All grown up

I found this post about Olivier when he was 12 years old (he’s a lot taller than me nowadays and I don’t wear spiky hair). He’s 25 now – how time flies. Today he starts his final exams for a Masters degree.

Not much I can do but wish him good luck and hope that he gets questions on the subjects he’s passionate about.

Extra terrestrial

More exams this week. I think we’ve finished for the season. On Monday morning the bus I was on stopped by the station and an extra terrestrial got on. he put a smile on my face for the rest of the morning. There was an awful lot of giggling in the back of the bus later too.

About that phone

This week is exam week every morning for me. It’s gone very well considering I’ve been getting up at 5.15 in the freezing cold and had lessons and a clinic visit to fit in. Last day tomorrow.

One little incident which almost made me laugh out loud: I was with one of our few male colleagues. He’s a very nice man, a gentleman, he keeps well away from any flirting and teasing which goes on, that kind of gentleman. When he noticed that one of the students had her phone on the chair between her knees; Students aren’t allowed to have their phones on them during an exam, he confiscated it and wrote a report out. He wrote that the student had the “telephone between her legs” – sorry I have a dirty mind, I couldn’t help wondering if it was on vibrate…..

Monday

I’ve had a bit of a strange day today. This morning I was supervising an exam at the school of commerce (yes, it’s that season again). I had to get up early and leave in the dark, in the pouring rain to catch the bus. Then wait in the cold waiting room for 20 minutes for the next bus. The waiting room isn’t heated in order to stop homeless people camping there for the day. When I finally arrived, the building has changed and the reception area split up into three different desks. Fortunately the exam department is in the same place.

There were 4 of us looking after about 60 students (we thought we were having 80). Most of the students this morning were Chinese and studying tourism in English so their French is not good. I gave out instructions in two languages. Nothing was straight forward at all. Then the wait for buses and home again. Next week I could be working there for 4 mornings. When the weather is like it is at the moment I’d rather work at home.

This afternoon I’ve been at the mercy of AOL – again. Perhaps there are so few of us left in France on AOL we’ve all been put onto the same decrepit server.

One thing I did manage to do this weekend was put up the Christmas tree and Rob to put out the outside decorations. I’m looking forward to Christmas but I haven’t got into the spirit of Christmas just yet.

Aperitifs and timetables

We went to visit some friends for tea on Saturday afternoon. This is what I like about living in France ; after a little walk the tea as followed by an aperitif. Aperitif dînatoire seems to be the new fashion. The nibbles are more substantial, in this case quiche and courgette tart amongst other things. When we got home we didn’t need to eat. Fortunately for me Rob never drinks and drives, so I get to have a drink.

Olivier came home for the weekend. We drove him to a neighbouring village for his lift back. It’s nice when we do that because we have the time to talk to each other before he goes off.

This morning I supervised an exam. It went well and despite the clatter of the air-conditioning I did not have a migraine. I was with a colleague who used to be a colleague of Rob’s. Apparently a month a go she told him that she will be a grandmother in January. He forgot to tell me. She’s so excited – she’ll be present at the birth (there isn’t a papa). He daughter is a very lucky girl, she has such a loving family to support her.

Since Manpower took over appointing us, the timetables appear to be a little confused. I’m working longer on Wednesday morning (though I suspected I might be) and I haven’t got to go to work tomorrow. I’d been told I had four mornings in January, but I’ve only got one after all. It’s a good job I’m not desperate for the cash.

The weather has gone really cold here, the wind is coming from the North East which means from Siberia. I wonder if we’ll have snow?

Saturday to Tuesday

We had a very good, but busy weekend. Managed to send Olivier off with his clothes all washed and dried in time. We went to a Christmas market in a nearby town, mainly to see our friend Janet who has a stand there and makes amazing things to give as gifts. She hadn’t made any mince pies this year, still we got some from the Irish Counter in town a few days ago.

Poor Dom ended up with a migraine on Saturday night. She rarely drinks alcohol and had a kir (White wine with an alcoholic blackcurrant syrup) at a bar in town. I think it’s the high sugar syrup which causes it. Anyway she slept for 14 hours. She works so hard. While she was here she printed out a report to read, 50 pages, amongst all of the other things she has to do. However, she does get rewarded for her hard work. J-M also bought work to do with him, he’s studying philosophy.

On Monday I helped to supervise a TOEIC exam. Lots of papers to sort into alphabetical order at the end. I came home with a migraine which didn’t go even after a sleep. We went out for a walk, it was dry and windy, coupled with a big dose of paracetamol it did the trick.

Yesterday was my visit to the leg Doctor. It went as well as can be expected. She was only 15 minutes behind and I swear the bus drivers hid around corners in wait for me, the buses co-ordinated perfectly and I was home earlier than I expected. While I was waiting to go in the receptionist came into the waiting room to change a light bulb. Fortunately I asked her if she was sure the light was turned off, which it wasn’t. She was running around in her bare feet as she’d taken off her shoes to climb onto a chair; ‘It’s a good job there is no one here’ she said to me. I’ll take that as a compliment.

A quick copy and paste...

When we picked Dom up from the station two weeks ago she was worried sick about not having a summer job; by the following Wednesday she had two interviews which led to work in July and September. She’s home for July, working in the tax office inputting data which is not interesting and they’ve already told her not to work so fast. She’s passed her exams which means she has a ‘licence’ and can now continue for her ‘masters’ exam in 2 or 3 years. We also met her boyfriend. He came to stay for a few days and is really, really nice. His parents are meeting Dom this weekend. My motherly advice was ‘parents get nervous too’.
Dom told me that she has kidney stones. She’s always drunk plenty of water and eats a healthy diet with lots of vegetables and fruit. What else can she do – any ideas?

Olivier finished his exams and, on the whole, he seems pretty satisfied with himself. Remembering he’s hardly worked for 3 years we must wait until Tuesday to see if he’s passed. He’s working in the towers during the summer and then he’s off to Poitiers to study ‘economics’– we hope.

Rob and I want off to an auction last weekend which involved leaving the house at quarter to 5 in the morning and getting home at 10 in the evening. Like the last time we went , two years ago, it was very hot. We came home exhausted with lots of interesting postcards.

I phoned my mum recently. She made Rob a lovely card for his birthday. In her village they have ‘dabble days’ where they can have a go at different crafts. She usually makes lovely birthday cards for everyone. I forgot to ask her how the court case went.

I’m writing this on word but don’t know when I’ll be able to post it. AOL is amusing itself by letting us online for two or three minutes at a time and not very often. Rob spoke to his mother today for a very short while as AOL has control over the telephone too.

Another week slips by

Wednesday lunchtime found me sitting outside the deputy head’s office with Olivier. He had had a dispute with his English teacher and called his lessons a load of ‘merde’. The result was a lecture about how he has never really put any effort into lycée and two days suspension from lessons; I’ve made a list of things for him to do over the two days, mainly revision, the Baccalaureate is in a month.

On Wednesday afternoon Manpower telephoned with some hours of exam supervising starting on Thursday.

Thursday morning I went to the loo with George Cluny before I started work. He’s on the toilet door urging us ‘girls’ to save water (put a brick in the cistern) and the planet. I hung my coat up over him. I mean, George Cluny, I want him to have a good impression of me….. I wonder who the boys have got in their loos?

I had a nice exam. There were supposed to be 8 international students but the Russians had gone home and someone else was taking the exam in their own country so I had two very polite young men from India; One of them was recovering from chicken pox. Friday was good too. Everyone finished well before time and I had a good chat with the lady I was working with. You remember I had a few problems with someone before Christmas? The class representatives had noticed her rudeness too and she was asked not to come back.

The washing machine went funny again this morning. I had to unplug it to stop it from making a blowing noise. I tried it again after a few minutes and it was fine. I must phone up and see if the company has been reinstated. I discovered that in France nowadays a company that’s due to go under is given 6 months to try to sort things out. Hopefully my guarantee will come back to life.

Yesterday, Rob worked until midnight. The idea was that visitors would admire the sunset from the top of the St Nicolas tower. It was windy, cold and wet – but they were still quite busy.

I also had an interesting find.

Some light at the end of the tunnel

You wouldn’t think it could get any worse, would you ? Well it did…

When I finally got through to the company that was supposed to mend my washer/dryer they informed me that my guarantee wasn’t valid anymore as the company I bought the machine from had gone bankrupt. We looked on the website and they went bankrupt in December of last year. All claims had to be filed by the end of last year, so my guarantee until the end of 2011 is worth nothing. We phoned the help line and their was a message to day that they would be back in business for 12th May! We’ll be checking to see what happens next…

Anyway, I went to visit my sad machine and I was thinking about the last time I had an engineer to visit. They always ask ‘Have you tried to use the machine since the problem developed?’ So I thought I’d give it a go. Rob ready to phone the emergency services in case I blew myself up. As the machine was still full of water I decided to try to empty it, so I set the controls to ‘empty’ , held my breath and pressed buttons. The machine emptied, no problem. Next, I decided to give it something a little more complicated. I fetched in the hand washing I’d done earlier and set it to spin dry. No problem. I couldn’t resist trying a full wash…, two full washes later and it was fine. All that stress for nothing.

My interview at Manpower wasn’t really an interview, just form filling. Another of the exam supervisors was there to. Manpower are very, very busy, the phone was ringing non stop and a queue of people waiting to be seen. All I have to do now is wait for my timetable, it looks like I’ll be working more in June.

We both had emails from MIL. She fell down the stairs last week, on her back. She’s in pain but okay. She’s 86, it could have been a lot worse.

The bad news or the bad news

When it’s a case of the bad news or the bad news, I suppose the best thing to do is tell it in the order it came. Since 2000 I’ve been supervising exams at the school of commerce in town. Just over a week ago I received a letter telling me that I would now be employed by Manpower as regards my work there. Tomorrow I have an interview with them and they will tell me my hours. I’m just hoping that I can continue to work just mornings. If I stay longer I get migraines. I also have my business to run. Will I be paid less? Will I have to pay some kind of entrance fee? Watch this space.

The other bit of bad news is that my washing/dryer machine has broken down. I went to remove my washing and found lights flashing. When I checked out the problem pages in the booklet it just said “call the engineer”. So I had soggy washing and another load which I washed in the bath. I tried to turn the machine on to empty the water out – nothing. The engineer doesn’t’ work on Mondays. The good news it is that the weather is sunny at the moment so I can dry things out side and if I wash them early in the morning they will be almost dry by the evening. I don’t normally need the dryer except in emergencies or the wet days of winter, but it’s impossible to wring out washing and get it as dry as a spin dryer.

Happy Birthday!

This photograph was taken 15 years ago today on Olivier’s third birthday. Today he comes of age. Happy Birthday Olivier!

He didn’t tell me until Tuesday that last week was the week of the mock baccalaureate. Perhaps it was for the best or I’d have been agonising over whether his biro would run out of ink or should he replace his calculator batteries. He showed me some of the papers..

Philosophy: His worst favourite subject of all. They only have to do a year of it and they either get it or not. Olivier doesn’t get it. He chose to write for 4 hours on ‘Is it possible to be yourself?’

Maths: I didn’t do ‘modern maths’ so I don’t understand most of the paper (plus it is in French). Probabilities was quite good , he says, all about a drinks machine which ignores orders and gives out drinks as it likes….

History: For this you have to remember that a French man is supposed to know something about every thing, so his choice of history questions covered the recent history of USA and of Israel.

English: A doddle for Olivier, an extract from something by Ken Follett

Last night he went to a night club to celebrate his birthday. It’s in the north of the department on a very busy road. I was a little concerned about transport as there have been youngsters killed on that road in the early hours of Sunday morning in the past. Some friends took him up and then he was staying with a friend who lives halfway because they put on free transport home to some of the nearer villages.

It's the little things...

This week has been scattered with little events which made me smile. I’ve been supervising exams again. I was on the bus on Tuesday morning when I looked up at a building and an open balcony window caught my eye. The traffic stopped for a couple of minutes and I could see a couple talking to each other. Then they gave each other a lovely big hug.

One of the students asked if he could speak to me after the exam. I had three hours to wonder what on earth he would want to talk to me about. Later he explained that he had lived in Alaska for a year and stayed with a family Knutsen. He obviously enjoyed being with them. He wondered if I was related. I don’t really know any of the foreign Knutsens. So Christine in Alaska, if you ever read this, this paragraph is about you!

I was eating lunch one day and the jay appeared again. He was very considerate and hopped around so that I could see him from all angles. I managed to reach my glasses without the movement frightening him off, but he was too far away for them to make much difference.

This morning we were in the middle of a probabilities exam when we heard singing. There is a large grassed area around part of the building. It was a beautiful morning, blue skies and sunshine. One of the Chinese students had taken her music outside to rehearse the part she was singing (opera I think), she had a beautiful voice and I certainly would have loved to continue listening. Unfortunately my colleague had to go out side and ask her politely to stop. The singer was very embarrassed and went off to find somewhere else.


I wonder what will happen tomorrow.

A little update

Time to supervise some more exams. This week kicked off with a computer exam. I’d never done one of those before, we were 6 supervisors looking after 100 students. I couldn’t help wondering what "vibrations" were being given off by 100 laptops in one room. One girl was crying because her laptop was playing up.

Olivier has been off lycée with a nasty cold. He watched the inauguration of president Obama on TV, I watched the swearing in and Aretha Franklin with him. I’ve got a sore throat this evening so I’m drinking a Kir; white wine with cassis (blackcurrant liqueur ) for extra vitamin C. That’s my excuse.

The weather has become ‘warmer’ so now we have rain, lots of rain.

P.S. No sign of the mice...

No snow

Busy, busy week again. Three mornings supervising exams, I’d forgotten what going out on a cold dark morning felt like. I had another session on my legs. It has worked on some of the newer veins so we are continuing. I’d like to explain that this is not just for vanity, she is dealing with veins which could become a problem later. I haven’t worn a shorter skirt for over 20 years. I did cry once a few years back. I saw a couple of my neighbours go out for a walk wearing short denim skirts and lovely tanned legs….. Other than that I’m a jeansy sort of person and I do like long skirts sometimes.

Dom had to get through snow to take her exams, fortunately she was in plenty of time.

If you look at a snow map of France, our village is just about the only place that hasn’t had snow.

A shite start to the week

It’s exam time again so I’ve been very busy with that. Unfortunately I had to work some of the time with someone who doesn’t share my idea of doing a job as well as I can. On Monday we were in half of a big exam room which is usually divided off. The room wasn’t divided so we shared with another exam group – that’s not a problem because exams are silent anyway so we didn’t disturb each other. The people supervising the other group noticed that my colleague was just sat texting or reading a folder, instead of walking around observing. I walked by the desk, her folder was full of photocopies of cartoons! She also went to the loo several times. At the end of the exam she was quite nasty to some of the students who didn’t understand her instructions (One of the rules of leadership I learnt in my bank training was that if a group botches up it’s usually the one who gives the orders who hasn’t explained well).

As usual in that place I had the start of a migraine (I think it’s the air-conditioning). Then when I left the building to go home, I slipped on the wooden walkway and landed flat on my back. A student came running and helped me up – bless her. Only my pride was injured, fortunately and I have a nice bruise on my derrière.

I discovered on Tuesday that someone had mentioned the problem in Monday’s exam to the exam office, I was relieved, though when I talked to Rob and Olivier about it they warned me to watch out as they know this lady has Latin blood and a bit of a temper. I saw her on the bus this morning and she was the same as usual towards me so, I’m still alive.

On the bus I also saw one of my pupils from when I taught problem children. She hasn’t changed, her mental age was always behind that of her peers, but now she’s physically grown up and living with her boyfriend, I wonder how that will work out. It was nice to see her again, but she’s not in contact with her classmates at all.

Roll on the weekend...

Christmas is coming...

Christian has come and gone. We took him back to the airport last Friday morning. It was strange to see him again after two years. Most of his old friends seem to be scattered all over the world so he didn’t really have anyone to visit. He sorted out a lot of his old belongings and loaded up a suitcase to take home, they will now be in his grandmother’s loft instead of our garage. The weather was really sunny and we went for a lovely walk and he took lots of photos which I hope he’ll forward to me so that I can post some here

I’ve started decorating the Christmas tree. For years Rob did all of the decorating at Christmas, as it happens I’m happy to take over as I don’t put so much out and it was always my job to clear away….

Next week and the week after I will be supervising exams nearly every morning. As the school of commerce grows so does the examination period – good news for us exam ladies.

Monday

I went off to the clinic this afternoon for a mammogram. The bus stops right outside these days and I got off with a lot of little old ladies clutching their past results. Perhaps I look like an old lady now too. Everything is normal, so that’s another set of results under the belt.

As the clinic for veins is on the same ‘campus’ I went and made my appointment there too. I must say that everyone is very polite, cheerful and helpful there. My appointment is for next Monday.

When I got home Olivier had made a pot of coffee and it was delicious. I didn’t know he knew how to make it. He’d been revising for his French Bac exam. The first work he’s done all year, the exam is on Friday. He left the house clutching his science revision book. Perhaps he’s got a new girlfriend he’s trying to impress?

Good enough to eat

Sometimes when an exam lasts two or three hours time hangs heavy. Fortunately we have to keep circulating, if I sit down for any length of time with nothing to do I fall asleep. It’s nice when we work in pairs and there is one lady I like to work with, she’s ten years older than me and will be retiring soon.

One morning she happened to mention to me that one of the young men was especially nice. He had longish blonde hair and beard, he was slightly muscular (don’t like too many muscles), tanned and wearing a white shirt and a neat pair of tight jeans. He was also very pleasant and polite so I’m not really sure what my friend meant. I checked his name on the list – Mr. Gateau.

Busy bee

I thought that I was busy before, but now I’m even busier. This week I’m exam supervising again. The week kicked off with a four hour exam and I was on my own. Fortunately someone replaced me for a few minutes half way through so I could pop to the ladies. The main season starts at the beginning of May and will go on till the beginning of July. The school of commerce has expanded so much over the last couple of years the exam period has more than doubled – good news for us supervisors! I’ve asked to work mornings only so that I can carry on with the postcards in the afternoons.

One week later...

Yet another busy week has passed by. On Monday I had a meeting at the school of commerce were I supervise exams. The old boss is back from maternity leave . She said exactly the same as her replacement but in a much pleasanter tone. We got paid for going to the reunion too. For the next couple of weeks I’ll be out supervising, there are a couple of mornings where I start at 8 and finish after one o’clock. I must remember to put a snack into my bag – I thought that cheese and fruit would be best.

I’ve put the Christmas tree up, Rob and Olivier aren’t interested at all this year. Anyway I think it looks beautiful.

Other than that mostly I’ve been working on the cards and writing revues of websites. Perhaps it’s winter, but I don’t feel much like doing anything else at the moment.