Je n'aime pas être seul

Je n'aime pas être seul // I don't like being alone

Today, after more'n half a year break, I went to a French class.

Even after all these years living outside of Russia, it still surprises me that the classes start NOT on the 1st of September, and that everybody starts on a different day. I guess the 1st of September will forever stay "back to school" (la rentrée scolaire) day for me.

First few minutes I was the only student in the class. After a considerable while, three more people materialized, looking lost and unsure. I guess it was something to do with the fact that the days of our class were changed last week, and an email went out, and yet the subscription carried on with the old schedule. I assume tomorrow the rest of the class will turn up and will roam the school in search of the teacher.

Well, never mind. Everything will sort itself out eventually.

Je suis exténué

Je suis exténué ; je ne peux plus rien faire ! // I am exhausted; I can not do anything anymore!

And once again, French Word of the Day to the rescue!

I am not sure why the cat is exhausted, I think he is just pretending to have a good long snooze.

I myself, on the other hand, feel exhausted since this week was dedicated to all things bureaucratic, and that takes it out of you. I even wanted to do a picture about the only two certainties in life, but couldn’t think of how to tax a cat. Cats are essentially untaxable, aren’t they.

Pictures related to cats @ Shutterstock.

néanmoins je l'ai écouté; story of my life

J'étais pressée ; néanmoins je l'ai écouté pendant une heure // I was in a hurry; nevertheless I listened to him for one hour.

And once again, Transparent Language word of the day holds the stage.

What a strange word "nevertheless" is, don't you think? French "néanmoins" is no better, same sort of combination of complete negation and an adverb "moins" (less), making it what? Less than nothing?

Come to think about it, Russian "тем не менее" is not exactly logical either.

In other news, this is the last leaf of my sketchbook which I started  back in November.

Hier le chat s’est reposé. Aujourd’hui le chat se repose

Hier, le chat a reposé. Aujourd’hui, le chat repose.* //
Yesterday, the cat rested. Today, the cat is resting.

Today we briefly touched on Passé Composé, a verbal tense similar to present perfect in English, although is doesn’t always translate into it. Two auxiliary verbs can be used — avoir and être (to have and to be). To have, avoir, is used in most cases. (Counterintuitively, we started with The Other One, être, as in “hier, ils sont allé”, “yesterday they went”).

I am not sure if Passé Composé sounds natural in this little description of the cat’s daily routine. But I wanted to use it anyway.

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* UPD: a correction just arrived from Twitter (AnessNuts) — it must be “hier le chat s’est reposé , aujourd’hui le chat se repose” — i.e. it is a reflexive verb and these take être as an auxiliary. By a strange coincidence this was exactly what we talked about in class today.

Pictures related to cats and sleep @ Shutterstock.