French Word-A-Day

tonnerre

Chief Grape in his tractor. (Photo taken earlier this month.) The vines are now leafy green and those bushes, in the foreground, are covered with sweet-scented, golden, Scottish-broomy buds.
 

Un update on Jean-Marc's test results in today's story: "Light at the end of the Tonnerre"...

Correction: The pronunciation for chocotte, or "to have the jitters" (and nothing to do with "chochotte", or "a fussbudget / fusspot"), is updated here.

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le tonnerre (toh nair)

    : thunder

Audio File: Listen to Jean-Marc pronounce the following example sentence and the expressions below: Download MP3 or Wav file

Le tonnerre ne vient pas au même moment que l'éclair.
Thunder does not come at the same time as lightning. 

un coup de tonnerre = clap, peal, of thunder, thunderbolt
un tonnerre d'applaudissements = thunderous applause
du tonnerre = terrific, wonderful, fantastic
Tonnerre de Dieu! (or "de Brest!")! = heavens above, or hell's bells!

 

A Day in a French Life by Kristin Espinasse

"Light at the End of the Tonnerre"

After the pounding thunderclap, I burrowed farther into my husband's arms. Lying there we looked out the bedroom window to the flash of lumière.

Out of blackness, the vineyard became illuminated, every leafy vine coming into view, the stones beneath them glistening. Overhead, a jagged hand of lightning pointed downward, like a conductor's swift command, and the field below was awash in the melody of light.

I listened to Jean-Marc count quietly: un, deux, trois...

A breath of French numbers tickled the back of my neck. 

... quatre, cinq, six...

I recognized his "distance of lightning" calculation. The seconds, divided, correspond to the number of kilometers between us and that threatening bolt.

... onze, douze, treize...

The counting trailed off. In the wait between time and space, I asked Jean-Marc to repeat the nurse's exact words concerning the test results for the kidney biopsy he had two weeks ago.  

"Rien d'alarmant."

I repeated his answer, as I had when we first heard it, and again in the hours between then and now. "Rien d'alarmant"....

"Oui, Chérie," Jean-Marc agreed, his arms reenforcing his hold on me. 

We lie there in peace, having stopped counting the distance of lightning. After twelve seconds and twelve long days that menacing thunderbolt never came.

 ***

Post note: Apart from the assurance that "rien d'alarmant" showed up in the biopsy results, we have no further details from the medical exam. Jean-Marc is to return to the doctor's in three weeks (the soonest the nurse could schedule him in) for an evaluation.  

Le Coin Commentaires
To respond to this story, click here to access the comments box. Merci d'avance! 

 

French Vocabulary

la lumière = light

un, deux, trois... = one, two, three...

quatre, cinq, six... = four, five, six

onze, douze, treize... = eleven, twelve, thirteen...

rien d'alarmant = nothing alarming

oui, Chérie = yes, Dear

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avoir les chocottes

Smokey takes a thoughtful pause (from blowing bubbles in the brook...) to contemplate nature and the history of the fleur de lys *** read more at the end of this edition.

Update on Jean-Marc: We are still waiting for the kidney biopsy results. Meantime, read about how we are passing the time, in the following story...  We have very good news: all is OK! The nurse called to say that the test results show nothing to worry about. That is all the info we have for now. Thank you very much for your caring notes and positive thoughts!

avoir les chochottes (ahv whar lay sho koht)

    : to have the jitters

Tip: Read beyond the word of the day. Discover stories from a French life, just below. You will learn many more French words in context as well as everyday expressions not found in a textbook.

***

Les chocottes is a synonym for "teeth". In the expression "avoir les chocottes" we can imagine chattering teeth in response to fear.

Audio File: listen to Jean-Marc pronounce this example sentence (Download MP3 or Wav file)

Quand il m'a demandé de tenir la barrique pendant que la tronçonneuse allait la scier, j'ai eu les chocottes! When he asked me to hold onto the wine barrel while the power saw cut through it, I had the jitters!
. 

A Day in a French Life... by Kristin Espinasse

"Taking Trust to the Next Level"

Jean-Marc wants to play "Magician and Assistant" only I'm not game. 

Never mind. My husband is not one to wait for an answer. Instead, he points to the 220-liters wine barrel and says: Mets-toi là! Stand there!

I drag my legs over to the old wooden barrique. 
"Je ne peux pas faire ça!"

My protests are met by slight annoyance on the part of The Magician, who turns his attention to the power saw and begins yanking at the cord.

The tronçonneuse gives a roar only to die down again... and just when I think I will be dismissed from this macabre chore... back to life that power saw roars!

The edge of the saw wavers to and fro as The Magician motions to the side of the barrel. I take my cue to step into place. I have no stileto heels, no sequined gown. I am dressed in tatters and terror.

Standing to the side of the huge barrique, I reach out to put the tip of my finger on its hard metal edge.

"Ne bouge pas! Don't move!" The Magician orders. 

Don't move? Je suis paralysée. Only, when the saw hits the barrel and the wood dust begins to fly I jump back. "I can't! I can't!!!"

Jean-Marc fires up the tronçonneuse once again and moves in toward the wine barrel. He is going to saw it in half with or without me!

Seeing the barrel rock, I inch over to it and grab onto the end. My eyes are pressed so tightly together that my upper lip rises in time to bare my teeth, which receive a thin screen of saw dust when wood particles hurl forth from the saw's blade.

When the power saw is fired up for the next round, I remember to hold my mouth closed. I feel the barrel roll forwards and backwards as the Magician rotates the cutting surface.

"C'est presque fini!" he informs me. 

I pry open my right eye to see whether Mr. Magician is telling the truth. En effet, the barrel is about to split in half!

"Voilà, Chérie," the husband-houdini announces. Two new flower pots for you!

I study the halved barrel. My other eye pops open when the critic in me can't help but point out the wavy, uneven coupe:

"Perhaps a straight line should have been traced first?"

"Mais c'est ça qui fait son charme!" Jean-Marc argues.

I follow the French accent to the uneven smile from which the argument pours forth. 

"T'as raison!" "You are right!", I admit to the disarming Magician, "C'est ça qui fait son charme!" Only, my eyes are no longer lingering on the crooked barrel.

 ***

Le Coin Commentaires

Corrections, Comments, and stories of your own are welcome here, in the comments box. 

 

 

French Vocabulary

mets-toi là = stand there

la barrique = large barrel 

Je ne peux pas faire ça! = I can't do that

la tronçonneuse = power saw

ne bouge pas! = don't move

je suis paralysé = I am paralyzed

c'est presque fini! = it's almost done!

en effet = as a matter of fact, indeed

Voilà, Chérie = There you are, Dear

la coupe = the cut

Mais, c'est ça qui fait son charme! = But that's what gives it its charm!

(pictured, left, another charming twist in home decoration: a whimsically painted wooden shutter. Photo taken in the town of Jonquières, and featured in Saturday's Cinéma Vérité edition)
. 

Newforest's Notes : Chocotte & Chochotte
In a follow up to her comment in today's Coin Commentaires, Newforest sent in these helpful and interesting expressions:

CHOCOTTE
When you are afraid, your teeth may chatter (choc-choc-choc)... "les chocottes" are a very old term for "les dents" (teeth) and is no longer used these days, except in a childish language and in the familiar expression used when you are frightened: "avoir les chocottes". In 'ordinary' language, you would say: "claquer des dents", which can be caused either by "avoir froid" ('being cold') or, "avoir peur" ('being afraid, scared') 

Here are other very 'familiar' expressions in French, to translate the idea of being afraid, being scared, being frightened

-> "avoir la frousse" = to be scared
BTW, if you are always afraid of something, you are "un froussard" (= "un peureux") 
- "froussard(e)" and "peureux (peureuse)" are also used as adjectives.

-> "avoir la trouille" = to be frightened/scared to death
You measure temperature with "un thermomètre"... atmospheric pressure with "un baromètre" and, by analogy, you measure your fear (your "trouille") with an imaginary.... "trouillomètre"! 
so, "avoir le trouillomètre à zéro" = to be VERY frightened indeed... to be petrified/paralyzed with terror

-> "avoir la pétoche"
= to be scared stiff, to be scared out of one's wits
Synonyms for "la pétoche" ->  "la crainte", "la frayeur", "la peur" 


CHOCHOTTE
The word "chochotte" (pejorative) means something totally different! 
"une chochotte" is either
--> a girl we can describe as affectedly pretty, very fussy and rather snobbish - a girl "qui fait des chichis"
- "faire des chichis" / "des manières" / "des simagrées" = to put on 'airs' 
- Familiar words for such a girl: 
"une pimbêche", "une chichiteuse", "une bêcheuse" (the word "bêcheuse" has also got other meanings).

or, 
--> a boy we can describe as excessively trendy, stylish (but lacking virility...), having extremely refined manners, effeminate.  
- pejorative for homosexual-

 

 

 What kind of flowers shall be put in our recouped barrel (which is just like this one, only sans fleurs)? Share your suggestions here, in the comments box -- and thanks in advance!

 

Mama Braise (BREZ) is pictured here... As Smokey dries off somewhere outside the edge of this photo.

**fleur de lys, continued ... one theory has it that the famous flower came into recognition in the early wars, when a certain king waded through the narrow, iris-flanked waterways to escape the enemy. After a safe journey (thanks to the camouflaging flowers...) the humble iris des marais, or "iris of the marais", was honored. It is this "fleur de Louis" that inspired the French coat of arms (and not the fleur de lys). But don't take my word for it... there are other theories (I heard this one from Uncle Jean-Claude and the facts might have gotten mixed up in translation!)

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faire passer le temps

                            Scottish broom in the French countryside...

Thank you for your thoughtful notes and emails, but we do not have any test results from Jean-Marc's kidney biopsy to share with you. And today, le lundi de Pâques, means we'll have to wait another day or two!

faire passer le temps (fer passay leuh tahmp)

    : to while away the time

Audio File: Listen to Jean-Marc pronounce the following French words: Download MP3 or Wave file

L'autre jour j'ai fait les magasins pour faire passer le temps. The other day I went shopping to pass the time.

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.
A Day in a French Life... by Kristin Espinasse

"A Hell-On-Wheels Heart"

Friday afternoon, with a morale at sub zero, I was haunting the aisles of a home-decor store. This was not retail therapy. J'étais en train de tuer le temps. There were two hours to kill while my 13-year-old and her giggly cohort cruised the mall (and I wasn't up to making an aller-retour to the farm and back!).

C'était un drôle de deux heures. It was a very strange two hours spent in full martyr mode. "What a dumb decision that was!" I chastised myself about the anecdote I had just posted. "You should have written about "Adult Chicken Adoption", as you had set out to do! 'Ex-battery Hens' would have been a much better topic, DUMMY! The plight of commercial egg-layers was surely a less risqué sujet than "ego annihilation via death to self"! (Of all subjects! Of all subjects!!!)

(Later, I would have the consolation of laughter, over a telephone conversation in which I admitted to my mom that perhaps a journal titled "French Word-A-Day" was an unlikely place to talk about mortification of self!)

Mortified, I was. And, in this state, I continued worrisomely to while the time away, or faire passer le temps, falling to greater and greater depths of despairing humiliation.

Though my eyes were fixed to the blur of my mind's colorful imagination (in which scores of Word-a-Day subscribers were signing off, en masse, dismissing its author as some sort of mystic moon-bather), I somehow managed to catch a glimpse of the shopper ahead me. Her head suddenly jerked to the side... as if an invisible tug rope were tied to it. Every few moments her head jerked again...

As the woman's children bombarded her with questions, the cigar-voiced mother-with-a-tic would snap back, literally. Her violent head-jerkings were tamed only by her take-no-shit send-offs, or ripostes, which followed her visible suffering. The whole hard-edged package was wrapped up in a cropped-haired, tight-jeaned, 30-something. As tough-exteriored as the woman appeared, you could not miss the affection and protectiveness emanating from her center as her children and her mother flocked around her in time for more chattering and more head-jerking riposting. 

If I ever had a heroine, the slumbering novelist inside of me mused, she'd be a little like her. I would have liked to have studied the woman a little closer, but feared that her involuntary tic might seem to her the object of my curiosity. She could not know that it was her hell-on-wheels heart that so enamored me. 

Thanks to this unknown woman, I left the store with my very own hell-on-wheels heart. A heart with character in time to weather the fickle air, cloudy one day, sunny the next. It was just the antidote my uneasy interior had been searching for, there, of all places, in the home-improvements store. 

***

A hell-on-wheels heart is not cold or closed, it's fiery and has wheels! ...though it doesn't always know where it is going...

Le Coin Commentaires
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Feeling unloveable? Go out and hug a flower! Nature will never snub or snob you :-)

French Vocabulary

le lundi de Pâques = Easter Monday

tuer le temps = to kill time

aller-retour = round trip

le sujet = subject

 

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        Sunny façade in Cassis. All photos & text © Kristin Espinasse

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