back in france

I've been back in France for almost a week now. It feels good to be back. The voyage back went fairly smoothly (once I left Cleveland), but it was so long! Two planes and two trains. Ugh. It makes me tired just thinking back to it.

I haven't been up to too much since being back. Saturday, we all got together for dinner and cake since Tish was leaving early the next day. The rest of the weekend was just spent relaxing, enjoying the nice weather (despite a few actual storms!), and marking exams.

Monday, I was back to work. My TOEIC holder class has grown to over 40 students. I doubt everyone will ever show up all at once, but if they do... well, I don't even want to think about it. I have the biggest class by far. It's just that there's no other TOEIC level class at that hour, so those who have their other language before that class must be with me. Even though it's very unlikely they will all ever show up, there was still a huge percentage of them there on Monday. Luckily, we were watching a film (and they seemed to get pretty into that and were laughing along with the jokes), but when it comes to discussion, I really don't know how this is going to work.

Yesterday, I did a lesson with my first year students that involved creating a new function for random objects I gave them and making a commercial for it. I became a bit worried when one group cut out a beard from newspaper and were getting laughs from the group next to them. Sure enough, when they started their commercial, one announced he was Bin Laden. What followed was a highly politically incorrect skit. Oh, my students. In another class, I learned that my two German students should never be around children, because they turned a spatula into a child slapper. They got really into it. Still, they have amazing English, so they put on a great commercial.

Yesterday afternoon, I met up with Denise and our friend Raphael for a coffee which was nice since the weather was gorgeous outside. Later, I met up with a bunch of people for a concert at a nearby bar. Since I'd been gone, it was nice being able to catch up with everyone.

Other than that, there hasn't really been too much going on. I think I might pay a visit to Chauny on Friday. After talking to C. for a very long time last night, I think I'm due for a visit :-)