A Game of Telephone?

Today was a bit out of the norm.... My American friend, Suzanne (she is married to a French man and has lived here for almost 7 years), was asked to be interviewed for a French newspaper regarding the U.S. economic crisis. She was also asked to provide another American for a different perspective. She asked me to join her and the reporter for the interview. It was quite exciting. I tried to be as prepared as possible by surveying some friends and family about how the economic crisis appears to be affecting the people they know. Very interesting to hear many different versions of the fear that is determining the actions of many Americans at this point in time. The consensus seems to be that everyone is curbing their purchasing of big ticket items and vacations. People my age are thinking that they will lose the retirement monies that they have saved but that they will have to time to rebuild. People in my parents' generation fear that their retirement will now be far different than the one they had saved and planned on. And, people even older are remembering the worst of the Depression and anxious to pull all of their money out of banks and investments and hide it in their mattresses. The interview was very interesting and lasted almost 3 hours! We discussed everything from obesity to economics to safety in the schools to the Presidential election! It was difficult however and I am anxious to see what will actually appear in print because while Suzanne is very passable with her French, she had difficulty conveying some concepts to the reporter who did not speak any English. She also had to act as the translator for me which meant that his questions were being translated to me by her and then my answers were translated to him by her. A bit like a game of telephone.
Fall certainly felt like it was rolling in today... It was cool and very breezy. It only rained (and rained hard with hail!) in the 5 minutes that the boys and I were walking home from school. We were soaked and cold but at least discovered this beautiful rainbow.