so well done to Amazon for spotting that and offering me more of my drug of choice. Honestly, if Amazon ever get into drugs, we’re all doomed.

           

“We saw you liked coffee, and thought you might like to try cocaine.”

“Why thank you Amazon. Say, this cocaine is brilligjsdkjhghhghhhhhh”

Today’s lesson dealt with prepositions and conjunctions, singularly unexciting particles of English but necessary. His teacher – or rather, whoever is setting his course as it is an online school – is an unbearable idiot, as evidenced by glaring errors of typography which I feel an English teacher ought to be able to spot. I’m terribly negative about it, but since it’s an online school it’s not as though the mistake has only been spotted once the textbook has been printed. It’s a webpage. Thirty seconds to fix. Surely.

Regardless. The boring work having been completed, we started in on the rather more exciting topic he has chosen for his descriptive essay. We talked about feelings and descriptions, how to communicate them, the difference between choppy sentences:

I raised my head. Something zipped past my left ear. I screamed. Dropped. My ear was on fire. Someone was shouting something. A face, close to mine.

And long sentences

I woke suddenly, the noonday sun slipping through the curtains and warming my face. The bed seemed unfamiliar but comfortable, and I lie back, idly wondering what the sound of running water meant for my immediate future. As though its occupant had heard my thought, the water stopped, and a door ahead of me opened wide, billowing with steam, the mouth to a fragrant and very pleasantly occupied Hell…

And so on. We practised them, and then I let him loose on his writing while I filled in an evaluation form. It bears striking resemblance to mine at his age, and although I know I keep saying it, it is mildly unsettling.

A genteel stroll back – though I almost lost my balance coming down a hill I’d negotiated with ease two hours earlier – meant a total of 6 miles strolled in a day. I could get used to having that sort of time to meander and amble, and listen to music. I should love to have The Lord of the Rings extended soundtrack, but it is unfortunately around £40 a go and unavailable on MP3 download, which to my mind is a frustratingly obvious way of extorting money from poor suckers like me. It’ll probably work, too; I’ve had Lord of the Rings on at work purely for the soundtrack because it’s fantastic. The extended issue DVDs might also go down a treat, just as soon as I get a huge television and some dolby surround sound. Because I'm kind of geeky like that.

This is next year, when I move back of course. I may also get a cat. A lot of my students have cats, and I find I rather like them. They affect disdain and yet are always there when one looks round. I still think their bottoms look like tea-towel holders, but such is life. One cannot have everything. I shall simply have to resist the desire to fill my cat with tea-towel.

Thus if you happen to be in Aberdeen and reading this, do let me know if you know of any nice little one-bed flats going in the area. I know I'm thinking about 9 months in advance, but I'd rather have it done. Let me know.