On being 72 and in charge

I am taking a french class. I love it. This is my second french class here in the Pac NW and I've been happily dusting off my skillz.

My current instructor is a 72 year-old guy. He's smart, witty and quite spry. But, sometimes in class, he goes off on a tangent. Last night we spent 40 minutes listening to him tell a story about the days when he used to teach out [nearby University that thinks too highly of itself]. The story had a great surprise ending. And although he was talking about something that happened "one time in French class", it had nothing to do with Chapitre Deux and even less to do with en parlent francais. It was just a 40 minute digression. This would have been perfectly acceptable at afternoon tea, not so much for my tuition-paid class.

But, he is 72 and these things are bound to happen. Maybe this is what happened to McCain when he mentioned that the average South Korean is three inches taller than the average North Korean. Sure, the discussion was on Korea, but on nuclear complicity, not the correlation between height and ethnicity.

Is this what we have to look forward to with a 72 year-old president? Are these early signs of dementia?

Whenever Monsieur T goes off track, he says "Don't worry about this story, I am old and crazy, I am allowed to ramble." I have a feeling that might not work so well in a meeting with Ahmadinejad. Well, I guess we don't really have to worry about that, because McCain would NEVER have a meeting with the likes of Ahmadinejad. Ever.

It's Nice to Meet You Again For The First Time

(Vida, remember that quote?)

Yesterday was the first day of my beginning French class. Now, mind you, I took 4 years of French in high school. Clepped out of the first 2 semesters of college French, then amassed enough French credits for a minor in French. Well, then I moved to Indiana (not exactly known for its diverse culture) and all French-speaking, writing and reading ceased (unless I was cruising the BBC website, or sneaking in on a French conversation class). So, after 6 years in French wasteland + 1.5 more in BF Texas (also no French speakers - imagine that!), I felt like I had maybe lost my skillz.

I recently decided that I wanted to be able to speak 3 languages (take that, American education system!) and figured I might as well start with one I used to know. Well, it turns out, I'm still pretty damned good with French (if I must say so myself) and am well on my way to being GREAT with French.

I do have beef with my teacher, though. Her name is Juliette. And, in addition to having a completely cute name, she weighs about 7 pounds, but has curves in all the right places. She also has a fantastically cute personality, a great sense of humor and happens to be beautiful. Is this a requirement for female french teachers? My high school French teacher had the same characteristics. The French teachers at Purdue also had these characteristics. It isn't fair!

I think I should mention that I am the 3rd youngest person in the class - the other 2 are high school students and really don't count anyway. Do you know how fun it is at the age of 31 to be the youngest person somewhere? Yay! I'm going to love this class.

I'm picking up Arabic in the fall, as long as they don't raise tuition too much. If the Europeans can be fluent in several languages, damnit, so can I!

To hear more hateration, particularly aimed at Europeans, read the next post...