Sunday, 25 March 2018
I got distracted into photo metadata and learned a smidge about big-endian (and its opposite little-endian—duh; collectively: endianness), and their distant “friend” circle of confusion.
I think I have spent some time in a circle of confusion, but today I just felt like that was a distant memory.
Thursday, 8 March 2018
As we headed out this morning, a fire truck and fire car consulted in front of the cathedral complex. Pompier means fire department.
And, around the corner, we came across two people walking flowers to…a shop(?), and two workers changing a lightbulb (no joke), using a high ladder…and another worker passing by. Ampoule means light bulb.
In the plaza around the market, many people had tables and displays on the ground of…just about everything but food…bird cages, western decorative items, bad art, record albums, books, household items, antique children’s bicycles, cross-stitched tablecloths…a wide assortment. Tablecloths are nappes.
Pass through the flower vendors under an awning and enter Les Halles, the market, and find enticing foodstuffs. This is about one-quarter of the seafood at this stall. The next stall was serving oysters on the half shell—at 11am, mind you!—and all but one of the tables was full. We kept strolling.
The locals meet up at Les Halles, wisely bringing their wheeled carriers…paniers?—oh, wait, the one on the right is a voiture d’enfant.
Heading south toward the wall, we found a service station…diesel is gazole, meaning gas-oil mix…and sans plomb, you can figure it out.
Ah, there’s the city wall, looking inside out. Wall is le
mur (duh, like mural).
Found these flying buttress on a church…église.
This was called a tartelette, and wow was it tasty. How can it not be? Cheese, sliced potatoes and bacon (more like smoky ham), hot and gooey (and more than I expected—that was a large ramekin!). With a salade verte.
This was the back of the hôtel d’ville, or city hall.
Me, I want one of those foot props! Foot is pied (like piedmont!).
Hey, way in the background, center, see the snow? That’s la
neige here.
Nice shadows in this courtyard after dark…shadows are ombres.
And, with that, bonsoir.
Monday, 29 January 2018
These ATL croci have not figured out the timing with the snow. The snow was here…and has been gone a while.
Yet our croci still are a lovely lavender/lilac (perhaps orchid) (but not really violet)…FLOWER-y purple-y color.
Tuesday, 23 January 2018
Came across a word today I don’t remember encountering before: derp. Seems like I would have seen/heard it before. I found it in a Krugman-NYT headline…and the article text, duh.
Derp means “foolishness or stupidity.” Seems like I would have encountered it, oh?, maybe a thousand times in the last year at least…. Maybe I haven’t been paying attention (hrrrrumph).
Monday, 22 January 2018
I “knew” this plant long before I remember hearing its name. I knew it had nice red berries come autumn. And some bright red leaves. I knew it had stiff woody branches, and no thorns. I knew that the branches were quite rigid, far more than most shrubs.
When I heard the name, I heard coh…toh…neee…assss…ter. Sure, fine. Then, sometime later, I saw the name spelled out, and I tried not to sound it out (as I was told to do, over and over; and over) because I found sounding it out to be misleading.
This is an artistic rendering of a section of an autumnal branch of a cotoneaster. So, again, it’s a distortion of reality…?
Then again, cotoneasters are taxonomically related to photinias. 😎
Sunday, 24 December 2017
I am not certain because of the veil of time, but I suspect that “bow” was the word that introduced me to the concepts of homonyms and homophones. I knew about this kind of bow (for hair**, too), then about bowing before royalty*. I really fought the idea that the same spelling could be pronounced differently, and realized that spelling had just revealed itself to be a can of worms, and, I suspect, nematodes.
Then I found out about “beau” and that it was French, and that may have put me off French for decades.
* Confession: we have finished season two of “The Crown” and are working our way through “Shetland.”
** Not mentioning “hare.” Or vale (first sentence). I realized that spelling was a trap. Still is. Many times people told me that Spanish is spelled the way it sounds. Not so. See: the trap is not only in tricky English.
Saturday, 2 December 2017
Would you call this a bi-color azalea bloom? Big one, too….
This flock (aka flamboyance or pat or…your term here) of flamingos are to mark the houses on the tour. Or this collection/bunch marks a super-house?
Too much pink? This is crepe myrtle bark, with wrinkles and marks rather like a desert graben.
Sunday, 26 November 2017
My constant companion these days is medically named paresthesia. It is the sensation mostly on the top of my foot and toes—they feel like they are “asleep.” With a vengeance. Sometimes I call it Pares, and think Paris, as a distraction.
The photo is to symbolize (lamely—haha) the light at the end of the tunnel. Or, “this, too, shall pass.” Something along those lines.
Thursday, 26 October 2017
We had our own little seasonal moment last night when the JCB dug in the blanket chest and, tada!, we had our first night under the feather duvet. Back in the MiddleAges (exaggeration) when I was a kid, we had quilts and nary a duvet.
Tuesday, 1 August 2017
As far back as I remember, I associate lavender with my grandmother. That may well change in the future…and I’ll associate it with my foot-thing….
Nard/nardus was the ancient Greek name….