Parlez vous Francais? Habla Espanol?

Well we do!! Okay…not YET, but we will. We have “acquired” all levels of Rosetta Stone French AND Spanish and gosh darn it, we are going to learn some foreign languages! Scott already speaks some Spanish, and I speak a really great mix of Spanish, Italian and Swahili – (I like to call it “Spitali” )and while it’s really fun (especially after a bottle or two of wine) – it really doesn’t get me anywhere. Once upon a time I had a life goal to be “tri-lingual” by the time I was thirty. Unfortunately, 30 has come and gone so I’m going to bump that up to 33. Or maybe 34. We’ll see how I do.

Scott has become something of a technology wiz and installed all the software and has made special accounts for both of us with voice recognition and everything! Let me tell you - this Rosetta Stone really IS something!! Gone are the days of flashcards and audio tapes – this is the REAL DEAL. I mean, this is the program used by CIA operatives (or so they say) and that is just plain cool. It is an "immersion" program that teaches you without translation or memorization. Rather, you learn through repetition and pictures. The idea is to learn via association. So instead of seeing a cat and thinking "cat = chat" you remove that "=" and just see "chat". I come home every day to a (very pleasant) robotic voice saying “Les hommes cuisine” and then I hear Scott repeat: "Lay OMM KWIseen". Before you know, I'm parked on the couch next to him and we’re both mesmerized and making that awesome “eeuuur” throaty sound like we’ve been speaking French for years. Pretty cool.

So – we’ll see how this goes. We figure we can pretty much converse our way around the world with this mighty triumvirate of languages – plus, it will give us something else to focus on and learn ASIDE from all things boat.

Scott is so enthralled (when he throws himself into something he REALLY gets into it) that he’s in the process of acquiring Mandarin. Me, on the other hand, I’ll just settle for French and Spanish!

Au revoir! Adios! Peace out!

Brittany and Scott