Veronique Moves To France

Visitor #2

2009-07-22T01:28:00.009+02:00

Lucky me, I am racking up the visitors here in Dijon. I need to open up a bed & breakfast! This time Alex Medina came to visit me. He is the son of some family friends of ours, Chris & Maggie. They go to our church and partners in crime with my parents both in and out of church. Chris & Maggie own there own hair salon, Hair On Stage and Chris is my hair stylist. I can't wait to go back to the US and get my hair done again, the right way. Chris is going to kill the dang "hair devil" here in France who fried my hair a few months back. We're still in the works of planning a secret mission to do so! Any who, Alex was out here in Europe doing some "studying" in Vienna for a month then stayed around to see some more of Europe after the program was over. He said he was studying urban design, but I think that was all a cover. Just an excuse to party a lot and take drunken photos of the city. But I won't say a word. He stayed with us for a couple of days and being the good influence that I am I threw him a welcome BBQ, took him to firework shows, took him wine tasting....all while making sure he had plenty to "drink".

We went wine tasting here at Chateau Marsannay

Just some of their vineyards

The path of paradise

Their reception room

Mmmmm Wine...

Wine tasting in a huge wine cellar by candle light!

Me in my element

Alex loved it!!

We walked over to the next little village to see a little church that a lady on the bus recommended to us because of the amazing dual sided cross they had in their garden with Jesus on one side and Mary on the other!

What a view!

And then I saw the gate I am installing on one of my future houses!!

I can't wait until my next visitor makes it over to this side of the ocean, Ms. Melissa Unsell!!! We worked together in a company called The Traveling Vineyard doing in home wine tastings. She has since switched over to Wine Shop At Home, which is a similar concept. She will be visiting me for 2 weeks beginning Sept 12th!!! Stay tuned for the the next post!!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci . . . signing out!

The Apostles Come To Visit

2009-07-20T14:11:00.015+02:00

Well not really, but they have apostle names! Marc & James. I knew these two back at Occidental College. I was a senior and they were sophmores, they really needed someone too show them the ropes at Oxy....so insert me! Perhaps it was more them showing me how to party it up, but in any case we were all bad influences on each other. So they finished undergrad. James is now teaching high school football, really he sells cotton candy at their games, but we just nod our heads and smile. Marc just landed some job where he gets paid a lot of money to basically do nothing. I think it was something to do with natural gas?....I guess you could say he will just fart around on the job. But who cares! They came to visit me in Dijon!!! So here is the photo evidence we racked up on their visit!

Marc & James are real intellectual kinda guys, they begged me to take them to a typical french cafe so they could intellectually debate about petty things like the french do.

They are always laughing, these two.

Pals forever!

Rear shot!

Marc, you could have zoomed in a little.

James always knows how to get a close-up!

They are really into taking odd photos with fake or live animals in Europe. Some kinda fetish thing.

Marc is a little more aggressive

Now no trip to France is complete without a little visit to the wine country! I took them to Chateau Marsannay in .....Marsannay, how original huh?

I just get so excited when I am amidst the vines!

My attempt at art...

Contagious!

He is forming the E in case you were wondering!

They claimed they knew nothing of wine, but they were just as excited as I was. Or they were making fun of me?

Marc tried to open the barrel, lucky for him it was empty!

Mmmmm lots of bottles of wine!

Just practicing for my future career! I have a frequent taster card here!

Next I took them to church, like the good little Catholic I am!

I made James confess, he was long over due!

Then we rubbed the famous owl of Dijon for good luck, James needed it cause the priest told him he had a limit of hearing 50 sins per day per person....and James was leaving the next day.

Marc decided he better do it too!

Off to see more Dijon

Dijon sightseeing, check!

Back home to have dinner!

But first we had to get caught in the rain!

Marc not soo happy...

We started the night out by drinking some quality burgundy wine and eating some regional cheeses.

Marc needed a second to meditate about how great this was! I think it was an excuse to nap....pansy!

Then we took them to eat at our favorite local chinese resto.

For 10 euros you get an incredible amount of food and the owner loves us and always hooks us up with house cocktails and extra food.

Marc loving the hot sauce

This was a great Oxy reunion! I hadn't seen these kids in about 3 years! They had a blast backbacking though Europe but told me that I was amazing for having a washing machine, a bathtub with running hot water and making them a homecooked meal! Also for getting them really tipsy on wine, like the old days!

It was great to have the apostles in town for a couple days! Stay tuned for the next entry about my next visitor to Dijon!

Until then, stay tuned!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci...signing out!

You know you're having too much fun at a blind wine tasting when.....

2009-06-19T15:28:00.011+02:00

the only pictoral evidence you have are the following photos.

WARNING: This is not typical blind wine tasting protocol. If you must try our way of blind wine tasting, do try this at home because otherwise you can make a fool of yourself in public.

In case you don't know what a blind wine tasting is, it is where you taste wine that has been covered up and proceed to taste the wine and guess where it comes from, the year, the grape type, etc. For this tasting, each of us brought a bottle to contribute. I forgot to take photos of the "sophisticated" part of the blind tasting. SO you get the aftermath, once we uncovered all the bottles and let all our inhibitions to the wine. I hope you enjoy!!

The first set of photos are what happens when you shake your head like you were motioning "no"... only very frantically, then you snap a photo ... hahahaha super funny!!

Then we decided it was group photo time!!

Now the solo photos....

Now a photoshoot of just me....

And of course no photo shoot is complete without the "giant croutons in your eyes" shot

The rest are just misc. photos from the night

Why thank you, I'll have another! hahaahhaha

See! It really was a blind tasting....you can barely even see the bottles!!

I hope the pictoral evidence made you laugh a lot! Also I hope it inspires you to have one of your very own!!

Stay tuned for the next post!!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci ... signing out!!!

It is not wine tasting, for me it is 'market research'

2009-06-16T16:11:00.010+02:00

What a chore I have to take on, preparing for this Masters in Wine Business. So much 'market research'. I don't want to be caught with my glass empty folks, the more I taste, the more I know (and the better buzz I get! haha)

Well whether you call it wine-tasting, market research or just maintaining the buzz...
We took a wine adventure to St. Romain. This is a small village south west of Dijon about 30miles/50km. It was popular back in the day due to the cliffs. Something about protecting people from nasty winds. Also the land is good for vines because they are positioned better in the sunlight due to the slope placement. Whatever. The wine was great! We went to one particular vineyard where the wine taster giver person gave us like 13 different wines to taste! And this was only before lunch!! Market research can be soooo demanding. In any case, I found time to take some pics for you... hope you enjoy some French countryside photos!

The Almighty Protective Cliffs!!!

The other people I dooped into "market researching" with me!

We were still composed after tasting allllll these wines!

NO JOKE, we tasted all but one of the bottles on display!!

The "downtown" of St. Romain

The left side of "downtown"

Martin - Market Researcher #2

Valerie & Stephane - Market Researchers #3 & 4

Alexis - Market Researcher #5

Well the wine was GREAT! But the city was small....when you only have one restaurant...you know you are small. And being the frenchmen they were, the restaurtant owners didn't want to make any extra money by having 5 people there...so they told us to go to another city to eat. Only in France! So we drove to the next town over called Mersault ("Mer-so")....cause we were mer-Soooooooo Hungry!!! So I took some photos there as well:

The mer-Soooooo old church

The mer-Sooooo typical Burgundy Roofs

A mer-Soooo pretty fountain!

mer-Sooooo close up now!!

mer-Sooooo far back now!

mer-Sooooo having a deja-vu!!

mer-Soooooo lucky I took a video of this dowtown Mersault!!

My mer-Soooooo yummy 'tartiflette' made with epoisse cheese (aka REALLY stinky)

I devoured this in like negative 3 seconds!!

A random photo opp I got of the french tractors that they use to ride throught the vineyard wine rows.

Hope you enjoyed my 'market research' in St. Romain and our detour in Mersault!

I'm mer-Soooooo excited to write the next entry!! Stay tuned!!

This Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci ... signing out!!

Save Ya Knees N Bones....

2009-05-17T23:08:00.016+02:00

Cause you're gonna need 'em to go wine tasting in Savigny les Beaune! (Sahv-ee-nee/leh/bone...get it??) Ok, so it was a cheap play on words....but that's what happens when you've had some wine to drink.

So I have a lot of bones to pick with France...but at the end of the day you gotta love 'em for the endless amounts of wine festivals they put on here! And this ain't no "1 oz" American wine tasting...these people pour you a whole glass! Hows that for "tasting" their wine? I don't know who is more under the influence at these ordeals....the tasters or the representatives. Granted most of the wine reps are country-hill billy-wine growing-old farts-who start each morning with a "petit blanc" (for you non-french speakers...'a little white'.....glass of wine) We all imagine the snobby wine reps in suits and ties telling you about the small little nuances of each particle in the wine that makes you feel like the size of a grape....but not here. These small wine festivals are to showcase the wine from that small region/village. So you get to meet the people who actually grow the wine, sing it to sleep each night, and who are the real deal. The folks with grape stained fingertips and talking to you in a style of french that you never learned in school.

Savigny les Beaune is a small village near Beaune which is near Dijon, where I live. Population: 1300. This village alone is home to 22 Premier Crus.....i.e. really good wine! So let's go!

Walking into town...

Get a load of Grandpa and his cane! Ain't nothin' stoppin' him from gettin' to some wine!

Gotta love the romanian mini carnival for the kids! All I have to say is romanian clowns are creepy!

There was a train to take you to the various wine tasting cellars in the village. Wine tasting is hard work!

Me in my element!

The pour souls we dragged into this adventure! We really had to twist their arms!

Oh, Paradise!

The chateau of the village. There were random military fighter planes in the gardens around this chateau, 81 to be exact, apparently the current chateau owner is a collector. They really added to the ambiance of the place....I mean who wouldn't decorate their chateau gardens with 81 fighter planes?

The quote on the entry to the chateau gardens says:

The wine of Savigny is nourishing, theological, and keeps death away! How true!

A wine village is not complete unless they have a basketball hoop of the San Antonio Spurs' Tony Parker on the wall.

So quaint!.....yes, I said quaint.

Feelin' pretty good!

"YOU GOTTA PROBLEM WITH ME WINE TASTING?"

Watch him turn those bottles of bubbly!

My turn!

*This is an old process of turning each bottle of bubbly by hand over a period of time, that allows the fine sediments from the yeast in the bubbly to settle in the neck of the bottle for easy removal before corking. This process called remuage is now done by machine but the old method of doing it by hand is still used in fine champagne making today.

Easy, breezy, beautiful, Coverboy!

How sexy!

The different sizes of wine bottles!

Imagine tasting wine here!

St. Vincent, the patron saint of wine makers

St. Vincent again!

A random New Orleans sounding jazz band outside one of the cellars! Very cool!

Leaving the village.

My homie, St. Vincent!

Well, I hope you enjoyed the wine tasting adventure. Don't be too jealous!

Stay tuned for the next entry!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci ... signing out!

Hard Core Wine Tasting

2009-05-04T15:49:00.000+02:00

Now I know what you are thinking.....

DEAR LORD.....Ceci & Hard Core Wine Tasting.....OH NO!!!
SOMEONE STOP HER!!! WHO UNLEASHED THE BEAST!!!

Hahaha, but no no. Let us not get ahead of ourselves here.

It was simply hard core because it was pouring rain in the area and it was an outdoor small village wine festival and you had to walk from wine cellar to wine cellar therefore we were amazingly drenched from head to toe....but we perservered!! No rain, no lighting, no gust of wind would stop us!!! This was seperates the men wine tasters from the boy wine tasters!!

So here is the pictoral evidence =)

We were in a french village called Moroges. Pronounced....More-Ojjzhhh?
Oh well ... I tried.

Sooo awesome!

This is real my friends!

It was raining, but who cares!

The poor folks we suckered into going with us!

Me, near the old grape presser....aka the DREAM MAKER!

THE DREAM MAKER II

Mmmm. Wine Stuff!

The Amazing Cheese Mixture On Bread that was was oven melted!!

OH SO YUMMY!!!

Some Bag Pipe Players that had to play under a barn cause the rain.

Some live footage!

Hope you enjoyed! Stay tuned for wine tasting weekend part deux....thats french for two for you slow pokes out there....

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci ... signing out!

Dijon 'Her'tory

2009-05-04T15:48:00.000+02:00

Ok so you're probably thinking to yourself, "Gosh, she is is taking forever!" But I have a good excuse!! I needed to reallly work hard on this entry being that it is the 'HER'STORY OF DIJON (why 'her'story.....cause it's the Ceci take on it!!) I needed to scour the depths of the internet, where few men/women have gone before, to retrieve the juicy details, the mundane facts, the gossip of the city, and of course go to the city history library to read the ancient french writings from the ancient rulers of this city......only to turn it into the comically offensive texan gal version....those old dukes must be making back flips in their graves as I am typing....."SACRE BLEU!! ZIS GURL EEZ MAYKEENG ZEE COMPLEET MOCKAIREE UHV UHSSS! ZIS IS KATUHSTROFEEEEEK"....Translation from really heavy french accent...Oh hell nooooo, this hoe is all up in the koolaid and she ain't even know the flavor!!! Uhhh-Uhhh Biotch!! (Snap Snap, Snake Head Manuever) So after being here 3 months....here is the Dish on Dijon!

So the most important part of a city is how it came to be....because without that....well, the city wouldn't exist......

So we go back a few years ago to....ohh....around Roman times, Aurelian, 270ish after Jesus, my home-boy! So these romans didn't have us Texan's capability to properly road trip, and needed a little pit stop between Lyon and Paris...which is ooonly 290 miles, OMG freak out!....what boobs! So they decided the now called Dijon was a good place to create a pitstop...

No no.....I'm not talking about no Flying J here people! These were the ancestors of the french,

They needed something scenic and pampering with birdies, flowers, running rivers and prime vineyard weather! So naturally they came across this piece O land and gave it the name Divio....or more formally Divionense castrum....which, by the way, sounds like a male private parts surgical procedure. Well really this roman word castrum thingy means a chunk of land designated for military purposes, but whatever, they were just pansies and couldn't hack a simple road trip! So time went on, the castrum became a functional city, with gentiles and all.....then a future saint, Benignus (we'll call him Bennie), came along around the 12th century and did his saintly works and transformed the citizens into God-fearing, guilt-loving Catholics and they made a church in his honor....

and declared Bennie the patron saint of Dijon! They later created the city anthem and called it "Bennie & The Jets" but just recently it was taken off the official records because Elton John filed a law suit stating too many royalty checks were being sent to the Dijon government and it was his version of Bennie & the Jets that was the popular one, so Dijon needed to find a new anthem ? And the french don't know how to put up a good fight....so they obeyed?

**Yes I made this photo

This whole 12 century Bennie Fever was a big hit! He unfortunately was martyred, but they sold t-shirts saying I Heart Bennie, and had Bennie Bobble Head Dolls, the whole works. They also became such fanatic Catholics that they built enough churches to be called "The City of 100 Church Bell Towers"

A few hundred years before this though, the city of Dijon became super famous because some royalty dudes called, Phillip the Bold, John the Bald, and Charles the Pimp...

decided it was a great place to put their palace...

and its throne, more commonly known as the seat, for the Duchy of Burgundy? Don't ask, just read. This Duchy idea is just a nice word to mean the rich royalty folk were playing musical chairs with the land, while the 99% working class were working the land and making it the famous wine and gastronomical monstrocity it is today. (I would like to make it known that I just condensed words and pages of Wikipedia information into 2 sentences for you)

So lets talk about what the 99% working class of Dijon created in these years of Duchy Musical Chairs....

They created the process of making the world famous DIJON MUSTARD!

They created the infamous SPICED BREAD!

They created the foundations for the world famous Burgundy Wine Regions and Wine Making!The drive from Santenay to Dijon, known as the Route Des Grands Crus, passes through the major vineyards of Burgunday.

They created numerous types of delicious cheeses, particularly Epoisse! Burgundy's legendary stinky cheese, Epoisses is a soft-centered cheese usually made from cow's milk with a rind washed in marc, the French equivalent of grappa, aka wine grape brandy. It is banned from the United States, because it is unpasteurized. This cheese is very very strong and smells like my arm pit after running 3 miles....but it is sooooooooooooooo gooooooooooood!

They created the delicious Cassis Liqueur, or blackcurrant liqueur. The famous Kir drink also originates from the city and was created by the former mayor of Dijon, Canon Felix Kir. The drink is made by mixing this cassis liqueur and white wine, especially the Burgundy Aligote, or Champagne.

Not to mention they built the city by hand from the ground up! And they did such a great job that the city is famous for having the largest amount of buildings more than 300 years old, which are still standing!! Dijon also is known for having the most varying types of historical architecture than any other city. Now I am no architecture whiz, so there is no way I am going to date these for you, but the following pictures are the different types of architecture over the centuries that are still standing in Dijon.

**Gothic Style Architecture

***The region's architecture is distinguished by, among other things, the Burgundian roofs, made of tiles glazed in terra cotta, green, yellow and black and arranged in eye-catching geometric patterns.

***The full street is preserved architecture from what it looked like in the Middle Ages

***Well I know its not architecture, but in my very mature mind, its just plain funny!

The walking route to discover all of these historic features of Dijon can be found by following the small triangles on the Owl's Walking Trail:

with 22 stops in front of the historical points in downtown Dijon. They look like this....

So why the owl? Legend has it that an architect in charge of drawing the blueprints for the Cathedral Notre Dame in Dijon, saved an injured owl on the side of the road on his trip to Dijon. To repay him for his help, each night the owl flew all over Burgundy to find the best architecture styles to tell the architect how to design the cathedral and greatly please the Dukes. The design for the cathedral was a huge success, and to give honor to the little owl, the architect had a small owl carved into the side of the cathedral. To this day it is the good luck charm for Dijon, and it is said that if you rub it with your left hand, it will be bring you good luck!

To finish out our journey......here are some other random facts about Dijon

*Twas the birth place of:
~Charles de Gaulle = former french Prez
~Henry Darcy = a french engineer who made several important contributions to hydraulics, so thanks to this guy you crazy mexicans can do that crazy lifting/dropping thing with you car.
~Gustave Eiffel = designed the Eiffel Tower, the Statue of Liberty, and the 4 Horse fountain from my Lyon Herstory Blog!
~And this lady?

Dijon is also host to the annual Gastronomic Fair at the end of October, for those of you still puzzled..., that means its a food fair, with over 500 exhibitors and 200,000 visitors every year, this is one of the ten most important fairs in France.

Dijon is also home, every three years, to the international flower show Florrissimo.

Dijon also is a host city for the famous Fete de la Musique (Music Festival) every June 21 in various cities worldwide (created by the french), celebrating the summer soltice with live musical groups playing on street corners, food, fun, and lots o drunk folks...lasting until til the wee hours of the morning.

Population of Dijon 150,800 and 236,953 for the greater Dijon area.

There are many museums in the city, including one dedicated to mustard and steak!

Dijon has on average 158 days of rainfall per year. Lucky Me!

AND THAT MY FRIENDS IS MY 'HER'STORY OF DIJON!!!
HOPE YOU ENJOYED!!

Look forward to the next blog, about my recent wine tasting festival adventures!!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci ... signing out!!

Were Gonna Drink Barcardi Like Its Yo Birthday!

2009-04-02T17:57:00.010+02:00

So here are the photos I promised you from my birthday!

The breakfast Stephane made me ....

Then we went to Lac Kir (Lac is french for lake for those of you who found it not so obvious)

After laking and having a picnic lunch of quiches....we went home and got ready for some chilean wine and spanish tapas. We arived at the restaurant and found boxers hanging on the ceiling. As we were later informed....on Saturday night, if you strip to your boxers behind a giant sombrero, then give the restaurant your boxers....you get a free drink!?!?!?!

Here was our meal....

The wall design.....Stephane and I were debating as to whether the thingy in the genital region of the bull was his 4th leg....or his other 5th leg? Ahahahaha

Boo on Water.....Drink Wine!!

Apparently the lighting cause the rim of my glasses to cast a shadow on my face in the form of a mustache...So this is Ceci is she were Don Juan de Ceci.

We went to a Jazz Concert Tribute to Billie Holiday afterwards, but I couldn't take any photos.

Followed by some french desserts with candles and some bubbly at our appartment.

On Wednesday was my actual birthday dinner. The restaurant we wanted to go to for my birthday is booked a month in advance and a month ago they only had an opening on the 25th....not the 23rd....but oh well. It is called the Pourquoi Pas? (Poor Kwah Paw)(translation = Why not?) It was a five course meal! See the yummyness to follow!

The first course was an amuse-bouche (literally a mouth amuser) of tapenade and toast with out pre-meal adult beverages.

The second course was our entree (translation = appetizer) I had an scallops and chorizo spring roll....and Stephane had a vegetable mousse thingy....

For our plat (translation = main course)

I had a fish potpie thingy and Stephane had Kangaroo...

Course 4.....cheese plate!!!!!!!!

Course 5......DESSERT! I had alcoholic sorbet....one was margarita, one was pink vodka, and one was a Cuba Libre. Stephane had a creme brulee

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci ... signing out!

Valentine's Post Will Have to Wait

2009-03-26T17:59:00.012+01:00

Cause my birthday is just way more important!

So, this year I turned the big 25! WhootWhoot! Now I can officially rent a car on my own and can no longer piggy back off my parent's insurance! Yaaaayy!! For those of you who know me, you know that I always celebrate with a crazy partay....but being that I am lacking in the friends department here in France, I thought it would be a better idea to play it low key this year....but I didn't skimp out on the fun!!
To begin it all, my parents threw me a WEBCAM Birthday Party at midnight my time (5o'clock US time)! They had my Dad's yummy famous BBQ and french champagne (there is no other kind) and drank some Malbec. I stood up with them until 5am and watched them go from sober to wasted! It was the first time I wasn't part of the drunken debauchery! Well, I was sipping on my fair share of wine here in France, but ambiance and company can add to the buzz. Anywho, I woke up feeling like I had a real life party and they woke up with real life hangovers. I had a blast and felt super great to have been able to virtually party with my family and friends. So anywho, upon waking up on my real birthday, Stephane made me a yummy breakfast!, then we took Miss Dolce and went for a walk at a nearby lake and had a picnic of Quiches, went back to apartment, talked to my sister on webcam, then off we went to have tapas and wine at a spanish restaurant, and then Stephane took me to a jazz concert tribute to Billy Holiday here in Dijon to top off my night. I will post pictures from my birthday in another post, cause something is all funky with the picture posting options (it only shows up in HTML and that would take me 5 hours to place them between text) sooo for now....I leave you with 3 interesting videos from my birthday night. The 2 are Stephane and I dancing to a song at the spanish restaurant and the last is us singing 'happy birthday' to me!!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci ... signing out

Attack of the Killer Squirrel While Moving to Dijon

2009-03-24T13:54:00.000+01:00

Well.....we were 'en route' to Dijon with a "big" van and all of our worldly belongings in tow....

When............ A Killer Squirrel tried to take over the van!!!

First he went for the guard dog!!!

But she was not in the mood.....so he turned his sights on the driver!!

In one giant leap he threw himself back on the dog!!

Stephane was mortified!!

So was I !!!

He then turned towards me and with an evil laugh went straight for my throat!!

Please don't hurt me Mr. Squirrel!!!

"You have no power over me!! I take your van now!" yelled the killer squirrel

We were lucky he couldn't see enough to drive.....

He then instructed Stephane to follow his commands

Towards the Center of Town!!

Stop! i want to see the topless girl on the billboard ad!!

Now go left!!

Make a RIGHT!! (actually our real street that we live on ..our apt is the 4th floor around the 4th tree back on the left side of the pic)

And before the killer squirrel told us to make a left into a building....

I picked him up in one swoop and made him my lunch!!!

With the Killer Squirrel out of the way, we were able to proceed with the moving in!!

Our "big" van....

We had to show off our muscles!!

Lost in the jackets!!

Our future dining room!

The kitchen!

Our future living room!

The future bedroom!

Stephane really wanted one of the rooms in the apt to be his office.....so I told him the closet room was plenty enough!

All in all.....we unpacked in record time and now all the rooms are up an running. To date, we only have about 5 little boxes that need unpacking....In a few blog entries I will post our apartment with everything all setup! Dijon has turned out to be a great little city and I am excited to make a post about Dijon for all ya'll fans of mine!! Stay tuned for the next entry...our Valentine's Extravaganza Weekend!!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci . . . signing out!

Whoever said packing is not fun....

2009-03-09T23:13:00.008+01:00

Obviously hasn't packed the Ceci way!!
Its last minute, its chaotic, its has absolutely no rhyme or reason ... but its miraculously efficient and gosh-darnit ~ a ton o' fun! Its like the clean up scene in Mary Poppins, only cooler.

Well, the day came to pack (most people take a couple weeks to do it) but I do it in a day! It is really not as easy to find cardboard boxes here in France. They are all shiesty with their boxes here. In the good ole US of A, all you have to do is ask your local store for their leftover boxes...here they look at you, spit on your foot and tell you that the government requires them to fill out a form to give you the boxes which must be accompanied by a form that has not yet been created that you, the needer of the box, must fill out.

No, but for real, you have to buy boxes here....and they are freakin 'spensive...like most everything else here in France. But there is a God and he is goo-ood, and at least the wine, cheese and foie gras are cheaper here.

Anywho...we bought some boxes....and began to pack

*The ubiquity that is Stephane

Stephane is one of those "planning" kinda people, does stuff in advance so as to be finished 2 days before it is necessary. He started packing his stuff like two weeks in advance and was secretly festering cause Ceci/Veronique is one of those people who does everything at the last second....Don't get me wrong, I always deliver - And its amazing quality & done 113% but it is done at the last possible second. And besides, every relationship needs to balance. And Stephane and I stood the test of all relationships....the moving test.....we did it without one fight.....well just one minor one cause I realllllllllly wanted to drive the moving van.....but Stephane won cause I didn't have a french driver's license. Boo. Sad face.

The living room....

The bedroom...

The bed....Don't know why I felt the need to take a picture of the bed....its not like you can pack it or anything...?

The "office"/ my shoe room ...

The hallway...

Dolce helping us clean up....

Packing is hardwork, one tends to fall asleep on the job....

or the stove....

or the john...(not the first time I have passed out on the john, *cough* college *cough* really drunk *cough* passed out in dorm bathroom *cough* pants still in the 'taking-crap-position' *cough* found by my roomate Meaghan *cough*)

Im not narcoleptic, just friggin packed in one day!

So we said our final goodbye or Au Revoir, as it were!

Made one last pose for the camera....

Walked out into the cold snow .... and headed off to Dijon!!

*View from the front door of our old apartment building

Stay tuned for the next entry...the journey to Dijon and the attack of the killer squirrel.

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci...signing out!

Lyon can suck on my bone! We're moving to Dijon!!!

2009-02-26T23:41:00.008+01:00

Okay, soooooo I am so over Lyon......

I got bored and quite frankly I was losing blog material......
Plus I heard the mayor got wind of my rendition of Lyon history and wasn't too happy. Damn the french snobbism......they have no sense of humor when it comes to making fun of their culture. Ugh!

So now I get a new city to pick on........a new history to make fun of, er uh, I mean recount...
Hopefully this one will be more into my sense of humor.....

So, why did we move to Dijon?
Well, Stephane got hired by a company called Groupama. Yes my friends, he did the impossible, he actually found a salary paying job during the financial crisis! So what does this company...."Groupama" do? Well anything with "-ama" for an ending has to be awesome right?

It ain't no drama if Obama is on yo mama without her pajama while pretending she's his llama.

Okay, well maybe not that cool....it's actually an insurance & banking company. I know, I know, you would think the last place to hire these days would be an insurance/bank company....but apparently they need lawyers these days.

Here is where Stephane works......its the shizz-ama!

They don't allow clocks in the building so everyone has to go outside to see the time.

So upon getting hired, they told Stephane that he needed to move to Dijon and be ready to start in one month......so we had to really kick our Ass-ama's in high gear and find an apartment..... and in this blog you get to come along on our trip-ama.

So we have our first apartment-ama visit at 9am......it takes 2 hours to drive there......1 hour to get ready and have breakfast-ama, so we had to wake up at 5ama !!

Stephane is very perky at 6am!

Of course the McDonald's on the way doesn't serve breakfast food....but they tell us with a smile that they are open breakfast hours with a regular menu!! So we had the breakfast of champions.....of heavy weightlifting.....ugh McDonald's burger at 6am......stomache ache-ama!! And a lesser known fact is that with the exception of select McDonald's, there are absolutely no places to get breakfast food in France.....where are the Jim's, Denny's, Cracker Barrells when you need them?

Mmmmmmm!

Smootchies to the McDonald's "Le M"

I want to eat the box-ama!!!

And seriously, you would think that someone in the translation-ama department would have thought twice about calling their ranch dressing wanna be......CREAMY DELUXE!

I love it when I have CREAMY DELUXE Sauce in my mouth!

Open wide, for CREAMY DELUXE !!

It wasn't until we got to Dijon that we noticed that the printer was out of ink when we printed the directions.....so it was super super light gray every other direction line and the rest was.....well, white ink?

I have no idea where to go?

Stephane turned to the CREAMY DELUXE for answers.....

So after driving around aimlessly-ama we found the first apartment, fell in love with it! Saw the second one, which was decorated like someone threw up greek deco, plaid, yellow, yucky crap on the walls (you think i am joking?) It was so bad, it gave me indigestion! And that was on top of the McDonalds burger and swallowing all that CREAMY DELUXE!!!!

Anywho, we didn't have the will power (nor the printed directions) to see the third apartment and besides, we already knew that the first apartment was for us.....so we called the owner-ama and told her we wanted it! She asked us for the secret password....which was obviously CREAMY DELUXE!!! And with that the apartment was ours!!!

Stephane telling the owner the secret password...

YAY for CREAMY DELUXE and OUR NEW APARTMENT!!!!

Dolce thinks we are strange....but she loves us anyways

And now......stay tuned for the "Moving out of our Lyon apartment-ama" blog!!

This is Veronique, the American-ama formerly known as Ceci, signing out!!

AMA!!!!!!!!

Never toooo much wine... to ring in '09

2009-02-26T14:32:00.010+01:00

Well my friends, I have internet back! We were offline because of our move to Dijon....but no longer! Now you may laugh again!! Or just think I am strange.....

So, where were we?? Ahh yes! New Years 2009!

Well it started out tame.....the French family having a brunch at Crumpets with the crazy Mexican-American family. They were staring at us for not knowing how to use a fork and knife properly......and my dad had to ask for tortillas for his filet of beef tenderloin!!!

So after we had a yummy brunch we went home, decorated, and set out all the yummy food and drinks!

The pictures of our New Years grow 'silly' very quickly....

Me with Momma Frenchie and Granny Frenchie

Me and my biznatches!!! aka Mom and Sis

Toasting in the New Year!!!

The other side of the circle...

And one big group picture!!! 3....2....1....Happpppppy Neeeeeew Yeeeeeaaaaarrrr!!!

Now lets blow on our noise makers!

He can blow his quicker!!

She can blow hers farther!!

She can blow hers longer!

We were interrupted mid-blow!!

Yo Momma ......... (you can fill in the phrase for yourself)

Then it was time for the "Crazy Hat" Game....

and the winner was......NewYearHatOSauraus

I was attracted to the beak...

Some of us entered the "crazy faces" category.....

And after not tooooooo much wine......there was some dancing.....

You know the night ended up great, when Rey couldn't find his drink......that was on his forehead the whole time!!!

I would have included the "other" photos.....but Frenchie's family left and thought we just played cards and then went to bed.....and what they don't know won't hurt them......muahahahaha

Stay tuned to the blog about moving from Lyon to Dijon.......

This is Veronique, the american formerly known as Ceci ... signing out!

The Gringa goes back to her roots...

2009-02-01T20:35:00.009+01:00

Yes, Yes, the gringa went back to Mexico, but she brought some peace offering gifts in the form of frenchmen!!! We all know the Spanish are to blame for taking over Mexico, sleeping with their women and multiplying the Mexican population (now you know where they picked up the habit of having so many fricken kids!) Well, you know the saying 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend' ..... so I brought the mexicans some frenchmen......to kinda smoooooth things over.

Ok, whatever, it was really the family of my sugarpie, Stephane. Annnnd, they came to the US to visit my family!! (Really it was to try and get US citizenships, but they won't admit it. They heard that my family has the 'hookups' all over the place.)

So once they met my family, and didn't jump on the next plane home, I decided to go for the gold! They had to meet my Mexican family. The BBQin', Corona drinkin', tequila shootin', grito loving, taco obsessed, hugs for everyone, talk to ya til your ear falls off, and feed ya til you're torturously full......Mexican family! And they still didn't run for the Altantic Ocean.....these frenchmen are relentless! I had no more cards to throw at them, so they passed the Barretto test. They are officially Barretto material and will now be referred to as Barretto Groupies.

So here is the pictoral evidence from Mexico....the incriminating photos have been left out because I honor the "what happens in Mexico stays in Mexico....except the Mexicans" code.

My grandma grew up and spends about half the year here in El Cercado. It is about 20min south of Monterrey. This is the view of the mountains that surrounds the town and was also the background for hundreds of my extended family's conceptions.... and not mine....so stop thinking of my mom and dad doing the dirty.....

This is where my family went after their conceptual action.....

There is a famous waterfall in the town called Cola de Caballo....or Horse Tail Falls, for all you white folk out there. And this was the view on the drive up there.

Here it is....

Just Kidding.....that was my dad taking a pee....

This is it.....

It really is a sight. The photo below is a retake of one my mom and I took about 23 years ago.....back then there wasn't that many fences and obstacles so in the old photo you could see the waterfall in the background....but if you look hard enough you can still see it in the background.....( I fit a lot better in her lap back then too)

Awww.....nice photo

The stunning creators of Ceci ...

We are the Barretto's....we can't help but take strange photos and make others do it too...

They call their grandma 'Mami'......and Mami was a great sport!!

We picked this guy up at the waterfall.....he claimed he was Stephane's brother and he kinda spoke some broken french, so we let him come back with us.....

How big, how monsterous......(Im talking about the mountains)

How gorgeous, how sexy......(I'm talking about me!)

Stephane and I with our grandmothers. Mine is "Welita"...and his is "Mami"

And my youngest cousin is just a photo hog, but a cute photo hog!

The background of the neighboring town, Santiago, where our hotel was.

Big Barretto & Barretto Groupie Family Photo......say "squeeeeeeze"

Stay tuned for the post of New Years Eve!!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci ... signing out!

A Lil Bit O' San Antonio in San Raphael

2009-02-01T19:03:00.000+01:00

Okay so I just realized a hidden file of photos, so I am going to make a major 'faux pas'... and place this one now instead of the family trip to Mexico, but don't worry....that one will be next!

So having returned from the depths of my photo archive.... this one is alllll the way back from August.

Me, your lovely San Antonio-an visited a lovely beach town called San Raphael in the south of France. Yes....I, Veronique Barretto, can finally say "I vacationed in the south of France...hmmm" How chic!

Well as all good roadtrips must start, we had to make sure the tires were up to par.

But please tell me how much the word for 'tire' in french looks like it would be pronouced like the english word for the male anatomy...? (Imagine....a 4x4 penis?)

This was my "I'm vacaying in the south of France" face!

This was Dolce's "my mom is so strange" face.

He was working on an important merger deal thing.....

And this was my merger thing....

The real reason we went to San Raphael in the south of France was to spend a weekend with Stephane's family at this resort place. So the first night we arrived, it was Spanish food night at the resort......this was the big vat of Paella....mmmmm!!

Steph and his momma!

Me and Steph's bro.....Pascal!! He was shocked I didn't wear any makeup!

I woulda made a great boyscout.....cause I'm always prepared!!

The theme for the entertainment was "Grease!!" it was really ....ummm....interesting to hear Grease reinacted....in french.....but all in all, they get an A for effort.

Summer lovin' had me a blast! Summer lovin' happened so fast!

Go Rydell High!

Beauty School dropout...

Why this car is systematic, hyyyyydromatic....why its Grease Lightning!!

Chchchchchchchchc Buhm Buhm Chchchchchchchc.....

Go Grease Lightning Go Grease Lighting !!!!

Saaaaandy, baaaaby, I'm in misery!

The resort decided to have a firework show to celebrate my arrival! It was sooo nice of them to do that for me!

The next day we took a tour of the city! C'etait magnifique!!!

Went tanning in the little cove!

Oh la la!

This was a brand of sugar, called 'Daddy', that was on the breakfast table.....the translation for the words in black says.... "Daddy takes the form of all your desires!"

The bold part says, "Daddy....all round, all white, it has all that is good!

The bottom says, "Click, Enter, Savor....Daddy.fr"

Either it was early or this was the msot fallic suger advertising ever!

A typical french resort breakfast....accompanyied by Champagne! Not sparkling wine.....no no, the real deal!

On the last night we went out for a night on the town!

The Adjou Famille

Stay tuned for the next entry, our trip to Mexico....this time it will be in chronological order =)

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci ... signing out!

Full Steam Ahead !!!

2009-01-29T22:19:00.005+01:00

Alrighty kids, we are back in business! Sorry again for the delay. I guess I was still butthurt about getting my camera stolen, then I went back home for a month and had zero time to get on my computer in between all the glasses of wine, parties, and catching up with friends and family. (Plus I was soaking up all the people calling me 'Ceci') But now I am back in France (and now I'm called 'Veronique') and I've got a new camera and new laptop in hand.....so here we go! The ever-famous Veronique Moves to France Blog is back!! And I would like to say a big thank you to all my readers who made it a point to tell me how much they missed my blog!! Smootchies!!

Sooo, naturally you want to know how my time back home in Texas went.....lets take a small journey down memory lane.....

Well for those of you who know me, know that my life is centered, at all times, around a glass o' vino......but this Christmas trip back home was an exception......Everything was centered around a bottle of wine at all times!! I have officially declared my blood type as 'Cabernet' ..... and my liver is still angry at me!

I took Stephane's family to show 'em how to really make wine! Hee hee! They insisted that even thought the bottle said 750ml....the bottles looked bigger here, but I just told them that once they crossed the border into Texas.....there is a vision force field that gives everyone Texan-Vision so that everything looks bigger.......Cause they can't have false advertising charges for the slogan "Everthing's bigger in Texas"

Stephane's brother, Pascal ......Thats Pas-Cal ..... not Pascual (for all you Mexicans out there)

well, he has a love for doughnuts, but in France doughnuts taste like cardboard... so we took him to Krispy Kreme......the pictures say it all!!!

I took the Adjou Family to see the lights dowtown....

And then it was Christmas!!!

The Barretto's & The Adjou's Christmas/Noel Throwdown 2008

There was an overload of gifts....many of which were contraband from France.....=)

My dad had to call Santa and Pere Noel and tell them they needed to join the "Go Green" movement because it was better for the environment and for his head!

So the gifts.....

My sister got her chocolate fix...

Liquid Chocolate for him, K.Y. for her....and him, too ;)

Stephane finally got his Texas Passport and his Honorary Citizen of Texas Certificate. His french name maybe Stephane Fabrice.......but his Texan name is "Stefanny Febreeze"

The BYOW Crew got an official BYOW T-Shirt !!!!

And I was apparently very naughty......so I got a letter from Santa and coal !!

So at the risk of keeping you too long from your job, chores, homework, or another glass of vino.......I will put the rest of my Christmas Break on other entries....to include the deux familles vacay to Mexico, New Years, & BYOW Madness !!!

Stay tuned & Welcome Back!

This Veronique, the American formerly known and Ceci ... signing out!

Alas, the period of mourning is over...

2008-11-13T22:23:00.004+01:00

To all my beloved readers....

I am truly sorry for the month long hiatus I have taken from this blog. It was due to the fact that my dear, dear digital camera was stolen a month ago at a bar here in Lyon called the Q-Boat.

Whoever the horrible person was who took my camera, I hope that it takes horrible pictures for you and I hope that karma finds you well. That being said, it took me a while to muster up the emotional strength to continue writing this blog. So until I get back to the U.S. and can buy a new camera, please bear with my posts as I am going to have to dig deep into the unknown corners of 'My Pictures' to produce the ever-popular blogs you have come to enjoy. And to kick of this new period of my blog [sans digi cam] I shall quote one of my previous post titles...

LET THE GAMES [RE]BEGIN !!!

R.I.P.

DIGI CAM TZ5

Give the damn thief hell !!!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci...signing out!

*This is my "death look" for the person who stole my camera!

**Disclaimer: My "death look" is not actually meant to impart death on anyone....it is merely meant as "you-are-a-punk-and-may-karma-kick-ya-where-the-good-Lord-split-ya-and-may-your-children-look-like-monkeys"

Institute Lumiere

2008-10-15T18:43:00.008+02:00

is where people go to learn how to play the character of Lumiere in Beauty & the Beast

Ok...
I really hope you didnt believe that.

It's actually the house where the Brothers Lumiere grew up.
So who cares right?
Well if you own, use, have ever used a camera, or have any pictures in your control....then you should!! If you own, rent, watch, or have ever watched a movie....you should!! These guys invented the snapshot camera, color photos, as well as the movie projector, the camera that records movies, and they were the first to ever make a film, show a movie to a public audience and the first to ever charge admission. Makes you feel pretty incompetent huh??

And even more bizzzaro is that their last name means Light.....?? Coincidence?? I think not!
Well they grew up in Lyon and invented and did all the above mentioned shiz in Lyon....so here you go....your very own tour!

This is what their house looks like.....its a mini replica....

Here is their parents room....their father owned one of four telephones in existence in Lyon around the mid 1800s. They other 3 belonged to the mayor, military, and the regional government building. So they were the only civilians to own a phone at the time.....crazy huh?

Brothers Lumiere invented the below glass plates for which a snapshot could be recorded on...

And the first color photo...

Basically the camera used to look like this, and you had to hire a pro chemist to mix some black goo that they spread on a plate, then pressed a button, and you had to sit there for at least 8 min while the camera took your photo. Cool huh? No.... So the Lumiere Brothers invented this glass plate with premade dry film on it that you placed in a camera,which they also invented, and bam in one second you get a photo, then you take the glass plate(s) to a developer and you could have as many photos printed out as you wanted.....so thanks to them, the camera was thus able to be used by the everyday man and mass printed.

Here are some more photos of their house ....

Here is a mini replica of where they shot the first film....its workers leaving their father's factory.

The first movie 'projecteur'

My class at the exact location where the first film was shot, pretending to be workers leaving the factory.

And yes, because I am me, I had my class reenact the first film for my readers!

They tore down the old factory to make a movie theatre for the Institute but they kept the roof from where the workers exited during the first shoot.

Me on the exact spot where the camera was placed to make the first film.....

Hope you enjoyed the tour, and if you are at all confused by my version of what the tour guide said, or you would like to know more....I encourage you to do some online research and you can even youtube the first film by typing "workers leaving the factory" Enjoy!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci...signing out!

*My first and only dirty martini....yuck

Half Birthday's are the Best!

2008-10-12T21:32:00.004+02:00

This blog is a little out of date order....but I thought you would want to know.... also this one has a video!!

Well, my half birthday was on September 23rd and we all know I love any reason to celebrate.....so being the wonderful honey bunny that he is, my sugar pie took me out for my favorite....wine and cheese!! The place he took me to was to DIE FOR!!!! I don't think we had a chance to say more than 10 words to each other because we were too busy salavating. The chef buys all of his meats and cheeses fresh from a pedestrian market near one of the rivers here in Lyon. And what makes them so good you ask? They are not allowed, off limits, illegal in the US....yup thats right baby, Im eating across enemy lines!! The reason they arent't allowed is because the cheese is fermented right out of the cow's/goat's udder. Zero amount of pasteurization!!! And it's like the drug of the cheese world....once it hits your lips....you're addicted! Basically the french aren't afraid to go "au naturel" !!!

So find out out your half birthday and/or the date of your conception and celebrate it.....you know you always wanted to celebrate your birthday twice, thrice...who cares..?!

I was super duper lucky to get a second sussssprise!!
An at home wine and cheese night!! Ohh la la!
(You're probably wondering where the meat is....but that came later!!)

Here is Dolce wanting a piece of the action!

Had to pause for a photo opp!!!

And here is for all ya'll Dolce fans!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci...signing out!

Lawyers are always more ready to get a man into troubles than out of them

2008-10-06T21:31:00.008+02:00

And that's exactly what happened!!

Here in France you have a sort of grad school for lawyers so they can become big time and even more lawyer-ish or something like that. So after deciding that being just a level one lawyer wasn't good enough, going through one year of even more hellacious studying and cramming, and after completing their first set of exams, Stephane and his fellow lawyers/classmates decided it was time to defy the law....of alcohol consumption! Naturally I felt I should join them in their endeavors.

So we started the evening eating Mexican food.....it was actually pretty decent, except for the definition they gave for a taco was that it was a sandwich from Mexico?? And their Tequila was no bueno.....but aside from that, they get an A for effort.

And they even had tortillas......

After, we worked our way to an "american" bar, they play top-40, serve Bud and Corona, and its the only bar in town that offers 2 poles to dance on!!! But you have to pry the 16 year old girls off of them first. I guess there is a perk to the american 21&up rule......

I don't know where he got these from, but they look good......on Woody Allen hahahaha

Before the drinks...

Still before the drinks hahaha

And sadly, yes.....still before the drinks

Then we went to a pirate themed bar....arggghh!

Is this what they mean when they say "Get some Booty?"

The legally tipsy lawyers

The legally blonde, tipsy lawyer groupie

The spanish girl praying for the answer to why her american friend is soooooooo strange.

But she forgot that Jesus is my Homeboy!

For the protection of the parties involved we had to keep out the more provactive and drunk photos. We wouldn't want to provide any evidence....at least not until after they pass the test, muahahaha

Sorry for the delay, I was busy doing crazy things & taking photos, so I have more of your favorite blogs to write!!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci...signing out!

Golden Head

2008-09-24T23:45:00.008+02:00

So economic financial crisis and the proposed $700billion bail-out plan aside,
what other reason do you folks have for not coming to visit me in Lyon, France?
Vous ne parlez pas francais??

Well its alright cause I am here doing the touristy thing in Lyon for ya'll!!
First stop...Golden Head Park!!! (hu hu hu) Ok technically Park of the Head of Gold, but golden head just sounds like more fun! It's called "Parc de la Tete-d'or" ...Tete means 'head' and Or means 'gold'....de/d' means 'of' and la means 'the'.....so there ya go!

Well, I went here a few weeks back when it was still hot but I figured you wanted to read about my drunken adventures first....

So Golden Head Park...here we come!!

*Just a side note, the park is named Golden Head Park because apparently the designer buried the golden head of Jesus H. Christ somewhere on the grounds...I'm coming here for Easter!!Why search for Easter eggs when you can search for the golden head of J.C. !!!

The grand main gate, but there are 7 other entrances to be exact.

Where is the golden head....

I don't know what this was supposed to symbolize other than sometimes one needs help moving one's ball.

The following are a series of artistic pictures that I call "Reflections on a Tree"

Pretty Lake

You can rent boats and go explore the lake...

Course we did!!!

Row Row Row your boat.....

The Rose Garden

And they have a free Zoo!!

The Lions of Lyon!!!!

The Elphalents!!!!! Thats how my lil sis used to call them when she was little!

I hope the Golden Head is not buried in there!!

And the giraffes!!!

And some kind of longhorn looking thing...I heard Mexico was missing their national animal!

Sorry this was super short....but I currently suffering from severe sinus problems!

But I want to keep my readers happy and informed!!

ByTheWay....Ya'll better stay tuned for the Presidential Debates with and I quote "Candy McCain and Obama Rama(who went to my college, Occidental College, for 2 years!! Whoot Whoot!!)

This is Veronique, the American formerly know as Ceci...signing out!

*I am officially french now

Cirque du Lyonnais

2008-09-14T16:22:00.008+02:00

Coming to you from the other side of the plastic wine cup......
I present to you...
Cirque du Lyonnais

In circle number one we have the wonderfully enchanting, highly skilled, expert swordsman,
the very vixen & vivacious...Veronique the Victor!!!!

In circle number 2 we have the incredibly feisty, tempestuously tempting, master of the corkscrew, the painfully pretty putatita from sPain.....Paula the Punisher!

In circle number 3 we have the ever so villainous, dangerous to the touch, daredevil of the dagger, the sexy, steamy, stallion.....Stephane the Severe!

The vixen Veronique goes in for her first victim!! Poor Stephane is helpless against her sensous ways!!

In one swift move she attacks with the kiss of immobility!!! And Stephane is out for the count!

Now she moves on to Paula the Punisher. Veronique tried but Paula is impervious to her kiss of immobility. Now it's a fight of skill! On guard!!!

The battle is neck to neck....who will be victorious?!?

Paula lays a quick slash to Veronique's neck....

But Veronique is no stranger to the master workings of the sword!! She gains control and makes Paula her BIOTCH!!!

Mmmmm....Victory tastes good!!!

Who won.....I did!!! (I made Stephane do this)

This pictures are soley the outcome of drinking a bit more than is considered 'moderate' and the pictures were not taken before the story was created....no, no. Thats just what happens when good alcohol happens to bad people? Or is it when bad alcohol happen to good people?

Anyways here are some more of the events that transpired...after more alcohol.

I found this strange looking object on the counter at the party.....I didnt know what it was and neither did anyone else...don't believe me...look at the pics...

Then I found a pack of these little white filter things that people use when they roll their own cigarettes. Dont ask....just laugh.

*Still don't know what this thing is...

*The fun is contagious

**Alcohol Disclaimer......too much of it is bad!
BUT IT SURE MAKES GREAT PICTURES!!!!!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci....signing out

The best audience is intelligent, well-educated and a little drunk

2008-09-08T21:29:00.011+02:00

Warning!!! This post is likely to make you want a drink or five. I encourage you to read this post two times. Once sober and once with a drink in hand!

With that being said....I hope you enjoy this post. Personally, I enjoyed the preparation for the subject of this post, as it required me to consume a hefty amount of alcohol. By alcohol, I mean wine. I rarely take in the hard stuff, well.......hard alcohol that is =) and beer is reserved for drinking games, Texas BBQs, and dive bars that don't serve wine.

So, now that we have set the mood for this post let me tell you why I got a bit loopy, my Spanish friend Paula had Miriam, her bestest friend of almost 20 years, come to visit her here in Lyon. She is spanish too of course. One spanish girl is wild by herself so imagine when you get two of them together. So they twisted my arm and made me go to Paula's apt, get drunk and then go to a house warming party. I resisted for all of -2 seconds. hehehe. The following group of photos are the events that transpired. And be prepared because I have included live footage of just how strange I am when I get some wine in my system, oh....and also how much of a bad/good influence spanish girls are.

*Paula is on the left. Miriam on the right

*Only one drink down and she is already making faces!

* It didn't take long for Paula and I to follow!

* In my drunken stooper, I think I remember telling her, " In order to take the perfect self-photo, you have to make sure the arm is long and stiff and that the hole is pointed right at your face." HAHAHAHA

*Onto the house warming party.

* I proceeded to show the spanish girls how to get "bobble-headed ghetto bizatch!"

** I think because people at the party kept looking at me like I was foreign....oh wait! I am!"

*SO I showed the example face and made the others try it out. And they had to say "Nuh uh girrrrl!! I know these b*tches ain't starin' at me!?!" at the same time!

*Paula was pretty darn good at it

*And so was Stephane (but he lived in San Antonio for 8 months, so he better know how)

*It took her a few times, but eventually Miriam got it!

*Then she taught us a trick

*And I thought I had a big mouth =(

* They are helpless!

AND NOW FOR THE GRAND FINALE!!!!!

WARNING!!!

THE FOLLOWING IS ONLY FOR

THE OPEN MINDED AND AGE APPROPRIATE AUDIENCE

AND LASTLY, I THOUGHT IT WOULD BE FUN TO SEARCH FOR QUOTES ABOUT DRINKING AND THESE WERE MY FAVORITES!!! HOPE YOU ENJOY!!!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will teach you to keep your mouth shut. - Ernest Hemingway

I think a man ought to get drunk at least twice a year just on principle, so he won't let himself get snotty about it. - Raymond Chandler

I drink to make other people interesting. - George Nathan

All right, brain, I don't like you and you don't like me - so let's just do this and I'll get back to killing you with beer. - Homer Simpson

Work is the curse of the drinking classes. - Oscar Wilde

I feel sorry for people who don't drink. When they wake up in the morning, that's as good as they're going to feel all day. - Frank Sinatra

Reality is an illusion that occurs due to the lack of alcohol. - ??

There can't be good living where there is not good drinking. - Ben Franklin

The trouble with jogging is that the ice falls out of your glass. - Martin Mull

Drinking doesn't make you fat, It makes you lean....against bars, tables, chairs, and poles. - ??

Alcohol may be man's worst enemy, but the bible says love your enemy. - Frank Sinatra

I drink too much. The last time I gave a urine sample it had an olive in it." - Rodney Dangerfield

It is well to remember that there are five reasons for drinking: the arrival of a friend, one's present or future thirst, the excellence of a wine, or any other reason - Latin Proverb

A man who was fond of wine was offered some grapes at dessert after dinner. "Much obliged," said he, pushing the plate aside, "I am not accustomed to take my wine in pills. ~Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

Sometimes when I reflect back on all the beer I drink I feel ashamed. Then I look into the glass and think about the workers in the brewery and all of their hopes and dreams. If I didn't drink this beer, they might be out of work and their dreams would be shattered. Then I say to myself, it is better that I drink this beer and let their dreams come true than be selfish and worry about my liver. ~Jack Handey

Without question, the greatest invention in the history of mankind is beer. Oh, I grant you that the wheel was also a fine invention, but the wheel does not go nearly as well with pizza. ~Dave Barry

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

For each sip I take, I think of you, my friends and family far and near! I'm a caring and thoughtful person so I try to dedicate one sip for each person close to my heart. Also its a quick way to finish a bottle!

Stay tuned for the next post!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci...signing out!

*and in this case....passing out

Why do zee French have zee cheese and zee Arabs have zee oil?

2008-09-04T19:23:00.013+02:00

Because zee French had zee first pick!!
hee hee hee

Ok that was my stab at how funny it is to hear th French say "zee" all the time instead of "the"

But to all my french readers out there, I'm sure there are 1,000 things I say in my very American accent that are funny, but you're gonna have to start a blog first before you can make fun of me.

Muahahaha

So after filtering through french jokes trying to find one that was postable....I didn't say funny.....just postable....I finally decided on this post's topic. I had to put on my thinking face for the occasion:

It came to my attention that none of you has seen or read about my studies here in France.....where do I go to school, what does it look like, what are my classmates like?? How rude of me! I have declared today "Take Your Blog Fans to School Day"
Here we goooooooo......

Upon waking up, showering and eating some grub, I find my way to the elevator and make one last mirror check before heading to school. This happens 5 days a week and 3 hours a day. (and I am referring to school, not the mirror session)

I walk the 15 minutes to the Metro...

This is my view as I wait for the metro

Then the task is to find a seat that is not next to someone smelly, someone who tries to hit on you, someone who stares at you the whole time, loud and annoying youth, someone begging for money, someone who wants to ask you questions (in french)....you get the picture.

*This guy tried to tell me he would be my personal Lyon guide. He seemed legit cause he had a guide book, but I refused....he came off as a bit looney!

And finally after one change over and like 10 stops and some more walking.....we arrive to my school!
The Alliance Francaise!!

The Entrance

The outside

The Courtyard

More Courtyard/Smoker's Tables

The side view....my class window is on the second level

The lobby where we socialize

The stairway to my class

My classroom

The Alliance Francaise is a super great school and super famous! They have chapters all over the world! But the one I go to is the best! Its so popular, even Jesus comes here to learn french!

Here is my class from July:

The teachers here are amazing and very patient with all us non-french folks!
But french grammer like all grammer can be taxing at times....

But once the school bell rings....we are back into action and ready to practice all the french we have learned!!!

The Lyon-ians enjoy spending time on their riverbanks, socializing, drinking, etc.
We have to practice the french drinking habits!

We practice the french "fete" concept!

But I don't think the French get this crazy!

This guy is from Japan....Can't understand a word he says in French or any language, but he is always a hit at the parties!

There are a crap load of Spaniards here! And they are the wildest of them all!

The Croatian gals have the highest tolerance to hard alcohol and it's impossible to keep the clothes on the Brazilian girls!

Of course the Mexican would get all the ladies! Pinche Cabron!

CHALE...eeeeehhhhhhhhhh!

Even the professors think we are cool enough to chill with!

And only the most daring french invite us foreigners in....

It was short, but sweet! Hope you liked my school !! And don't forget....it's the girls from Texas that are the ones your mom warned you about!!!!!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci...signing out!

The first condition of understanding a foreign country is to smell it...

2008-08-28T11:55:00.022+02:00

Do you think Rudyard Kipling had been to France before he said that? Heehee

Well folks, here we are...my brother is back home and it's just me now....
no one to bestow my great and powerful wisdom upon...
no one to teach the methods of my madness to....

well,
no one that willingly accepts anyways....

So that leaves me with a crap load of french people. I feel sorry for them.....because Ceci has arrived!!! I have to use my alias, Veronique, or else they will never accept me. That, and the fact that the word "ceci" means "this" in french.....can you imagine if you name was "this" ???

Next time you want some amusement, tell a new group of people your name is "this" and see where that takes you!

I hope you are ready for this post because you are about to be stuffed like a Thanksgiving turkey with lots of Lyon-ness. After this post, you will know more about Lyon, than the Lyon-ians do.

Let's commence with the Lyon-Learning:

A reallly freaking long time ago, there was a place called Rome and they had these emperor dudes. One of them was called Caesar and he decided that he wanted to expand his domain and he sent out three dudes to go conquer some land and call it Gaul (currently France, So. Germany, No. Italy). The dude who appears on the left was the one who conquered Lyon. It was then declared the meeting point and eventually the capital of this tri-regional Gaul place due to the fact that it was situated on the converging point of the 2 main boat friendly rivers of Gaul (currently named the Rhône and the Saône...how cute...they rhyme). After Rome it was the 2nd largest city in the roman empire

The Rhône is the fast river and the Saône is the more calm and smaller one. A sculptor made a statue thingy to represent the two rivers, but in the form of a man and a woman....this representation of something in another way other than the literal meaning is known as an allegory... see...I made you smarter already. Below, is the above mentioned allegory. Hopefully you can make out the really forceful, strong, active man on the top (the Rhône)and the submissive, calm, sleepy woman on the bottom (the Saône). Gender discrimination issues aside, this statue is really amazing.

I don't know if this is quite what the romans had in mind, but nevertheless, here is an aerial view of the center of Lyon and the 2 rivers that made Lyon super popular and useful for Caesar. The next three photos are some roman ruins here in Lyon and are also some of the oldest in existence!

Next stop on this fantastic voyage is the Place des Terreaux. It was originally built to host the public executions......don't lose your head over it....the french don't do that anymore....thank God!

The big building in the back is where the mayor works and the big fountain on your right is the highlight of this major Lyon meeting point. It was originally designed for the city of Bordeaux but they couldnt pay for it, so the ballin' city of Lyon picked up the tab and here it stayed. The horses are supposed to be an allegory....eh eh remember allegory?... for the Garonne River of Bordeaux flowing into the ocean. The dude guy that designed this fountain was A. Bartholdi....do you know what else he is famous for? YOU SHOULD!!! HE DESIGNED THE STATUE OF LIBERTY !!!! Don't worry, I didn't know who he was until I researched the history of this fountain. So we are all bad Americans together.

Here is me.....sitting on the allegory. (That's a phrase I never imagined I would say)

Some more cool things about Lyon.....

In addition to a subway, trams and buses...

They have a public bike system. So all you do is flash your transportation card in front of the bike hub regulator thingy and you get a bike for free for 30 min, enough time to ride it to the next bike station, park the bike, flash your card again and get another 30 min free, so on and so forth. Pretty cool and really great for the figure!!!

Dad, I'm sure you will be happy to know that Lyon is also the international headquarters for the international police, aka INTERPOL. So I'm well protected! Or highly observed! Although I don't think they would accept a phone call from you asking them to keep an eye on me, like you did with the campus police at my college!

And for all my fellow San Antonians out there...Lyon is an offical fan/sponsor of the BEST FREAKING NBA TEAM...........
THE SAN ANTONIO SPURS
And haters are not welcome to leave a comment on any other opinions of who they think is a better team....all opposing comments will be censored. My blog only accepts "freedom of speech" from San Antonio Spurs fans.

Moving on.....to Croix-Rousse. There are two hills in Lyon. One has that really gigantic church with the golden Virgin Mary and the other is Croix-Rousse. So the one with the church was/is known as the "hill that prays" and due to the ginormous (thats between giant and emormous)historic silk/textile making industry it was/is known as the "hill that works". Now Croix-Rousse is like this indie-ish place with lots of artists, musicians, artsy-craftsy and other "artsy-working people". It is wonderful place to just walk around. If you are from San Antonio its like the King William District without the mexicans, and if you are from or know Los Angeles it is like Eagle Rock without the mexicans hahaha or Occidental College for that matter. So because silk is super precious and delicate the silk workers known as "canuts" built this maze like system of passageways, called Traboules, that creates shortcuts between streets to help transport the silk more quickly and protect the silk from bad weather. The traboule system is also credited with preventing the Germans from taking control over this area during WWII. The traboules can be a huge giant maze if you don't know them, you can become seriously lost and end up making circles between streets. I mean there are 230 of them in the city for crying out loud!! But if you know them well, like true Lyon-ians do, you can save a lot of travel time. Entrances into this traboule system can be a small unmarked door next to a shop, or a dumpster....you just never know. And in the middle of some of these traboules are some pretty amazing courtyards.

My professor this month was nice enough to take us on a tour of these Traboules, so being the loyal blogger that I am...I took pictures every step of the way so you can feel as if you are TRABOULING too! And yes there is an actual verb unique to Lyon for the act of using, exploring, and walking the traboules. The verb is "trabouler" (pronouced 'trah-bull-ay')

I hope you enjoy!

The sign into one of the more famous traboules. And a zoom in on the english.

We're headed south folks...

Into the traboule we go, where we end up...how the f* do I know??? Im so lost!

Out one traboule and into another

Looking up ....and just for you, I climbed all the way to the top to take a picture looking down.

I took advantage of my zoom affect to photograph my professor and classmates on the ground!

After that first traboule system we ended up on a street a few blocks away! Then we ducked into another traboule and in the middle of it was this courtyard.

These really are a work of genius! To anyone who has seen the movie Labyrinth, this is pretty close to it!

And we end up on another street!

I'm super dizzy now!!!

For your enjoyment I took some photos of more "trompe l'oeils"! If you are clueless right now, read the previous blog.

One more Kodak Moment, I couldn't help myself!

Just in case you are wondering it says that they have "double cabins for couples" and they are "airconditioned"!!

I really enjoy the fact that they advertise "initiation" into S.M. hahaha

I hope you enjoyed my take on Lyon! For any city officials who read this blog, I am a freelance city summarizer! I charge a hefty fee, but it is worth it to have a "Ceci's City Summary" or a "Vision de la Ville Selon Veronique"

Hope you enjoyed learning about the city that I have taken over!

Stay tuned for the next one!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci...signing out!

Eiffel Towering

2008-08-25T21:09:00.013+02:00

As the saying goes, all crazy, wild, fun, outrageous, laughter-filled, pandemonium like things must come to a close. So here we are...the last day of my brother's visit to France. =(

We had to drive him to the airport in Paris, so we left the day before to spend some time doing terribly touristic things!

First, we saw Ghandi....

* I liked his message. I always knew Ghandi was a smart man.

Then we went to see Notre-Dame Cathedral. No matter how many times you see it, it is still just as breathtaking!

And as all tourists do....we took a picture in front of it

*How I got Notre-Dame to move and not Stephane and Dolce...is beyond me

*Everyone together! Gotta love the invention of the time delay option

Then we headed towards the ever famous.... Eiffel Tower! We decided to buy some wine and sit in the gardens facing it, along with other tourists and locals.
I think this act deserves its own verb....time to look at Veronique's/Ceci's Dictionary!

In english, Eiffel Towering....In french Tour-Eiffeling

Eiffel Towering / Tour-Eiffeling [tour-eye-felling] v. to visit the Eiffel Tower and sit in its garden/grassy area for purposes of socializing with friends, imbibing alcohol, and/or picnicing

Everyone has to take a picture

Even Dolce!

Now we can commence with Eiffel Towering...

We walk towards it

We walk up to it

I take a strange picture (as usual)

One is never enough

We walk under it

We walk behind it

and we plop ourselves down in the grass, bottle and glasses in hand

Evidence that we were Eiffel Towering / Tour Eiffeling

We made a toast to Vincent's stay here in France, but the moment was ruined when I passed gas

It was pretty bad

Hee hee hee......

I warned him before we got together that this may happen a few times and he willingly entered the realm of Ceci/Veronique....so I don't feel bad

He kept complaining that it smelled really bad.....and I told him "You better like it !!"

And like the fantastic boyfriend he is...he changed his face real quick!
(he knows whats good for him)

Vincent did too. Im not a force to be messed with. Neither are my farts

"I want a chicken sandwich...and some waffle fries...FOR FREE !!!"

*If you wanna get that inside joke, you're gonna have to YouTube it. Search: Unforgiveable

After the passing of gas incident.....came the real entertainment...

THE EIFFEL TOWER LIGHT SHOW!!!!!!!!

Below are some pictures of the spectaclular show

I got a little camera happy on the "Starry sky" mode

And just because I am such a nice and giving person...I have put 2 videos of this wonderful sight for your viewing pleasure.

After the show, we went to our hotel room, woke up and took Vincent for one last lunch at a french Brasserie (Cafe/Bistro for all you ign'ant people out there). And off he went, back to the good ole US of A!!

It was way too much of a good time! I miss him a bunch already. I can't wait to see the crazy posts for when the sister and parents come to visit! It was ultra amazing to have my brother here to help the move to France be a little more easy. I am having the experience of a lifetime here, but I miss my family and my friends like crazy!! Vous me manquez beaucoup beaucoup!!

I still have dreams about the craziness we had while my brother was visiting....he kinda looks like this in my dreams

This is Vincent...signing out of France (don't worry, he'll be back)

And that my friends, is the end of Two Barretto's in France, now its just me....so you better keep on reading!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci...signing out!

Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?

2008-08-21T19:26:00.014+02:00

" The younger brother must help to pay for the pleasures of the elder."

~Jane Austen, Mansfield Park

Considering all the "pleasures" I've had as the oldest child.....

Muah-haha-haha!

A thousand apologies to my all of my readers for letting so long go by without a blog. I was in the south of France for several days (life is hard) and then I had a bit of french homework to catch up on. So now you can rest your nerves and let all those withdrawl symptoms go, I am back to my ever-so-entertaining blog.

It's a new post on my blog and a new day in Lyon...

*View from my kitchen balcony

So, where did we leave off?

Ah yes, the mini-vacations we took to Erquy and Nantes with my brother. Once we got back to Lyon, my brother had about a week and a half left here in France. I had to make sure it was jam packed with lots of fun and educational activities!

1.) International Appreciation

Being that I go to school with kids not from France....I am now one of the "international kids"

So I gathered a few of my other classmates and we showed my brother a good time.

I think my brother was a bit scared cause one kid was asking my brother if he had ever tried swedish meatballs, another asked him if he wanted to try a spanish tortilla, and yet another asked if he was familier with irish creamer ???

At the restaurant, a "french" magician came up to the table and said he would use his "french" magic to take my bra off without even touching it !! (It must be a popular french trick because I think I have been told that before by another frenchman)

*For those of you wondering, he secretly had previously tied to two ends of a handkerchief to a black bra (not mine) and once he said "Voila" everyone thinks it was my bra, but I think he shouldn't have used an A-cup and picked me as the model ! Just sayin'

2.) Urban Art

I'm not such a bad influence, I tought my brother some cultural artsy things too. One of the things Lyon is famous for are the street paintings on walls that are made to look like a real apartment building with people looking out from their window, or leaning off their balcony or as if a person was really leaning out of a bakery window. Generally, the people portrayed on these walls are famous people of Lyon from various centuries. The name for this kind of art, in french, is called "trompe l'oeil " (pronounced "tromp loy") or "trick the eye" The definition from Wikipedia may define it better for me,

"[trompe l'oeil] is an art technique involving extremely realistic imagery in order to create the optical illusion that the depicted objects appear in three-dimensions, instead of actually being a two-dimensional painting.

*Take 1

*Take 2

* I wanted to show you a close up of one of the people on the balcony. I have a lot of friends who are into film, acting, cinema, etc. This is a tribute to them. The two gentlemen depicted here the Lumiere Brothers and are credited with inventing the cinema, the motion picture camera that projects a film and the world's first public film screening. So thanks to them, you can watch all those fantastic movies on the big screen. A funny side note, lumiere (pronounced "loom-ee-air") means "light" in english. Coincidence?... I think not.

*The thingy that the Brothers Lumiere invented

*The wonderful and amazing world renowned french chef ... Paul Bocuse.

**Vincent wanted to pet his dog

3.) Religious Education

I had to teach my brother about the most important saint...

The amazingly old and intricate art work of the really old churches

and the influence of gothic architecture on the ...umm....churches of old

*yes we actually attended the service. Contrary to popular belief the Barretto family is composed of members who are extremely dedicated and devout Catholics but who also enjoy the pleasures and luxuries of life in moderation. Moderation is relative.

Holy Mary, Mother of God...a once in a lifetime experience,

we got to see up close and personal the ever famous Golden Virgin Mary (1843), who was removed from her place on one of the Basilica's steeples overlooking the city, for a cleaning. This rarely happens! But you can see the footage of her removal on youtube! Type: "Descente de la vierge dorée - Pastorale Jeunes Diocèse Lyon" in the search bar!

*You can see the Golden Virgin Mary on the left

On your next visit to Europe, prepare to spend all of your time inside the magnificent cathedrals...like so

After all this intense cultural/educational experience Vincent looked like this...

Being that my brother was tired and had a tough week, I felt like I needed to give him the right phrase to help him get through such a time, and I think I speak for all my fellow adults when I say the correct phrase is, " I NEED A DRINK!"

Being that drinking in public is against the law everywhere except Las Vegas, the french quarter in New Orleans, and Fiesta...

NYPD came to issue a ticket and protect the streets of Lyon!

With that being said.....I need a drink !

Stay tuned for the next post where we journey to Paris to take my little bro to the airport to return home to the good ole US of A!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci...signing out!

Life's a beach...

2008-08-08T00:36:00.019+02:00

and then...you move to France!

So, day deux (that's french for two, pronounced somewhere between 'duh' & 'do') of our "year since we met" anniversary, we travelled to the beach town of Erquy (pronounced 'air-key') Stephane's family owns a chateau there. Hahaha, you wish! But they do own a pretty swell beach house! The beach town that is Erquy is located on the northwest coast of France, around the English Channel area. (Hmmm speaking of english channels, there are none in France. Well except the ever controversial Al-Jazeera. But it's nice to hear the news from the 'otherside') So here is a map of France to help you keep track of all the places I have talked about in my blog.

So you are probably thinking to yourself, "Self....there are 2 towns on Veronique/Ceci's map that I have no idea about! WTF?" So St. Raphael is a beach town near Cannes....I really hope you know that city from the major film festival there. We are going to St. Raphael this weekend to visit Stephane's parents who are vacationing there for 2 weeks. It's a hard life huh?

*St. Raphael's beach

*Stephane's "beach"

hahaha

The other town is St. Malo (near Erquy) and I am pointing this beach town out specifically for a dear friend who just so happens to be a real pirate!! He may reside in San Antonio and run his own office furniture business, but Mr. Andy Ortega is a pirate! (If your in the market for office furniture, look him up and tell him I sent you. His business is called Reddito. Check it out on the net.) http://www.reddito.net/

*For all those who are lost 'Pyrata' is spanish for pirate

So St. Malo is the home of the old 17th century french pirates who would pillage and plunder the boats that sailed the English Channel. Technically speaking they were called privateers because they were sanctioned by the government. For those of you scratching your heads right now it means the pirates were allowed by the St. Malo government to do pirate things like take over ships and steal the money/treasure/women etc and in exchange the St. Malo government would suckle on the money nipple of the pirates.....tu comprends? (french for: you understand?)

*St. Malo's beach

*Ain't that a 'beach'?

And here are some classic examples of what french pirates looked like:

So enough of the french lesson right?

Where were we....Oh yeah....So we made a day trip out to Erquy

*One of Erquy's beaches

*One of my 'beaches' !

hahaha! jk jk That's my Dad, aka Daddio, to whom I owe my sense of humor!

And before attacking the spectacular beach of Erquy....we were a bit hungry. And when you're at the beach and hungry, what better to eat than a lot of MOULES!!!!! (that's french for Mussels)

*Mmmmmm.....we love to eat moules!

We had a wonderful meal, beachside and under the sun!

* You can't see her because she is under the table, but Dolce was there too!

Another popular food from Bretagne (Erquy is part of Bretagne and Bretagne is explained in one of my first posts,......keep up people!!) are galettes...better known as crepes. You haven't had a crepe/galette unless you've had one from Bretagne, the inventor of this yummy food. For my fellow americans who are totally clueless as to what a galette/crepe is....it's basically a reallllllllllly thin version of a pancake. But its more than just a breakfast food. You can put whatever you want in your galette! I know I do! (hee hee) You can put seafood, meat, veggies, sweets, or even eat it plain! Somehow I feel really dirty after writing the last two statements.

* About to manger on some galettes.

(Manger is french for 'to eat', pronounced [mohn-jay])

And after we ate......it was time to beach!!!

*Dolce doesn't like the water

*She really doesn't like it
*The black doggy is Stephane's family dog, named Pilou (pronouced Pee-Loo)

*The tide was strong

So that was our adventure to Erquy!! What a 'beach'!

And to all my family, friends, and fans.........

P.S. I do have a few french readers that I need to provide an explanation for......Beach sounds super similar to the english explicative 'Bitch' You may have heard of it. So anytime I use the subtitle "beach" and there is no picture of a beach....I am making a reference to the word 'Bitch' And if further explanation is needed for how we use 'bitch' in english slang please refer to this website... http://onlineslangdictionary.com/definition+of/bitch

Stay tuned to the next post!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci...signing out!

"Love is...

2008-08-06T02:46:00.007+02:00

...a grave mental disease." - Pluto

But that's ok cause I'm already a bit crazy. It's a good thing Pluto didn't know me cause I don't want to know what he would quote about me!

So back to the whole "love is a grave mental disease" thing. Stephane and I have been together for one year now! (All together....awwwwwww!) And yes, it is safe to say that together we create one strange mental disease! We were still in Nantes and decided to celebrate the day we first met (in addition to the first day we officially became a couple) because well we are all mushy and lovey dovey and we just really like reasons to drink and go out. Oh and we spent a better part of that year 5163 kilometers apart, so don't even think about giving me any crap about how sappy this entry may seem or how corny it is to celebrate both the first day we met and when we became a couple, cause I will straight up get gangsta on yo booty!

Just because we are so nice, we took along VinMan to witness this love fest. We started out by having a drink at a local bar in Nantes and by drink, I mean an entire bottle of wine. I don't measure my wine consumption by glasses, I measure it by bottles. Don't try it at home folks...I am a trained professional!

The picture below is Vincent and I trying to calculate how many bottles of wine I have consumed since the year 2002. (do the math...I was drinking wine since before I was 21, that makes me a professional)

The next photo is my reaction to the number of bottles I have imbibed since 2002 (plus the one we were drinking) hahaha

Stephane drank to that as well (considering he has been a partner in wine since the first day we met)

And Vincent, well he toasted with his reflection cause he was feeling like the third wheel

So, ya'll are probably wondering just how many bottles I've guzzled down.....

I think Vincent's face says it all ... a FFFFFreakin Shload of wine

Yes you read it right, a FFFFFFreakin Shload!!

Shload is another word from the Veronique Dictionary:

Shload [sh-lohde] n. 1. an amount too much to count 2. the combination of the words sh*t and load stemming from the ever popular slang word, sh*tload!

Example: I have drank a shload of wine in my time.

Did you honestly think I was going to incriminate myself like that? The IRS would most definitely make me pay a tax if I disclosed that number!

Next, we walked across the street to have our celebration dinner at a restaurant that served some tasty "aperitifs" aka the french word for "appetizer in drink form". (Oh my Lord, how I love the french! Before they let you eat their food, they make sure the 'spirit' is with you, and I am not talking about the holy one.)

* Vincent with his aperitif

And, the best part was the awesome Zebra decor!!! In case you don't know, I am obsessed with something other than wine and it is Zebra print! My room back at home is allllllllllllllllllllllllll zebra...well that is if my parents haven't turned it into their private "office".

And, the next best thing after the Zebra-ness was the YUMMY food!!!!

*My dish - Assorted "Fruits of the Sea" (that's what the call seafood, en francais= 'fruits de la mer' [froo-ee deh lah mare])

*Stephane's Dish - Albacore Tuna Steak (tuna en francais = thon)

*Vincent's Dish - Gigantic Shrimp over Pasta (shrimp en francais = crevette [krev-oht])

(gigantic shrimp en francais = gambas)

Then we decided to walk of the meal. Well actually, Vincent and I walked and Stephane hobbled cause he was still on crutches from his attempt at qualifying for the Olympic french hurdle team.

*Vincent tried to be nice and make Stephane feel loved. Little do you know that Vincent was actually kicking at Stephanes crutches the whole way to the car!

On a strange, yet important, side note...It has come to my attention that lots of french women stop buying pants when they are 13 and wear them until they are 35! This creates the reverse camel toe effect and looks like so...

French women !!!!!!!! Stop !!!!!!!!!!!! It is not only horrible to look at, but it causes yeast infections!!!!!! Buy new pants that don't create the GREAT DIVIDE!!!!!! And a special thanks to my brother who so willingly posed for this picture!

Back to our one year (when we met) anniversary.

To end the night, we went to a bar that looks like the inside of a pirate ship and drank some more and listened to some good ole american rock and roll!!! Oh, and we were totally getting a kick out of these 2 couples sitting near us. Apparently they met on the internet under the "young couple seeks other couple for misc. (fore) playtime" and this was their first meeting, one couple was horrified by the other and were trying to guzzle their drinks down and get the hell outta Dodge! Super funny!

Hope you enjoyed our first (when we met) anniversary! Hope it wasn't too sappy!

Stay tuned for the post about our trip to the beach

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci...signing out!

Who wants to go "Chateau"ing?

2008-08-03T23:33:00.008+02:00

So, in case you didn't know chateau is the french equivalent for castle (it's pronounced "shah-toe"). And as always, I like to make up words that sound cool, hence the verb chateauing. Let's look at the excerpt from Veronique's Dictionary:

chateauing [shah-toe-ing] v. to explore a chateau

So, Stephane, Vincent and myself went chateauing. And for your reading enjoyment, I will now narrate a story to go along with our chateauing experience.

There once was a chateau in the kingdom of Nantes and it was ruled by Prince Vince and his sister, Princess Cec.

Now Princess Cec was the fairest in all the lands, no other princess was as beautiful, smart, talented, funny, or freakin' awesome as she. Every king and every prince wanted to marry her.

Sadly there was an evil queen who wanted to do away with the princess. So she hired a henchman named Frenchie the Henchie to steal the Princess and take her to the forest and turn her into a wild boar. Prince Vince and Princess Cec knew of this evil plan and had to keep a constant watch over their chateau.

One day while Prince Vince was standing guard, Frenchie the Henchie came from his smelly hut in the nearby forest to try and kidnapp the Princess. Prince Vince tried to shoot him from the chateau tower, but Frenchie the Henchie was too quick and he overtook the guards at the gate and made his way inside the chateau.

But, Princess Cec was waiting on the inside to take him on! In one swift move they both pulled out their guns and the trash talk was heard a mile away.

"Thou art a droning doghearted codpiece!" shreaked Princess Cec.
"Thou art a gleeking flap-mouthed foot-licker!" snorted Frenchie the Henchie.
"Thou art a lumpish hasty-witted horn-beast!" Princess Cec sneared.

Frenchie the Henchie was outrageously appalled by the horrible insults the Princess was yelling. And a fit of rage consumed him. In a blink of an eye he stole the gun away from the Princess.

Prince Vince was not so far and came to his sister's rescue.

"Let me grab my giant weapon!" said the Prince

"Not that weapon!" yelled the Princess!

So the Prince grabbed the right weapon

And in a split second, he shot the guns from Frenchie the Henchie's hands and because he was such a gentleman, he let his sister have the honors...

And to Frenchie the Henchie's surprise, the gun had a secret switch that turned the victim into a gargoyle!

And Prince Vince, well... he swallowed him whole.

The End

A special thanks goes to Stephane for being such a good sport and letting us use his crutches as props! You see, he hurt his heel really bad trying to clear a locked gate to a tennis court and the Doc made him use crutches. Also a special thanks goes to the wonderful and historic Chateau of Nantes. It was the Chateau for the country of Bretagne, now a part of France. (Read my first entry and Bretagne is explained a little more)

Stay tuned for the next adventure!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci...signing out!

Tef de la sique-Mu

2008-08-01T18:59:00.008+02:00

You're probably thinking "What the hell? (in internet lingo "WTF?") What in the heck is ...Tef de la sique-Mu?" Well don't ask me why, but Stephane and his friends like to take certain words and say them backwards. For example, "Fou" is the french word for crazy, so they say "ouf", "Chaud" is the french word for hot so they say "au-ch" (as always, don't pronounce the last letter 'd', and in french 'ch'= is said like 'sh'). So following their strange customs... "Tef de la sique-Mu" is actually Fete de la Musique. Fete means party or celebration and I hope you can figure out what the english equivalent for Musique is.....(jeopardy song plays in the background)...... Good job! It means music! So it's the Celebration of Music and the french celebrate it every year on the summer solstice/longest day of the year/most daylight time to party.....usually June 21. So every city (en francais=ville) has its own Fete de la Musique. Everyone goes downtown (en francais=centre ville) drinks until 6am and local and famous artists alike, strap on their guitars, bang on their drums, and belt out some tunes. No joke, huge cities like Paris and Lyon can have 300+ bands playing in the middle of all the streets downtown. So the following photos were my brother and my first experience with the Nantes-ians "Tef de la sique-Mu."

*hard to see, but bands were lined up on both sides of the street

*Nantes is known for their large population of hippies and neo-hippies.

**Neo-hippies is best described by the users of UrbanDictionary at the following address:

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=neo-hippie

***Parent's, this is an excellent website/tool for you to use to understand the slang your kids come home using.

*A close up of the Nantes-ian hippies

*The ever-famous hippie peace symbol (minus the weird tongue thing)

*More Nantes-ians

*Etc

*Vincent and Maxime at the hip hop section of Fete de la Musique

Stay tuned for the next post. Peace!

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci...signing out!

To Be? or Nantes To Be? That is the question!

2008-07-30T23:00:00.009+02:00

You're probably wondering about the title...Nantes, it's a French city in the north western part of the country (so as all words in french go... don't pronounce the last letter. So you say "nohnt") The city used to be the southern most border of a separate country called Bretagne (pronounced "breh-tohnya") Some famous king dude, Louis the something, decided it needed to be part of France, so now it is part of France. But, Bretagne is kinda like Texas, cause some people still think it should be independent, they have their own flag, emblem, slanguage, and they are super proud of their state-thingy. Whatever. Anyways, Stephane was born and raised in Nantes, so we decided to take Vincent there. Also part of the reason for going was Stephane's best friend Maxime and his little brother Pascal were celebrating their birthdays. Like most roadtrips, we stopped at some pretty rural rest stations. One was called Paris. We felt obliged to use the Notre-Dame Catherdral restrooms. And take some pictures at some upside down fork in the road called the Eiffel Tower.

*If you use the Notre-Dame Cathedral's bathroom, is it considered a religious movement?

*Who knew a bunch of scrap metal would be so popular?

*Straight up gangsta, yo

*I was going to buy this apartment on the left, but the street traffic is ridiculous

And most importantly, we found Vincent a french moonbounce. (in french: bounce de la lune) and you will be happy to know that Vincent kicked out some 5 yr old kids just to take these pics.

Upon arriving in Nantes, we took showers (that's an important detail) and then headed over to Maxime's birthday BBQ, Stephane's bestest friend since grade school. French BBQs are very different than Texas ones. While Texans appreciate their meat, the French are obsessed with their sausage.

So back to Maxime's BBQ...

*Maxime is the guy hovering over Stephane

*It was the guy's "crazy picture" and don't ask how Maxime can reach his leg that high...ok fine, he is a 23rd degree black belt in Taekwondo

*These guys have been friends since before they had cooties

*Word up, G

So basically we drank a lot of "non-alcoholic" french wine, beer, and rhum. And after feeling really sober we decided it was time to shake it on over to a club.

*Who can resist Michael Jackson's signature move?

*Billy Jean is not my lover...

*Let's just say Michael Jackson was on for a while

*We gonna sip Bacardi like its yo birthday

*I know he is taller than me, but he is still my little brother

*Awwwwwwwwww

*Fo shizzle dizzle, grab yo blizzle if you a gangsta-izzle

*This is only excusable cause it was Maxime's birthday

*What can I say, this is what "non-alcoholic" drinks do to you

*Naturally, the night ended with Vincent showing the French clubgoers how to dance

*Anyone got some $1's ?

Little did we know that the sun was making its way up by the time Vincent made his way to the pole. We left the club at 6am! It was a super fun night and a super drunken one too! How drunken? Well, I may have fallen down the stairs coming back from the bathroom...damn those "non-alcoholic" drinks! I guess I have an allergic reaction to alcohol because I always seem to make a fool of myself when I drink a lot ?? I don't get it! I guess I need to get really drunk more often so I can figure this out. Not to worry all you fans of the scientific method, the next night I got equally as drunk and thus able to test out my hypothesis. I am so glad I paid attention in grade school. Let's see if I remember it correctly:

Ask a Question: "Do I have an allergic reaction to alcohol because I always seem to make a fool of myself when I drink a lot?"
Do Background Research: So, I looked back at all my pictoral evidence since college.
Construct a Hypothesis: I think that when I drink a lot, I make a fool of myself
Test Your Hypothesis by Doing an Experiment: Well, this oughta be fun
Analyze Your Data and Draw a Conclusion: Still in progress
Communicate Your Results: Does this include those drunken phone calls I make?

To any grade school teachers who read this, "Thank you for teaching me and so many others such a valuable lesson."

So back to Vincent being in France, stay tuned for the next night of our "non-drunken" adventures.

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci...signing out!

What's worse than one Barretto in France?

2008-07-29T11:19:00.010+02:00

TWO !!! That's right, France had the lucky privilege of having not one but two Barretto's within its borders! Lucky for me, my hangover from the All-White Party had subsided just in time to pick up my little brother, Vincent, at the airport in Paris for his month long visit. Ok, that's a lie. I still had a hangover so I made Stephane go pick up my brother. Ok, that's a lie too. I really couldn't miss school. But it's way more hardcore to say I had a week long hangover. hahahaha.

Anywho, my brother arrived here in Lyon on June 11. And like most big sisters would, I made sure he was well taken care of =) I take great pride in knowing I was the perfect role model. Rest assured I taught him all I know. Skill is everything!

And so did Stephane...

Now don't get your undies in a twist, we showed him the finer sides of life too. For example, historical fountains

bridge architecture...(bridge in french: "le pont"...don't pronounce the last letter!)

fashion...(in french: Haute Couture)

fine dining...(in french: Haute Cuisine)

ninja-like cooking skills...(in french: cuisiner comme un ninja...pronounced "neenzha")

and of course a well balanced diet...YUMMY!!! What? Fruit is a major part of a proper diet!

(in french: ooh la la!)

After such a long day of learning about "adult-like" things...it was time to show Vincent where people in Lyon go if they want go "down under"....... you are sick! We took him to an Australian Bar! Aussie's are known for their "non-alcoholic" beer and "totally sober" bar patrons, so naturally we thought it was a great place to take Vincent.

* the only thing missing in this Barretto sandwich is our middle sister, Tori

*And these two are lawyers???

*I take no responsibilty for my brothers facial expression, oh wait, i was buying him "non-alcoholic" beer

*We really are rockstars

*Don't ask, just laugh

So, being that my brother stayed for one month, the next few posts will be about the positive influence and cultural teachings that I bestowed upon my brother. I like to think he is my protege.

P.S. A message for my brother:

"The force is strong with you, young Jedi"

Love,

Your Oldest Yoda

(I know Tori teaches you a thing or two also)

To the rest of you, thanks for tuning in. Look for the sequel to the "Two Barretto's in France" adventure.

This is Veronique, the American formerly known as Ceci...signing out!

Those poor French people will never know what hit 'em

2008-07-28T10:10:00.000+02:00

Now that I have YOU under my spell and addicted to this blog lets get down to the nitty gritty, the juicy stuff, what REALLY goes on hear now that "Veronique" has arrived. If you really know me you should be saying to yourself..."Self...DUH!! Ceci would P-A-R-T-Why?...Because she's gooood at it!" No, seriously here is how good I am at this whole part planning thing...BEFORE I even arrived in France, I already had Frenchie draft up some invites for a themed party to celebrate 2 of his friend's birthday. (That was just a cover up, they were really there to celebrate my arrival to France, teehee)

As is the custom for all of my parties (in french the word for party is fete, and remember you never use the last letter =), so it is pronounced, "feht") so back to the custom of my "fetes", there is a THEME!!! I went with a classic one of having everyone dress in all white. Give me a break, I have to ease the french into this theme fete idea. Not to say they dont have themes, but they dont have "Ceci" themes. I love that my name has now become an adjective!! So with invites out and guests RSVP'd, the week after I arrived we had the Fete Blanche (if you can't figure out the second french word too bad, i'm not stopping the bus for you).

Almost everyone, showed up in all-white. As is the custom in France, we drank a ton of champagne and wine. I did all the cooking, so naturally it was scrumcious, some highlights were my tasty guacamole, some of my famous stuffed mushrooms, and Stephane handmade some sushi (watch out ladies, he's taken). I also introduced them to "jello-shots". They looked at them like they were lab samples but upon shlopping them down, they said, "Voila! C'est magnifique!!"

They don't know what jello is here!! They don't have it! I can't imagine childhood or college without jello. I discovered the jello at a small tiny bagel sandwich shop that sells some American staples like stuffing (6 euros), fluff (7 euros), Trix (10 euros), Dr. Pepper (2 euros), Budweiser (5 euros), Arizona Iced Tea (4 euros), Aunt Jemima syrup (11 euros), and jello (5 euros) Now go back and multiply the euro amount by 1.5 and you have the equivalent amount in dollars. So for what normally costs me $0.39 a box in the US....here I have to pay $7.50....for FREAKIN JELLO !!!! Dr. Pepper $3 a can!!! So if you are feeling generous send me some jello or some Dr.P.

Continuing on, after some champagne, some wine, some jello shots, some beer, it was time for me to show them real party music. Hee hee hee. All of my BYOW peeps better know this playlist by heart. (I will explain BYOW to all the deprived in another post) Songs included some Bohemian Rhapsody, Crank That, Santeria, Walk It Out, Hypnotize, I Got Friends in Low Places, etc. I didn't speak a lot of French, but I think I got my message across pretty clear! I'm "unique". hahahaha.

After the craziness of Ceci singing solo (Stephane helped a little but didnt want to look look tooo weird in front of his friends) it all went down hill. I think I may have "tossed" a couple of glasses on the floor, balcony, wherever there was prime breaking area. I think I may have comically went off one of Stephane's friends for not being "gangster" enough. Oh well, if they didn't know Ceci before, they know me now. Just a small discalimer .... they all had a blast, they want me to throw another one (with jello shots), and they still hang out with me. (well not the kid I reamed into for not being gangster, but 1 out of 7 ain't bad).

*the guy in the right is the one I yelled at for not being gangsta enough

**the blonde one is actually a gangsta

When this fete happened, I had already been in french school for 5 days. The class had some interesting folks in it but one imparticular stuck out. This spanish girl with black hair like the color of toros (in english that's "bulls") and fiesty like one too!! Hahaha but from day one we were a pair. I take the words from Mae West, "If you've got nothing good to say about someone, come sit next to me!" So, I teach her Ceci english and she teaches me Paula spanish (for all you mexican spanish speakers....im learning Thpanish from Thpain) We are quite a duo trying to survive in France and making fun of the french way of doing things the whole time. So from here on out Paula may appear in some of my posts, so readers let's make her feel welcome. I'm proud to say that even after inviting her to my all white party and her seeing me in all my glory, she told me, "Veronica, you are one crazy *spanish explicative* and I LOVE IT!! We will get along just fine!" and we have. On a crazy side note, her and Stephane have the exact same birthdate, right down to the year!

Needless to say, after one week, I made like a dog and "defined" my territory. So I hope you enjoy the post, the pics, and stay tuned for more of Veronique Moves to France.

P.S. To all my BYOWs and BYOW groupies, Bohemian Rhapsody is no fun when you sing it drunk and alone. So when I get back to the US, we are totally getting wasted and belting out at the top of our lungs all the BYOW favorites!

This is Veronique the American formerly known as Ceci...signing out.

Let the games begin !!!

2008-07-27T12:58:00.000+02:00

So finally after two months of living in France I am able to devote enought time to start my blog. My Blog about this crazy adventure of moving from my comfort zone, also known as the US of A, to "a place in France where the women wear no pants". (Don't lie to yourself, you know everyone sang that jingle. I think it was circa 3rd grade)

Ok, seriously, I have set up camp in the 2nd largest city in France called Lyon. (not pronounced like the zoo animal, but rather "Lee-Own", and if you have ever studied a little bit of French and want to say Lyon properly ....never pronounce the last letter of ANY word hahahahahah.) So back to where I live...I live in Lyon, the gastronomical capital of the world. For those of you who are scratching your head right now, gastronomical is the adjectival form of the word gastronomy which means "the art or science of good eating" and for those of you who live out in the country....it means Lyon's got some damn good grub. I still miss a good Texas BBQ but the food here is pretty impressive.

So lets review, Im living in Lyon and it is the "good food" capital of the world. Also I live here with my French/honorary Texan boyfriend, Stephane, aka Frenchie. We live on the 5th floor of an apartment building (its actually the 6th floor but here in France the ground floor is not the 1st floor its called RC. I still dont know what that means but all I know is that you don't push the number 1 on the elevator because you will end up on the 2nd floor in US terms.)

Also living with us is my cutie pie of dog, Dolce. I put her in a lavishly furnished kennel, which was placed in the temp and pressure controlled cargo hold of an Air France plane and she flew with me across the big pond and here we are... Two Texans in France. If I could start a show about the 3 of us living here maybe I should call it Two & A Half Texans Living in France.

For those of you who don't know, I met Stephane in San Antonio a year ago while he was working as an exchange lawyer for 8 months. He didnt really know San Antonio or Texas til I got a hold of him 2 months before he was supposed to return home to France. He fell under my spell and as is the case when you meet anyone in the Barretto family, once you meet a Barretto....you are addicted for life. So boy meets girl, well actually french boy meets crazy texan girl, they fall in love and crazy texan girl decides to study the biz of wine and moves to Lyon, France to study french, get an MBA in biz of wine, and of course keep french boy under the Barretto spell.

So, as Austin Powers once said..."wherever you go, there you are." Thus, here I am.

Stay tuned for some more posting, some more pics, and some more good ole Ceci/Veronique humor.

P.S. Here in France I go by my first name "Veronique" which is super french and apparently super chic here. But for those of you back home I am still Ceci. I feel like I have a dual personality cause they call me Veronique here, but I still refer to myself as Ceci. I often catch myself saying, "Im freaking Ceci, and thats how I roll." or some crazy self reference like that.

Tell anyone who knows me about this blog, tell your friends who don't know me, heck if you think your mom can handle it, tell her too. I know my mom can, can yours?

This is Veronique, the american formerly known as Ceci......signing out.