The QOTN outside.......... I've only got to finish those roses and sew the beads on, but I didn't do it yesterday, as I spent most of the day shopping.

Everything takes a long time in Paris, you can't just pop out and do shopping quickly. I had to go to the epilation, my eyebrows were starting to look a bit scary, and they are supposed to open at 10:00 am, but it was 10:15 before she rolled up, so that kind of put me behind. Then I went over to Le Rouvray, just for a little look, and then to Le Bon Marche, where I bought wadding for the two pochettes I have to finish. I also looked at their Scandinavian Exhibition, which was not that great, too many very weird clothes from designers I've never heard of - and I know the shops in Copenhagen at least pretty well. Finished up at the Grande Epicerie, where I bought stuff for dinner, a really nice Thai curry paste and some pork and vegetables. It was delicious, so maybe I haven't entirely forgotten how to cook, after not doing it for over a year. It's quite true that I never used the stove in the apartment in Nicosia.

I've been reading a lot over the past couple of days, as I went to Brentano's on Friday night after work and bought all the Elm Creek Quilts novels that they had, four of them. They are very good reading for stressed business architects and very calming.

This week has been extraordinarily stressful, in fact, as the new project seems terribly disorganised to me. We have no proper desks, we have to sit around large tables, with not nearly enough network cables - actually I am tempted just to go out and buy a hub - so if you get in late, there is no connection. Also, we haven't been given security badges yet, so if you get in too early, you can't even get in! I am supposed to have had several meetings that haven't happened because I've got no idea who to have them with and nothing seems to have been arranged.

I did have two meetings, one of my own on estimation that went well (first time I met a client who likes our estimation algorithms actually, normally they argue like mad about how their own is better) and one of Casey's, where I was the cavalry. She went off and I had a phone call ten minutes later to ask me to come and help. The subject was accounting interfaces, and this is difficult, even for fluent French speakers. Which she is not. Anyway I semi-rescued things, and later Gil turned up, which was better, as he is French.

It's actually the first time I've worked on a French-speaking project, and it is fairly tough, but I think I can do it. Derek told me he was fluent in French, but he isn't, and Casey certainly isn't, so I am the most fluent of the non-French people. We have two technical people coming next week, and they are non-French speakers, so Gil is just going to have to translate whatever they write into French - I have volunteered to translate from French to English for them when necessary, but I'm not going the other way!

Better finish, I am in MacDo, and want to go home and do a few million things, like the ironing.