YOLO Beav

Tuesday, May 10, 2011

2011 - Official 'Group Pic'

The 2011 UGA Cannes Film Festival Study Abroad Program

OFFICIAL PICTURE

Photographed by yours truly

Sunday, May 8, 2011

Thursday, May 5, 2011

Juan-Les-Pins (from my balcony)

By day...

And by night...

Thanks to my favorite red-head - the lovely, former Program Coordinator of this Cannes study abroad (aka: my one and only predecessor) - and her unexpected recipe advice the last time I had dinner with her at "The Grit" in Athens, GA....I bought eggs and tabouleh at Casino (the local, French grocery store) to make for dinner tonight. Odd combination? I thought so, too. But according to one Ms. Firor (yes, her name is pronounced "fire" and her hair is red) it is an ideal combination. I blindly (and wisely) followed her suggestion for one delicious homemade meal. C'etait magnifique!

Before:

After:

Dinner for one on my lovely French balcony. Sigh.

I'm here!

I'm alive. I'm happy. I'm jetlagged, my hair is dirty, but, damnit, I'm here.

For proof, see below image that I just took on my balcony:

I arrived yesterday (Tuesday) morning 45min earlier than scheduled (thank you, tailwind) from JFK into Nice. After a wonderfully sunny day-and-a-half on the ground here, it is now late afternoon on Wednesday and I just returned from a quick trip to Antibes to buy a new printer cartridge and four reams of paper - all of which I carried back to JLP by my lonesome. So, basically, I am She-Woman.

Namita (our French colleague) also arrived yesterday from her home in Avignon, as she does every year, to help me set everything up has at the beginning of the program. She is a native French-speaker and her negotiation skills for room rates at our student residence (where I stay) and the local apartments for professors is unparalleled. Her expertise comes in very handy in the days before the students arrive as she and I set up the housing for everyone, arrange catering for the 'opening dinner' we hold for the students on Monday night after they arrive, etc. She also delivers all of the 30-some-odd French cell phones we loan to our students/professors that she stores at her home in Avignon during the off-season.

Anyway, after a busy 24-hours of hitting the ground running with her in all of our planning efforts, Namita has left for the day to go stay with some friends of hers in Nice for the night. Apparently they were able to get tickets to a Classical music concert going on in Monaco tonight, so she and her friends will attend that together before she arrives back here in Juan-Les-Pins to get back to work with me tomorrow morning.

The rest of my evening looks relaxing! I can finally unpack, get everything settled in my apartment, shower (with soap & shampoo, at long last!!), BLOG, and begin the process of creating/printing the Orientation packets I will give to each student upon their arrival this weekend. Perhaps I'll even squeeze in a little pilates on my balcony at sunset - oh la la!

For now, though, I am snacking on some Comte cheese, watching live coverage on CNN (the only English channel I get) of Obama arriving at Engine 54 in NYC (a fire station that lost 15 men on 9/11) to deliver a private speech in the wake of Bin Laden's capture/killing. Oh, and I'm uploading some other photos to use on this blog - so, stay tuned.

I plan to work BACKWARDS from today to get you up to speed on the last 36 hours of my life. Away I go...

Monday, February 14, 2011

Happy Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day has never meant much to me - so I'm neither happy nor sad today. I do intend to have some good food for dinner tonight, but besides that expectations are pretty low/non-existent.

I DO have something to celebrate though... Dan is now OFFICIALLY BOOKED FOR EUROPE this summer!! Thanks to my expert travel-agent-via-internet skills and about 60k Delta Skymiles that Dan had accrued, he is now booked to enjoy an 18-day European getaway this summer. I'd say that more than makes up for his unfortunate absence last year.

I am extra excited because I am getting to experience new places I've never been to before this year - including London and Venice - in addition to sharing with Dan some of my all-time faves (like Cinque Terre and, possibly, Rome - maybe just for lunch).

Anyway, just wanted to share my excitement. Valentine's Shmalentines......but YAY FOR EUROPE!!!

LONDON

CINQUE TERRE

VENICE

Thursday, January 27, 2011

92 Days

92 days, 92 days - how am I inspired? Let me count the ways...

1. Friends & friends of friends.

http://annarouthphoto.wordpress.com/

http://blueeyebrowneye.com/

http://wessumnerphoto.tumblr.com/

http://farewellpaperie.com/

2. The email blast I got this morning, entitled: "What if Anthropologie did weddings?"

3. This quote:

"There is no security in life; there is only opportunity."

- General Douglas MacArthur

4. And this quote:

"Don't ask yourself what the world needs; ask yourself what makes you come alive. And then go and do that. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive."

- Howard Thurman

5. The countdown in my planner