Computers, Temperature Inversions & Our Xmas Tree

Yours truly, blogging away!

What did we do before computers? Our computer is our life line. It's our library, french language tutor, communication system (phone and email), weather and ski condition reporter, diary, recipe book, music stereo and DVD player. I spend about 3 hours a day tapping away on the keypboard! And one of my favourite things, is to switch it on each morning to see if we have any emails. So come on you slack corresponders...send us a quick email from time to time. We love to hear news from home!

There was no skiing done today! We ended up having quite a long french lesson. We are nearly up to asking questions and forming proper sentences!!.... there's hope yet! Normally we go to Liz from 9 - 11am, three mornings a week. But we hadn't seen her for over a week, so we had a lot to share about our adventures with J& J in Bergerac!! By the time we got home, it was lunch time.

It was gloomy in Araches today with a heavy cloud hanging over us and down in the valley below. It really never got above 1C. It reminded us of Wanaka in pre-winter mode. Also like Wanaka, it was a temperature inversion and when we checked the websites of Flaine and all the high ski resorts in Chamonix they were bathed in bright sunshine. You can guess what our plan will be tomorrow...?

So when the going gets tough...the tough go shopping. See the photos of some of our favourite stores - The mighty Carrefour (ie., The Warehouse on steroids - For the Aussies - Target meets Coles). And our favourite Charcuterie (Deli) - which is located on the valley floor at the very bottom of our mountain road. When we first arrived, our landlady, Marie had left us a Pineau cured sausage. After tasting it, we have become addicted. It's almost as good as Cam's (Gra's brother) homemade salami. They also have all sorts of beautiful cured hams, sausages, cheeses and other scrumptious specialities from the Haute Savoie region. Expect more reports on the delights of Pineau Charcuterie!!

Today also saw the purchase of our Christmas Tree. I know, I know - it's a little sad. But our space is extremely limited and this photo does not do our little "hang-on-the-wall" job, justice. It's actually quite cute. And for E$4 we couldn't go past it! We debated long and hard whether to get a real tree in a pot or just a cut tree but space limitation made us re-evaluate our ideas. We also bought some christmas lights to go outside our front door.

So we are set! We already have 4 christmas cards from our friends and family and so our little apartment is taking on quite a festive air!

Tomorrow, they are now predicting snow. Given this, we'll need to find a nice sheltered place to ski. In the evening we go to Rick & Liz down the road. Her brother and his family are visiting. I'm contributing the dessert. Since I'm catering for 12, I made a big pan of apple crumble. Don't even ask how hard it was to find Rolled Oats in a French supermarket! The French do not do porridge!!