....my life has gone to the dogs

The Players

Morgan
a.k.a  MoMo,  Mo, Lard Butt

Morgan is half labrador and half golden retriever (on her mother's side!).  She is a lover.  She thinks that everyone she sees should be greeted with a bark and a bout of vigorous tail wagging.  She is stronger than she knows and in her mind she is much smaller than in real life.  On a recent trip to the vet (more on that later) she had everyone in the waiting room smiling as tried repeatedly  to climb on my lap and sit there.  Morgan has settled into apartment life, but she is a little big to be an apartment dog.  She also is the barker of the pair and thinks that every door slam she hears in the building or person she can see in the garden must be greeted with a bark.


She has a problem with pulling on her lead during a walk and therefore requires a head halter or harness.  As I mentioned, she is strong and has on two occasions (so far) actually pulled me over in her attempts to say "hello" to people before we got her on a restraint system.  She has gotten a lot better over the course of this last year and only pulls for the first bit of the walk and then settles into a reasonable pace.

Einstein
a.k.a.  Einey, Whiney, Meat Brick

Einstein started life as what we refer to as her "ditch dog" period.  She was found with 3 other puppies in a ditch and since I am a sucker for hard luck cases, took her in.  As best as I can piece together by her looks, she is part Shiba Inu, part pomeranian, maybe a little border collie and, we are almost certain, space alien. 


She is a better size for apartment life and seems to be able to successfully ignore everything and be quiet (unless Morgan tells her otherwise).  She is not a "puller" when walked alone and seems to need less trips out than Morgan.  For a little dog, she has a huge bladder!  However, Einstein has a problem.

Redirected Aggression: This type of aggression is relatively common, but is a behavior that pet owners may not always understand. If a dog is aroused into an aggressive response by a person or animal that he is prevented from attacking, he may redirect this aggression onto someone else. A common example occurs when two family dogs become excited, bark and growl in response to another dog passing through the front yard. The two dogs, confined behind a fence, may turn and attack each other because they can't attack the intruder.

Both dogs don't have this problem (thankfully), so what happens is Einstein attacks Morgan and Morgan is forced to defend herself and then I have a full blown dog fight on my hands.  This has happened on four occasions when I have been walking them resulting in 3 weeping, hysterical phone calls to Patrick (Sorry, Patrick!) and one that hit me on a very bad day and resulted in hysterical yelling at said dogs (Sorry, Neighbors!).  There have been smaller fights in the apartment, but are usually quickly resolved and most commonly started over food issues.  The ones outside however are on a much grander scale and infinitely more embarrassing.  I can only stand there and wait for a lull in the fighting to try and separate them.  Until recently, we have only suffered small ear wounds and lots of slobbered on fur.  The last fight however landed Morgan 4 trips to the vet, 15 days of antibiotics and a scary 24 hours waiting to see if the bite to her front leg would result in nerve damage.

Me:  Some of you know already that I have to walk the dogs on average of 4 times daily since we were lied to misinformed about the ability to let them go in the common area of the apartment.  Now this is not a problem unless we encounter a "trigger" that sets Einstein off. This is usually in the form of another dog, but did happen on one occasion when a cat crossed our path.  I have been walking them together and when we don't encounter anything, it works well.  But since the most recent fight, I have been walking them separately because I think I might go insane if there was another fight.


So now instead of 6 times up and down the "hill from hell" I am doing no fewer than 10 trips up and down just for dog walking.  

Up and down
the Saint Cloud workout!

And if I felt bound to the apartment to tend to dog toiletry before.....I just added an additional 30 or so minutes to the regime.  I guess on the bonus side - my legs and butt are looking better. I really miss my backyard where I could just let them out and they could do their "business" in private without the drama.


Ah the joys of pet ownership.  Maybe instead of rehoming Squirrel the rabbit or Rolo the chinchilla before we left, I should have brought them instead of my "drama dogs"!

It's no fun being a "legal" alien

Did you hear Phil Collins?  Okay, I changed a word, but still......




 Recently, I had to undergo the lovely process of (1) getting my French driver's license and (2) renewing my Carte de Sejour (residence card).

First, the driver's license.  Patrick and I had the foresight to exchange our North Carolina driver's licenses for Florida ones before we left the States because Florida has a reciprocal agreement with France.  This means that you should essentially be able to exchange your Florida license and obtain a French one without having to endure L’Ecole de Conduite Francaise (french driving school) for which we have heard NOTHING positive.  In fact, since we live on one of the steepest hills in Saint Cloud, we are treated daily to driver's ed cars being stopped mid-hill by instructors from the Marquis de Sade Driving School (not the real name!) and then forced to try to get up the remaining slope.  It seems that in addition to having to take lessons, you must take them in a stick shift car.  While I have heard this is probably the best way to learn to drive (the thought being because then you can drive any car) I did not learn this way and still to this day cannot drive a stick shift!


We had one year to get this task accomplished, so as usual, we waited until we had a 3 month window left in which to accomplish this.  We contacted the agency Schneider provides to help with these things and were told the first thing we would need would have to come from the U.S. Embassy in Paris.  Okay, Patrick takes a day off work, we go, we get.....done.  Oh nay, nay....  Now you need about 3 reams of other papers (power bill, passports, proof of employment, etc, etc), all of which need to be translated into French (thankfully handled by the assisting agent) and at least 4 passport size pictures of yourself and make sure you are NOT smiling.....there will be NO smiling!  


Okay, done.  We are to meet the agent at the Prefecture (city hall) who will then talk to the powers that be and "present" our file.  Patrick takes the morning off work and we arrive on what has to be one of the coldest and windiest days to a building that looks like it belongs in a tenement.  No one is allowed inside the building until the magic opening time of 9:00 a.m.  Everyone is huddled in the corners of the building try to keep from freezing which is hard because the building is along the banks of the Seine so the wind is coming off the river with force.  


Once inside, we proceed upstairs with our number (which is like #1 since we are the first in) and wait for the worker behind the window to arrange her coffee, hang up her sweater, check her make-up, exchange cheek kisses with her co-workers.......you get the picture.....  She is the only one working this area.  The paperwork is passed through the safety glass (yep, safety glass) and she shuffles it around and passes it back through!  WTF!  There is a back and forth exchange with our agent and we are to discover we are missing proof that our U.S. licenses are real.  Are REAL! You have got be kidding me!  Isn't that what the Embassy paperwork was for.  Our agent is equally shocked as she has never heard of this mysterious paper and has never been asked for it before.


So now, we have to request our "driving records" from Florida and North Carolina.  The Prefecture here needs to know when we got our initial driver's licenses and since we both became licensed driver's in North Carolina, we need to obtain them from there.  But alas, since we are surrendering Florida licenses we must also show paperwork from Florida as well.  And then, it must all be translated into French.  Thankfully, something that would pass for what the lady wanted was able to obtained and ordered online, so we quickly sent for these.  We had them all sent to Patrick's mom (Thanks, Margrid!!) who then express mailed them to us.


Okay....back to the Prefecture...Patrick off work for the morning.....meet agent.......  Low and behold, it's our same favorite worker behind the window.  Again after the morning ritual (coffee, check; make up, check; kiss everyone in the office, check) she recognizes our agent and processes our paperwork fairly quickly for French standards!


And this is what you get for your troubles.....

Inside of license
Nice picture huh?  Tried to look as unfriendly as I could!

back of license

Talk about "is it real".  It is a partially laminated piece of paper with a picture on it.  Hmmmm, so much more real than my U.S. license which is encased in plastic, embossed, bar coded, and sealed by the State.....  The other interesting thing is according to this license, I am legally allowed to drive a motorcycle as long as it is under 125 cc's.  Okay.......  Nice to know, but I have never been "street legal" on a motorcycle in MY life, but France says "ppfft, is okay, ze paperwork, she says you can"!  Well that's enlightening.  Maybe that's why so many motorcycle riders here seem to have no idea what they are doing when riding here.

Vroom Vroom!  France says I can have one!

Next, because of all this paperwork shuffling, I noticed that my Carte de Sejour was about to expire.  I had to show it to get the driver's license and I noticed that I had about 2 months to get this handled.  You would think that since we have Visas valid for three years that my Carte de Sejour would be the same length of time, but no.  Patrick's is for three years, but he is the one working so I guess that makes some kind of sense....? Patrick informed the department that is in place at his office to deal with these things, and they put us in touch with same agency that helped us last year and in fact, the same lady who helped us obtain the infamous driver's licenses!  

So she sent me an email telling me she would need the following things:

• Work contract CERFA (which you obtained after the medical check-in at the OFII)
• Medical certificates of both of you (which you obtained after the medical check-in at the OFII)
• Marieanne’s birth certificate + official French translation
• Marriage certificate + official French translation
• Last electricity or Gaz or rent bill dated from less than 3 months on Marieanne’s name (copy)
• Patrick’s 3 last payslips (copy)
• Attestation d’employeur (attestation from Schneider saying that you are currently employed (original)
• Social security attestation (I suppose that it should be an agreement between USA and France)
• Last income tax
• 4 ID photos (3,5 cm x 4,5 cm, light background, without smiling; see attached format)see they actually give you the instruction NOT to smile!
• Attached attestation signed by Patrick (original)
• Application form CERFA signed by Marieanne

I was thinking "okay, not as bad as it looks", right, since a lot of the things on this list are the same things we needed last time and after all, it is the same agency handling it this time as the last time......wrong!  I received a reply from the agent the next day saying she needed all of these things as she didn't handle the case last year, so she had none of the papers.  Wait, wait wait......now I don't expect everyone to have electronic records, but surely there was at least a filing cabinet somewhere in that office with our file it...  Um, no, it would seem there wasn't.  Side note:  When you purchase anything here they will hand you no less than TWO receipts every time.  Their love of paperwork is epic, so you think they would have an efficient way to keep it handy.  Not so much.

Thankfully Patrick's work does have a filing system in place and they had the majority of these documents and forwarded them to the agent.  I only had to meet her for about 3 minutes one day to sign a form and take her my non-smiley pictures.  

After all this gathering of paperwork, you would like that it would be mandatory for me to present myself and give them one of my internal organs or something, but you would be wrong.  After all this, they mailed me a temporary Carte and will mail my, better laminated than my damn driver's license, "permanent" card in about three months (about 9 months before it expires and I have to do this all over again!).

So, alas, it might actually be easier to be an illegal alien.

On a lighter side - this has become the new breakfast must have for the kids!

"Home made" pain au chocolat

These come in the "tube" we all know and love like Pillsbury, but what's inside is oh so different.  This is actually a buttery dough and you wrap the little chocolate sticks up in the dough and bake.  When they come out of the oven, you have this super yummy fluffy pastry with melted chocolate inside.  Not as good as what you might find in the local patisserie, but nice because you get to eat them while they are still warm and gooey.

...lost in translation

Often in my travels around the city, I pretend that I am "practicing my French" by reading signs.  But what I am really looking out for is funny signs.  I think some shop owners think it's cool or hip to try and throw in a English word, however, sometimes it doesn't work....

There is also a restaurant I haven't been able to get
a picture of yet called "Eat Meat"

I

This is a really nice (and pricey) store

Sound it out.....

Sometimes using your 

"family name" is not a

good idea if it means 

something else in another language....

The "a louer" sign means that this place is for rent...
Guess no one wanted Swedish sushi

And sometimes things just really make no sense together..

Kinda like cheese puffs...only curry flavor
(yeah, not good....)

But then sometimes they do have a sense of humor!

This is for water park close to our apartment (this poster is on the back of a bus)
The title:  "Roast Your Peach"

It will be keeping my eyes open for more.......

....in between

It's that time of "in between".  The weather can't decide between Winter or Spring.  One day it will be gray and 40 degrees and the next, 60 and sunny.  Trees are starting to bud, but still are looking decidedly skeletal.  There are some daffodils right outside out building poking their heads out, taking the chance that Spring is on the way.  I hope they're right.

We have just passed the one year mark here.  So I guess you could say we are "in between" on our time here.  We have be "contracted" for 3 years so technically we are on the long side of in-between, but recently we went through a round of "do we stay or do we go?".  Seems trouble with the Euro is making companies re-evaluate their expats on assignment.  As of right now, we are here for the next two years, but there was some vacillating recently.

Now I know, I should be so grateful to have this experience and to allow my kids to have this experience, but recently with the in-between weather and the dangled idea of going home, it has been hard.  We also took a 3 day trip to London while the kids were on half-term break and being surrounded by English speakers and things we could READ and understand, made it hard to come back to the land of Franglish and charades!

Sam and the Queen
Madame Tussaud Wax Museum

Outside London Aquarium

Jammin' with Jimi!
Madame Tussaud Wax Museum

Look Harry Potter Fans!
The Night Bus in London!
"Get a move on, Ernie"

Max doing his best "no expression" look.

In the past few weeks we have also learned the hard truth of being expats.  Since the people you tend to meet are also expats, they LEAVE!  In the past few months we have learned that two of the people Patrick works with and chats with the most are leaving.  Ronan is going home to Ireland and Lorraine and her partner are going to Texas (which is a great reassignment for them as their family happens to be in Texas!)  This will considerably cut the number of folks in Patrick's immediate workspace that he used to lunch with but also people we would see outside of work for social evenings.  Lorraine was the one who "sponsored" Thanksgiving last year and Ronan was Patrick's "boys night out" buddy.

The kids are also having friends leaving.  Hawthorn and his family (His parents have been here 16 years!) will be leaving to return to England in the summer.  Hawthorn's family were the ones who took us to their club and where Max got to play cricket.  They were also the only other family I knew in Saint Cloud who went to the British School.  William, another buddy of Max's, will be leaving in the Spring.

Max and William
during Victorian Day Tea at school

Samantha's friends Kaia and Sophie will be moving this summer.  Her class already said "good-bye" to Lucy whose parents had a reassignment to Hong Kong.  Sophie's family has been here 5+ years and so unless they want to start paying into the French tax system, it was time for them to go.  Kaia and her parents will return to Spain, her father's county or origin.

Sophie, Sam and Lucy
Summer Fete at British School

We knew this would happen.  People come and go in the English speaking, expat community here.  New people will arrive to take their places so future friends are arriving....but damn, it's hard.  You are comfortable with these people.....  You share all the same inside jokes....  they know your coffee order.....  You are happy for them but there is a part of you that thinks "crap, I want to go home too"!

Please don't think we are unappreciative of this experience, we are.  Don't think that we are sitting around moping and wringing our hands either (Mom!).  I think that once the weather changes and we can get out and about, we will be revived.  But now, it is just the season of in-between......

...driving in Paris and related things

You never really know a place until you live there.  Everything looks pretty and fun while you are on vacation, but until you spend some time there, you don't get the feel of how things work.

We have just passed our one year mark here in Paris and I can tell you now that driving here SUCKS.  There are so many levels of sucking, I will be unable to cover them all here, so I will hit the highlights...

I think I have already touched on the fact that Parisians live in their own "bubble".  They don't acknowledge you unless they have to.  They don't move if they are in your way.  Unfortunately, this bubble applies to their car and they think that this bubble means that they can stop, swerve or generally change lanes as they wish with no consequences.

You can be driving down the road and then BLAM you see headlights coming your way.  Now don't panic, they will move, but at this moment in time their lane is either blocked by a delivery vehicle or bus or maybe they just like the look of yours better.  They will see you and move but you have to beware...because their lane may now be occupied by other drivers and they have to work their car back in to the appropriate lane.

Speaking of lanes..... they are narrow and most times do not have the painted lane markers so whose side is whose is up for debate.  Thank goodness we chose a narrow car.    There are also times when the road is so narrow that it is splint; meaning that if no one is coming your way, you quickly motor down the road and get back on your side as the road widens again. There is also the phenomena on residential roads where people park on one side of the road with no regard that two cars are supposed to fit.  So again, you look to see if anybody is coming and if not scoot down the road until it widens again and hope no else has the same idea coming the other direction!

And if the roads weren't narrow enough, the motorcycles have their own set of rules here.  It seems they are allowed to make their own lane by driving in the middle between two rows of cars.  They sometimes are so close to the cars on either side, they have to travel very slowly so they can "weave" their rearview mirrors in-between the cars they are passing rearview mirrors.  (Click on picture for larger view)

See the dog on the back?

See the motorcycle making his own lane?

Yep, that's my rearview mirror,  They are that close!

Because of all this "close" driving, you frequently see this...

Kinda hard to see what's behind you now

No more mirror

Nothing a little Duct tape won't fix!

People get their mirrors knocked off all the time and don't seem fazed by it.  I've seen it happen!  They get out of their car, look at the mirror, kinda nod and then drive away....... c'est la vie.

I could go on and on and I haven't even addressed parking yet.  When parallel parking, just picture bumper cars at a slower speed bumping the car in front and the car behind until their car successfully fits between two others......  we call it "French parking".  

We are also trying to get our official French drivers license except we have run into some hellish French version of the DMV who has requested we get documentation to prove our licenses from the U.S. are really real!?!?  Even though we already have certified, notified letters from the U.S. Embassy here, they would not process our paperwork.  So we are waiting for proof from the U.S. that yes, indeed our licenses are real and we didn't make 'em at home.

You never know 'til you live there........

Happy Chinese New Year

Welcome to the Year of the Dragon!

I decided I wanted to see the Chinese New Year's parade this year since it is  the Year of the Dragon and I was born in a Dragon Year (way back when!) and so were Max and Samantha.  Patrick, alas, is a Sheep..... but we will forgive him.  We went down to the 13th arrondissement on Sunday to watch one of the Chinese New Year's parades happening this month.  We originally tried to see the parade at the Hotel De Ville (town hall in the heart of Paris) but really couldn't figure out the parade route, so when we finally arrived....we had missed the beginning.....

But as it turns out, I think we were at the better parade/area on Sunday.  It seems there is heavy Asian population in the 13th arrondissement and therefore the shops and restaurants where putting on their best.

This was our first parade in the city.  I don't know why I was thinking that it would be like in the States.....  First, like all things French, I think the start time was subjective.  It seems the French don't like to be held accountable when it comes to time.  Second, while waiting for the parade, people don't wait patiently on the curb, staking out their spots....... they stand in the middle of the road and wander around.....

Wandering around parade route....la la la.....

I thought "surely they will move back on the curb once the parade starts"..... NOT!  They form a column only wide enough for the parade participates to pass..... literally ONLY as wide as the parade.

Parade in the middle......
Spectators lining the sides......

Oh well, c'est la vie in Paris!  We backed away from the press of the crowd and stood on the sidewalk up on a little curb formed by a planter.  Every once and while I would brave the press, approach the crowd, and stand with my camera above my head and snap away.  Fortunately, I was able to get some good pictures.

Yeah, I supposed I looked like this......

We also grabbed a quick bite while we were down there.  We stood in line for a take-away chinese/vietnamese place.  It was super crowded and really hard to figure out what the process of ordering was, but I am glad we waited.  The food was very tasty for being "buffet line" kind of food.  The nems (egg rolls) where hot and tasty, the lo mein (new pan put out the minute we stepped up to the counter!) was a big hit with the kids, and I got the plate de jour which was a chicken curry with rice and it was the bomb.  The best thing is the way they serve it up.  They take your selections, reheat them so they are nice and hot and then they have this machine which puts a sealed plastic film over the top, so you are good to go with no slopping or spilling.  We stood on the sidewalk enjoying our lunch and watching the parade. We were extremely chilly (it was about 30F), so the warm food made everything that much better!

The parade route was inundated with balloon sellers....  There were 15 or so guys walking around with huge bundles of balloons and other crap (read:  silly string, confetti, horns) everywhere.  Some of the balloon bundles were so big, we almost expected the sellers to start hovering above us....

Nothing says Happy New Year like
Sponge Bob?!?!

T-Rex as big as you are?
Win!

The parade lasted awhile.  I would estimate about an hour and a half in length.  That was partly because of the stopping and starting of each group of participants to do demonstrations (or trying to get through the throngs of spectators!).  The people holding the dragon puppets would stop and preform a dance with the puppets weaving in and out.  We decided it was a "dragon battle" dance.

This dragon looks excited about some pizza!

Look out....here comes the White Dragon

Uh Oh!  Orange Dragon gets his ears tangled in the
White Dragon during their dance!

Other than being chilled to the bone by the end of the parade, we all enjoyed it.  If we attend next year... 2013 will be the Year of the Snake.... we will better prepared and know that here you just stand in the middle of the street and wait for the parade to move you out of the way!  How crazy to think spectators should line up orderly on the side and heed the road to the participates.  C'est la vie!

....bits and pieces

This post is just some random observations and thoughts.  We haven't really ventured out much since we've being back so no new pictures or adventures.  I've just been hanging out with the dogs and picking up the kids at school after their multiple activities. On the weekends, the kids seem to be still catching up on their sleep and sleeping until 10:00 or 10:30 a.m.  Or  I may be entering some kind of pre-teen/teen pattern of sleeping until noon.....I don't get it, as I have always been an early riser.


Any way, here goes.....


-- I follow a couple of blogs, but there is one that makes me laugh out loud 99% of the time. Parenting. Illustrated With Crappy Pictures
(<center><a href="http://crappypictures.typepad.com/crappy-pictures/"><img border="0"src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6119/6286068685_b32e2c836a_m.jpg"/></a>) 


The author posted a quote on Facebook recently which I thought was so spot-on.  "Parenting without a sense of humor is like being an accountant who sucks at math".  


Don't I know it!  I would be tearing my hair out daily if I couldn't just laugh and enjoy the moment knowing deep inside my head they will only be this young once.  I know there are still a lot of "moments" to come, but I plan to just keep laughing....

-- Next, I know this is cliché but it really happens! This gentleman appears some mornings in the tunnel leading to the Metro station by our house.  This is the tunnel I go through after I walk the kids to their bus stop in the mornings.   

Granted some street musicians are better than others but we really don't like the guys who get in the cars on the Metro and play LOUDLY, regardless of their skill level.  Then they come around with the hat to collect money from a captured audience.  I mean really, we are forced to listen to you because we are enclosed in a metal capsule speeding down a track in cramped quarters and now you want money from me for listening to you play?!?   Like I had a choice!?!

-- I recently downloaded a compilation album of k.d. lang.  I had forgotten how hauntingly beautiful her voice is and how powerful her lyrics are.  Also it's nice to hear a little "county twang" after listening to accordions, cellos and violins in the Metro stations and streets of Paris!

k.d. lang - Constant Craving

-- A treasured friend emailed me the other day to ask how come I am never in any of the pictures on here.  When writing back, I had to say that I am usually the one behind the camera.  And it looks like that isn't going to change any time soon.


As part of my New Years resolution, I am going to try and get out and see more of Paris.  So, I signed up to take a course in photography.  Granted, it's with an English speaking continuing education program here in Paris, but I did say "see" Paris, not try to communicate with her.


The first course I've signed up for is learning how to get the most out of a SLR digital camera.  I tried to sign up twice in N.C. for a similar course and both times it was cancelled; the first time because of the instructor and then the next time, not enough people signed up, but I am hopeful for this course since I was one of the last two spots filled.  Of course, Patrick told me last night that the weather report calls for snow next Saturday.... 


There is also a course in the Spring that combines photography and walking tours and I plan to sign up for that as well.  Just really hoping to be able to take the basic course first....


Well, I think that is all the randomness for now....but be forewarned as my head is constantly filled with random things.....