one week of classes left

Yesterday was a good day. First of all, the weather was beautiful once again. Go Picardie! It's been several days since it's been cold and rainy.

My class with my BTSers went very well. Because of the new rules of the school, the students can't enter the building without their teacher after the breaks. Claude went to go get the BTSers where they were waiting while I hung back. When they saw me, they all lit up, and one even called me their "américaine préférée" (favorite American). Aww! The class was once again full of fits of laughter. They couldn't stop making jokes, and we all couldn't stop laughing. I even managed to make a few jokes in French.

After lunch, we all headed to Noyon to meet up with Dot, Lauren, and Matt for Ellie's goodbye party. She's moving to Lyon on Saturday for her summer job. We all had drinks and cake and sat around chatting for a long while. It was a great time! Luckily, this was not our goodbye to Ellie, because we convinced her to join us in Chauny on Friday. However, it was probably the last time we'll see Dot, Lauren, and Matt. Sad.

Once we returned to Chauny, we took advantage of the gorgeous weather to have a BBQ with G. Let me start out by saying that the French's idea of a barbecue is different than the American idea. Hot dogs and hamburgers? As if!! Everyone we've talked to has scoffed at the idea. They do only "gourmet" meals at their barbecues. Yes, I realize we do that too sometimes, but we also like the simple things. With G., we compromised. We bought hot dogs and let him choose the other meat products. He also attempted to make some kind of potato thing, but it was a failure... partly due to the grill. Since we didn't have the BBQ at his house, we had a makeshift grill that we supported with stones. We were going to go to the "lake (actually... it's a swamp), but it was getting late, so we went to the canal instead. It was a fun time! I'd call it a success.

The other night, our friend T. stopped by to see us. We haven't seen him since before vacation, and he said that he was busy for the rest of the week, so we were surprised when he came over. We missed him! It was nice to catch up with him.

Today, I had my last class with Carole's secondes. They went well. This afternoon is my last class with the dreaded DP6. Hopefully, that one goes well also or is at least tolerable. I'm not expecting miracles here. It's also a beautiful warm day, so I hope to spend some time outside as well.

Photos
The BBQ
Rome Part I (on Facebook)
Rome Part II (on Facebook)
Dublin Part I (on Facebook)
Dublin Part II (on Facebook)
Viany's birthday (on Facebook)