Challenges....

I've just waved Paul off. He's sitting exams today. No, not laser exams -  Language exams. As part of our Permanent Residency application we have to prove that we can speak, write, listen and read ENGLISH!

Yes, he is English. Yes, he did attend schools in England for his entire academic career and yes, he does have a PHD from an English University. (OK, to be fair, I can not vouch for how much of his thesis is written in English, it all seems like a foreign language to me. The pictures are pretty though!).

Anyway, in the interests of fairness everyone has to sit the same exam. So I waved him off this morning, having sharpened his pencils for him (with his lucky Niagara Falls pencil sharpener), and provided him with a list of words and phrases he should attempt to shoehorn into the written and spoken parts of the test. I wonder how many of these he'll manage:

• A parliament of owls.  (Bonus marks for any collective nouns he can invent and drop in).
• Knitting.
• Jasper. (Preferably as an invented best friend, who is to talk of in human form, not as our dog).
• Inauspicious.
• Boardwalk.
• Jessica Fletcher.
• As is tradition.
• The correct use of the words 'pants' and 'trousers'.

 I'm hoping he gets assigned a writing task where he has to write a letter of complaint. This should open the field for an elaborate and hilarious story about a mix-up with a trouser-press in a hotel in Cabot Cove, where an inauspicious character named Jasper, seen knitting on the boardwalk kidnaps a Parliament of Owls and is hunted down my Jessica Fletcher. As is tradition.

Yes, it would be easier (and more fun) if I took the test! But, sadly as a 'dependent' it matters not whether I can speak, listen, read or write, as I have my big strong man to do it for me. In my case, when faced with a fifteen minute speaking test where he has to make small talk with a strange woman, my big strong man would probably rather rewrite his thesis. In French.

While I'm here, for those of you interested in the knitting/crafting side of my personality (and if you aren't, I'd be interested to know what other facets you do find interesting!) there is a new blogging adventure happening here: knitters rumble.
with my friends Julianna and Emily. I wasn't going to share until I'd taken the lead in our little competition, but that's taking longer than expected, so I'd best garner support now!

Have a great weekend everyone. x