Zoe: "and the other presi-nent? Il set mechant?"

arrrgh

Still no internet, and pretty busy at work, so sorry if I haven't been responding promptly to emails!

Bike path

Storm aftermath. Not easy to bike over that mess!

… and we're back

It's been a busy few weeks, and I haven't had much time to do any updates. Also, despite giving our ISP (Bouygues) almost two weeks of notice, we STILL do not have working internet or phones at home. Amazing. I'll be filling in a few posts from the past weeks as we have time, but it is still hard to upload imaged. Everything goes through my phone, in hotspot mode.

Anyway, last night when we went to sleep there was a cold rain blowing sideways, strafing the flanks of the Neron, but no hint of snow. When we woke up this morning, we were amazed to see at least 5cm of snow on the ground!






When I opened our window to open the shutters, I could hear the cracks of branches and trees breaking under the weight of all the snow. Indeed, a tree fell over in the lot and almost hit our car.

A party!

After our move, I was eager to get things out of boxes as soon as possible, but it was a very busy week at work, so we didn't get much done. It would have been nice to delay Zoe's party until next week, but it turns out that next week is the start of a two week school holiday, so we figured that not many of her friends would be able to make it. So we bit the bullet, scheduled it for this weekend and unpacked like crazy into friday night and saturday morning. Chloe cooked her second set of cakes (the first set was delivered to school earlier this week). Invitations were sent out earlier in the week, and finally the big day was here. Earlier in the day I made pain perdu (French toast) and we decided to put a candle in it.

Neither Chloe nor I had ever done a party like this, as it was the first year Zoe expected it, and we were pretty stressed out. Of course, the weather turned out to be pretty uncooperative: the forecast went from sunny to rain, and then freezing rain. As a result we were left to scramble for indoor games and came up with pin the tail on the donkey (which I guess is not very common in France, but the kids seemed to really like it)

and a treasure hunt. Vanessa very kindly stayed the whole time to help -- thank you Vanessa!!!

Hmmm.

Move

Today was the big day of the move. After lots of packing and much hand wringing about how bad the movers would be, they turned out only to be the second worst movers ever (why can't they all be like Pat Ryan? http://www.yelp.com/biz/pat-ryan-moving-and-storage-san-francisco-2 ). But still, fewer things broken even if they did suddenly change the amount we had to pay because the entrance to the apartment was greater than 20 meters from the parking. What can you say to that, really? Many boxes clearly labelled in french were delivered to the wrong room, etc etc. Basically, moving was awful, but not as bad as the last time. We're just glad it's over. In the run up to the move, we threw away or donated a huge amount of stuff but there was still quite a bit. Oy vey. I should say that the three non manager guys did a good job

Note the ironic text on the box

Storming the Bastille

ok maybe "flailing my way up" would be more accurate. The Bastille is a local climb known for it's steepness. It even got the famous Bernard Hinault off of his bike, but that was after a long stage in which he had a spectacular crash. I have ridden up it a few times: once mildly drunk at night with a buddy on MTBs, and then more recently when I met up with some local expats who promptly spat me out the back. The first ramp is almost comically steep... and then it gets worse. By the end, even 15% grades are a welcome respite from the serious parts. But somehow I did not remember this when I was deciding where to go for my lunchtime ride. I guess time dulls my memory of extreme pain, but it came back very quickly. The steepest parts make it hard to even keep the front wheel on the ground, and standing up is more or less out of the question. Some photos:

painful, but a pretty unique and cool climb

Pedestrianization

The local merchants are all up in arms about the proposal, which will be put to a vote, to turn the center of town into a pedestrian only area. There are big hyperbolic signs announcing the death of the shops etc etc, and the story even made it into the Dauphine Libere (image below, used without permission)

That's our mayor, who one day assured me that he was doing what he could to stop the Tabac owner from sounding the alarm every morning and fixing the extremely noisy delivery door. Of course, it was immediately fixed. Or not at all, I can't remember which. In any case, I seriously doubt turning the center into a ped only area will kill the local stores, especially considering how much business the boulangerie does on a Sunday (when the street is closed to traffic). It will certainly be less convenient for people who live on the West side of town, however. I'm not sure how I feel about it -- if I really thought the boulangerie would be affected, I might be swayed. It is a pretty good boulangerie, after all. On the other hand, people drive through the center of town at very high speed, and the main street is basically a not-so-secret detour taken by jerks who live in Voiron, Chevallon and other places east to save time. Since they are doing it to save time, they feel obligated to put all of our lives at risk by driving in the typical French small road fashion: at the rev limiter. Unfortunately, their detour goes on the same roads on which kids cycle to school, and indeed have made one such road (The rue de Cornillon) too dangerous for that purpose. The main road can still be used, but only with very close parental supervision. It's not unusual to see little pelotons of families making their way to school, parents looking warily behind them to assign risk to the oncoming cars. Kids turning high cadence and largely oblivious to the danger behind them.

A mouse in the house!

There was a mouse in our house! Chloe bravely shrieked, jumped onto the couch cartoon-style and had the kids and I trap the mouse. The kids were beside themselves with excitement, even if it was short lived. We dropped it off in the park up the street.

Cheese plate!

Last minute trip to Annot

With Ian and Susan. The drive down kind of sucked because we left late. Tons of traffic, and we did the last (very windy) part in the dark. We eventually made it there though.

Montaud

Rode Montaud with Ian today in between the raindrops. Legs felt ok at the bottom and pretty bad after le Coing. We went most of the way up to the tunnel in the end.

Annot, Day 2

More bouldering








Ian found a pretty bird feather, the ownership of which led to much consternation and tears.

And then it was time to drive back. We stopped for lunch in Annot, but it was overrun with retirees for some reason. We couldn't get into the pizza place, so settled in for a nondescript meal at the PMU bar (France's version of off track betting). Later, we were surprised to see a convoy of Willy's jeeps drive by with American flags. Weird.

More traffic on the road back to Grey-noble, but the Trieves was glorious as usual
. We were behind a Ferrari Maranello for a while, and eventually overtook. As we did, I glanched over and saw a very old woman driving it! I'm, guessing at least 70 years old. The other weird thing is that it did not have Swiss plates.

Annot, Day one

After a relatively good sleep at La Rouie and a big breakfast, it was off to the boulders. Annot has featured many times in this blog, but just to recap: it's a small town in the Maritime Alps which is a funny mix of mountainous terrain and Provence. The cicada features prominently as in other places, but it gets cold here. In fact, we have been here a few times when there was still snow on the road. Anyway, it has an extremely rural, somewhat yokel-ish feel to it. It's a bit of a drive from Grenoble, but we always come back very relaxed and refreshed after wearing ourselves out on the boulders. It works pretty well with the kids, too, as long as the weather is not good. The best way to do it is to just play it by ear and not feel obligated to go just because you have planned it, because it is kind of miserable when it gets cold and or rainy.

Anyway, we had a great day on the blocs. Nothing very hard sent on my part, but we all got to try new stuff and the kids got to run around like little savages
























It was the Place Vendome sector, like last time. And I got spit off the same boulder as last time!