FRENCH WORD-A-DAY

Jean-Marc and I trekked north over the weekend, to les Alpes du Sud or the Southern Alps. While we didn't spot an ours, I'll tell you what we did see tomorrow...

un ours (oors) noun, masculine
  1. a bear

Also:
un ours polaire = a polar bear
un ours savant = a trained or performing bear

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Expressions:
être un peu ours = to be a bit gruff
avoir ses ours = to have one's period
vivre comme un ours = to be at odds with the world
tourner comme un ours en cage = to pace up & down like a caged animal
un ours mal léché = (a "poorly-licked bear" or one not well cared for by its mother) an uncouth person, a misanthrope

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Citation du Jour:
La parole humaine est comme un chaudron fêlé où nous battons des mélodies à faire danser les ours, quand on voudrait attendrir les étoiles.

Human speech is like a cracked tin kettle, on which we hammer out tunes to make bears dance when we long to move the stars. --Gustave Flaubert

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Animal Expressions:  Part II
by Barbara Barles

- Devenir chèvre
"To become goat"
= s'énerver, s'impatienter / to get worked up, to lose patience

- Ménager la chèvre et le chou
"To arrange the goat and the cabbage"
= se conduire de façon à ne vexer personne.
to behave in a way so as not to vex anyone

- Avoir un chat dans la gorge
"To have a cat in one's throat"
= être enroué / to be hoarse

- Avoir mangé du lion
"To have eaten lion"
= faire preuve d'une énergie surprenante.
to show amazing energy

- Chercher des poux à quelqu'un
"To look for bugs on someone"
= lui chercher querelle à tout propos.
to argue with each point

- Laid comme un pou
"Ugly as a bug"

- Mettre la puce à l'oreille
"To put the flea at the ear"
= se douter de quelque chose.
to doubt something, to make suspect

- Mettre la charrue avant les boeufs
"To put the cart before the horse"
= commencer par où on devrait finir.
to begin at the point where we should have finished.

- Vendre la peau de l'ours avant de l'avoir tué
"To sell the bear's skin before killing it
  (To count one's chickens before they hatch)
= (du succès) disposer d'une chose avant de la posséder.
(on success) to dispose of something before possessing it.

- Une peau de vache
"A cow's skin"
= personne très dure, très sévère.
someone who is very hard, very severe.