I don't know about the moon, but my own memory is impressively intact, though sometimes spotty (I blame my college years, for reasons I won't delve into here, but to which I'm sure almost all of you can relate).

Allow me to quickly apologize for not posting this on my way out the door Friday eve, as I've always promised to do with these flashbacks, but I had three stories due that day and as a result did not accomplish much blogging at all (read: zilch). Forgive me, si'l vous plait.

Maintenant, on to the main event. Can you guess what it is? I've given you a hint. Mais oui, today's memory concerns my study, sort of, of French, which lasted from seventh grade through my senior year of college.

Sadly I don't recall much of le francais, other than the few phrases you'll find here and the simple fact that I was enrolled in some form of French class for the better part of a decade, but that's probably largely because I've so far spent only four days in my entire life (which is nearing upon, oh, 13,605 days now, wow) in France, and those days occurred when I was 17, which, I'll tell you without being entirely specific, was a really long time ago.

But I digress.

Something this weekend reminded me of my high school French teacher, whose name is totally escaping me (probably for the best, for her sake), but whose penchant for wearing leather, especially this shiny, red, almost-patent leather (it could have been pleather, tragic) zip-up dress, with which she sported some crazy-high heels, is forever implanted in my mind. Did I tell you I was in Vegas this weekend?

Anyway, Madame, as we'll call her, since I can't recall her name for the life of me, at the beginning of every semester would pass down the aisles a list of French names. We each had to pick one and for the remainder of the year, we would known within her classroom walls by that name. Those of us who stayed on year to year retained the same name the entire time.

Due to my being late the first day freshman year and not getting a look at the list until everyone else had already made their selection, it was slim pickings for me, and I ended up with Yvette. No offense to any Yvettes out there, but at the time I really thought that Cecile or Juliette would better become me. Alas it was not to be. So Yvette it was and Yvette it would stay.

Madame also had a rule that took effect each day about 10 minutes into class and stayed put until le fin, under threat of punishment. Said mandate was what she called "pas d'anglais," or, basically, "no English," meaning that after roll taking and general housekeeping stuff at the start of class we were forbidden from speaking our native tongue until were excused for the day.

Je detestais pas d'anglais (I hated "no English"). Probably because I didn't know much French, although I did eventually master enough vocabulary to, when I visited Paris for a few days over the summer between my junior and senior years, adequately enough order beer (la biere!) and acquire directions to a Burger King, which serendipitously sat close enough to l'Arc de Triomphe to allow us to kill both the day's mandatory sight-seeing and burger-craving birds with the same stone.

I would actually go on to make a similar short visit to Paris the following summer, post high school graduation, during which I fondly recall drinking cheap wine (le vin!), the bottle fashionably wrapped in a brown paper bag, while sitting in a park with friends quite near the Notre Dame Cathedral.

Since then, and despite my best intentions, embarking earnestly, as I did, on a double major in French literature at UCSB (I dropped it to a minor when I couldn't get through the linguistics class requirements, pop-quiz-heavy tedium that they were), not to mention being a fanatical tennis fan with a not-small urge to one day witness in person the glorious red clay of Stade Roland Garros, I have yet to return to France.

But you know what? Madame's racy-for-a-high-school-teacher wardrobe aside, I remember enough of the language to have made it all worthwhile.

When the mood strikes or it seems like a good idea, I'll bust out a few key phrases to impress strangers at a party. And, more importantly, if an undesirable inquires after my name I always reply: Yvette.