My Nemesis!

Old Man's Beard

This is my nemesis, otherwise known as old man's beard.  Now I call it dead man's beard.  It is a wicked, evil vine that wraps itself in brambles and nettles [another wicked weed!] and crawls up trees etc and overtakes them.  After being scratched, pricked, nettled and bleeding.....let me tell you, I was serious about getting this out of our trees....I finally managed to get most, not all because it is evil, but most of it out of our trees.  Ok, I admit I was obsessed!  But since I've been here, I've honed a whole new skill set as gardener, dead animal disposer and chicken wrangler.  Could come in handy some day, oh I don't know, say if I marry a farmer from Montana :)

St. Hilarius & Other Funny Men!

While I've done some research, I cannot seem to find the answer as to what St. Hilarius is the saint of besides the fact that he was the Pope of the Roman Catholic church from 461-468.  Maybe that was enough to make him a saint!  Regardless, I find him, well, hilarious!  I also find some other men in my life fairly hilarious and recently I've noticed some universal similarities in men such as there must be a "funny man gene!"  By that I mean, they are very funny about certain things like asking for directions, I think we all know that one.  Or for example, we were in the grocery store the other day and John could not find the anchovies.  He didn't want to ask anyone because if he couldn't find them himself than he didn't want them, yet he spent quite a while looking for them.......funny!  I finally asked someone, at this point my French was almost completely nonexistent, and I managed to find the "anchois". I could go on, but suffice it to say maybe women aren't as concerned about being embarrassed as men? I don't know and don't even care to venture a guess, but, whatever the reason, I love them dearly......funny gene and all!! Bisous

Intoxicated by the night

I can't adequately describe what I'm feeling at this moment.  It's late but the stars were calling me to come and have one more look so how could I deny them.  With the moon gone, they are intoxicating and thanks to my headlamp [gift from my mom!] I am able to walk out in to the darkness, turn off the artificial light and be amazed and awed at the vastness of the stars.  Not quite sure what has possessed me this evening but I feel like staying up all night and watching the sunrise.  It's been quite a while since I've done that.  It's one of those "Ah!" moments, you know the ones.  They come along when you least expect it.  After being plagued by allergies [it is the country after all] and mini-migraines all week, this is the best feeling ever.....recharged, rejuvenated and, dare I say, relaxed?!! I thank my lucky stars for this opportunity.  Bonne nuit etoiles!

French or Foe?

Not the people, but the language.  While the language is very musical and the locals speak "allegro", it has been a bit of a "foe" to me!  I am still listening to my French CD's but am not consistent with them so I will work on that. So far I've gotten pretty good at road signs and menus and managed to have a brief, very brief "conversation" with a nice old French lady one morning, as well as, the guy in the grocery store who helped me find anchovies.  Although there were more charades going during the grocery store dialogue than actual speaking, I'm still proud of the attempt :)

           ps Google translate is my new best friend!

City Girl or Country Girl?

I think that question is pretty obvious!  You can take the girl out of the city....... :)  We picked up our 4 new baby chickens today AND visited a goat farm to buy some cheese and to watch them being milked.  And that pretty much sums up an average day in the life for this "country girl" at the moment.  Not to mention baby chicks and goats are pretty darn cute, even if they do try to eat your pants and your hair [the goats that is!].  And despite all that I can't imagine being anywhere else right now.  Oh, and did I mention that visiting the goat farm was research for my job so it's all in a days work!