Yesterday morning I gleefully (if one can be said to be doing laundry 'gleefully') stuffed my plaster-encrusted work clothes into the washing machine. The last of the "decorative lime coating" had gone up on Thursday, so I no longer needed my protective gear. As you may have guessed from previous 'plaster in my hair' -type comments, I am not a neat worker. But I got the job done.

I'm just glad that it's over. The rest of the house is going to be wallpapered or painted. No more textured wall finishes for me, thanks.

After I got the laundry in, I drove the Frogman to Switzerland (don't be impressed, it's only 20 minutes away from the house). Then I had to stop at the grocery store, keeping in mind we'll be having a guest for the weekend: Christi the Romanian Handyman.

The Frogman has decided that we are too overwhelmed with large, handyman-ish tasks that really need to be done before the cold weather sets in. (The VERY cold weather, I mean. It's already quite, quite cold here, IMO. ) So, when our pal M (a Romanian actress turned geologist. Long story.) mentioned a couple of weeks ago that she knew a nice fellow countryman looking for a bit of work, this news did not fall on deaf ears. The Frogman arranged for him to spend a weekend here working with us.

And I said (as I so often do) "This is SO going on my blog".

Anyway, cruising through the supermarket, I was passing the frozen foods and suddenly noticed...Hot Pockets! I was amazed! I was fascinated! I bought some! Hot Pockets in rural France? Get outta here!

It's kind of strange that I was so excited about this. For one thing, I've never eaten a Hot Pocket. Ever.

Second of all, I am more of a buy local and organic kind of food shopper. And what isn't local, I try to buy fair-trade, green, ecological, etc.

But the presence of these uber-American items in this small French supermarket somehow had an irresistable appeal. I bought a couple of boxes. I had to!

So, for lunch, I fed the twins Hot Pockets. Cooked in the microwave. Egads and Quelle Horreur! Junk food. Microwaved junk food! But they LOVED it- thought it was the tastiest ever.

After lunch, Mallory came up to me with one of my copies of New Scientist. She was quite interested in the cover story, but was finding the text too hard to read on her own. So, I had her read it out loud to me as I cleaned up the kitchen. I explained the difficult bits and helped her with the pronunciation of 'cephalopod', 'chromatophores' and other interesting, but not present in daily life, English words.

Raising kids to be truly bilingual takes a certain amount of effort. Luckily, it's usually lots of fun.

After all that, the twins headed back to school and it was time for me to start waxing the walls in the dining room. I opened the jar of orangy-colored wax, dampened my sponge and got to work. I spread it around in one corner, using the prescribed circular motion.

It looked like crap.

I turned to the cats. "Does this look like crap?", I asked them, which was a huge mistake.

All those two did was sit there and look at me disdainfully. Of course they thought it looked like crap. They that think everything I do is bad, or at best stupid. That's how cats are.

You dog owners can't even imagine how bad it is. Your dog thinks everything you do is really swell, extra peachy-keen and just generally super-duper. His eyes say it all: I love you, everything about you. You are perfect. Please give me food now. And even if you don't give him the food, he still worships you.

Cat's don't do worship. They do contempt. And you better be quick with that food or you just might earn a bite in the ankle region.

So, I have been severely handicapped in my home-improvement projects by the fact that I have two cats in the room with me at all times. They stare at me with that look that says. "You're doing it wrong, loser. And my food bowl better not be empty."

It's kind of dispiriting.

But I bravely ignored the two furry naysayers and forged onwards. I finished the first wall.

The Frogman came home from work.

He agreed with the cats.

"That looks pretty bad" he said.

But unlike the cats, he actually had a constructive suggestion. And he was right, a second coat DID help, immensely. Suddenly, the wall looked just like the sample wall back in the DIY store. Possibly better!

Take that, cats!