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| Mets ton bonnet, tu vas attraper froid! // Put your hat on, you are going to catch cold! |
Today’s phrase of the day is the wintry battle cry of all Russian moms and grannies — except it is in French. «Надень шапку, простудишься!» accompanied all our attempts to go out without a hat from September to May, roughly.
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| Je n’aime pas conduire quand il neige // I don’t like to drive when it snows |
That.
Transparent Language’s word of the day keeps turning to be wintry. And the combination of “snow” and “driving” in one sentence made me remember this particular bit of the road leading to the house where we lived in Finland. A few postboxes, little bridge, sharp turn left, then right and a steepish shortish up. I disliked driving this bit even in summer, but in winter I had to steel myself every time it was coming up.
Pictures related to winter, snow and Finland @ Shutterstock.
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| La nuit tombe très tôt en hiver // The night falls very early in the winter. |
Curiously, in Russian the night doesn’t fall, as it does in English and, it seems, in French as well. It normally descends (спускается, опускается) or advances, military-fashion (наступает). Sure, you can find mentions of the night falling (падает), but it not that common.
Maybe it’s because we are from the North, and our sun doesn’t move so fast.
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| Les enfants jouent dans la neige. Un moment parfait pour une tasse de thé. // The children are playing in the snow. A perfect moment for a cup of tea. |
The phrase about children comes from today’s Word of the Day. The other one is mine.
The kittens seem to be playing two different games. One on the left is making a snowcat (bonchat de neige), and the one on the right is playing hide-and-seek (le cache-cache).
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| Nous sommes allés nous promener de nuit, sous un beau ciel étoilé // We went for a walk at night under a beautiful starry sky |
French word of the day from Transparent Language to the rescue.
What can I say, my take on black and white van Gogh falied miserably.
Pictures related to night and starry sky @ Shutterstock.
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| Кот отмухивается // The cat is waving away the flies |
Today, let’s do something Russian for a change. Kirill wrote a nice article about Blends, Melds and Portmanteaux in his blog, where he mentioned the word отмухиваться, i.e. “wave away the flies”, all in one word (отмахиваться — wave away, мухи — flies).
I did read the book “От двух до пяти”, where it comes from, but I forgot this wonderful example completely.
So I felt compelled to illustrate it.
Pictures related to cats @ Shutterstock.
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| Et si l’on invitait mes parents pour Noël? // What about inviting my parents for Christmas? |
Poor cat. He only just settled down with a good book.
I don’t know whose voice it is. I don’t even know if it’s the same voice that asked not to leave jam on the table or if the tap was closed. For all I know, they are three different voices.
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| En montagne, il fait très froid à cette altitude // In the mountains, it is very cold at this altitude |
I do hope the cat is wearing the angora wool sweater his granny made for him.
As to the “cat-above-the-clouds” title, let me explain:
When I was writing a post about ascent of Teide, I was fascinated by the specific Latin name of one of the flowers — Spartocytisus supranubius, “supranubius” consisting of above (supra) and clouds (nubius).
It feels strangely satisfying to be able to use this seemingly useless bit of knowledge.
Pictures related to cats, clouds and Mount Teide @ Shutterstock.
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| Grand-mère m'a tricoté un pull en laine angora. // Grandma knit me a sweater in angora wool. |
Here is a very late contribution to the worldwide Ugly Christmas Sweater pool.
Well, at least he is warm as toast.
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| Nous allons déboucher une bonne bouteille de vin pour fêter cela // We are going to uncork a good bottle of wine to celebrate that |
The cat obviously had to go down to his wine cellar to bring up this very dusty bottle of wine. He has a party hat and everything, he is ready to celebrate.
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| Il est parfois plus facile d’apprendre les langues par le jeu que scolairement // Sometimes it is easier to learn foreign languages by playing games than scholastically |
What can I say. He seems to have chosen a wrong type of game to play if his aim was to learn a new language.
Also, he is losing, it seems.
In his defense I must say that the guy he is playing against is Emanuel Lasker, as (at least partially incorrectly) described by conman Ostap Bender in The Twelve Chairs.
«Вы знаете, Ласкер дошел до пошлых вещей, с ним стало невозможно играть. Он обкуривает своих противников сигарами. И нарочно курит дешевые, чтобы дым противней был.»
“You know, Lasker came to such vulgar things that it became impossible to play with him. He blows cigar smoke all over his opponent. And he purposedly chooses cheap cigars, so that the smoke would be nastier.”
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| Je cuisine pour elle pendant les vacances et elle mange mes petits gâteaux avec délice // During the holidays I cook for her, and she eats my cakes with delight |
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Il y avait une légère brume sur la route // There was a light fog over the road
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