3-D Scales

The American Library is quickly turning into the Dating Game for me. Francoise informed me today that there is yet another nubile French boy who wants to conversationally delight me for an hour at some random bar. His name is Pierre Jacob, which she pronounced jay-COB, with an accent on the second syllable. Anthony was a nice enough boy but there were some dry spells occasionally, such as when he mentioned that he doesn't really like movies, he's never seen Lost, and that he considers Simon and Garfunkel and Queen to be shuffled into the realm of music that only one's parents would listen to. Hmm.

Before scavengering for toilets in the mall I checked out the Hotel de Ville's full-scale version of Montpellier, done by some guy with way too much time and little blocks of wood on his hands. I couldn't have imagined that the Hauts de Massane would have been featured (we're out in the boonies) but yep, there we were. I know it looks like Mr. Rogers' neighborhood here, but click to enlarge. See the grass island in the middle of the road? The bus driver cuts it short every day and I get thrown helter-skelter into the nearest pole. My host family's house is about three or four houses to the right and across the street.

And I found out that my Culture and Patrimony professor had been completely right about the denim/de Nimes issue. Trusty Wikipedia informs me that:

A popular etymology of the word denim is a contraction of serge de Nîmes in France. Denim was traditionally colored blue with indigo dye to make blue "jeans," though "jean" denoted a different, lighter cotton textile. This is because our usage of jean comes from the French word for Genoa, Italy (Gênes), for whom the first denim trousers were made.

I realize that I haven't posted a picture of the girls yet; Elsa remains mysteriously unphotographed so here's the only one I have of 14-year-old Nina, forcing the bunny's jaws open with a huge knife.