Back to Reality

So, I started back at the gym this week. Saturday and tonight. My usual class, "Body Attack".
The photos pretty much sum things up.

Rubber Duckie, UR the One!

This shower gift from last winter in Vermont, which has sat on the shelf in the bathroom, is having its moment in the spotlight over the past few weeks. This duck has become the love of my daughter's life, she becomes almost uncontrollable in the bathtub when it is presented to her. It's all about the chew factor.
For 2 weeks I've been singing the first verse to the song as it was all I could remember. I finally went on line and got all the lyrics. What a great tune! Estelle seemed almost relieved tonight to hear the rest of the song.

"Come Again?"

This expression is what I was internally screaming to myself last Wednesday sitting in a notary's office on the Port of Nice.

Allow me to explain.

I needed a letter notarized for one of my many "business endeavors" in the States. Funnily enough, I went to a notary. And here's where things get a little "Slumber Party".

I walk in. A receptionist greets me. I tell her I have a letter I need notarized (I said "notarizé", since the French word for notary is "notaire", I figured I was ok). I got the blank stare and the up-ended eyebrows. I tried again.
"um, you know, like stamped? you know, the notary stamps it, to make it legal? Certified?" I start throwing out any and all verbs I can come up with. More tense eyebrows. Then she looks at Estelle, like the baby's gonna know the word.
She says "let me go and ask someone."

Boding unwell for me, I think. She disappears. I stand in the reception area, Estelle strapped to my chest in the carrying scarf, staring at an enormous wall mural painted behind the reception desk, all of the Port of Nice, very colorful and detailed and interesting. She comes back. "Please, you can wait in the waiting room over there." I say "Actually I'm really enjoying looking at your mural." She leaves, but then turns and walks back thru to another doorway. She ducks into a hallway. She comes back and hands me a greeting card with the wall mural printed on it. I am impressed. Boding well for me, I think. She smiles. She leaves again.

2 minutes later she returns with another woman. "Please follow me." I step into another office. She's a 30-some-odd woman. "Now, what exactly do you need?" I repeat exactly what it is I need, letter by letter. "Humm......" I say, finding myself funny "Um, this IS a notary office, right? You like, you know, NOTARIZE things here?" The girl is almost upended by this question and says "okay, so all you need the notary to do is stamp you letter and look at your passport to certify it is you?" Now we are getting somewhere, I think. So I have to make an appointment to see the notary. For the next day. I ask "What will the charge be?" She says "um, I don't know, but not much. Maybe he will do it for free." "Great" I say.

Back I come the next day, armed with all my documentation, and Estelle in my scarf. I am shown the waiting room. Two different women come in and seperately ask me EXACTLY what it is that I want. I tell them I have a letter which is going to America and I need it certified that I wrote it, and that I am me. Puzzled, they leave. They come back. They start photocopying everything I have. Twice. They scrutinize dates. They ask to read the letter. I hand it over. They leave. They stop midstride. They come back. "But this letter is in English." "Yes." We all have a moment in the waiting room, broken only by the sound of Estelle slurping on her fingers. Slurp. Slurp. Estelle looks at the women, then at me. Slurp.

They leave. 2 minutes later, a man walks by. Everyone is scared of him, I can tell. He is very authoritative, and he walks like an American - no time to waste. One woman say "Master, she's right in the waiting room." The other woman nervously trails him, tripping on her too tall boots. "Master, here are the copies of her documents." To what do my wondering ears should appear, but a man with women calling him master? It's 9:45 am, and I'm having one of those surreal moments in France, with no one to share it with.

He says "Madam, if you'll come this way." And off we go, into his office which resembles a vault, covered with massive canvases of modern art, huge high ceilings, leather chairs litterred about. I'm thinking about the woman at my old office in DC who used to pull her notary stamp out of her bottom draw where she kept her coffee filters. Something is awry.

I am asked to explain, once again, what it is that I need, and why. I do. He looks over the passport, then presses a stamp across my letter, and then rolls a massive blotter right out of some Masterpiece Theater episode over the ink. I thank him. I have been in the office 2 minutes. He curls him fingers from each hand in an interlock over his desk. "You've been told of our fee structure?" I say "Well, yes, as a matter of fact I asked yesterday and your clerk told me she thought maybe it was free." A shadow crossed his face, and without a flinch he said "Madam, that is not the case. This is a legal service, thus you are to be charged the minimum fee for any basic legal service, which is 60 euros."

This is where my bi-lingual brain has to count outloud in my head, like I'm in some acid-trip version of The Electric Company. I can see the figures floating around in the air in front of my face. Estelle gurgles. Did he just say 60 Euros? Like, Come Again? "Oh." I say. What can I do? The deed is done, I need the document.

60 euros is like, well, about 75 dollars. Which explains why he has so much modern art, and women running about calling his Master. Apparently, life is good if you are a French notary. No coffee filters in your drawer, no sir. At least I got a free greeting card out of it. Dang.

Daddy's Girl

Thomas wants a disclaimer on this photo that his hockey teeth aren't as bad as this photo makes them look.

Here's One!

There's been a lot of talk about how I don't post any bad photos of Estelle. I found one where she looks unhappy, it's the best I can do.

6 MONTHS

This is her asleep.This is after she woke up. Here she is, on her half birthday, in all her glory.To acknowledge both us of surviving the adventure for this long, we will celebrate by serving her meat tomorrow, per Doctor's orders. Sorry to the veggies reading this.

Soup's On

Okay, every once in a while I feel compelled to post about what I originally started this blog for - ranting about the French. Or rather, presenting and analyzing the mysteries of cultural differences. So here goes with 2 totally unrelated things.
First, We have started having a minor roach issue, despite my Romanian cleaning girl and my obsession with sanitation due to the bébé. A man came to spray. He was so in love with his job as a roach-sprayer, I could barely get him to shut up and not holler at me over his shoulder about all kinds of intimate details about roaches that, frankly, no one needs to know. I said "I'm sorry, but my baby is asleep, do you think we could discuss this a bit more quietly?" He said "sure. And don't worry about they neighbors hearing you and finding out you have roaches - they do to! They called us to spray a few weeks ago. That's why you've got them now!" He chuckled away and was quite jolly while telling me this and clearly thought it quite funny.
And story Number Two, certainly of a less frivolous nature: Tonight on the port of Nice in front of a massive church which you see and hear from my apt, there is a big protest going on. Now stick with me here while I explain. Every Weds night, a charity group sets up shop in front of this old church and hands out soup to the homeless - a soup wagon, so to speak. It is pork soup. Now a national judge has banned this group from handing out the soup, because it is pork-based and thus discriminatory against Jews and Muslims, who cannot eat pork. So naturally there are those on one side screaming "For god's sake, repeal the ban and let the charity give the hungry people the damn soup!" And then there is the charity group itself, mournfully regretting that they cannot give out their soup (or so they act). Then there are the charity-organization haters, screaming at the charity things like "You bunch of lousy racists! You are all going to hell, you and your damn pork soup!". And finally the homeless people, who, seemingly, just want the soup to accompany their several bottles. What the average passerby wouldn't know is that the judge who made the ruling did so because this "charity" organisation is in fact a nationalist Jean-Marie Le Pen-type right-winged group called "The Solidarity of the French", and they purposefully serve pork soup so as not to feed the "non-French". They try to get away with not outwardly admitting it but that's the deal. On their website, it even says that they will not give dessert and other accompagnying food products to anyone who doesn't eat the soup--sort of like saying clean your plate or you don't get the cupcake. This is to prevent anyone who wants the rest of the handout but can't eat the soup (i.e. the Jews and Muslims) from getting anything at all. Then they are the people screaming "Where are the damn non-pork soup-wagons? Why is it always the Christians who have to feed everybody? Why are the Muslims running their own 'hallal" soup wagons and the Jews a kosher one?"

I re-state that these are unrelated stories - there are no roaches in the soup, one would hope.

Posing

Some friends who know me well accuse me of posing for a camera. I'm slightly alarmed to say that, while not yet 6 months old, Estelle seems to have a bit of a chip off the old block.
Today when I took out the camera she immediately stretched her arms and started smiling. Maybe she thinks my Nikon is another family member?

"I think, hmm, Charles Hamilton may get it!"

If you get that reference, you know where I'm going with these photos.....
Estelle, surrounded by little boys, vying for her affection - or at least her hand to kiss/fingers to chew on....


This was yesterday's "Galette de Roi" party - eating pastry cakes filled with Frangipan - a paste made with almonds. It's the "king cake" of the New Orleans mardi gras for those who know it. Cut it open, and whoever gets the bean, or little statuette, gets to wear the crown. The period of "galette de roi" lasts from Epiphany to Mardi Gras - in other words, lots of calories. But these babies (there were 8) were none the wiser whilst checking each other out. Estelle was much more interested in someone else's rattle.

Sho-Lo's & Tennesse Top Hat

These are Estelle's new favorite things - the magnets on my fridge of men with mullets. In this photo, she's talking to her friend, Squirrel Pelt.

Under the gums!

If you look closely, I'm sure you can see the teeth that simply must be lurking under the surface. Hence the constant drooling and off and on fussiness!

Dig In

Back in sunny Nice after 9 days without a speck of sunshine in the north. I spent my first Holidays with Thomas' family in the Loire and my first not in Vermont. There are too many differences to mention between how home and my adoptive country celebrate Christmas, but why bother with details, let's just cut to the chase -- look at the desserts.
Temptation Number One: The Buche de Noel
Had I been allowed to ram the whole thing down my throat, I probably would have, sinfully divine!

Temptation Number Two: No idea what it's called, but there was a LOT goin' on in there, and it was all good stuff.

The difference is that everything is in moderation, with reasonable helpings, and sprinkled with champagne, foie gras, etc. Hence no fear to get on the scale, unlike the previous 35 Christmases of my life......

Talbot's Girl

Here's Estelle in one of her 400 cute outfits that we got as gifts. Luckily we also got lots of bibs, because otherwise this outfit would look like one big spit-out of carrot purée.
The good news is that as of Tuesday, Estelle has a new cousin, Heather, who will inherit all of Estelle's wardrobe, whether my sister-in-law likes it or not! Heather joins brothers Wayne and Cole, who can't decide what is better: Christmas, or their new sister.

5 months

Another milestone: Estelle eats something other than milk and her toes i.e. homemade apple purée. She devoured it.
To celebrate, she partied with her friends LuLu and Maxence.

I Accept

Sometimes all it takes is a college roommate's boldface dare on your very own blog's commentary to get you to do things your husband never knew you were capable of. Touché!

No Plantar's Warts Here

Don't tell this girl she can't have her toes AND eat them too.
I think this counts as Milestone #2 but who knows. I'm impressed with the flexibility, frankly. I can do that too, but I'm not quite as graceful about it.

Milestone #1

It's official. She rolls over on her own, all by herself, and can prop herself up and look around. She was pretty interested in that other baby she discovered in the mirror.However the glee doesn't last too long, as after awhile she starts to drool or shreik or both - see this last photo for a visual of that kind of moment. Bit frightening look to tell the truth.

Electrolux? No.....Fire!

Last night at 8 pm, I came out of my kitchen where I'd been cooking up garlic and onions, thus had the range fan on and the kitchen door shut, oblivious to anything else going on in the apt, and this is what I saw. Thomas in his pyjamas with this man. Who is he, you may ask? Why, one of our local firemen, naturally.
Each year around this time, they go door to door, all over the country, selling calendars. Ours is complete with photos of the French Riviera on fire and various states of disarray. Note the wallet in Thomas' hand. By "donation", you get one of these lovely calendars. I wanted to invite the guy in and hear his life story. 8 pm, going door to door! Can you imagine?
Just one of the many things that make life interesting living over here. Plus, let's discuss that uniform. He was proud as a peacock to have his photo taken by an "American".

It's beginning to look a lot like....

Estelle's new boyfriend, Alessandro, half French, half Italian.
Born about a month before her; they got together at a holiday tea yesterday to check each other out.
Bellissimo! And below, Estelle's new favorite thing, a "Teething Bling", looks like my jewelry but is secretly a teething ring. A gift from my friend Shannon in where else, the land of opportunity and creativity, the good ole US of A.

Papa Content

I don't know who is happier - Thomas to see Estelle again, or me to have a computer and broadband.
Alive and well as of yesterday afternoon, back in Nice after what can only be called a whirlwind Queen's tour of Vermont. For those I never called, I apologize - but when you have 10 siblings, and your mom is one of 16 and your dad was one of 6, well, you get the picture.....