We've installed a speaker system in the bakery. We listen to a satellite radio jazz station that plays the same songs every day... not a set 24-hour playlist, just a very limited repertoire, so that I hear two different versions of "Mack the knife" every day. I like "Mack the knife", but I've learned the words to about fifty songs from my ( Read more... )

Business at the bakery is pretty good. Today, for example, we sold nearly everything in the shop, and we're only open from 8 to 3 on Sundays. They're cutting back on our hours, but I can't complain that I have more time to hit golf balls and study Russian and Japanese. The other day a guy came in with a windbreaker and ski poles... on a ( Read more... )

Having worked for a week in the bakery, I have come to see the importance of not cutting corners. Our owner, who already has three restaurants in Mayville and is opening a fifth shop, as well as a restaurant in Jamestown, apparently really likes to save money. Some examples of his handiwork ( Read more... )

Well, after a rocky start, the "café-pâtisserie" in Mayville opened about an hour ago. No, I'm not there; I go in this afternoon. Despite all the exciteable talk about it and the presence of an actual French chef in the administrative staff, this is the extent of the shop's Frenchness: it uses French words, albeit mundane ones, in its name: " ( Read more... )

I'd forgotten how much I hated high school. Or maybe I just hate it more in retrospect than I did at the time, it's hard to say ( Read more... )

Well, I've finally gotten all my pictures sorted out from my travels. There are a lot of them. I've determined that I've taken over 3000 photos since November, not all of which are posted on that site (which will hereafter be referenced at the bottom of the page ( Read more... )

Being back in Ashville isn't as bad as I thought it would be. I haven't had the time to get bored yet, what with all the things I have to do in the meantime: job interview, unpacking, scholarship applications and other assorted paperwork, various errands... and getting a haircut ( Read more... )

For the record, it has come to my attention that the phrase "the grapes of wrath" is taken from the last few verses of Revelation 14. So the translation into French isn't really that silly. I prefer my crow fried ( Read more... )

Being in a near-constant movement from place to place over the last three and a half weeks has given me a lot of things to reflect on. The adage seems to hold a lot of water, that wherever you're going, getting there is half the fun.
( A series of lengthy stories follows, abridged for the sake of not cluttering others' 'Friends' pages )

I've got to stop paying attention to what I'm doing, or else I'll go crazy. I haven't stopped playing the "where was I a week ago...where will I be a week from now" game since I was in Nice over a month ago, and the increasing variety of the answers I'm getting only makes me start philosophising (more than normal; I never stop philosophising) ( Read more... )