Tag Archives: French

Today: Do something trivial

5 October 2009

Leave a comment

tom selleckI’m not sure if you’ve ever been to trivia at a bar, but if you have, you can probably just go ahead and skip this post.  Come back in few days when I’ve thought of something else (equally, if not more, mundane) to write about.

Now that I’ve exclaimed that disclaimer, let’s talk trivia.  We won again this week.  I don’t really know how that happened, but I do know I got the question about Oscar Wilde right.  [This Irish writer was quoted as saying, "There is only one thing in life worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about."]  No offense, teammates, but this is clearly Wilde.  Keats?  Please.

Normally I get really excited for the French questions.  Last week I was all over haute couture, but when the question about a French pastry being named for its resemblance to lightning popped up, I had no idea what the heck the answer was.  La foudre?  Never eaten anything that remotely sounds like that.  Frankly, that sounds dégoûtante.  Apparently, the correct answer (which my teammates pulled through on) was eclaire.   And (not so) apparently, some French people call lightning… eclaire.

I totally got served when we tried to win full points on the guess the person section.  The trivia DJ (amazing job title) gives clues, with point values, to describe an individual.  The first clue has the highest point value and the later (and presumably more obvious) clues have lower values.  I tried to cash in the highest point value on a one Mr. Bill Cosby.  The clue immediately following my bounding up to the DJ with that answer was, “This person turned down an offer to play Indiana Jones in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.”  Clearly, I was doomed.  Incidentally, the correct answer was Tom Selleck.

We managed to pull off the comeback of the century (it’s all relative, my friends) and left on a winning streak.  You only need to win twice in a row to call it a streak, right?

Also On Tap for Today:

  • Survive back-to-back-to-back meetings on a Monday morning
  • Find the cord that connects my digital camera to my digital computer
  • Make plans for Kristine’s visit later this week!

Do you have any suggestions for trivia team names?  Have you ever mistaken Tom Selleck for Bill Cosby or vice versa?  And does it annoy you when people say vice-ah-verse-ah?

Today: Have a happy Monday

3 August 2009

2 Comments

Mondays get a bad rap. lundi

In college, we invented Monday Night Club to kick off the week with a little fun and festivity.  In college, I didn’t have adult responsibilities that precluded me from being over-served on a weeknight.  In hindsight, those late nights with good friends may have done more good than I intended.  I came up with some pretty incredible ideas for the week ahead on those bus rides back to campus.

I had medieval French lit at 9 o’clock on Tuesday mornings.  For my final, as Kristine will remember well, I made puppets that resembled figures from an illuminated manuscript.  I sat under my professor’s desk and the puppets acted out some weird play (in French) atop the desk for my bored and boring classmates.  I got an A, so while it was great for my grade point average, it did nothing for my reputation as a normal human.  Then again, most normal humans are not French majors.  I guess it’s all relative.

Speaking of things medieval (if you consider the 19th century “medieval”, which would make you… wrong) and Mondays, the following nursery rhyme (published in 1838) explains why I am so darn good looking:

Monday’s child is fair of face,
Tuesday’s child is full of grace,
Wednesday’s child is full of woe,
Thursday’s child has far to go,
Friday’s child is loving and giving,
Saturday’s child works hard for a living,
But the child who is born on the Sabbath Day
Is bonny and blithe and good and gay.

From now on**, instead of grumbling about the week ahead, I will celebrate Mondays as the day I was born… and the day I decided to make French-speaking puppets.

Also On Tap for Today:

  • Unpack a little, repack a lot.
  • Take a bite out of Shark Week 2009, raaaaaaaaaa!
  • Shake it in Zumba will Hilary

Were you born on Wednesday?  Woe is you.  [Not sure what day you were born?  Click here.]  How do you adjust your attitude on Mondays?  Thoughts about puppets?

[Monday's Child lyrics from (shock!)  www.wikipedia.org]

**Let’s see how long this lasts.