Frog with a Blog

We’re sitting by the river, somewhere in Auvergne. I’m staying in a house with friends of a friend for a couple of days. Lots of people I have never met before.

Her: My husband is so into his inflatable boat.

Me: Well I can see that!

Her: Look at him! It’s his passion, he loves it so. He gets to be alone for a while when he’s on his boat. He needs his rest from the family for a while. the girls and i can be quite demanding. He’s so independent, you see.

Me: How about you, do you get to take some time off from the family sometime?

Her: Oh me, you know, I don’t need it as much as he does.

He is trying to blow in his greyish inflatable boat. We are all looking at him. He insisted on taking his inflatable boat down the rapids. He is a man. He needs his daily share of fear. It doesn’t bother him to see that he is inflating his boat while we’re doing nothing. Not a single concern. Not a single question. We’re expected to enjoy the mere sight of him inflating his boat.

She is looking at him with love in her eyes. Her passion in life is his love for an inflatable boat.

Her youngest has just crapped in her little pants and she changes the diaper immediately. She is all over the place, feeding the kids, comforting them as they cry because daddy is going away. He blows in a little hose as she blows her children’s nose.

He goes on his little alpha-male trip. He arrives 4 hours late to dinner. We’ve been waiting for him. He falls asleep on the table. She looks at him and smiles.

Her: He is adorable when he falls asleep on the table. He even does that when we go out for dinner.

Me: I think I’ll take the early train tomorrow morning, if you don’t mind.

She meets an old encounter on the métro. It is obvious they don’t want to talk to each-other. Still they will talk forever.

Today, thanks to FwAB, you will learn how to make useless small talk with an old acquaintance you don’t want to talk to, et tout ça… en français.

Alors merci qui?

Heard on the métro:

Elle : ah bonjour, ça va ?

Lui : He mumbles something back. She doesn’t listen.

Elle: Alors, comment ça va? Ca va bien hein ?

Lui : He mumbles something again.

Elle: Ah oui ça va bien hein? Donc, comme ça va alors ?

Lui (…)

Elle : Oh, c’est bien, c’est bien si ça va alors ! C’est bien.

Lui : Et toi ça va ?

Elle : Oh ben moi, tu sais ça va hein, et toi alors, ça va ?

Lui : Bon à un de ces jours alors. On s’appelle hein?

Elle : Bah oui, c’est ça, à la prochaine hein. Mais bon ça va hein ?

Lui : Oui oui, ça va.

I have a French female friend. Very chic. Very polite. Well-mannered and all. She comes from a good family and would never use dirty words. Well, not until she came to me the other day:

Friend: You know I lost it with an Australian couple the other day.

Me: Oh really, what happened?

Friend: Well, they were talking about France and how horrible French people are!

Me: Oh I see, so that’s why you lost it. But honey, you know everyone thinks we’re horrible, we just have to deal with it.

Friend: No, it’s not what made me lose it. So at first I asked them why they thought we were horrible and they said we didn’t work and were just a lazy bunch who were better at complaining than working.

Me: Oh my, I can’t believe Australians are saying that when we ALL know how THEY never work and stay on the beach all day! I understand why you lost it!

Friend: No, that wasn’t what made me lose it! Then they said that French women spent their working days painting their nails and putting make up on.

Me: Well, I’m understand that as a French hard-working woman, that made you really mad!

Friend: Well, wait, that wasn’t what made me mad, I mean it’s important to look pretty at work.

Me: So what made you so mad that you actually threw a fit at them?

Friend: You are never going to believe it. It’s so rude and unfair.

Me: Oh my god, did they complain again that the French won’t speak English?

Friend: No, worse!

Me: I don’t know, did they say that Paris was completely overrated?

Friend: No, Paris IS overrated.

Me: I don’t know, JUST TELL ME FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!

Friend: They said that French baguettes were gross and French bread in general was tasteless.

Me: What???? No!!! They didn’t. Oh how dare they?

Friend: yes, I simply told them to piss off and leave if they were not happy.

She leaves the room, mumbling… “baguettes tasteless…pfffff”

Tracey and Pierrick from Red February are taking a train to Australia. It may sound crazy and impossible but it’s true. An Australian and her French husband whom I’ve know for a few months now (thanks to two of my very naughty friends), have taken off and are now riding a train (trains) to Melbourne Australia.
After a quick introduction to snow and rain in safe Sweden and Finland, they will be soon entering the scary and snowy open spaces of Sibiria. They are currently in St Petersburg, staying in a youth hostel, that seems to be more of a gathering place for recently released criminals than a quaint little datcha.
Tracey and Pierre met a few years ago in some remote Chinese village while touring Asia and the travelling bug has never left them since then. I find their blog really exciting and keep on connecting myself all the time in order to prentend that - for a while - I am also travelling with them. So I invite you all to go to their site to say hi and perhaps, like me, you’ll want to follow them on their trip as if we were all part of this incredible adventure.

You might think it looks scary, but this picture actually turns me on with excitment.

This is Frog with a Blog reporting live from Parisian Celebs wild nights. Petite Anglaise whose book was released last Thursday, threw one of her glamorous parties last Friday to celebrate the launch. Naturally, Frog with a Blog was there, for your viewing pleasure. Hear how our hostess promises us a full-frontal on a future Short & Shallow interview on this blog. See how scared she gets while discovering yours truly’s hairy chest and finally do look at all these glam people drinking rivers of Champagne celebrating Paris Bloggers’ own Evita Perón.

Warning: These two videos contain explicit language such as nipples and ass groping. You have been warned.

I had to cut this video in two as dailymotion thought it was too hot.

Part 1

Part 2

Theater class is just over and I’m sitting in the Métro on my way home. A goodlooking Italian woman who wears a lot of black eye-liner sits opposite me. She happens to be one of the participants in my theater group. Her rolling r’s and her loud voice and melodious intonation put her in the center of attention of the whole train. She’s been in France for 5 months and is still working diligently on improving her French. She has therefore bought a colorful little note-book in which she jots down all the new words and expressions that she hears or learns. I ask her to show me her list as I’m dying to see what new words she has learnt.

Me: What is that word, raquin?

Her: Don’t you know it? My colleague taught it to me, it means “cheap”, as in “cheapskate cheap”. You can say je suis raquin.

She is proud to teach me a new word in my native language. But I’m puzzled. I have never this word before. I hesitate between blaming her for not hearing her colleague properly and blaming her colleague from coming from some very remote village in deep Belgium.

A woman who sits next to her and who’s apparently been listening to the whole conversation without being invited to, looks at me and moves her head from left to right meaning “no”, this word does not exist”. It makes me feel better as for a second I almost thought that might be a word I didn’t know.

Me: Are you sure? Because I’ve never heard this word before. Are you sure you don’t mean radin?

Her: No, no I’m sure, my colleague is French so she knows.

Have you ever thought that the first person who says something to you is always right and if someone says something different later, they’re necessarily wrong?

We continue looking at the list.

Me: And why did you need to learn the word prépuce*, if I may ask? to read the rest of this entry click Read more »

Feeling for a new French expression per week taught by our favorite podcasters and your dear Frog? Meet us every Sunday on the new and extended Katia & Kyliemac’s French Lesson. Three sites for the price of one! The ever so popular K&K VO, K&K Teach You French and finally the K&K Tourist Tips to France. All of that in true K&K spirit, with a lot of talking, laughing, caughing, choking on Halloween peeps, making fun of France and the rest of the world and a little bit of facts as well… just a little bit.

Here is a little video shot after an episode we recently recorded, during which our favorite girls open up a present sent by one of their faithful listeners. The Waddling Pooper Penguin is the Valentine’s Day present you all want to give to your loved ones. Yes, you’ve seen it here first and I know already how thankful you are.

Characters: A Frog and his 3 year old nephew

Time: Bedtime, a few weeks ago.

Subject: I insist to tell him a bedtime story. I am the only one convinced of my bedtime-story-telling art. That’s what it sounded like…

Me: Once upon a time there was a little girl…

Nephew: (interrups me abruptly) Did she have a Wii?

Me: no she didn’t. She lived many years ago and there was no Wii at that time.

Nephew: (sad look expressing genuine empathy for the afore mentioned little girl): oh!

Me: So once upon a time, there was a little girl who lived in a very cold country. There was a lot of snow on the trees and big white bears in the woods. The place was called…

Nephew: the North Pole!!!

Me: How do you know about the north pole? You’re only 3!

Nephew: Duh! That’s where Santa lives.

Me: Oh well, of course, I should’ve thought about it.

Nephew: Duh!
Read more »

Wasn’t it high time you had your traditional new fwab year video? Here’s a quick overview of all I got to do thanks to blogging in 2007. Such a fun year! So many new fwabulous people! So many hours spent on the computer! So few hours of sleep…

Some bloggers I met in 2007 and who appear (sometimes quickly) in this video:

Rhino75, Petite Anglaise, Meg le Blagueur, Maîtresse, Antipodéesse, Adult Runaway, Ms Mac, Put your Flare on, Dispatches from France, A view from Ivry, The Bold Soul, Dumdad, Upstez, Kbykareen, Aussie Lass, Kylie Mac, Tricoquine, Francophoney, Matoo, Bedtimes Stories, Ikare, Widow Creek, Petite Américaine, Always Ace, Made in Taiwan, The Ryndex, Kosmogal, Henrisson, Holy Smokes.

PS: and a happy new year to the ones I may have forgotten on this list or whom I haven’t met yet.

I’m going to the swimming pool. The place is empty. As I leave the shower to go towards the pool, I realize a huge insect - almost as big as the pool - is playing the water. It sees me and runs after me to play. As joyful as a dog. I know it’s not going to harm me but I’m annoyed and close the shower door to prevent it from entering. Its long, thin and hairy legs get stuck under the door. I moan.

What’s your theory?

This is going to be a great year.

I wish you a fwab one too.

For some strange reason, I seem to be an expert at Freudian slips. As if my subconscious took over my mouth and reminded me how foolish I can be/sound sometimes. I really hate those moments, they last for a few seconds but can be served back at you several years later.

For example, at the age of 22 I moved to Sweden. A few months after I had moved, I travelled back to France to visit friends and family. One day at a party, I was asked a question by a friend: Why did you move to Sweden? I wanted to answer “because I’ve always wanted to go there and also to get work experience“. Instead I said “because I’ve always wanted to go there and also to get sexual experience“. Unfortunately for me, the latter was the real reason and everybody knew it. My friends from that time still enjoy reminding me of this Freudian slip many years later. At every party, in front of everybody, you can be sure that the story is going to be told. People I didn’t even know asked me once whether I was the famous friend who went to Sweden to get laid…

There is another type of Freudian slip. The ones you encounter when you juggle with different languages everyday. Languages that include a good deal of “false friends” ie words that sound the same but do not mean the same thing, French and English being the epitomy of such concept. This morning, for example, I arrived late at a meeting with two English-speaking colleagues. I entered the office and quickly apologized for being late (en retard) by saying how sorry I was for being so retarded.

Finally, you have the situation slips. The things that you can only say to your friends and family but that come out when you talk to someone you don’t know in a rather formal situation. For example, when I was a teenager, I would frequently call my teachers “Mom” or “Dad”, quite an embarrassing situation when you are a teenager although I know it often happened to other classmates. But when you start calling your boyfriend “Mom” then things start to get worrying.

Or the day I called the tax office, ended the conversation with a dry civil servant with an automatic and natural “bisous à bientôt”, hung up and died.

I know I’m not blogging much these days but it seems that I’m not alone. If blogging is “out” then I’m “in”. Why don’t you join us on our new blogmeet tomorrow night in the Marais? We’ll discuss the joys of not blogging and compare the number of friends we have on Facebook and how amazingly entertaining it is to get poked 14 times a day. What? It doesn’t sound exciting at all? Ok, forget Facebook and blogs then, ‘cos the only thing we’ll do is drink, dance on the tables and gossip about all the bloggers (and non-bloggers) who can’t come tomorrow night.

Hope to see you there.

PS: Don’t tell me about “short notice”. In France the day before is considered to be “in advance”.

PS2: If you can’t make it tomorrow, you may want to comfort yourself by listening to this instead.