Monthly Archives: December 2006

The big news in France today is that Marina was knocked out of Star Academy last night. This is surprising because until recently it appearred that she was the only contestant on the show with any real talent. However last night the audience were given a choice between Marina and the dark, tatooed and far [...]

I’m lucky that my immediate neighbours are students. No matter what time of the day or night it might be – they are always ready to answer the door. Why this might be is anyone’s guess; perhaps it’s something to do with being sociable … or drugs? Anyway, there is a distinct advantage to having [...]

Concerning my post about the quality of service provided by ‘La Poste’, the french post office, I am dissappointed to report that even though I ‘touched-wood’ one of my parcels went missing in late Ocotober and, two months later, has yet to surface at it’s destination. Alas, my opinion of the French postal system dwindles [...]

The French have no sense of humour when it comes to self-ridicule; they just don’t get it. Perhaps it’s a form of humour exclusive to the British? Who knows. We Brits can get some serious chuckle mileage out of things that are, for all intents and purposes, ‘crap’. Our politicians, our terrible public transport, our [...]

I pick up Metro, the freebie daily journal, from the stand on rue Austerlitz every morning – for two reasons: I’m a cheapskate Metro is an easy read for foreigners like me: containing short, succinct articles, written using relatively low-brow French, i.e. nothing too deep or philosophical I rarely read a whole article, usually just [...]

Having been very rude about Chirac’s concern over leaving a lasting legacy I have to admit that I am most impressed by France 24, the new french international news channel, one of Jacques’ big ideas. Launched simultaneously in three languages (French, English & Arabic) over the internet last night, it is the only English Language [...]

Denzel Washington was on the news this evening. That is – he was in the TF1 newsroom sitting next to Patrick Poivre d’Arvor, for the entirety of the show, waiting for the opportunity to plug his latest film: “Déjà vu” at the end of the program. But this is not unusual on TF1 – the [...]

Predictably it’s at this time of year that conversation turns to ‘what you do in your country’ to celebrate Christmas; and this inevitably leads to some bright spark, in French class, suggesting that everyone bring in a little something to share and compare before the end of term. Thus I discovered that it is impossible [...]

Before I begin – I must apologise for the immature school-boy sense of humour of this post. At the supermarket yesterday I noticed a box of oranges in the fresh-fruit section that were carrying a rather unfortunate brand-name: ‘FANNY’. Yes – Fanny oranges, all clearly labelled with individual Fanny stickers. So – I wondered whether [...]