Last week was an eventful one for Julie.  Her thesis finally finished printed and sent off to the prof, and also hearing back as to which school, and which city she will be teaching in.

And that city is:  Blois .  Yes, that is pronounced like “blah” with a “w” in the middle.  Mike’s going to have a field day.

It’s a little town of about 50,000 inhabitants.  It is a very old city, dating back to the 6th century or so, and has a very rich history.  It was a residence for French Kings.  Louis XII was born and lived there.  Other notable homeboys are Denis Papin, who built the first piston steam engine, and Houdin, the father of modern conjuring.

The middle of town is hilly and winding.  On our apartment hunt yesterday, at least two of the flats we visited were in medieval houses.  One of which was literally next door to the chateau (I wanted that one because it’s on all the postcards).

Just a few pictures from Angers. A house with 3 testicles?

According to an analysis of campaign contributions by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics, Democrat Barack Obama
has received nearly six times as much money from troops deployed
overseas at the time of their contributions than has Republican John McCain, and the fiercely anti-war Ron Paul, though he suspended his campaign for the Republican nomination months ago, has received more than four times McCain’s haul.

Troops Abroad Donate 6:1 to Obama Over McCain

From the learn something every day files:

I did not know this. Cheese is not vegetarian.  Cheese requires a rennet, to speed the coagulating process along.  And for most cheeses out there, rennet is made from the contents of the fourth stomach of a newborn calf.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rennet

http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mrennet.html

While this doesn’t directly affect my diet — I eat beef — my girlfriend is an ethical vegitarian, and I’m the cook.  So as of yesterday, she swore off cheese cold turkey.   Yay.

The thing is, there are so-called vegetarian cheeses, using plant material, microbes, or DNA for rennet.  However, I read this one here: http://www.seriouseats.com/2007/12/is-cheese-vegetarian.html

which makes an interesting point:  You can’t have milk without bearing calves, and at best only some will be kept for milking; the rest will be slaughtered eventually.

I’ve been playing around with a little software app called Personal Brain.  Stop laughing at me, dammit.  You can use it for brainstorming and organizing… something.  There’s a free version, a $200 version, and I suppose you can get the ole’ five byte discount if you catch my drift; but I think the features on the free version are good as it is.

He’s tall and lanky, with long hair and clunky glasses.  He has really really white teeth.  And his voice is so high, people think he’s a girl.  Maybe that’s why Christoph Willem is such a big hit, particularly with the younger kids. It’s nice that not all popstars have to act like toughguys.

Christoph Willem — Jacques a dit (acoustic)

Jacques a dit: “Jacques said”, a game not unlike Simon Says.

Or a Butter Crock or Butter Bell.

There’s really not much French about it, other than the fact that it is attributed to a French inventor.  I bought this one last year in Naumburg as a gift for Julie’s mom.  She seems to remember her grandparents having one, but I have yet to encounter anyone else in France who knows what these things are.

That’s a pity because every kitchen should have one.  You pack a stick of butter into the top section, and pour a little water into the base.  The butter is stored upside down at room temperature, and the water creates a nice airtight seal. Voila, fresh spreadable butter every time! The result is that you use less butter than you would with hard, cold butter (unless you are like me and just skip the butter altogether if too hard, in which case you eat a hell of a lot more butter.)

I could go on, but there’s more here:

http://www.webexhibits.org/butter/crocks.html

From the Learn-something-every-day file:

Cats dig kiwi branches.  It seems to have an effect on them not unlike, but milder, than catnip.  They really like it.  There is a small orchard of Kiwi plants here, which were all pruned today.  Here’s Cajou going to town.