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Blog 4-08-08 A Monday
Ok, It's now Monday night, no...I don't have a telephone and with that said...I have no Internet as well. We went to the Tourist Office this morning to consult with our resident French Cultural and Technology Specialists E and MC, MC was caught up in another major operation regarding a new computer being installed in the office for use by patrons...like us. E called the lovely folks at France Telecom for an explanation of why did we receive a notice this morning of some billing issue re the NEW phone number when there is NO DIAL TONE on the aforesaid telephone line. They referred her to the technical office who is sending out a techie tomorrow morning...er ah by 1pm that is to check our line and find out why they think our line is GOOD and we have no telephone instead. When we disengaged ourselves from the office I came home and checked the telephone in another socket, no hope, doesn't work. Oh well, someone who really KNOWS how this system works will be here tomorrow with luck and maybe oh maybe we will get connected. What a bore this is.
We have a dinner planned with friends Thursday evening. Thai food promised, but what they will get is my interpretation of Thai food using French ingredients and my addled memory of the recipes of my books in California as I have none of those here. So yes, I'm faking it a bit but I understand the differences between Thai and Chinese and Vietnamese and their similarities as well so it'll be a good fake I hope. A soup with lemongrass and ginger, nems with pork and spring vegetables, Oyster Sauce Beef with red peppers and snow peas, Thai Shrimp Curry over rice, apple/ginger tart al a mode. Wish me luck.
So today we worked on the walls of the dining room, YES THE Dining Room we will be using night after next for the Thai dinner. Hanging cloth by the yards, quite a process, nailing up the wood strips to hold the cloth on all sides, hanging the cloth with installed battens at the top edge of heavy paper after placing the fuzzy stuff over the area that the cloth will cover. It looks great though and we are almost through with the 3rd of the 4 walls with only the window wall left to complete. I doubt we will get that part done before the dinner but we will see.
Kelly went to the doctor that speaks english today, first this morning to find the office open, warm and empty with a notice saying the first patients will be seen at 2pm. So she returned home to continue the wall project, it's a three block walk more or less so not a lot of time was wasted. At 2pm she went back to see 9 patients sitting in the room and decided that was a bit too much of a wait for her sensibilities today so she came home again. Maybe tomorrow.