20 words for snow

People often say that the Esquimeaux have 20 words for snow.

I've never been particularly impressed by that, after all; the English probably have 20 words for rain:
cat-and-dog weather, cloudburst, condensation, deluge, drencher, drizzle, fall, flood, flurry, hail, heavy dew, liquid sunshine, mist, monsoon, pour, pouring, precip, precipitation, raindrops, rainfall, rainstorm, sheets, shower, showers, sleet, spate, spit, sprinkle, sprinkling, stream, sun shower, torrent, volley*, wet stuff, window washer

In English there also exists these cunning things called adjectives, so in effect there's no need to have a word for every nuance of something because you can qulify the noun with adjectives: heavy rain, driving rain, cold rain etc.

Anyway, what got me onto all this is that I love andouillettes: sausages made from pig offal. I love them, but Fiona can't stand the smell (they smell like pigshit) and I'm only allowed to cook them outside on the barbeque.

So I was reading the list of ingredients on the packet and it's not complicated. Pig's stomach, pig skin, and "chaudins". Illoked up chaudins in the dictionary because I didn't recognise the word and found:

En France, en vue de son utilisation en boyauderie, le côlon de porc est divisé en deux parties; le chaudin, boyau bosselé, épais, tendre, rose clair, et le suivant, non bosselé, lisse, tendre, rosé ou blanc

"In france, because of it's use in sausage stuffing, pig intestines is divided in 2 parts: the large intestine, bumpy casing, thick, tender, light pink, and the small intestine, not lumpy, smooth, tender, pink or white"

That's the French for you: 20 words for pigs intestines.

La Créativité dans la Cuisine

Vous prenez deux pommes de terre dans son filet. Vous prenez également un saucisse de Strasbourg. Il faut que les patates ne doivent pas trop grandes. Si leur peau est un peu ridée tant mieux.
Puis, vous faites de votre mieux pour être aussi créative que possible. Reflichissez bien des toutes les possibilités.

Moi, je me suis régalé.

I'm on a roll!

After the gate, I'm now progressing nicely with the trailer. It's ridiculous how expensive a new trailer is. I little one will cost 500Euros.
My little blue trailer (you can see the carcass beside me) was made of wood. Because I had been given it, I was a bit careless with it, left it outside too often. So it got rotten, and one day recently, when the guy at the sawmill was lowering a charge of wood into it with his forklift it cracked underneath.
The wooden one also had the axle bolted to the blue box and the towbar bolted to the box, so it was possible for the towbar to come away, and leave the trailer careering down the road.
The new version I've welded up has the towbar integral with the frame. I've also welded on four nifty threaded chain links on the sides that can be used to attach ropes or chains.
Today I must finish decking the floor of the trailer so I ca at least use it to fetch more wood.
Then I must work out a cunning way to build the trailer box, and I want the hinged tailgate to be removeable, so I need to find a plug that can take the 5 wires for the lights/indicators.

The trailer's first job will be to cart the old blue box down to the tip.

In other news, France is in a panic over Tunisian supporters whistling during "The Marseillaise" during the International friendly the other day. This lack of respect for the national anthem is causing angst because it is evident that the Tunisian supporters are in fact French born, children of immigrants.
The locals are full of "send them all home". When I point out that they ARE home the response is "send the whole family home".
The government's response is to abandon any future match where such whistling takes place. the difficulty is that matches are played under FIFA rules. Only the ref has the authority to cancel a match and whistling during the national anthems is not one of FIFA's criterea for abandonment of a match.
There is an added difficulty of trying to get thousands of dissapointed and angry fans out of a stadium after the game they have paid to see has been abandoned because of te actions of a few hundred.

It is EXACTLY like the cricket crisis in the UK a dozen years ago. English people were appalled to discover that the children of immigrants were supporting Pakistan or India during Test matches against England.

France - not very internet savvy.

The latest trends in web traffic have been released and I find it very revealing about french internet habits.

Comscore lists the sites most visited by french internauts for the months of July and August 2008.

It's not merely the NATURE of the sites visited that is revealing, but also the number of hits.

This pic shows the sites that have had the most improvement in traffic.



So the most popular sites are sports, music download, social networking, TV listings, music lyrics and an online bank. The high score for the sports websites is down to the Olymic Games

Most visited sites by French net users?

Google, Microsoft, Orange, yahoo, Yellow Pages
Where's the porn?

DailyMotion is like YouTube

Jambes Lourdes - Heavy Legs

French TV is full of adverts for treatment of a dreaded syndrome - Heavy Legs.

Fi and I had never even heard of the malady of Heavy Legs until we started watching french TV. Now every night we are treated to adverts showing women tiredly trudging up stairs, then, after taking product X, lightly skipping up the same stairs.

A Google search on "heavy legs" on google.com nets 460,000 results while a search on "jambes lourdes" on google.fr pulls a whopping 646,000. French menopausal women are obsessed with heavy legs.

But British women suffer too -

ANTISTAX Leg Vein Health Capsules - a clinically proven natural health supplement - asked 400 women over 45 if they suffered from problems with their legs and also asked how they felt it affected their daily lives. The results were astounding!
- 75% said they suffered with leg health issues
- 50% said they suffered with TAHLC (Tired, Aching, Heavy Legs
Complaint)
- 71% said TAHLC interfered with their daily lives
- 75% said it affected them more than the menopause!
- 75% said it affected them more than sight deterioration
- 77% expressed concern for their leg health
- 66% are concerned about the pain and discomfort caused
- 51% said they are hindered in their daily lives by having to
keep their feet up as a result
- Women over the age of 45 are more likely to suffer with TAHLC than
thread, spider or varicose veins and find TAHLC more disruptive to
their everyday lives than these other leg health problems

Most of the adverts for heavy leg remedies are herbal type snake oil stuff. The market is huge, and I am very suspicious of the efficacy of this stuff. I'm also very suspicious of surveys conducted by companies that sell a "cure"

Here is one of the more popular french remedies "Jouvence" by l'Abbé Soury.

The blurb says: the formula is based on plants (Hamamélis, Viburnum, Calamus, Piscidia) traditionally recognised for the properties against heavy legs.

Strangly, a google image search on "jambes lourdes" seems to show more "jambes svelte et legère" I feel obliged to post one for your (my) edification.

Found at http://www.italiq-expos.com/blog-shopping/2006/05/29/220-jambes-lourdes

Strictement Interdit!

Many things in France are against the law. Smoking in public places for one. And while the French legislature and parliament love making new laws, the French people largely ignore them. Which is why Michel, our café proprieter always has a 'clop' hanging out of his mouth.

L'interdit ? C'est une pièce fermée à clef avec tout ce que je désire à l’intérieur.
Richard Hawley, chanteur

- Qu'est-ce que l'interdit ?
En gros, ce qui est "interdit" n'est pas consenti. POURQUOI PAS ? Qui dit "interdit" dit "on a interdit". Il y a dans l'histoire un être humain, ce petit con aux motivations souvent puantes d'arrogance, de peur, d'ignorance, de rancœur. Il faut fouiller là où l'on nous dit "interdit". Car, dans l'absolu, tout est permis
Jasmine Bande, chanteuse

According to Charles Bremner there are 9,500 laws in force and parliament passes 70 new ones every year. A further 120,000 decrees have been issued by trhe state ranging from "interdit", through "formellement interdit" to "rigoureusement interdit".

One such law is the ban on using foreign words in advertising or broadcasting without an accompanying French translation. Thus, theoretically a football announcer should not say "A la suite d’un corner, le Cosmos a bénéficié d’un penalty" but rather "A la suite d’un coup de coin, le Cosmos a bénéficié d’un tir de réparation". This one is known as La Loi Toubon. It is largely ignored in everday use because it is so impractical, and impossible to police. A list of troublesome words (bulldozer, computer, disk-jockey, design) and their improbable replacements is discussed here.

Some of the French laws seem very odd to Anglo Saxons. The dates of shop sales being fixed by the Prefecture for example. The interdiction of selling products at less than cost price. It is illegal to cut any children out of your will.

But more bizarre still, is the things that are NOT illegal in France. Like incest. Apparantly incest was dropped from the Penal Code by Napoleon 200 years ago.

Anyone know of other crazy French legalisms?

Eenie meenie ....

... minie moe

That's the way we did it in the playground.

In France, as usual, it's different. It goes like this:
Ams, tram, gram,
Pic et pic et colégram,
Bour et bour et ratatam,
Ams, tram, gram.

And, it sounds like this (an advert for a french lottery - )

Am stram gram pik et pik et colégram
envoyé par dhauss

Like the eenie meenie version, this french count-out has no meaning and there is disagreement about how to write it, but is thought to have come from ancient German, the ams tram dram being a corruption of old "Ein, zwei, drei"

Goodby Humphrey

Humphrey Richard Adeane Lyttelton 23 May 1921 – 25 April 2008

I'm a relative youngster (compared to Humph anyway) and as I only came to the UK in 1990, I only discovered I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue towards the end of its run.

I'm still very saddened that Humph has gone. His delivery was so good.

Here is an episode from 1995 replayed by the BBC in tribute.

Have a listen, it's excellent as usual, and shed a tear for an era gone forever.

French Taxman supports gay marriage

I wouldn't know whether to laugh or cry.

In today's Charente Libre newspaper is the story of Mr Gérard Chaillou, a habitant of Cognac. he is divorced with one child. As such he is entitled to a family allowance.
He has a friend, who lives alone in a large house. "My mate had a very big house in which he lived alone. He invited me to move into one of the rooms to avoid paying a rent."
This Gérard did, in October 2005, and being a good and conciencous citizen, he noted on his tax forms, that he was staying rent-free.
But he then received a letter from the hôtel des impôts saying that this benefit is only applicable to widows, single parents or divorcees, and "according to their information" Gérard was living "en concubinage" with the man who owned the house. Thus, equivalent to married, no single parent benefit.
Gérard is very bitter about the way he has been treated by the female civil servant in charge of his file. She had always refused to meet with him to discus his case.
"Basically, she's treated me like a homo" said the sixty year old through gritted teeth. The "according to our information" suggests someone had had shopped him.
He moved out of the house, and through a mediator was re-embursed the missing allowances, amounting to about €100 per month.
What has made him bitter was that he received no apologies or any recognition that he has been treated badly.
PS - I've taken some liberties with the translation, not being au fait with french fiscal terms like CSG, RDS and une demi-part fiscale, but I'm not far off the sense of the thing. Anyone who can clarify is welcome.

So civil servants have absolutely nothing against same-sex unions, provided there is some kind of tax to be gained from it. This is the way forward for equal rights. Don't bother arguing about social justice or equality, just find a way to point out to government that they can earn revenue from it. Man those equality laws will be on the books before you can say "ooh get her!"

Cultural Differences

This is an advert on French telly at the moment. When we saw it we just sat there with our mouths hanging open in disbelief.


Here is the transcript:
No! That's for mummy.
Ah! You want to play?
One, two, scissors!
One, two, paper!
One, two, rock!
Ha ha, you're really a loser, like you're father.
(voice over) No point fighting against it. Daunat sandwiches, so generous that just one is enough

First the baby's hand morphing out of the stomach is horrible. Like a scene out of alien. Why isn't the woman screaming in terror? She should be grabbing the kitchen knife to cut the damn thing out. Nasty. Reminds me of a strap-on dildo, but that's probably down to the videos I've been watching.

And then ... the baby flips the mum the bird!! The middle finger! And she just laughs. She's got Damien inside her and she thinks it's funny. Comes time for childbirth a thing like that may well decide not to come out. She won't be laughing then.

And finally she calls the kid a loser.

I must question my french friends on their response to this ad, because if they think the ad is OK, or funny in a comedic sense rather than in the weird sense, then there must be more separating us than just the Channel.

And does the advert work? ie: will it sell Daunat sandwiches or will people associate Daunat with mutating, insolent, loser babies, and their mothers who pick losers for lovers?