French Post Office

This morning, coming back from the Hypermarket, I had to post a package and stopped by one of La Poste facilities there are in the neighborhood.

I'm not the kind of person that queue for this kind of purpose so I went to the automatic machine, waited for 2 minutes and when the guy just before me left with a strange face, I understood why... the machine had suddenly decided to stop working, what a chance! I looked at the people queuing - waiting for 15min just to stick a postage stamp - and I thought "not today". The woman behind me who also wanted to use machine, also decided that it was not the day.

Now, I'm asking:

* why on earth, when there are so many people waiting, don't they open other desks? Especially when there only 2 or 3 opened, and one is for special operations.

* what are all the employees occupied with? why don't they hire people and everybody is happy?

* is it the same thing abroad?

P.S. no no, French people do not always moan... indeed, that's not a French touch, that's just mine!

Customization

Thanks to all the bloggers that without knowing, make this blog being a little more fun than it was the first day, giving tips on their own blogs (i.e. Wolverine for creating this emoticon application you can use in your Blogger/Blogsport blogs)

Sisi

Hello to all!

You can see on top of the posts, a little rabbit. I found this application quite fun and I wanted to integrate my rabbit on my blog. Her name is Sisi - there is no spelling mistake, I did wanted to put only one 's' to make it original. I named her that way cause she seemed to be a little princess when I adopted her and she has always been! =) Her fur coat is between black and dark brown but her nose (always moving) is all white!

She has her character (as her master!), but become very sweet and kind, especially with me and later when she gets to know people that treat her well. As all rabbits instinctly do, she loves to scratch and gnaw all that she can (paper, cardboard, even sometimes tissue) so you'd better not let a book, a file or a box near her!

I always think, if I was still at school, I could have used the excuse for not making a homework "but my rabbit ate it!!" lol

She loves rabbit treats and gets some each time she's behaving well.

She's very clever and we were surprised one can educate a rabbit as well (even if they like to not obey sometimes, it's natural!)

She's 3 years old, I adopted her in August 2005, she was already 5-6 months old. I had had two mice the year before but didn't want to take others because they don't live enough long and it's too sad when they die so quickly. A girl I knew from a Internet pet forum, that was working in a pet shop, told me about a little she rabbit that they could not sell because she has a little "something" on one of her eye and she could not find clients who wanted to take her (they preferred babies). I met her to see the rabbit and fell in love with her. I bought a big cage (compared to the little one the mice had), a transport cage, some food, some hay and litter and brought her home.

At first, she was very scared because she had been the past months all alone in a cage in the shop reserve with much contact or love I think, who knows how she was treated, poor girl?... After some time, she began to be more sociable and she adopted me. We like to play together, during the day, she's free, her cage is open and she can go (almost) wherever she wants. She has a nap time, between 12pm and 5pm (more or less), it's actually like her night time.

Her favorite places would be when she can hide, especially to sleep or rest, my bedroom (dunno why) and she likes to listen to music. Each time she's somewhere in the apartment and I put some music, she will come and seat under our desk, so funny!

As I'm often alone at home, she's my little friend, my roommate, my living stuffed rabbit, someone I have to take care of and I hope she will accompany me for a long time.

Patience...

Yesterday morning was kind of a non productive morning.

I had a 9:30am meeting at the ANPE to meet a job adviser as I registered again as a “job seeker” as soon as I stopped working as a temp salesperson last January. I know that these meetings are mostly useless for people who have diplomas, it’s just not the right place but I have to attend these appointments to stay registered.

Here is how it went:

- The woman asked me about my professional background

- I told her I had already been registered as a job seeker in June but forgot to actualize my situation as I was abroad for a summer job and not used to doing this thing, that I had been working as a salesperson and now I was back on the track to find a better job

- She asked if I had any leads

- I replied that I was waiting for some answers so far

- Then she proposed to see if there was any interesting job offer on the ANPE Website as Marketing Assistant

(… the lady was very nice but can’t I do that from home, as I’m used to do regularly?...)

We finally selected three job offers that she printed for me and type down conclusions of the interviewsto let my next month’s job adviser know about it.

I, then, drove to the Sous-Préfecture ( du Raincy to go and get my new license (as I passed the moto license last February). Six years ago when I went to the main Préfecture to get my driving license, I had waited for about an hour and I thought it was quite long.

I arrived at 10:49 when I took the little ticket where was marked 447. And 410 was announced on the little red screen. OH-MY-GOSH!! After 5 people had been called, I did a little calculus and arrived at the conclusion that my turn will arrive in about 1h30 (what?!?!). Fortunately, I had thought about bringing a book* I started there.

There were about fifteen rows of chairs all oriented towards the little desks like a public waiting for a representation that was never beginning…

People were reading, sleeping, chitchatting, almost dying waiting, being on the phone, cell phones ringing (about a dozen times, I had wisely thought about putting mine on the vibrating ring), going to the bathroom, going outside, coming back, arriving, getting up to have a drink at the coffee machines (I had NOT thought about having some change to get me something to drink while waiting).

I chose a quiet place near the large window at the back of the rows and began to read my book. The two little screens began to change numbers (one for the driving license and one for the car registration papers). It strangely appeared to me that the 2^nd one was changing numbers quite quickly compared to the 1^st one that still had not change since I sat. The numbers would keep on changing with the little bip while the driving license screen would very slowly change numbers. I tried to reach from sight the desks and I suddenly understood! There were 7 car registration desks and ONLY 3 for the driving license! How lucky!

An hour passed and I decided to make a break, go to the bathroom, have a hot drink (that’s when I realized I had not enough coins), sat back where I was, sent some text messages, called my mom to let her know that I wouldn’t be home early as I thought and went back to my reading.

Another hour passed! I was now beyond the delay I had calculated. And began to find that waiting very long. People would continue to arrive, be called at the car registration desks and leave. Whereas the driving license numbers had not changed much. I was now thirsty, hungry and my backside was kind of fed up of being on this uncomfortable chair.

About 2h30, the screen was now approaching the 447 ticket the little machine had awarded me. Suddenly, I looked up and it was announcing 446, YES, my time was about to come! And it did, 447 appeared on the little red screen, indicating just below which desk to go to. I packed my stuff and triumphantly left the soon-to-die waiting rows to approach desk #9. It took the lady about 5mns to prepare my brand new driving license.

As I was leaving with my brand new little red paper, looking at the more good looking picture (the former one dated back from 1998 when I was in highschool) and the new printed date beside the motorcycle drawing. I was as excited as 6 years ago, this time I was officially allowed to drive a moto. Now, I’m just eager to be able to buy one!

*Petite Anglaise (from Catherine Sanderson, go and see her very nice blog)

Independence Day

This morning, I chatted with a friend on MSN, asking him if he was coming to a mutual friend's birthday on Saturday, he said he was. Then, I asked him about his girlfriend he has been dating for a few weeks as we don't know anything about her and he said very simply and honestly

- “we’re doing okay. She’s kind. But there is not the little flame on my side. We’ll see”.

- “She’s kind? Okay…”

Then I asked if she was coming to the birthday and he said

- “Oh no. We don’t see each other much on the weekend. We see each other enough during the week. And I like my independence. So the weekend is dedicated to the buddies”

At least, that’s clear! :o)