ma vie aujourd'hui
it's been a little while since i posted so, true to form, i will now toss a list together.
things i've done since last posting:
1. two weekends ago we went to salzburg, austria, the home of mozart. we got to see the house he was born in and the house he lived in later until he moved to vienna. also, the city was doing their annual music festival, so we go to hear some music while we walked around the city. it was very pretty. i will put pictures on later.
2. last weekend we went to nuremburg. it is the second largest city in bavaria, which is the region of germany that we live in (the biggest city is munich, the capital). it was pretty impressive, as the city dates back to the middle ages. the entire old section of the town is surrounded by huge stone walls to keep people out and, much like salzburg, had a castle/fortress built on the hill overlooking the town. i took several hundred pictures, and i will post some later.
3. two fridays ago i finally took my drivers test so i can drive on base. i passed. hold your applause. driving off base is like driving in a video game. the germans are very aggressive drivers and the right-of-way is not like you would imagine it would be given the way things are in the states. it is sometimes a bit scary. and on the autobahn (i haven't braved this yet) people are seriously going over 150 mph. it sounds cool, but then i think about how an accident could not be anything besides fatal. not fun. when we went to salzburg, we were going about 110 and were in the slow lane...
4. i sent out all my letters to agents. i still have the ones by email to do, but i am hoping to get that done on monday or tuesday.
5. we heard yesterday that my car is here, which is cool because it has a cd player and hook up for the ipod and i miss hearing music while driving. we go to get the car today. the base i go to pick up the car is the same one my ex is stationed at. let's hope we have no happy reunions.
6. the girls started school on monday, which is great because now i don't have to listen to them argue all day long. haha. actually, it isn't that bad, but i was sick of doing the workbooks with them. stella can do hers by herself (she's been doing them since kindergarten) but it was abby's first time and at the beginning of the summer she could barely read, so i had to do them with her and we did them from about 8:30 in the morning until 11:30. NOT FUN.
7. william gets rosetta stone (language learning software) access for free through the army website, so i have been doing the french program. it is really good (i believe my love of free french learning materials has been expressed clearly). i am on unit three. they have a bunch of different languages. i will probably do german and italian as well. i will encourage the girls to do it too. i wish i had been shown this earlier because i would have been doing the german with the girls. oh well.
8. they are redoing the roof on the building we live on so there are always a bunch of construction workers around and it is loud and annoying all the time. meh.
9. this weekend we are going to strasbourg, france, which is cool because i will finally be able to understand what the hell is going on. william knows a very small bit of german and i know nothing (aside from how to say thank you, hello, and good bye, which, really, is all you need, right?), so it will be nice to have some idea about what people are saying and what is written on signs and menus. i'm sure i will feel grossly inadequate when it comes to my mastery of the french language, but i know enough to get by. i'm looking forward to hitting up a bookstore while i am there. i've been reading this horrible r.l. stine book in french (le chalet maudit or the cursed house) because i read it when i was 12 or 13 in english and i thought it would be good for me to read books on a teenager's level. also, the price was good on ebay. navigating the book is okay--i am only halfway thru it--but the writing is so horrible and the story is gay as hell. next i will restart le petit prince. amusant, non?
10. william came up with a good idea this last week. i've been wondering what to get a master's degree in and he said i should consider getting it in french studies, or the language itself. i can take the clep test here on base for french one and two since i never took them in college. now i just need to find a program. it would also be something easy to do online. actually, what i would like to do is an immersion program in france, like at the sorbonne or something (not sure if the sorbonne does that, but i want to go to the sorbonne, meh), but they are expensive and no one would be around to watch the girls. damned kids.
11. william is putting his packet in for officer training. i told him it is too bad he just couldn't take my place, as i worked hard enough to get it. but it's air force. oh well. it is a fast program because they are so desperate for army officers, so he shouldn't have any problem getting that through. we'll see.
okay, that's about it. i will try to put pictures on later.
things i've done since last posting:
1. two weekends ago we went to salzburg, austria, the home of mozart. we got to see the house he was born in and the house he lived in later until he moved to vienna. also, the city was doing their annual music festival, so we go to hear some music while we walked around the city. it was very pretty. i will put pictures on later.
2. last weekend we went to nuremburg. it is the second largest city in bavaria, which is the region of germany that we live in (the biggest city is munich, the capital). it was pretty impressive, as the city dates back to the middle ages. the entire old section of the town is surrounded by huge stone walls to keep people out and, much like salzburg, had a castle/fortress built on the hill overlooking the town. i took several hundred pictures, and i will post some later.
3. two fridays ago i finally took my drivers test so i can drive on base. i passed. hold your applause. driving off base is like driving in a video game. the germans are very aggressive drivers and the right-of-way is not like you would imagine it would be given the way things are in the states. it is sometimes a bit scary. and on the autobahn (i haven't braved this yet) people are seriously going over 150 mph. it sounds cool, but then i think about how an accident could not be anything besides fatal. not fun. when we went to salzburg, we were going about 110 and were in the slow lane...
4. i sent out all my letters to agents. i still have the ones by email to do, but i am hoping to get that done on monday or tuesday.
5. we heard yesterday that my car is here, which is cool because it has a cd player and hook up for the ipod and i miss hearing music while driving. we go to get the car today. the base i go to pick up the car is the same one my ex is stationed at. let's hope we have no happy reunions.
6. the girls started school on monday, which is great because now i don't have to listen to them argue all day long. haha. actually, it isn't that bad, but i was sick of doing the workbooks with them. stella can do hers by herself (she's been doing them since kindergarten) but it was abby's first time and at the beginning of the summer she could barely read, so i had to do them with her and we did them from about 8:30 in the morning until 11:30. NOT FUN.
7. william gets rosetta stone (language learning software) access for free through the army website, so i have been doing the french program. it is really good (i believe my love of free french learning materials has been expressed clearly). i am on unit three. they have a bunch of different languages. i will probably do german and italian as well. i will encourage the girls to do it too. i wish i had been shown this earlier because i would have been doing the german with the girls. oh well.
8. they are redoing the roof on the building we live on so there are always a bunch of construction workers around and it is loud and annoying all the time. meh.
9. this weekend we are going to strasbourg, france, which is cool because i will finally be able to understand what the hell is going on. william knows a very small bit of german and i know nothing (aside from how to say thank you, hello, and good bye, which, really, is all you need, right?), so it will be nice to have some idea about what people are saying and what is written on signs and menus. i'm sure i will feel grossly inadequate when it comes to my mastery of the french language, but i know enough to get by. i'm looking forward to hitting up a bookstore while i am there. i've been reading this horrible r.l. stine book in french (le chalet maudit or the cursed house) because i read it when i was 12 or 13 in english and i thought it would be good for me to read books on a teenager's level. also, the price was good on ebay. navigating the book is okay--i am only halfway thru it--but the writing is so horrible and the story is gay as hell. next i will restart le petit prince. amusant, non?
10. william came up with a good idea this last week. i've been wondering what to get a master's degree in and he said i should consider getting it in french studies, or the language itself. i can take the clep test here on base for french one and two since i never took them in college. now i just need to find a program. it would also be something easy to do online. actually, what i would like to do is an immersion program in france, like at the sorbonne or something (not sure if the sorbonne does that, but i want to go to the sorbonne, meh), but they are expensive and no one would be around to watch the girls. damned kids.
11. william is putting his packet in for officer training. i told him it is too bad he just couldn't take my place, as i worked hard enough to get it. but it's air force. oh well. it is a fast program because they are so desperate for army officers, so he shouldn't have any problem getting that through. we'll see.
okay, that's about it. i will try to put pictures on later.