Words and scenes

After a week of blogging silence, prepare yourselves for a flurry of posts (silence and a cup of coffee make for an interesting combination - hopefully I won't come across as too hyperactive and nonsensical!) So what's been going on this week? Well, apart from me becoming slightly worried about the power of words - I wrote about tea, the next morning our kettle broke; I wrote about shipwrecks, the next day the Cutty Sark went up in flames - Lyon has been quite the hive of activity. Classic French scenes of the past week or two have included swathes of people congregating in Place Bellecour to play la boule lyonnaise (From what I can glean, la boule lyonnaise - recently renamed sport-boule - isn't exactly the same as pétanques, but is very similar); a parade of protesters 'manifesting', followed by a considerably larger number of police officers in vans and unmarked cars; people dashing through torrential rain clutching baguettes and for a final cliché, workmen preparing Lyon's Roman amphitheatre for summer concerts lunching VERY leisurely under a gleaming white marquee erected on the stage. (Instating long lunches in England is high on my list of priorities). So as to avoid gargantuan posts (I'm always told off for writing mammoth sentences and paragraphs), I'll split up everything else into separate nuggets. Keep reading...