Linked In is a networking site where you can connect to present and past colleagues and classmates in order to build your own network for professional purposes. I don’t remember when or why I joined originally, but I now have over 50 connections, and have found and been found by several old friends through it. I don’t know how useful it is for work-related networking, but for personal networking, it’s great.
Have visa, will move to France
Yes, that’s right – the French visa court was so moved by our appeal that, after only a year of deliberation, they decided to grant us our long-stay visas. We picked them up last month, and now we’re good to go. We’ll be moving sometime between Febrary and April, 2008, but we’re not sure where yet. Originally, we planned to go back to Toulouse, since we loved it so much. But then I started thinking about how nice it would be to live near the beach, so Nice and Marseille started looking good. And then we wondered about living all over – spending a month or so in a dozen different cities, and that’s what we’re leaning toward right now. There are several problems with that:
- It’s expensive to move once, let alone 12 times
- It’d be a pain to find a new apartment every month
- I would need a (likely expensive) wireless internet connection, because many French rentals don’t have fixed phones
I’ve got some good leads on number 3, so now I’m doing some research on number 2 – maybe we could find a rental agent who could help us find a place in each city, something like that.
In any case, it’s still all way up in the air, but at least now we know for sure that in just a few months we’ll be moving to France for a year – something I’ve been wanting to do for more than half my life.
I’m back, did you miss me?
It’s been ages since I blogged anything, and you’ve all probably given up on me, but now that I’m done with my book, things have settled down and I’m ready to blog again. Coming soon are more pictures of Costa Rica, details of our trip to Nicaragua, and other assorted goodies. LKL’s blog will live again! 🙂
Apostrophe s
The English apostrophe s and s apostrophe cause a lot of problems, even for native speakers. This lesson’s task is to help you learn about possessives and contractions that need apostrophes and plurals that don’t.
Howler Monkeys
Some of the most visible – and audible – wildlife here in Costa Rica are the howler monkeys. They travel through the trees, and their “howl” is far deeper and louder than their appearance suggests – sort of a cross between a growl and a moan. They tend to howl when they feel threatened or are unhappy, and one of the things that seems to make them unhappy is rain, which means they howl a lot. When several howl in unison, the sound can be pretty creepy – like something out of a horror movie. Continue reading
Natural Remedies for Bug Bites
Now that I live in Costa Rica, bugs are not just annoying, but downright disruptive. There are a few mosquitoes, but it’s the no-see-ums that are really bad. Since I don’t like chemicals, I’ve been trying out some natural remedies, and there are a few that work: Natural remedies for bug bites