It goes from bad to worse - still no database, so we are filling in time doing documentation for tests before we have done the tests. Yes, exactly. There is a certain amount we can do, but of course it will all have to be revisited when finally we can do something. Gil is also in a not very good mood, as they had a horrible committee meeting yesterday, where he was the main victim, and our new PD (who is only part time on this project) was not very supportive.

I was talking to Suzette this morning and said I really felt like going and buying shoes tomorrow. She said, if she was me, she would get the matching handbag as well! In fact, buying shoes is the last thing I should be doing, as the recent exercise with the wardrobe etc revealed that I have absolutely no idea how many pairs of shoes I do have. It could be about 50, I am really not sure.

This really has not been a good week, I've done so little stitching that there's not even any point photographing it,I'll see how I go by Sunday. I have knitted a foot of scarf in this Noro yarn called Ganpi Akaba, but that's not very exciting to look at. I get the usual strange looks in the metro, a bit unfair really, when you think what some people are doing (barking to themselves, eating ham sandwiches for breakfast, picking their noses etc etc).


What else has happened this week? Well, all of our work mobile phones stopped working on Wednesday, in some cases in mid phone call - our new employers, who had sent us a letter saying that the contract was going to run out at some date that they did not tell us and they would send us another letter beforehand regarding replacement phones, just forgot all of this and let the contract expire. So my cellphone is now nothing more than an alarm clock! I actually wouldn't mind a new phone, as mine is the oldest one in the company, it dates from 2001. It still works, more or less, occasionally the buttons stick or something.

Of course the person who is handling this from our side is the mad Ruritanian Help Desk man (the one we refer to as Dracula), who has just told us that he has no idea when we will have new phones - some of the PDs, who are already getting severe withdrawal symptoms, are very cross with him. Gil and I are just sitting here saying, well, if anyone wants to call us.... it could actually be quite pleasant to be without a phone for a while. I don't actually have a personal one, when I first came to France, of course I couldn't get one (no French work contract, no French bank account, etc etc), and, although I could now, I've just never done it.

Plan for the evening - sneak out of here before 6pm, buy bottle of Sancerre, go home, whiz through some chores while Sancerre chilling, open Sancerre and sit with this and stitching in front of the Three Tenors. They are having this on tv tonight, the famous concert at the Caracalla Baths, in memory of Luciano Pavarotti, and I think this is more my sort of thing than France v Argentina.

Re Rugby World Cup, I think there will be a certain amount of mass hysteria here, although not like the Soccer World Cup, but certainly all the hotels are booked out at present, and virtually every advertisement you see for anything has got a rugby ball in it..... of course the poor dears expect France to win! I will go along the road to the Eiffel Tower when I can (it's a whole 5 mins walk from chez moi) and report upon this rugby ball shaped NZ pavilion at some stage....