A Missed Opportunity

This salmon being smoked at the Hanover Christmas market reminded me of my Pacific Northwest Heritage -- and she felt the same way.

Christina, of Mausi, and I have a lot in common. We're both from the PNW, she from Vancouver, B.C. and me from Olympia, WA. We've both lived in Europe, married to Europeans, since 1990. And we're both involved in ESL teaching.

I've followed her blog off and on, and she mine. But when I went to Hanover in early December for a conference followed by a weekend "just for me," I neglected to write anything about it on this blog. And after a very short post about the Hanover trip, I got this comment from Christina:

As in Hanover, Germany?? Dang, we could have had coffee!

And the worst thing is, we really could have, because I had all Saturday to myself!

Regrets, regrets...but maybe a message to myself to get back into the blogosphere somehow.

In the meantime, I'll refer you to this wonderful post by Christina about the Hanover Christmas market, or Weihnachtsmarkt, and the general festive atmosphere in Germany at this time of year...because who knows if I'll have time to do a big post about my trip!

I am, however, going to make an effort to get back to blogging on FP. I miss it and I miss you all.

A timid return for a Word-light Wednesday (74)

Cool lights, big city. Hanover charmed me and I want to go back...

The walls come tumbling down

(Flickr image courtesy of Courosa)

My mind is elsewhere these days. Any readers of my blog (formerly blogs) have certainly noticed a slowdown, and may be wondering if it will all come to a screeching halt soon. I used to write three blogs: one is on hold indefinitely, another has been put to pasture for good, and this one is, well, limping along.

If I used to comment on your blogs, well, that isn't happening so much anymore either. Yet I'm online at least as much as I used to be -- it's just that my Internet time is increasingly being spent on activities related to teaching.

Teaching. That's what I've always done for a living, by the way. And it's something that has been carefully kept out of my blogging life. You have only to look at my Blogger profile: "I've been living, working, cooking and raising a family in France for 19 years."

I've covered the "living" part on this blog for nearly 4 years, with a little bit about my family thrown in now and then. I covered the cooking part for almost as long on Cuisine Quotidienne.

But working? I made the conscious decision to keep that out of blogging.

I think that is going to change soon. (Fear not -- if I start a teaching blog, it will be on a different site!)

Of course I would never write one of those "this is what's going on at my job" blogs, the type that gets one fired. But since getting involved in Twitter, I have plunged into the world of teaching philosophy, methods for teaching English as a foreign language, and have discovered fabulous websites and blogs by teachers who are not counting their work hours.

I want to be part of all that -- again. I realize that while teaching here in France, I have built very French-style walls around my work life and home life. And it's been for the best of all possible causes: being available for my daughters. But they are increasingly doing their own thing, and with that void, my passion for teaching has returned big-time.

It was never really lost, it was just left at work when I went out the door in the evening.

Now it's with me all the time, the way it used to be in my pre-family days when I was teaching in an American high school.

My mind is elsewere these days -- and it feels great.

Wordless Wednesday 73

Betty and Loulou's adventures, Part 3

A new, cozy and colorful salon de thé called "La Toile Cirée"

(2014 Post-script: La Toile Cirée is now closed)

Until the day before she came, I was ever so excited about Loulou's visit to Rodez, planned for the 10th and 11th of November.

Then Rodez went weather-crazy, as it is known to do.

I had to go into town on Monday the 9th: the wind was whipping, it was pouring sheets of rain, and it was just oh-so-barely over freezing. I also found out that Chez Marie, the cheese merchant/restaurant that Loulou really wanted to try out, was going to be closed for those two days.

"This is a terrible idea," I started to think. "She's going to hate Rodez" -- who doesn't when the weather gets so dreadful? "She's going to freeze to death."

Well, she did freeze, although not to death, but my other dire predictions did not come true.

The weather was downright chilly, true, but we were able to warm up over hot chocolate at a new salon de thé that I had never been to. And Loulou liked Rodez, calling it "sophisticated" (!) and well kept-up.

(Shadows in the Rodez cathedral; photo courtesy of Loulou)

Rodez does have its dark, gloomy side, as we discovered in the shadows of Notre Dame de Rodez. And I learned that it is mossy. Being from the Pacific Northwest, I had never noticed the moss, but Loulou pointed it out to me. Yep, it's there.

She even claims that cattle she had seen as she was driving up had moss growing on them, but my husband and I are still waiting for photographic proof on that one!

Speaking of photos, I suffered two camera malfunctions, one on each day, so I don't have much to show for her visit -- but take a look at her blog for a lovely shot of Le Trou de Bozouls, which is ten minutes from where we live.

Loulou, thanks for braving the elements and making the your way to Aveyron!

Just another Wordless Wednesday (72)

Wordless Wednesday 71

(Photo courtesy of DAPHNE Jouanneteau)

Use of a Flickr photo for online guide -- what do you think?

My "selected" photo of Fort Worden State Park

The funny thing is, I'm not that crazy about this photo anyway: I certainly could have done without all of the cars in the foreground!

But nevertheless, this photo somehow got noticed by an online map/guide system called Schmap. And a few weeks ago, I got an email notification that one of my Flickr photos had been chosen as a finalist for inclusion in "the newly released ninth edition of our Schmap Seattle Guide."

The email clearly asked for my permission to eventually use the photo in the guide; the terms were clearly explained. Without much thought, and fully knowing that Schmap was a professional venture, I answered positively.

Well, today I found out that my photo "has been selected for inclusion" in the guide, and it is visible here online, and I can even see here what it looks like on Schmap's iPhone version.

And now I must admit I feel a little funny about the whole thing.

Don't get me wrong: Schmap was totally up-front and did everything right. Despite the slightly inflated language, they never presented their venture as some sort of veiled contest; everything was explicitly laid out in due form, and I did indeed give them permission to use my photo.

But should I have?

The question is not "my photo" as such. My thought is not that "maybe they should have paid me for it" -- I'm far from a professional photographer. But I am wondering if maybe they should have paid someone else for it -- or for something better.

What do you think? With so many photos floating around on Flickr, is this just the wave of the future and no big deal? Or by surrendering my rights to this modest photo, did I somehow contribute to undermining the work of professional photographers?

General update, sans photo

I don't have much inspiration for a photo-related post this weekend, so I thought I would just do a quick update on some of my news.

1. My globe-trotting daughter got in, at the last minute, on a one-week school exchange trip to Ireland. French schools are big on orgnizing trips to other European countries, and my girls have taken a total of five so far: Scotland, England, Ireland, Spain and Germany. She had a great time but today is homework catch-up day, which is the downside of going on a trip where the whole class is not involved.

2. I was in Paris for work on Tuesday and Wednesday and since I had the rare occasion to spend the night, I took the chance to finally meet up with Leesa from News from France! We were definitely not in blogging mode as we took no pictures of food or each other -- I didn't even have my camera with me as it meant extra weight to drag around in Paris. But we had a great evening together and I thank Leesa and Alex for their hospitality.

3. I may be blogging here less, but I am as active as ever online. Spurred on by some summer reading, I am doing a lot more work on my English classes and discovering all sorts of new materials and even a whole new way to teach that I am experimenting with, at least partially.

4. This year I finally signed up as a student at the Rodez Ecole de Musique, and I am taking harpsichord lessons. It is a fun new challenge but is also keeping me busy, busy, busy.

5. Finally, I don't want to go into any medical detail on this, but my dear father has been very ill and hospitalized and/or in acute care since about the beginning of September -- shortly after we left the USA. We have hopes he can come home in a few weeks. The general upshot is progress, but very slow progress. Please give him a thought.

So you can see, readers, that life is very full at the moment. I know I haven't been faithfully commenting on a lot of your blogs, but I very much appreciate those of you who take the time to comment here.

Bon dimanche à tous!

A new angle on Rodez

Rodez se réveille

Even though I drove my eldest daughter to her high school on the outskirts of Rodez every morning for two years, and I've driven myself to my job in Rodez's new business district for many more, I've never really gotten a feel for downtown Rodez in the early morning.

I love how the few open shops stand out as the sun rises

Now that my eldest daughter has an apartment in the hyper-centre, and my youngest goes to a high school that is also right in town, I'm led at times to come into town quite early, around 7:15 or so.

It's a different Rodez, one with many free parking spaces, subtile shades of light -- and residents! Living outside of town, I usually thought of downtown more as a place to shop and not so much a place to live.

Sure, I saw that above every shop were apartments, but the notion of people living up there was abstract -- after all, when I was in town these town center inhabitants always mixed in with the crowd.

Now I see them scurrying about: employees rushing to catch the shuttle bus to go to work in Bourran, where I work, and schoolkids hulking their huge backpacks through the pedestrian district. On Mondays and Fridays, when the internes (boarders) arrive and leave, a number of students are also dragging suitcases.

Looking up from where I park on early-morning apartment runs

This year is a different life, and Rodez has become a different world to me.

Cooking Blues

Mini fondants au chocolat cooked in my blue ramequins

No, this is not another half-whine, half-mourn about how sick of cooking I am. This is actually a response to a tag. Well, let's say a tag I invited myself into because I've been such a lame blogger that the tagger, my dear friend Loulou thought of tagging me but figured I'd be too uninspired to carry through!

Now there's a challenge that would revive any blogger...

The original tag from Croque-Camille was "find seven blue objects in your house and do a little show and tell." Loulou took this one step beyond in her lovely post and showed all sorts of blues in and around her village.

If I lived where she does, I might do that too. But here in Aveyron, things are a little greyer, or pinker, or just plain colorless. However, blue is my favorite color and I figured I could find seven objects just from my kitchen...and revive some food photos at the same time.

My, there are four blue objects in this photo alone:

1. A mug from who knows where, containing a type of individually-served Mexican rice salad from the days when I was doing imaginative cooking
2. A plate from a set that my husband picked up at the local Leclerc supermarket
3. A napkin that goes with a tablecloth set I bought in Avignon -- these are generally reserved for company, so maybe I brought them out to offset:
4. The unmatched utensils, including a blue teaspoon that goes back many years!
   

I've got at least two blue things here, maybe even three if you count that my shirt as reflected in my blue stove looks blue. I picked up the colander at a supermarket too -- one can find a lot of nice kitchen objects in French hypermarchés.

I could go on and on, as about half of the things in my kitchen are blue.

What about you? Where do you have "the blues?" Feel free to play...

Adieu, Cuisine Quotidienne

R.I.P.

There are two activities I am really sick of right now: cooking and laundry.

Now I never ran a blog about laundry, so that poses no online-life issues. But I did write a cooking blog for nearly four years -- and over the summer, I realized I just had to let it go.

My terse, virtually commentless farewell post on the site itself bears witness to how out of steam I am on the subject. But what I didn't say there is that the problem isn't really blogging -- although I am going through a dry spot there too -- the problem is cooking.

I will have been living in France for twenty years come next April, and as another expat friend with a similar background said to me a few months back: "Let's face it -- we've done one heck of a lot of cooking."

I've mastered the basics of French cuisine; I've thrown dinner parties that took me a day of planning and shopping followed by another day of cooking; I've prepared meal plans and shopping lists to correspond to particular recipes; I've worried too much about what my husband and family would all like to have on their plates.

Been there and done that now.

I don't know about my friend, but cooking-wise, I'm burnt out.

Wordless Wednesday 70

All I want is a room with a view

(Not the best light, but I couldn't wait to post this picture...)

And now we have one. Okay, my eldest daughter has one -- and more than a room. She is gradually moving into a darling, old, one-bedroom apartment right in the center of Rodez.

A year ago, we weren't expecting her to end up in Rodez for university. But various factors led to that decision, and we all couldn't be more pleased. Eldest daughter is thrilled to be going to a small university, because she has heard plenty of horror stories about Toulouse Le Mirail, which is the closest university besides Rodez that offered her chosen major.

The apartment is a bonus, in a way, but when faced with buying third car, having her do a 34 km commute every day, and her having nowhere to go during her big breaks in her schedule, the downtown living quarters appeared as an obvious choice. Besides, maybe it's my American background, but I like the idea of students gaining some independence.

My youngest daughter, back from the USA, has of course bought into the concept heart and soul. Her high school is less than a five-minute walk from the place, so she will stay there a few nights a week when transport, or the notoriously late French school days, pose a problem for us.

(Downtown Rodez abounds in funky, hidden courtyards. We get to look out on this one.)

And another great thing: Mom has unlimited access to the place! So now I finally get to use a little pied-à-terre in town. I won't be there constantly or anything, but at times it is going to be very practical.

A new chapter is opening up in our lives, and it's coming at a good time. I feel like I need a little change of routine -- and it's so fun to be a part of Rodez's inner sanctums.

Wordless Wednesday 69

Wordless Wednesday 68

Good-bye to this

As every year, it takes me a little time to settle in to life in Aveyron after a summer in the Pacific Northwest.

Olympia, in all its calm yet funky glory, had never looked more charming to me than it did this summer. Was it the resolutely warm weather, or just the mood I was in?

Perhaps knowing that my daughter had spent a whole school year there made me look at my home town with a fresh eye. I wrote this post about leaving her behind there exactly one year ago, and it does seem like all year long, I had Olympia on my mind.

Now it's la rentrée, and time for new experiences here in Aveyron. My youngest will start a new, French high school; my eldest will start la faculté here in Rodez. My husband and I both have plenty of work lined up, and hope to do a little better on the social side than last year.

Good-bye for now, Olympia.

Wordless Wednesday 67

I'm home, she's home, we're all home

At some point, in the wee hours and far too shortly before we left Olympia, my youngest daughter's accumulated "stuff" was looking like this.

It was just as well I was asleep.

But we made it home, our full allowance of 8 suitcases in tow:

Departure from my parents' garage

28 hours later, this accumulation of sweatpants, T-shirts and other accoutrements of American teenage life was neatly packed in our utility trailer that had been stored in Toulouse:

And, most importantly, she's home:

Signing off for the summer

It was difficult to find an image for this final post of the year. (Don't worry, I think in school years!) So what more fitting photo than my place of work, which I said my summer good-bye to on Friday?

On Monday I'll be staying in a hotel in Toulouse to catch an early flight to Frankfurt, then Seattle. It will be the first time since 1990 that I will have made the trip alone. But she is already there, and she is staying behind with papa for a few weeks before the four of us will be reunited in the USA in late July.

I usually manage to do some blog posting over the summer, at least here where anything can happen -- although nothing has been happening of late. But I think I'm going to take advantage of my summer respite to rethink my blogging, although I may write a few retrospectives on Cuisine Quotidienne, which is breathing its last.

Come September, I will likely be writing only one blog -- certainly this one.

In the meantime, I hope to catch up with you and do some blog reading...and I'll certainly remain active on my Twitter page.

A great summer to all! Bon été!