Countin' the years

Today I returned to the Alps for a day of shredding with friends. I hopped on a charter bus at 4:45 am to get there. Killer deal, totally affordable and convenient. Well, these slopes were covered in those pull lifts. They are called téléski. In all my years snowboarding, I've only been on them twice. It got me thinking "how many years have I been riding?" I counted. 17 years. Holy cow. These téléski lifts were brutal. I'll begin by reminiscing about my first experiences using these.

It was my first day on a snowboard, I was eight. The day before, I had been on skis. But I wanted to snowboard like my brothers, so I insisted. My oldest brother was a lifty at a mountain in our vacation spot, so he was more than happy to teach his baby sister. I remember he took me to the bunny slope and that's where those pull lifts tend to dominate in the states. (Must be why I'm not accustomed to them.) Naturally, I fell off the lift. My bro was behind me on the lift and I remember he ran me over with his board. It hurt, I cried. Honestly, that's one of my few memories of the trials and tribulations of learning.

Téléski lift. Not me, and I didn't take this photo.

Walk

The weather has been so beautiful lately, it has simply been too nice to take the métro. The beautiful sunlight is perfect all day. The sun never really reaches directly over head either. Perfect. I'm finding myself taking easy strolls through the city streets enjoying the quiet happiness. I've been taking long one hour walks home from friend's homes just because, je ne suis pas pressé. (I'm in no hurry).  Everyone seems to be delighted by this shift in weather. Must. Be. Outside. Ciao.

Curious

Just out of curiosity, am I the only person who thinks it's rude for someone to have a conversation with someone else on your facebook status update? I hope I've never done that. Irk.

It's like someone coming to your party and your neighbor saw them and came knocking on your door to talk to them and didn't bring a few beers.

On a more relevant to this blog topic, I had a premonition of how my summer in France is going to be, and it's going to top my best summers I've ever had, even the pre-18 summers. Yep yep. La mer, le soleil, plongée sous-marine, baigner, bronzer.

My little home

I have a little home I share with myself. I've been using boxes as tables for the microwave and the printer. The microwave fell through the box the other day. It was inevitable. I know really glamorous right. Want to hear something even more glamorous? I found an old handmade Tunisian oven in the street and my friend helped me carry it home. It was a really long walk. That thing was heavy. But we got it up to my apartment and it sat on the terrace until I decided to clean it today. I didn't know what it was until I showed a picture to my uncle. My other uncle recognized what it was. It's complete with one of those giant spatulas with a long handle to get pizza out of an oven. I think I scored with this one. I don't plan on using it as an oven. It will make a nice cabinet and surface to place my microwave and toaster oven. Today I went into the garage of my building to toss out my garbage. I noticed a wobbly shelf in the garage left for dead. Tonight, another friend helped me get it into the bachelorette pad. Comfortably nestled in a corner where it can't wobble my shelf resides. Home sweet home.

Poodle

Today I got on the tram to go home from work. It was packed with all of the commuters, it was the end of the work day after all. Rush hour. Packed in like sardines. I was standing in the isle and an old woman was sitting near me with a poodle under the seat. A seat freed up across from her after a few stops. I sat down as there were no old people or people with children around that would need the seat before me. On a side note, people in france are very courteous of pregnant women, people with children and with old people. I always see people standing up immediately after seeing a person, as described above, entering the vessel asking them politely to sit down. I can't say I took much public transportation before moving to france, but I hope it occurs everywhere else this way.

So this lady with the poodle, she knows the tram is impacted and she notices the poodle's paw sticking out from under the seat. She tells him in french in and irritated tone to move his feet, for fear he'll get stepped on. This is very comical, I don't really know why. On another side note, I heard a child on the tramway on the way to work. Every time it paused at one of the stops, I would hear the cutest little voice sitting back to back with me say "ça y est!?" (pronounced Sa yeh, an interjection meaning, "That's it!" and the child meaning "Is this where we're getting off?" The mother would tell the child "No not yet." Ok back to the woman with the poodle. So she begins talking to me, I guess I have a open heart ready to give and receive. I don't know, maybe she was bat-shit, one will never know. But it really brightened my day. To read more, click below.