Mud is not my friend.

The days have been flying by, I have been more active outside with the nice weather. I have also been more active inside witht he nice weather. Mop. Mop MOP> stupid kiddies and their muddy boots come in, mudify everything and then leave me in their wake.. Ah well.. now I dont feel so guilty for not doing anything around the house..

I have gone to gymnastics three times now.. Everytime managing to get lost on the way there and back and everytime wishing I had put a better CD in. ( Emma has her CD full of Lady Gaga, and other terrible englsih trash), The gymnasts are really entertaining, and ready to include me, the coach is a different story. She is a very large lady, who spends her day "coaching" from a chair. I have a realllly hard time holding my tongue ( not something I am ecspecially good at..).

She lets the other kids spot each other, which is no biggy when you are sixteen and kinda know what you are doing.. but when you are six... They really don't understand how the body bends. Two of these cute pigtail kids trying to help another do a backwalkover. The poor kid falls on her head as the other two "spotters" pull her legs from under her.

They have two trampolines, one above ground and one in ground. Usually the rule is one at a time. Apparently not here. I cringed as I watched the four or five kidergarteners gaily jumping on the above ground tramp. I had visions of them flying off and landing on the cement below .( Did I mention, no mats under or around the tramp?!)

Putting aside the useless coach, gymnastics is fantastic! I ripped both of my palms, rolled my ankle, and am so sore that my arms are not happy anywhere above my head. A few very successful days.

My english lessons are also fairly successful. Emma can now do negatives (Knowing the dif between neg with " to be " and other verbs) and she knows present, continuous present, past and future. When she is working on her english, I usually steal her verb book from school and do a few lessons. I think she enjoys pointing out the mistakes I make, she does it by laughing crazily and saying something along the lines of "stupid". The kid doesn't have much tact, but it is all meant to be joking, in the odd impolite french joking way.

Sometimes I say things that realllly makes her laugh. The other day I asked for her to get the "Copote de pomme", trying to say apple sauce. She laughed and laughed at me, so I started to get a little annoyed, "the copote s'il vous plait!". She delicatly explained to me what I was saying.

"when two people don't want to make a baby, they use it."

I had been telling her to get the condom. get the condom!
I know from now on.. it is CoMpote. Compote, compote...

Spring has (almost) sprung

rain. rain . rain
The end of the ski season was yesteday, complete with a lameo concert and torch skiing at night. I am sad to see the snow go.. it was a good source of entertainment. But now, between the rain storms I have been doing some hiking in the hills, having exhausted (within the first day or two) the walks within the little village.

Despite the mud, the walks are lovely. no worries about hungry bears or wildcats, or snakes. They killed all those off a long while ago. I did come across a pig skeleton of sorts the other day..which could be worrisome...

I went to gymnastics in Grenoble the other day, just getting there was too much effort. It took about an hour to drive to the stupid place, only to find out that google maps has directed me to a Judo club. I walked around in my snowboots, sweating and swearing and asking for directions. I even borrowed a guys phone once. He only handed it over to me after some intense questioning about where I was calling, how long.. I really picked the wrong guy. I planned to get there a few hours early so that i could grab something to eat, and read, i did get there early, but I found the gym right on time.

Turns out i have signed up for competitive girls gymnastics! Fourteen, fifteen years old.. and then me. i was happy to see that a 22 year old girl arrived a little late, and we ended up hanging out the whole time. It was a really nice gym, with two types of foam pits, two tramps, but surprisingly relaxed. I asked what they needed me to sign, and pay, but they waved me off and said later.

They had rythmic gymnastics at the same time, and they were pretty decent. Very very bendy, complete with a ball or hoolahoop and a sparkly costume. Even though its Not gymnastics, I enjoyed watching it..

La Grave mountain ( AKA death mountain)

Whistler mountain=1,530 m (20 lifts)
Apex mountain=610 m (4 lifts)

Ten minutie ride up, five min board ride down. I like this ratio.. ski some, rest some, ski some rest some.

Death Mountain=3,200 m (2 lifts)

I really should have googled this one before agreeing to go. Laurnece had some sense, she stayted home with some warm cocoa watching tv. Unfortunatly she did not share her sense with me.

I was led there like a cow to the slaughter house. Emma and her friends raving about how great the mountain was, how great the snow was, how I will just love it. I was pretty stoked.

The Gondla ride takes about 45 min ( unually only 30.. but it was windy, so we had to sit tight while they stopped the chair waiting for the wind to die down) just enough time for our guide to inform me of the dangers of the mountain..

-Expert only ( lovely)
-No groomed runs. rocks, trees, and cliffs everywhere.
-No warning signs ( you could be skiing down a lovely corridor.. only to find out that it ends with a cliff and you must hike back up to get out)
-Crevasses
When she got to the danger of crevasses, I stopped her mid sentence.
"Crevasses? In ice? Glacier?" I said. She gave me a wierd look and told me that this mountain was a glacier mountain..
Thanks for telling me guys. Really appreciate the heads up.

We finished our first run in about an hour and a half. I looked like a uncoorodinated snowman, with the kids whizzing around me , taking jumps and of course waiting for me to catch up.
Lunch we had on the hill. It was hell to get to ( a long tree traverse that I had to do entirely on my toes) but worth it to sit outsidein the sunshine with a nice hot meal. While eating one of the employees brings out a megaphone and stands on a table. He tells yells at some skiers that we can see on the the peak across from us. They were on one of those runs that finish.. abruptly.. They wern't finished climpbing back up by the time we left.. poor suckers.

By the end of the second run, I wasn't turning- I just went for it. Fell, went for it again, fell... It was much less effort then acutally trying (a little chillier though)

These people are crazy trusting. Jean-Michel gave me the car to go back to the house, while they stayed at the ski hill.

I have never driven his car before.. I couldn't even remember where we parked the car. Finding the car, I couldn't remember the name of the village we were staying at. I DID know that Grenoble was in the oppoisite direction.. so i just asked which way to go to Grenoble, and did the opposite.
I did make it back to the house, and spent the rest of the day lounging in the sunshine.

Snow Snow come once more.. throw the 20 below out the door.

I currently have on ; pJs , a sweater, long underwearm ,socks ( might I add that they are merino wool) , and my lovely grandma made slippers . All cocooned in my sleeping blanket. Yet it is all O K. Soon I will be entering my tropical chamber, where I can shed all my layers, and bathe in the radiating warmth. I love having my own heater.
Lets do another list.. a list of things I love
I love..
-my snowpants.
-and my gloves ( which I forgot luging today.. my fingers are still a bit tingly..)
-my personal milk ( We get normal milk for me Hoorah! No warm milk with an seemingly everlasting duedate for me!)
-my dwindling supply of english books
-my blackout curtains
-my animal friends.. and I supose my human friends too.

Which I have more of, due to one entertaining night.
I went out to the party (with a guy I met at the tourist office. I go there so often to ask for help that he took pity on me) in the town. I say the party, because there is only one. There is sufficent people for one (1) party. Therefor, everyone, anywhere around my age was there, sometime during the night. I didn't bring anything to drink, but TADA, no such thing as BYOB here- the lovely host supplies it all, and not all of it was wine! Needless to say I got a little tooo over excited about the different beverages.

The poor fishy was the first to go.. I accidently knocked him over, and then rescued him by putting him in a nearby gin and tonic (honest mistake! It looks like water..) My coordination was off a bit, but my french got rolling! I had fun ( besides the first bit) and got a ride home at a respectable time. I woke up feeling pretty ok, except for the fact that I still had my snowpants on.. which turned out to not be my snowpants..
We did a little exchange, snowpants for my forgotten camera, and everything is Honky-dory!
Off to some other ski mountain for the weekend-
i will post pictures when i get back, if someone will tell me how?

BAHHHHHHHH

We went for dinner yesterday to Natashas families house. It's a big sheep farm, and you can smell it a mile away. Putting the stink aside ( which was very hard to do..) it is a cute log home, with a huge stable next to it. I looked longingly at the house ( with its smoking chimney.. and almost visible heat rays) as I was led to the stable ( with its visible stink rays?). We all sat down and a very confusing game of werewolf and villagers. After the game was over , we ate dinner, all fresh foods from the farm. Fresh mutton patte is now one of my favorite snacks, of course smeared on some crunchy french bread.

After the crepe dessert ( LOVE this place.) I went to check out the sheep. If "sheep" pluralized had an 's" on the end then I would most definatly say sheepsssssssss-because there was a whole shitload of them! More than two hundred I think, two hundred heads trying to get to the feeding trough. I was contemplating crowd surfing them, when i saw the lambs.

oh MY goodness. about the cutest things in the world. Maybe 30 or 40 of them..
I then proceeded to sit down ( i am assuming in manure..) and let them all crowd around me , while giggling like a three year old. I think I almost had Laurnce convinced to take one home.. I will work on it.

A few of the moms died, so they have to bottle feed more than a dozen of them. I am sure they would love to have some help!!

I Give up.. some day during my week... more than a few weeks in

The masks are great. They only pulled out a few eyebrow hairs, and are currently still intact. Emma and Natasha both did one on each other, which they found very amusing. I was a lttile worried when Emma ( who went first) was running around the house screaming , sometimes her "fun" scream and her "pain" scream sound awfully close. She complained of it " suctiononing" her face as it was drying. I don't think it caused too much damage, her face has retained its normal oval shape, although I do recall it being a bit of a wierd feeling as it hardened on your face.

After school sometimes we pack a snack and head to the hill, not for skiing, but for "luge". We are hardened athletes, to be participating in such a crazy sport. Falling off your areodynamic, olympic worthy sled is not a lauging matter. Not only that, but I have to borrow my sled, one that is made for a much narrower bottom. My sled gave a valliant effort, but was forced to break in half, forcing me to finish my slide with no protection.

Calling sledding "luge" really makes it feel more age appropriate. I love the french language!

Since sledding is not my forté, I tried my luck on a giant slalom course. Thats right, I entered a competition, a ski competition, On a snowboard. Needless to say I blew away the competition, and got awarded a Gold . A big ass trophy for being first and last in my own catergory. Having no one to compete against is the best! I was the only boarder, I fell once, missed a door,ran over another one- but I finished.
...and I got a bloody trophy!

The only crappy part, was that when accepting my trophy, they thought it would be funny to give me the microphone to "say a few things". hahaha.

Thankyou?... very much?

Troisieme semaine...Je pense..

With Emma in school, I have been boarding every day until about lunch time. The weather is beautiful, sunny and warm. I love it. The snow.. not so much. It is icy and hard, simply turning is difficult because you can't catch an edge, its like boarding on a downhill icerink.

Emma comes home for lunch, at 1130 and goes back to school for 130 until 430. We have been playing a sickening amount of old maid, which she finds very amusing. The old maid has different animals and pharses on them, that she says whenever she gets a pair.. so despite my boredom,, it really is good to play.

I have made suppers every day this week, we have had omlettes, and spaghetti and stirfry .. none of which i ended up eating. Eating a big meal at 7 or 8 is just too late. When Emma has her after school snack, I usually eat supper :)

Gymnastics!! yay! Laurence phoned the gymnastics gym in Grenoble ( I tried, but the dumb lady wasn't understanding any of my marvelous french, so I hung up) and they are willing to let me come a few times for drop-in. I am pretty stoked about that.

Chelan (one of my former best friends.. :D ) has hooked me up with some of her friends near by. Apparently she thought my positive qualties would not be enticing enough for them to want to hang out, so she told them I was a loner, with no friends, and needed someone my own age to hang out with. It worked, they are happy to meet me, but really- loner? Thanks for the confidence boost chelan, you are a real doll.
(xoxoxo)
Wednesday today, and we are in the middle of making plaster masks. I hear squeals from the kitchen, which makes me a little nervous. Hopefully we put enough vaseline on the eyebrows...