Question du Jour #12

If you look carefully at the photo above, you'll notice there's a little buggie floating in the glass of wine. Don't see it? Maybe this one below will make it easier.



Little guy up toward the top. Got it? Okay, good. This fella happened to fly in after the glass had been sitting out on our coffee table for a bit, but I was glad to have the chance to take a picture, as we have had a couple of small-insect-in-beverage incidents at restaurants recently. Once in a carafe of water, and once in a glass of wine. These are, in my opinion, situations of a different stripe than a friend's finding a larger critter in her onion soup...and then again in the one the waitress brought to replace it. So let's focus on liquids. The bug in the drink, to me, falls into a category of scenarios I have always wanted to discuss outside my own head. Basically, I don't think a tiny, winged beastie in my water or wine is that big a deal. I could fish it out with a spoon and, with little difficulty, forget it was ever there. But doing so feels as though I am letting the restaurant get away with something it shouldn't. If I complain to my server, I feel as though I am being a little difficult (although both guys were most apologetic), but if I don't, I am letting carelessness walk all over me. This brings to mind what I have always thought of as situations with no middle ground. For example, if you hold a door or an elevator for someone, you are considerate, where as if you don't, you are kind of a douche. There is no middle ground there--a choice that makes you a neutral, okay person. Other day-to-day happenings have rung this same bell for me, but they're not coming to mind at the moment. So I guess I want to ask you this:

If you find a harmless little bug in your drink, do you complain or just deal with it?

Question du Jour #11

Here's one for ya, courtesy of today's visit to the Mont St. Michel: Forgetting the rope and the surrounding Spaniards (although I do appreciate the size perspective they offer)...

How big a hamster do you think it would take to get this wheel moving?

Question du Jour #10

One of my pet peeves is being able to clearly hear what other people are listening to on their headphones. But I noticed, when looking at this random stranger's standard-issue Apple earbuds (seen closer-up at right), that there are holes on the non-listener side--that is, facing me--that look like little speaker holes. So my question is:

Why would headphones be designed so as to project sound toward people who don't want to hear it?

Question du Jour #9

Do I owe you a question every day now? Oy, look at the precedent I've set. Well, it's still Friday here, and will be in the U.S. for a few hours more, and so I give you this, suggested by Nick and Donna at dinner tonight (photo not taken by me):

Why do French people wear so much more clothing in the métro (where it's super-warm) than we do?

Extracurriculars, Part II

Why not a kir in a paper cup? Why not a paper cup with balloons on it? Why not a paper cup with balloons on it that was uncommonly expensive, because, unbeknownst to us when we walked into the place, we bought it and seven of its brethren at a store that imports goodies from the U.S. and charges homesick expats or wannabe Frenchies top-euro to buy them. Ah, well. We were having a picnic on the Champ de Mars, facing the Eiffel Tower (see photo to the right), and needed cups for our wine.

This is just going to be a quick update, but I wanted to share the fact that...I got the internship! The lady from Camp Experts decided that, even though my potential absence during some of her salons was a major inconvenience, we were a good match. Hooray! So I'll start there in early January.

In other outside-the-home news, I've spent the last week or so waffling as to whether or not to join the Chorale Pop and Soul after all, just as a way to meet people. I had told the teacher that I wasn't going to be able to do it, because the class I'm going to be taking at the Sorbonne meets on Mondays and Wednesdays from 5-7, and the Chorale starts at 7 on Wednesdays, not too close by. But she countered that it looked as thought the meeting time was going to be changing to Tuesday nights, and so it was once again a possibility. I was more or less resigned to devoting two hours, two consecutive nights a week to singing, in the name of both working on challenging material and befriending some real Frenchers, until two game-changers came down the pipeline:

1) I started talking to more cool people in my Monday-night chorale.
2) E-mails from the teacher made it look as though Chorale Pop and Soul may not change its rehearsal night after all.

So I'm staying put, at least for this semester, and not spending 350 € on new friends. Something else Nick and I are considering checking out is an organization called Polyglot Club, where people who speak all different languages get together and converse in their non-native tongues. Nick's ears perked up when we saw a story on the group on 100% Mag, a TV news magazine that's on five evenings a week, right after Un Dîner Presque Parfait (A Nearly Perfect Dinner), my favorite French TV show. There's actually a Polyglot Club get-together tonight near the Centre Pompidou, but we'll see whether we make it out of the house. Will keep you posted...

Question du Jour #8

Whenever I see these little pork nubbins at the supermarket, the way they're all crowded together kind of yucks me out. Hence today's question:

What might be a more appealing way to package cocktail franks?

Question du Jour #7

A serious question today, and one to which I am anxious to have your feedback. If I have x amount of money that can live in either my U.S. bank account or my French bank account (and can, obviously, be transferred between the two, for a fee), and if my purchases can be charged on my U.S. American Express card (thus earning me points), my U.S. debit card, or my French debit card, with the AmEx bills' being paid from either of the aforementioned accounts...

What combination of the above is my best bet?