Spring is Here
Officially. Granted, about a week and a half ago, the city put up banners for the Spring/Easter festival... with snow still on the ground. I greatly enjoyed the discrepancy between the message and nature's level of cooperation. But for the past 3-5 days, it has been mid-70s, so I think we can call it Spring.
I'm at the halfway point of the 6-week term between breaks. I have officially lived in France for more than 6 months. As of next Wednesday, I will have officially worked in France for 6 months. Due to the weirdness of French school schedules in combination with the program contract, I will only work for 2.5 weeks in April, since there's that two week break in the middle. Dad's going to come during the break and we're going to visit Rome, Florence, Venice, here, Strasbourg, and Paris. It's gonna be pretty ridiculous.
I only wind up with a half day tomorrow, since the teachers at one of the two schools I work with on Tuesdays are on strike. This will be the second time I've been off for a strike, but the high school assistants have already 4 or 5 days off. One of those coming when the students striked (struck? that just sounds wrong... 'went on strike' is safe, but I know you could say "I am striking tomorrow" so 'to strike' as a verb could be synonymous with 'to go on strike,' in which case I feel like it would need a different past participle to differentiate between the meanings, like with 'hang': "John hung his coat on the hanger" vs. "John was hanged"... therefore I'm deciding that 'striked' is the proper past participle when designating 'to go on strike') Anyway, the students striked in support of the teachers. I don't think I've ever had a teacher go on strike, let alone the student body.
Finally congrats to OU (even though you lost to Tennessee, we love you and are more proud than you can imagine) and Xavier for both exceeding my expectations. Now, if Xavier, who is one of only two teams to make the Sweet Sixteen for the past three years (Michigan State is the other) can only make it to the Final Four it could potentially face OSU, and that turncoat Matta. What color did the Cardinal's Guards wear in the Three Musketeers? Scarlet and Grey. Coincidence? Methinks not. Go X-Men!
Big 3:
Best: Played a game with a group of French people that was right in my wheelhouse. They give you a card with an English word and a French word, teams go back and forth trying to come up with songs using either word, when a team gets stumped, the other team wins the card, most cards wins.
Worst: Couldn't sleep last night. Got about 3 hours, and I've been fighting the urge to nap all day, so that when I try to go to bed tonight, I'll be tired.
Funniest: Discussing with one of my teachers what the differences in profanity between Québécois and France French, which led into a discussion about English profanity, and me ranking the severity of various swear-words. She found this really amusing since I was taking a very analytical approach, and didn't seem the slightest bit awkward. I decided to skip telling her about how we worked that profanity, specifically the f-word and it's immediate suffixed or prefixed relatives, could be used as all parts of speech in English, except conjunctions and prepositions.
And yes, I know that you're checking for yourself, now.
Until next time:
May you never have your soul absorbed into the Netherworld by a power-hungry televangelist.
I'm at the halfway point of the 6-week term between breaks. I have officially lived in France for more than 6 months. As of next Wednesday, I will have officially worked in France for 6 months. Due to the weirdness of French school schedules in combination with the program contract, I will only work for 2.5 weeks in April, since there's that two week break in the middle. Dad's going to come during the break and we're going to visit Rome, Florence, Venice, here, Strasbourg, and Paris. It's gonna be pretty ridiculous.
I only wind up with a half day tomorrow, since the teachers at one of the two schools I work with on Tuesdays are on strike. This will be the second time I've been off for a strike, but the high school assistants have already 4 or 5 days off. One of those coming when the students striked (struck? that just sounds wrong... 'went on strike' is safe, but I know you could say "I am striking tomorrow" so 'to strike' as a verb could be synonymous with 'to go on strike,' in which case I feel like it would need a different past participle to differentiate between the meanings, like with 'hang': "John hung his coat on the hanger" vs. "John was hanged"... therefore I'm deciding that 'striked' is the proper past participle when designating 'to go on strike') Anyway, the students striked in support of the teachers. I don't think I've ever had a teacher go on strike, let alone the student body.
Finally congrats to OU (even though you lost to Tennessee, we love you and are more proud than you can imagine) and Xavier for both exceeding my expectations. Now, if Xavier, who is one of only two teams to make the Sweet Sixteen for the past three years (Michigan State is the other) can only make it to the Final Four it could potentially face OSU, and that turncoat Matta. What color did the Cardinal's Guards wear in the Three Musketeers? Scarlet and Grey. Coincidence? Methinks not. Go X-Men!
Big 3:
Best: Played a game with a group of French people that was right in my wheelhouse. They give you a card with an English word and a French word, teams go back and forth trying to come up with songs using either word, when a team gets stumped, the other team wins the card, most cards wins.
Worst: Couldn't sleep last night. Got about 3 hours, and I've been fighting the urge to nap all day, so that when I try to go to bed tonight, I'll be tired.
Funniest: Discussing with one of my teachers what the differences in profanity between Québécois and France French, which led into a discussion about English profanity, and me ranking the severity of various swear-words. She found this really amusing since I was taking a very analytical approach, and didn't seem the slightest bit awkward. I decided to skip telling her about how we worked that profanity, specifically the f-word and it's immediate suffixed or prefixed relatives, could be used as all parts of speech in English, except conjunctions and prepositions.
And yes, I know that you're checking for yourself, now.
Until next time:
May you never have your soul absorbed into the Netherworld by a power-hungry televangelist.