Getting the (elevator) shaft

Maybe I overthink things. Actually, I know I do. But have you ever noticed how in all action flicks, elevators are relatively easy to escape from because their ceiling has a conveniently placed hatch of sorts? I wouldn't want to belittle the effort required to access this hatch and make it onto the top of the elevator to pull off an amazing stunt, make a getaway or surprise bad guys, but... I have been checking out elevators here and there, and NONE of them have a removeable ceiling. No hatch. No potentially easy exit.

Am I missing something?

Clearly this has pretty much zero impact on my everyday life, but now every time I see a movie with an elevator escape scene, I can't help but wonder what the characters would do if their Plan A was not applicable. And I also wonder why elevator companies don't put hatches in all elevators - I mean what if something happened and you couldn't get out through the doors?

This is right up there along with the fact that good guys apparently have a much much better aim than bad guys. And when they get shot somewhere, it doesn't impede their actions whereas bad guys shot anywhere will drop down and be useless - but I doth digress.

My point (I think) is that I want to suspend my disbelief when I go see a movie. But if you're going to blatantly ignore the laws of physics and logic, then you may as well make your heroes wear spandex and have special powers, because that's always cool.

Aube Musicale

What better way to start your day than to go to a free saxophone concert by the lake and watch the sunrise? Exactly.

Me & Claire last Wednesday, almost awake and soaking up the first rays of sunlight of the day.

Saxophone player in action. In between pieces, he read out some poetry. Not sure what it was about or if it was in French or Spanish or some other unidentifiable language, but we appreciated the idea and effort, really.

Lake Geneva at sunrise.

Have to say that I love just how many music and movie related events there are in Geneva throughout summer - Musiques d'été au Parc de la Grange, Aubes Musicales, classical music concerts around town, lunchtime concerts at the Red cross Museum, Cinelac, Ciné Transat, the list goes on. And that's not even including the music festivals in the wider vicinity! And this is exactly why summer is everyone's favourite season around here...

It's the small things in life

Last week I found a great Italian-Bolivian restaurant in Geneva: La Baïta. There is no logic to that combination but the Pique Macho we had was delicious, AND they have a downstairs Karaoke bar, so I will definitely be going back! The point of this post, however, is to point out just how much I love typos on menus. Some are better than others, and this one is right up there:


"Falso Conejo - beef milanaise, onion sauce and green peas" except instead of saying "petits pois" for green peas, they wrote "petits poids" which translates to "little weights"! Apparently the cook or manager have traumatic history with green peas...

Priceless.

Bike-a-licious

Tuesday was a test. Claire and I rented bikes from GeneveRoule and pedaled our way to Jussy and back for archery practice... Verdict? 27km total with 1h of archery practice as a break at our destination, and we survived! Even made it back in time to return the bikes before the store closed. *does a victory dance*

Picture on the right is the kind of landscape we were biking through - don't you just love the sunflowers?

Notes to self:
- Take water with you when you exercise, it's a lifesaver.
- If you set your cardio belt/watch to beep when you are outside your ideal BPM range, be ready to put up with a lot of beeping.
- You need a bike that is the right size for you, otherwise you will suffer that much more.
- Those silly padded biker shorts? Not so silly, precisely because they are padded. Consider getting some if you're going to do the 38k in Mayotte...
- Eating less than 1h after you have just worked out is not so smart, even if the idea of food is extremely appealing.

That reminds me... we have the programme!

Raid Amazones, October 2010
13-14: Travel & set-up
15: Canoe 18km
16: Trekking 12km
17: VTT 38km + surprise activity
18: Multi-activity session on Chissioua island, Bandrele
19: Trekking 14km
20: Running 2km + canoe 16km
21: Return to Paris/Geneva

And now we have a Facebook page called "Modern Day Amazons" where you can follow our training and fundraising, which completes the blog for my team - http://superchipettes.blogspot.com/

Breakfast

I've been trying to figure out a good formula for breakfast for a while now, and I think I am getting closer. The thing is...

1) Brunch is my favourite meal, but let's just accept that it is not an option to have brunch for breakfast every day, no matter how tempting.

2) I love the egg and cheese sandwich option, but it's not so healthy long term and requires a functional kitchen* as well as time before you leave the house to prepare and eat said sandwich. Not ideal when you pathologically hit snooze an extra 3x every morning just because you know you can get away with it if you skip breakfast (bad Shahnaz!).

3) When I eat breakfast at work I can take my time instead of snarfing it in 35 seconds on my way out the door. Work has a functional kitchen I can use.

4) I don't like wasting food, but sometimes things happen and I don't go with the planned breakfast for a few days. When I tried having fruit for breakfast, this inevitably lead to waste.

5) The whole concept of muesli is curious to me and not intrinsically appealing, but if so many healthy active people embrace it, it has to have something going for it, right?

Well, if you thought having muesli for breakfast was as easy as buying the stuff and making yourself a bowl of it with some milk and fruit, you were wrong. I tried that, and it tasted like horsefeed! Plus I am pretty sure it dehydrated me from the inside out, that's how dry it was. Turns out you need to get the dose of milk just right and should let the muesli sit in milk overnight so it can absorb it... yeah, not happening. But there is another way - add milk to the muesli and zap it in the microwave while you chop up the fresh fruit and TADAH! You're one giant step closer to having something tasty. Then it's just a matter of getting proportions right. Oh, and if you buy the cheap muesli, it will just be that much more stubbornly dry (trust me, I tried).

So far, the best formula seems to be: (muesli + lots of milk)^microwave + 2 fresh fruits from the set {peach, nectarine, pear, banana} + optional dollop of honey

And yes, I'm a dork.



*I have not really had a functional kitchen for 3 weeks now due to a move from the family house to an apartment... long story, deserving of its own post (or 12).

World, here I am

I'm back. Yes, I know - most of you didn't even notice I was gone. It's ok though, I don't bear a grudge. So last time I started one of these up was to keep track of my Bolivian adventures. This time it's for everything else, ranging from my attempts to find a suitable breakfast to the challenge of prepping for Raid Amazones, an amateur sport competition for women that will take place on an island off Madagascar in October (www.raidamazones.com if you're curious). That's why I thought I would call this blog "Trial & Laughter" - because I feel like my life right now all about transition and is full of change which is mostly based on trial & error... even though I try for a rational pseudo scientific approach (ish). Hence the end result tends to be a lot of entertainment, for myself and those around me. And in the face of adversity and unexpectedness as well as chaos, is laughter not the best of medicines?

Here are the two dream teams! The Chiquititas on the left (Sophie, Claire, Emily) and the Chipettes on the right (Roxane, Alicia & me). Photo taken last night after archery practice.