Extra study time

It is snowing out this morning, the sky is grey and it is windy too. Sadly it is not the pretty stuff that sticks. I realise that snow is a Right pain for many people it is an inconvenience in their routine, but I have never grown out of the excitement of looking at a wonderful white world.

Well if it carries on like this all morning I will be staying in and doing some extra study time.
Three white words
blancheur = whiteness
blanchâtre = whitish pallid
blanc = white

Here is a picture that I took earlier this year in our village the church looks prettier in the snow.

So when you need to put some white blankets on the bed think of the snow in France. Actually I use a duvet.

PS. An hour later 9.20 am the snow is thick and is sticking. ha ha.

James Bond or Indiana Jones?

Bought myself a book. Just a small one. I really wanted Robinson Crusoe translated into French, but I got Indiana Jones et Le Temple Maudit. I have always had a soft spot for Harrison Ford. I have only read one page and already have dived into my favorite online dictionary several times.

It starts off in 1935 Indy is in his fathers office his father is late and Indy is looking around at the piles of unopened mail, or as we say in England post.

Then I read this..Il se releva d'un bond......Bond not a money bond or James Bond? No it means to leap to ones feet or bounce do you know I have never heard or seen this word used so I will be watching out for it.

Watch this clip for some great shoulder pads, Carly Simon is singing Let the River Run from a film I enjoyed, which starred Meg Ryan and Harrison Ford. The film was called Working Girl.

Vivre dans sa boule.

Many Brits are criticised for living in rural France, some accuse them and say they they have run away, and that they are living in some kind of idylic rural bubble. Well I wasnt running away to the countryside since I previously lived in Dorset.

But even that picture above can give you the wrong impression about real life. nowhere is perfect and trouble free. We all need to wear some armour to get through our own personal battles in life, and sometimes that means living in your own private little bubble. The French word for bubble is boule.

Change

Changed the clocks last night. Fall back one hour. Look around you and the world outside is full of change.

The leaves are changing and it is an exciting time to go out with your camera.

Sometimes when I look at the photographs on Flickr I feel I am missing out not being in a town very often, but I guess I just need a few hours in Fougeres soon and I will be fixed.

Here is one of my favorite forest places.

In February, in the sunshine.

August in the rain.

October, grey sky and no sunshine.

They say a change is as good as a rest, and we did get an extra hour in bed.

H2o

Fougeres marvelous castle is situated in a rather odd position because it is not sitting high above the town but in fact down below the town with the river Nancon flowing through. Here is a view looking down from the Jardin Public. In this area of the town there are some very attractive timbered buildings or Colombage.

Nancon River in the park at Fougeres.

I seem to have rivers on the brain at the moment, I blame the poem I now have to learn about the river Seine.

Just down the road from where I live is a house which was once a mill, the water runs really fast and I like to stop and take some pictures there.

Everyone is downsizing these days so lets finish with a flaque (puddle)

Bad for the waist line.

French Fancy sounds like a cake or a luscious pastry to me. I have just started to read a blog with this yummy name. French Fancy. She looks like an old hand at this blogging and so I have only been lurking.

Anyway do go and look at her blog she is a London lass, who sometimes eats dog food.

Bon appétite.

Enjoy my cake decorations below.

The art exhibition in Rennes

I hadn't heard of the artist before. But I have seen these pictures in the past, I don't know where. I do like black and white images there is something mysterious about them.

Gilbert Garcin.......link here............Some pictures here

This is a picture that I took in the Restaurant in Rennes just before we went for our walk around the old part of the city.

Here is another black and white picture I took very early this year in the forest.

Unfinished homework

I didn't learn the poem.. I am suposed to remember it off by heart. oops and it is my class on Thursday morning. Actually I have worked very hard, but yet again so hard I have lost track of what I was suposed to learn.

I have tried to analyse why I learnt the first poem and not this one! This poem is about the river Seine in Paris. I guess this poem just doesn't grab me. I really liked Tombe la Pluie I could hear the raindrops.

I like the word élèves, when I see the little ones going to school I imagine elves although my friend said that they are more like naughty goblins!

When I wandered around Rennes a few weeks back I saw this group of school children some who were not paying attention to the teacher.

Reading in Bed

The French word for bed is lit. And when you learn about the word for read lire, when he or she read the word is lit. So I will have to imagine that she is reading in bed.

Well so where might the word litter come from I wondered. So reading in bed makes sense then!

Here is some forest litter.

Just ticking along

Nothing to report? No not really, just a fairly quiet weekend at home just taking walks, and taking pictures and trying to learn French. The first two are easy!

All the same the weekend flew by where does the time go? The French word for clock is horloge, which I guess comes from Latin?

Here is a picture taken outside the Clock Museum in Fougeres.



Almost opposite the museum are these lovely blue doors.

The flower that sounds like a frog.

A special friend has had to hurriedly go back to her roots. The French word for roots is racine. Rushing back home when a loved one is ill is something that we all have to face at some point. We have to catch a plane or take a ferry along with all the holiday makers returning back to the UK after a holiday in France.

Something that you might say to a friend or loved one is Tu me manques... I miss you. strange language.. You me miss?

So special thoughts for a special person.x

Here are some flowers for my friend. They always make me smile when they brave the elements in springtime.

Can you hear this flower it sounds like a frog.

Her youngest once asked what the flower shown above is called.

Of course its a crocus.

He then asked "how do you make it croak"!!!

He does come out with some classics.

Here he is with his sister, he has a chicken under his arm.

With a chicken under his arm one day he asked if he could have it for tea.

Beau

Today it rained, mud stuck to the soles of my shoes when I closed the gates. But although the sky is grey there are marvelous colours all around. I always find it odd that the dying leaves give us so much joy.

But after the colour of autumn there is another beauty to look forward to. The maize is harvested and our fields return, the leaves fall and views are revealed.

Here are a few colourful pictures.

These bee hives in the forest have been hidden behind the bracken and soon will be back in view.

These trees in our village have been hidden for several months, and further views beyond.

Beau

Belle

Douce France

Sweet France.........Learning French by music. Douce means sweet or gentle.




Something sweet?

Here is a picture of the old quince tree in the garden. I must do something with the fruit and make some quince cheese.........(JAM).

Who needs magazines when you can read

About real lives.

I have only been reading blogs for about four months but already I have found some great ones I especially like blogs that help the story along with photographs or pictures. I think I am a visual person. I must go back to this one soon, Nice blog here, and here and here and now here

Pause......................................Paws ...........Patte

Back soon so lets pause for thought.......or as they say in France inactivité temporaire.

Bof

I have spent almost every available minute trying to learn something about French grammer. Well I think that this expression may come in handy Bof. I simply cannot remember all this conjugation. But lets not get too down in the dumps!.

Here is my dog looking fed up when I wouldnt play...........I was busy emptying the car.

Anyway here is a lovely word........PLOUF..........for splash.......in the FLAQUES puddles.

A fishy story

Once upon a time there lived a hermit in Spain his name was Pelayo. One night in about the year 830 he was guided by stars and discovered a tomb!.....It was the tomb of Saint James, however he is known in France as Saint Jacques.

So this place were the tomb was discovered becomes a place for pilgrims. The place is Santiago de Compostela.

Some of the pilgrims died on the way as they travelled along the chemins (countryside road) some were attacked by bandits. Then as a penance when you were almost there you had to crawl on your knees for several dozen meters!!. I read that they tied giant clam shells onto their knees..OUCH.

I think they have eased off the painfull knee crawling.

Have you ever heard of coquille Saint Jacques

Here is a picture that I took in the forest today of something very odd, I think that looks as though it should be on the sea bed!

Looking backwards

Oooh la la....yes French people really do say this a lot.....French class was not a total success, I know loads of words but no grammar and very little glue in between the words. So when I failed to rewrite a poem in the past tense on the spot........I realised some more swotting is required..yeurk.

Parler.......er verbs......remove the er and add an é.......but of course it isn't that easy eh. Never mind practice practice...Link for my homework.

When I am taking photographs I look all around and that includes backwards. The light changes and clouds move I might miss something. I now notice so much more around me, and photography teaches you to look at the whole picture.

Look UP.

Look Down

Look Forwards??????........what am I looking forward to??.......maybe my French class ...haa

Homework

Doing my homework for class in the morning. Imperitive verbs. I may have this all wrong but what I think i have understood is


Imperitive = French Mood........

Give an order.......


Fermez la porte.........close the door..

Wouldnt you guess that my favorite blue pot smashed to the ground this week as it fell off my window sill..........DAMN..

POLITE Request

Veuillez m'excuser...........Please excuse me..........If I have offended you.

Tombe la pluie

In Brittany you soon need to learn the word for rain Pluie.........after the dog has been racing around the garden we get this brown stuff.........mud. The French word for Mud is boue.

Yes it has rained but I managed to get out and walk. I got a couple of nice shots.

I have spent most of my evening sort of doing my homework and looking up French words that I didn't know.

For example apercoit to catch sight of. I didn't know the word for nasturtiums which is capucines.

Here is the French word for puddle.

Some of my puddle pictures hardly look like puddles by the time that I have finished mucking about with them. The multi coloured picture is unusual. The big lorries which remove the logs in the forest leave diesel. When I edit the photograph the strange effect of the diesel shows in the finished picture.

Bonheur

It is incredible what you can find when searching the Internet. The word bonheur which means goodtime and or happiness also is a name of a French artist look what I found here.

Happiness is a daily struggle for many in the world so the rest of us should try and find some joy in the simple things that we see in our daily lives.

The weather has closed in at the moment and so even the simple things like a walk in the forest are not always possible. Sunshine always makes us happy and having milestones to look forward to helps too. This week my diary is empty but I am looking forward to my new French class. Last week our teacher gave us some handouts about Fougeres which has some lovely places to see.

Here is a great link which tells you a little bit about this lovely town Fougeres

Jacques Brel

Saturday night on Arte tv which is French and German there was a programme about the singer Jacques Brel...The clips showed how animated he was when delivering his songs. What a performer, and how odd how I had never heard of him until last Christmas when our neighbours came round to out house. Sadly this marvelous performer was a chain smoker, which killed him at an early age. There was never a moment when he was interviewed that he didn't have a cigarette in his hand

Here is a sad song with subtitles and they are very different from English versions that you may have heard.

Looking on the bright side

Sometimes when the weather closes in and it becomes cold we feel a bit fed up.

Some of the best things that I have are free. Where I live there are some beautiful things to see. And now that the sun is getting less and less, the scenery is more spectacular.

My friend gave me a little book to thumb through here is a snip from a page in the book. When it is cold she loves to be indoors and light the fire.

Mieux en Mieux

Les médias tentent de nous convaincre que rien de bon ni de valuable n'existe plus en ce bas monde. Mais c'est faux. vie ne cesse s'améliorer nous sommes en meilleure santé plus riches, plus libres et mieux informés. L'avenir nous sourit comme comme jamais auparavant. Profittez-en.......

Roughly translated....... based on a page in Le Petit Livre De L'Optimisme by Paul Wilson.

Better and Better
The media try to convince us that nothing good nor of value exists anymore in this low world. But this is false. Life does not cease to improve, generally we are in better health, richer, freer and better informed. The future smiles at us as like never before. Profit.

In the warmer months simple things like wild flowers and butterfly's were there if you looked for them they are free and make you smile too.