Toutes Directions

I've been procrastinating...

I got back from Ireland, and before I could do a proper post, I was back at work. And then friends came for the weekend. And I'm still behind at work.

So a few random comments/observations:

I am currently dealing with applications to study at the university next year. I have to do data entry to put their name, address, previous degree, and program they're applying to into a database. This means typing in every applicant's email address. I've noticed that a lot of French kids add their department number to their name, whereas as other nationalities add their birth year or day more often.

One of the applications I was going through had a recommendation from Ewan and Eve McGregor. "Wait, the Ewan McGregor?" I thought. So I looked up on wikipedia who is wife is: Eve. Turns out the girl was their au pair after doing her Licence and asked them for a reference for the Masters program. Best part: they included a phone number and personal email address on the reference. How cool is that?

B and I had dinner with our neighbors who gave us our cat, and during the apero, I noticed a pile of knitting next to the couch. Not only does my neighbor have an awesome cat who had an awesome kitty, but she also knits! We got talking about projects, and she showed me her catalogue from Bergère de France. I will admit: I'm only just getting out of my novice knitting stage. I started off buying from Phildar, which I now know is kind of crappy. Then I started going to Bouton d'Or stores. But I just might become a Bergère de France convert. Why? They offer a catalogue with yarn samples so you can feel the yarn at home and then order it over the internet. Can we get more awesome? They also sell this: inter-changeable circular needles. It's a bit pricey, but then again you have lots of possibilities and the cables go up to 120cm, which I haven't seen elsewhere.

My neighbor showed me some of the magazines she has and the patterns she used, but they're all in French (of course), which made me very glad I bought Stitch 'n Bitch when I was in Ireland. I need to flip through practical books, like for crafting or cooking, so I didn't want to just order something online from France. This is the second book by the author, and explains some of the more complicated techniques (with humor). I've been advancing nicely on a knitted blanket, but now that I've mastered the increase-decrease pattern, I'd like to try something a bit harder for my next project. I'll have to stick to my book or Ravelry for my patterns though because there is no way I'm following a pattern with instructions in French!

When our friends came for the weekend, it was to go to the board game "convention" held in Toulouse. One of the games we tested was Cro-magnon. We played in French, but the editor apparently sells English, German, and Dutch versions. The game is basically charades/pictionary since you take cards with words you have to communicate, but it was pretty silly since we had to pretend to be cave men. During different parts of the game you are limited to miming, using play-do to form the object, drawing with a piece of coal, or using a very limited list of words to create sentences like "Moi pas sentir bien" or "Animal couleur". We also had "tasks" to do each time it was our turn. One friend had to hit the table and growl, another had to smell himself, and I had to look for bugs in the other players' hair. I wouldn't recommend this game for a crowd of mixed nationalities or with anyone who didn't speak French well because the words were sometimes hard to communicate or specialty vocabulary (I pulled 'gourdin' which means club or bludgeon; definitely not something I say every day!). But otherwise it was a fun and silly game.

We also tried Divinare, which is a modified betting game. Out of a total of 36 cards of 4 different types, 24 are distributed among the players, who then pass a few to their neighbor. Based on what you had and what you received, you bet how many total cards of each type are in the game. Then the game proceeds by each player putting down a card, which allows you to slowly see the true number of cards in play for each type. With each turn, you can change one bet, and the goal of course is to be the closest to the correct number when everyone has put down all their cards. It took us a bit to get the hang of the game, but I think it could actually be a rather quick play, and since there's no language involved, it can easily be played by a crowd of mixed languages.

Off to look at my plants now. I'll do a gardening update soon.