Mmm, Tastes Like Cricket

When I was in high school French class, my teacher was preparing us for our trip to France, and giving us some great advice.  Monsieur told us to take in the country with all five senses.  He told us to eat different foods, savoring different tastes than what we were used to.  So I visited a perfumerie, a patisserie, a flower market, and smelled as many scents as I could.  I purchased a cassette tape (yes, that tells you how old I am – approximately) and listened to French pop music.  I pet the street dogs of Paris who roamed into the open-door cafes.  And, of course, I saw as many new and incredible sights as possible . . . and took almost as many pictures.

I did all that, and I’m glad I did.  And now I’m a forever fan of  crusty French baguettes, L’eau de Temps perfume, Jean-Jacques Goldman’s songs, wet pup noses, and the bright white glory of the Sacre Coeur.

I encourage this sort of five-senses tourism with my children when we vacation some place new.  I also encourage it in the classes I teach.

This week, I happen to be teaching  Bible stories to young children.  I always try to include a little snack and music, as well as pictures, and often, scents that help them remember the story and/or feel a stronger part of it.

So, I’m off to our local hardware store (of all places), where, I have been told, I can buy fried and flavored crickets.

I’ll let you know how they taste.

Because we’re learning about John the Baptist, and he survived on insects while he lived and preached in the wilderness.

Submerge yourselves in life, folks! 

Dive deep!

~Thanks!

A short blog about smells: Please reply!

It isn’t difficult to describe what something looks or sounds like, but often  it’s hard to write about all five senses.  Perhaps we leave out taste, touch and smell a bit too often in our narratives.  Let’s not do that anymore, shall we?

This week I’m going to blog about writing about the senses.  I’ll start with the most underused, but possibly the most important sense: the sense of smell.

However, I’m not actually going to WRITE about any of these smells.  I’m merely going to picture the olfactory objects here, and invite ALL OF YOU to pick one or more and write about it in a reply back to me.

Here we go.  I only wish your computer came with a smell-o-matic app – or a scratch-n-sniff screen.

1.  Honeysuckle: (I started with that since I’m smelling it right now to the left of my porch)

2.  Baking Bread

3. Wood Smoke

4. Skunk

5.  Freshly-mowed Lawn (one of my favorites, actually)

6:  Ocean Surf

7.  Bacon

8.  Old Spice Aftershave (Original)

9.   Gasoline

10: Asphalt in the Rain

Have fun!  Happy smelling!

Thanks!