Sorry I've been away for longer than a week. It is difficult to write these lacking internet in the house and forgetting to upload pictures to my laptop to share with you all, but never fear! We have internet again! YAAAAY!
The reason I mention smell is because I have come across another comical smell here at CERN. If you'll recall from an earlier post (possibly my first, I can't remember) I mentioned a smell hanging around the site that I could only describe as industrial lucky charms? It has since cropped up once or twice more, only last time it was closer to industrial fruit loops, if one can be specific about such things. Well, today's comical smell has been hanging around the hallway outside my office. Maybe it's haunted by a smell ghost, I don't know. More likely it has something to do with all the hammering and noise next door, but if so I don't want to know why this particular smell is being produced. This olfactory event can best be described as honey walnut shrimp with a (used) car battery.
For those who have been to Noble Court in bellevue or have had dim sum where they serve the stuff, you will recognize the smell right away. For those who have not, honey walnut shrimp is even less healthy than it sounds, and even more delicious. Basically it is shrimp fried and coated in a mix of mayonnaise and honey and is deliciously calorific before being accompanied with walnuts. I've always wanted to try it myself actually, but never have gotten around to it, and in any event the smell is delightful.
The (used) car battery is similar the smell one's engine has when it overheats.
Anyway, that isn't what I came to talk to you about. I came to talk about the draft. And by that I mean pictures! I wasn't sure what to write on today, but I have a number of pictures of various random things around CERN and the area that are amusing, delightful, technological, or delicious. Sometimes all four (sort of like a honey walnut baby kitten dressed as a clown that has been assimilated by the borg, except I think that'd be more sad than anything else). In any event, enjoy!
Those in my family ought to find this picture interesting. This is a poster in the room that I am using. The kicker is, I have seen these three Cheetahs in real life. They are three brothers that were orphaned while still young, and thus rather than going solitary as they reached adulthood, they have stayed together and learned to hunt as a team (and done very well). My family and I saw them while in Africa for the Kenya Marathon.
This is one of the main conference rooms where meetings take place at CERN. The table is cool, but what I'm really interested in is that thing in the middle. I have no clue what it is, but this is CERN so I'm pretty sure it is a holographic display used to plan the attack on the Death Star.
You know those small rides they sometimes have outside of stores for kids to get their parents to spend an extra few coins? Well this is the France edition featuring Spider Mas secret police investigation. I had no idea he was a member of the Secret Police, but there you go.
And here we have something completely different, a baby goat. It is adorable. There are a bunch of them in a field near the ALICE experiment (not the CERN main site) and at one point I stopped to take pictures and they all looked up, went "baa!" and ran over to see if I had any food. I didn't, but it was still cute as all get out.
And here we see how some things can go too far. Enough said.
And now to the pictures that I really wanted to share! This is the market at Ferney-Voltaire, which I promised to get pictures of. This was last weekend. I only got pictures of around a third or a quarter of it, but it has much the same except that there are places with clothing in lieu of food. Sorry, no Churros here, I forgot I had my phone until after we had gone past that stand.
This is Kati (Katie?), that is Katarina (Caterina?), my landlady's daughter. She thought I was acting like a huge tourist. Which I was.
And here is the famous Mont d'Ore moldy cheese! That wrinkled cloth looking thing is the skin of the cheese. More on this later
And here is Yiota herself! Landlady extraordinaire. Also, CHEESE. My word there is a lot of cheese here. I got almost the whole thing, but all the way down to the end there is cheese. Welcome to France!
This is generally how the market looks from opening to closing. As you can see it is quite popular.
For those of you who have had fried chicken over at my place and have seen my Dad bust out his paella pan, the one in this pictures is even bigger. And looked delicious (but I was out of cash at that point).
Lots and lots of produce of course, there were many stands like the ones I've showed (save that I showed the largest cheese stand I could find there).
And then we met Nanook.
Fish! Not Pike place standard, but surprisingly fresh owing to our not being on the ocean. Though I suppose we're not THAT far from it... Still, for a small town farmer's market? Not bad.
And to complement the cheese, we have the essential wine. One of many stands of course.
Here's one for those of you who don't like to see your food preprocessed. Also something I haven't seen in a market before (though since I have been pheasant hunting, this wasn't as new as could be for me).
And now, the moment you've all been waiting for: pictures of the preparation of Mont d'Or a la garlic et vin blanc. (I don't know what French for garlic is). First you scoop out the middle and fill it with lots of wine and garlic. This actually wasn't quite enough wine, so I added more.
Next, Wrap it in tinfoil as best you can (harder than you'd think) with a cone shape.
Once it is in the oven, you gotta get your bread ready. I like to make my bread look nice (not necessary, but show some artistic pride!)
And here I am with my meal (which I shared with whoever was about, there is a surprisingly large amount of cheese in one of those boxes.
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