Your oldest friend survives a terrorist attack and your self works at mcdonalds

There are some strange and unpleasant things in this world; that's nothing unusual, there's always horrible shit going down somewhere. The only thing that makes this horrible shit different is that it's happening to me and my nearest and dearest.

As many readers of this blog will know, my oldest friend was fortunate enough this week to be out of town on a day when terrorism struck small(ish) town Thailand, killing one of her friends and by the sounds of things really devastating the community. Her closing line in her email telling us she was ok ("Being poor but unharmed is fine by me" or words to that affect) really made me think about the world and how wierd it is that it's also so full of troubles. I mean, the problem with troubles is that they're so common and pervasive that you just don't notice anymore. But it is wierd when you think about it. We're all here just trying to breath, drink, eat and get laid and yet day in day out people are waging war on one another and blowing eachother up in the name of ideology. I realise this is extremely old news but have you ever had it where something you've always just known, you suddenly really know? Like, the simple fact of "I'm getting older". Suddenly one day you might really think about it and something just falls into place. Maybe it's just me.

So, in amongst all this devilry, suffering and loneliness, what have I done to alleviate my situation of being unemployed and homeless?

I've applied for a job in McDonalds.

Yes it's true. One day some small child will be able to say to another small child that his Dad works in McDonalds and he won't be just teasing. It'll be me. All five stars on my name-badge, flipping the finest burgers known to man and trying to chat up the woman who minces the cow eyeballs in the back room.

It's hardly my idea of a dream come true, but in a funny sort of way I think it's rather good. It's a job that's relatively easy, in French (est-ce que je peux prendre un BigMac et Fries s'il vous plait) that will pay reasonably and allow me to carry on my french classes in the mornings. Plus they've got these new natty McDonalds matching jeans and denim cap outfits that I've not seen before. Will they have my size I wonder....!

In more news today, I may be on the brink of moving in to the biggest cop-out of all time: A flat with an english housemate... Not only that but an english housemate I already know. It's a friend of a friend who I stayed with when last I was in Toulouse. It'll be rubbish for my french, but great for my life overall as the flat's super-swish, relatively central and not too costly. I think my time for living with french people will come, but maybe it's not quite yet. Perhaps once I've scaled all 8 levels of the Alliance Francais...

All my love to all those in safety and comfort as well as those in post-traumatic stress mode.

Your humble blog writer,

Rob (Pictured here drunk with language students in Toulouse. It's a good job you don't love me coz I'm handsome!)