Educational Television

I've been away from mainstream television for awhile now--during the bulk of my residency program I was completely clueless about the "popular shows" (e.g. Lost, House, etc) and I typically would only watch sports, the occasional episode of "Scrubs", and reruns of Seinfeld, most of which I could practically quote by memory but were better than anything else on.

Well, now that I am in France and television-watching is considered an EDUCATIONAL activity for me, I am trying to fill in the gaps of my cultural knowledge by catching up on the important television programs of the past few years. First off, we have Prison Break , which is quite popular in France. Of note, it features a different theme song which is in French and I have heard a couple of times on the radio; I think this is to drum up further French interest in the show. Next we have Lost, which I am currently addicted to...Claire & I are renting Season I from this cool "DVD Vending Machine"-thingee located in our neighborhood. And finally we have the "The Office", which is perhaps my favorite T.V. show currently showing. Most people are aware that the NBC version (starring Steve Carell) is based on the original British show, but did you know that there are also versions in French ("Le Bureau"), German, and there will soon be a Quebecois version.

Back to our "French Word of the Day": the word today is "le chauve-souri", which is the French word for "bat" (as in Batman). Literally translated, "chauve-souri" means "bald mouse."