Two fun things, a film and something overheard at Panera:

While at Panera, sitting and eating and trying to mind my own business, I could not help but overhear the loud conversation at a nearby table between two female UD professors, one of whom was animatedly telling the other of her search on and off over the years for an old boyfriend and how her recent discovery over spring break of Facebook enabled her to finally track him down. She was apparently quite oblivious to the fact that she was broadcasting her personal information to all and sundry in the vicinity of Panera's fireplace, and also broadcasting (as it turns out, an apt verb choice) that of her ex-boyfriend, Dave Kelso, now a radio DJ in Oklahoma City who uses his middle name as his last name professionally because his real last name, which starts with an S, is always mispronounced by people. If David Kelso ever googles himself and happens across this, he'll know exactly who it was that was broadcasting information about him in public. David, your ex-girlfriend is so new to Facebook, she doesn't realize that she can set her Facebook profile so that strangers can't read it.

After having learned more than I really cared to know about a random stranger, I went to the Neon Movies to watch a film whose main character is quite the opposite of the loud UD professor at Panera in that she reveals as little as possible about her life to anyone. Kristen Scott Thomas stars in Il y a longtemps que je t'aime, a film about a woman named Juliette who, after a long absence, goes to live with her younger sister and her sister's family. Details about Juliette's situation are revealed slowly over the course of the film, and they're not predictable, at least not all of them. I find such a film much more enjoyable than one whose ending one knows practically before it's begun. I'm also in awe of Scott Thomas who is perhaps best known for her English-speaking role in The English Patient but who is quite comfortable acting en français. I've lived in a foreign country myself and become fairly fluent in German but not so much that I could act in a film auf deutsch (not that I could act in English but at least I'd have a chance in English). Aussi je parle un peu du français mais il y a beaucoup de years since I took it (in high school, to give you a clue just how many). I remember enough to help my nephew with his French lessons and to recognize words and phrases in conversation but not enough to follow an entire French film sans subtitles.

So the lessons to be learned from today are to speak quietly in Panera (and in public in general) when talking of personal matters and to go catch I've Loved You So Long at the Neon while you still can.