In the third episode of our ongoing series of podcasts, we talk about some of Andrew’s many hobbies, including a few that we share together.
First, we discuss our shared love of the stars and the wonders of our solar system, which we enjoy exploring together through Andrew’s new telescope.
Then we talk about a hobby that is a little more down-to-earth – video games. We discuss some of our favourites, including classics such as Tetris and the original Super Mario Bros., which we play together on our GameBoys and my Nintendo NES, and the mind-bending puzzle game Portal.
Next on the agenda we have comic books. Reading French language comics such as Tintin, Spirou magazine, or Andrew’s childhood favourite, Astérix, is a great way to build up your reading comprehension skills.
We share some of the delicious recipes we’ve been trying recently and describe our newfound love of plants, such as our miniature forest of basil, our Russian-speaking lemon tree seedlings and the latest additions to our household, Joséphine and Mélusine, the Calatheas.
We hope you enjoy hearing about our hobbies as much as we enjoy doing them, and maybe you’ll be inspired to try something new.
Andrew’s telescope 
Our GameBoys 
My best score on Tetris – level 13! 
Andrew’s best score on Tetris 
Playing Super Mario Bros. 3 together on my NES 
Many hours later we reached world 4 in Super Mario Bros. 3 
Andrew’s growing collection of Asterix comic books in the original French… and a couple in Portuguese 
A Victoria sponge cake 
This didn’t last long 
Home-made hamburgers 
These didn’t last long either! 
Home-made quiche 
According to Andrew, symmetrical meals taste 101% better 
Another night, another quiche 
Pasta mixed with our delicious home-made pesto 
A fraction of our basil forest. We used these plants to make the pesto 
Pénélope likes it here. She’s growing lots of new leaves 
Mélusine (left) and Joséphine with their leaves closed in the evening 
Mélusine (left) and Joséphine with their leaves open in the morning 
A close-up of Joséphine’s leaves. I promise we didn’t draw the lines 
Mélusine’s leaves 
Our new comrades, the lemon tree seedlings. From left to right, Yeltsin, Gorbachev, Gergiev and Prokofiev, Gagarin, Putin
French Chatter 