The rest of this week has been taken up with "home duties"and internet activities. The desired trip to Isola 2000 hasn't happened yet - maybe this weekend. It is almost the Dong's last week in France. Then it will just be Rick and Katherine Ganter and us to represent Oz in Thales.

Anna left last night on a train to Italy after a week staying with us. We managed a couple more museums that I hadn't been to before: Musée d'Archeologique and the Musée d'Art moderne et d'Art contemporaine where we saw a rather disturbing display of works by a Jean Fabre, containing lots of animal (mainly insects) and human body parts. C'etait trés bizarre. His great-grandfather was a well-known entomologist, Jean Fabre.

Other things we managed to do:
walked around Antibes, went to "bandes dessins", English books and Asian foods shops
walked around old Grasse and saw the costume and jewellery museum
drove to Mons and did a walk downhill towards the aqueduct romaine
found first geocache near the Col de Vence (St Barnabé) (from Geocaching)
dinner in Mougins (vieille ville) with Martin Childs and Norman and Sharon
I played tennis in the heat while Anna went and explored Nice by train

We finally did a long bike ride today with Norm. We went down the hill cross-country to the Park de Vaugrenier then along to the Cap d'Antibes to Juan-le-Pins and back home, 42 km in all. Wow, what a sore bum! Apparently if I do this more often I will become accustomed to it (what process is going on to make your pelvic bones more used to pressure?).

Anna rang to say she'll book a train ticket from Paris and arrive sometime next week.

Bad news: Spanish bombings, Israeli bombings ...

Today found that The Guardian online has monthly weblog recommendations.
This one Mzansi Afrika > is by a South African and mentions a conference in gated communities around the world. As we are now living in a boom-gated "domaine" with 24 hour security presence this could be interesting.

From an article in the SMH on weblogs I found this link (no Aussies living in France except a Lesbian woman and her lover)
Aussieblogs Webring

So I just thought I could note where I've been link-wise recently. Today I looked up the "sorry ever after" lyric to find out what 74-75 refers to. The song, by Connells, doesn't seem to mean much except it mentions the years 1974-1975.
Also looked at the Eurosport website and it is slightly better than the newspapers in presenting a more balanced diet of sport than the major male ones but not much better. Flicking though our channels I have found that the Motors TV (which used to feature moslty obscure Australian motor sport) has been replaced by a Belgian French channel RTBF.

Also been looking at photography sites - have to remember to ask Sam or Susan again for her website.

Yesterday we ventured out to Menton (the long weekend in Haut Vaucluse had gone by the by) after the end of the lemon festival. We had a short walk in the old town centre and cemetery with Russian princes and Webb Ellis (we didn't find his grave but an unstable section was closed) before retiring for a seafood lunch by the sea.

Actually it's still Wednesday. I have to stay up to pick Pat up at Nice airport at 11pm (23h). On Eurosport we have the garbage collection that is The Wedneday Selection, golf, sailing and equestrian. Last night I tried to rewatch Vertical Limit in French but it was still so excruciating that I had to turn it off and play computer scrabble. Couldn't even hear the Aussie accents because of the dubbing. Looked up Ben Mendelsohn on IMDB instead and that lead to some reminiscences about Mullet and other Aussie films. Also looked at the Oscar results. Now how does one get to see Harvey Krumpet?

Haven't heard from anyone in Aus lately except Mum and Dad. Jim C rang just before Mum and Dad went home, which was nice. I hope we get to see them, though they're coming in July and we might go away somewhere. Also want to catch up with Martin B, either in Germany or here.

Back to the blog

I'm now ensconced in the life of the expat wife in Villeneuve Loubet on the Cote d'Azur. Tennis, hiking, French lessons, shopping, coffee, internet.

The topics from my previous posting are still relevant, here in France. I can still watch the eucalypts waving in the wind outside our balcony windows, looking towards the Mediterranean Sea. Also, I have been sick 3 times since I arrived in September, 2003. I arrived with an ear infection (Dr B thinks I may have hearing loss in the left side) and have subsequently had two colds, one whilw our Aussie friends were living here with their two boys, and one after skiing in Morzine.

Today I have had to do a load of washing in our landlady's washing machine. She lives next door. I managed to wake her son, Benoit (20). Even though I waited until after 12 he wandered out in his underpants rubbing hie eyes! He did help me and brought the clean wet load back up. While I was waiting I had lunch and vacuumed this hard-to-clean off-white tiled floor.

Pat left for a GSS team building exercise in the Cotswalds on Monday afternoon. He will be back late tonight and hopefully tomorrow we can go away for a long weekend to see more of northern Provence or maybe even further away.

So what has happened in the 20 months since I wrote that first entry. Simpler to list some point form:
* got engaged in August, bought opal ring
* fell over a small cliff into Lane Cover River and bruised hip and badly grazed arm. Old mobile ruined!
* job found at Sydney Uni with Centre for the Mind, supervised by Allan Snyder and Terry Bossomaier. Friendly colleagues including Elaine M, Natasja W, Angela Y, Maria and Martin B. My office turns out to be opposite Max's labs so again a neighbour to William L and Duncan B.
* got married at Banjo Paterson's Cottage, Gladesville on 29th March, 2003 (almost our anniversary now)
* month long honeymoon in Bhutan, with a group of friendly Aussies and Americans
* gave notice in June that I was going to France
* we packed up townhouse in North Ryde into a storage space in Hornsby
* Pat left for the south of France
* after a week's skiing in Perisher, handed over my job to a rather volatile man (who lasted 2 weeks before Allan sacked him)
* left Australia for Nice
* hotel in Sophia for a two weeks before finding this townhouse through Norman Dong (he and Sharon had lived here before)
* some outings with Claire Moore to get to know the area. Started driving.
* we got our visas through visits to the Mairie, madical examination and chest x-rays with a French helper, Catherine Bo
* couple of games of squash with David M before they leave for Australia in December
* 10 day trip to UK while Pat is back for a sea-trial in Australia
* watching the world cup rugby
* started hiking and tennis with the IWCR women during Christmas activities
* my cousin Adam survives a terrible car accident as a pedestrian in Gosford and spends many weeks in hospital
* Chug and Ang arrive for a few days from Indiana and have Christmas meals - yum
* Jenny and Bob arrive from Canberra but miss the good weather. They go on through Italy to ski in San Cassiano while we drive up to Morzine to ski with Mum and Dad for a week
* they come back early after Bob's father dies in New Zealand. They make it back for the funeral.
* Mum and Dad come back from skiing in Austria and Italy to see the south of France. Mum's ski acident rebounds in effects of delayed concussion and they are forced to stay almost two weeks longer than they planned. We did quite a bit of sightseeing as a result (instead of more skiing).