6 September

Question on French game show called "Burger Quiz":

What presidential family rhymes with ouche?
Answer: Bush (pron booshe)

We have finally succeeded in getting all of our pictures in order. So, there are nine separate slide shows available on this page. To start with, here are three from last fall and winter:

Our apartment in downtown Cannes
Our motorboat trip last fall to an island off Cannes
A trip to Menton on the Italian border in early spring

Then we have, from last spring, a trip to the wilderness north of Cannes. The Gorges du Verdon were beautiful and vaste:

The beautiful Gorges du Verdon

In February, we came from Cannes to the Atlantic coast, to find out if we wanted to move here. You can see a few pictures from that trip at:

Our trip to Hossegor and Biarritz in February

That finally brings us almost up to date. Then we come to pictures of where we actually live, all taken in the late spring and early summer:

The seashore in Capbreton and Hossegor
Our house in Capbreton
Pictures of Kona incl. three rare childhood shots

The most recent pictures were taken in Toulouse during a trip to meet Andy VonSalis, a childhood friend of Andrew's (well, I was a child, and he was a young-ish adult).

A day trip to Toulouse

In other news, we returned to the US for the first time since leaving. We spent a week at our cottage in West Falmouth, Cape Cod. That trip was a test for us -- it was supposed to be a benchmark, and tell us whether we really love France, really want to stay here, or whether it would be immediately obvious that we should return to the US. In the event, we had a great time. It was nice to see everyone, and we still love France. How long will we stay? No idea.

This summer there have been several vacationing families staying in the neighboring apartments and houses, and we've made friends with some of the kids. We play boules with them. This is a game in which you throw a small wooden ball the size of a pingpong ball about twenty feet away. Then, each player tries to get as close as possible with three steel balls the size of croquet balls. It's fun, and we've learned more French from talking to the kids. They're much easier to talk to, because we're not as afraid of looking foolish. Gia is far and away the best boules-player in the neighborhood, so far.

I (Andrew) have reported at various times on the difficulties I've faced in business the past year. Having had the whole summer to settle down, I can say now that things are definitely improving and stabilizing. Gia has been helping me make sales calls, and I've had the energy and the time to make serious marketing efforts. It is really great to be living here and know finally that it is really working to telecommute 8,000 miles after all. There were times when I was worried that it just wouldn't be possible!

The summer has been really beautiful. We've gone to the beach several times a week. The water is very warm, and great fun to swim in. We've swum in waves that are up to about 6 feet tall or so. It's pretty intense. One thing that was nice to find out is that the water here is apparently much cleaner than the Mediterranean. According to one statistic, it is about six times less polluted.

All the details of our lives aren't that interesting, so I won't list them. Suffice to say that Capbreton is a nice place to live. It feels a lot like Colorado or California, except that everyone speaks French. As I mentioned, we don't know how long we'll stay here, but it does feel like a good place to be for a while.

After all the serious stuff, here are some things we've been accumulating that we'd like to share:

It dawned on us a little while ago that people, both French and American have warned us about almost everything ever since we got here. In fact, nothing bad has happened. This is a statement about something, but what?

Miscellaneous amusing thing number 1: car companies love to use English words to name their cars, but they don't use words that are very attractive in English. Examples include:

the Renault Manager
the Renault Traffic
the VW College
the Citroen Jumpy
the Fiat Shopping

A non-car example is a flashy new mountain bike called the "Bloody Bike".

Miscellaneous amusing thing number 2: cities/towns in France that, no matter how hard their chambers of commerce try, will never host major international corporate headquarters. Can you imagine...

General Motors EuroHeadquarters in Condom France

Proctor & Gamble International in St. Pee France

Microsoft Europe in Bitche France

And (in a related fashion) we see ads for a Spanish dish soap called "Colon." While we're targeting Spain, we found an advertisement for a Spanish hotel with the following quote:

"The Staff speacks English and his only desire is
to make your stay among us a plesure."

Miscellaneous amusing thing number 3: from the United States, French seems like a really seductive lanugage. Sauvignon Blanc, Je t'aime, etc. However, there are quite a few strange words that don't have the same romantic ring:

Monticule means mound.
Javellisation means bleaching.
Harleyiste is someone who rides a Harley Davidson.
Perdrix is a partridge.
Nid is a nest.
Anfractuosite is a crevice.
Motard is a motorcyclist.
Indomptable means untameable.
Marcassin is a young wild boar.
Trame is a framework.
Serment is an oath or pledge.
Nef is a nave.
Dard is a sting.
Gerbe is a sheaf.
Noctambules are night birds.

From now on we'll include our contact information etc. on every page. You'll find it all below along with links to some family members and a box from which you can send us a message immediately.

· phone from US: 303-952-0404 · in France: 06 18 26 09 61 ·
· 2, av. des Ecureuils · appt. 9 · 40510 Seignosse, France ·