French language Q&A Forum

The text reads “Tant mieux, car je n'ai même pas encore commencé à râper le fromage”, but there’s no “même” spoken in the audio (Cécile has confirmed this to be the case in the Q&A). 

The text just needs a small correction. 

Why is the definite article not excluded from:

J'ai peur des araignées.  just as it is excluded from the verbal phrase:

J'ai besoin de farine.  or even : J'ai besoin d'araignées

It seems inconsistent.  Is it?

j'ai commencé à voir quelques petits boutons

Why is there passe compose and not l'imperfait? 

- Can I use "se composait" instead of "regroupait"?

- why use "en eut assez d'attendre (passé simple) while this place is supposed to describe the speaker's feeling, therefore can I use avait (imparfait) in this context.

As I read this lesson, I see two directives: 1) with trouver one always needs "que" and 2) with trouver, sometimes you don't need "que". Please explain a deeper difference between the two usages presented.

Bit of clarification please:-

- Isn't 'I pass by the new coffee shop' better translated by 'passe par' ? The exercise on Passer  gives -Passer par / devant ...   (to pass by / in front of...)

- does not 'J'aime' mean 'I love' and wouldn't 'J'aime bien 'I like' be better in this instance? (the excercise on Aimer says 'Note that when using aimer bien, it actually lessens its meaning from 'to love' to 'to like' [someone] / [something].'

Is it as simple as J'ai honte d'avoir peur des chats?

Can you say "je n'ai pas encore reçu" instead of "je n'ai toujours pas reçu"?

Also, can you say "il m'a fallu frapper à chaque porte"?

Why isn't nouvelle année not in caps? 

The fill in the blanks exercise was about people arriving in a new town, to find the streets empty of people. "Tous les magasins de la ville étaient fermés." This was followed by a sentence in the past tense (walking on empty streets from 3pm till 5pm) Then came the sentence being queried (post below).   Thanks so very much to all who responded earlier.