An American in Provence

Where I used to go to college, the period between the return from Christmas holidays and early springtime was called "The Dark Ages".
Dark all the time, nothing to look forward to (like Christmas), nothing to stress over (like final exams), no football games, nothin' but the everyday drudgery.
Which is pretty much how I'm feelin' now.

Get up at 6 am every morning, even weekends (yeah, I'm cool like that. once Ye ol' internal alarm clock gets set there is no turning it off) in the dark. Leave at around 6:30 am in the dark. Drive to Aix in the dark. Park at the parking lot (you guessed it, in the dark).
Catch the shuttle in the dark to the centre ville.
Walk to my office, turn on my computer, make my tea, start work.
(still dark outside).

Work until 1 pm. Maybe go out for lunch, but it is rather cold and sometimes rainy, so sometimes I stay in (big mistake).

Leave a little after 6 pm, it's already dark out.
Actually, my work day ends at 5, but I have so much to learn/study that I might as well stay. Plus, if I get on the highway at 6 pm C'est l'enfer. I prefer to wait another half an hour and be able to (usually) drive directly home.
So I leave around 6:15, walk in the dark to the bus. Usually just miss it.
I could try to plan my arrival at the bus stop for a time just before the bus arrives. That would work if they ever arrived at a predictable time. Instead, you can pretty much guarantee that at any time you arrive, you will have just missed the bus and will have to wait for the next one, usually 10-15 minutes later, but a guaranteed 20 minutes if it's raining and you forgot your umbrella.

Get to my car. In the dark.
Drive back to Marseille. In the dark.
Find an illegal parking spot (the only kind left after 6:30).
Next morning: Repeat.

A fellow bus passenger told me to watch out for a new radar that has been installed on the Aix-Marseille route.
The only problem is that I haven't driven the highway in daylight since then (mid-November) so I don't know exactly where it is, whether it is in the direction Aix-Marseille, or Marseille-Aix, or both, or before the bridge or after the bridge, or right under the bridge.
I'll let you know in May where exactly the radar is.