Lawn Care

I've traveled a bit in our world, but before this morning I have never in my life seen anyone, anywhere, combing their lawn. But this man was out there whistling and combing his lawn with a tool that looked like hairdresser's razor comb, on a stick, like a rake. There were big piles of brown grass to one side. The lawn he'd finished did look better!

Mail Delivery

My sister and I have a running joke about how bad La Poste is. Our address is 1 Rue de l'Église, which is immediately adjacent to 1 Place de l'Église and this has caused no end of problems. I've practically taken to running naked in the street in an attempt to get the postman's attention so as to alert them to the difference in these addresses. There are too many postmen and the weather has been too cold...

Anyway, found a video that explains it all:

http://www.culturepub.fr/videos/dhl-france?hd=1

New Old Armoire

There is a flea market in Paris that is legendary, but no one would call it affordable. We have been stunned at the prices they've invented. We were just certain that there are more affordable options patronized by the locals and last week Tata took me to the REAL flea market.

I was charmed by this antique armoire. This is not our usual style; like Helmut Lang I think I might have been influenced by our watching of Game of Thrones. 

I don't know if we'll bring it home with us or not. We are lucky that we get to try it out before committing like that. And if we sell, armoires of this era go for a lot more on eBay so it's basically a risk-free trial.

Daddy says this armoire is like another house - it has doors, windows, curtains....

Anno 1719 - that's pretty old

As wood carvings go I think these are pretty. They remind me a little bit of our work. Note the pegs holding the joints together.

Here is a close up of how the pegs work to join the pieces of the cabinet together.

How to know if this is real? I don't know.

More pegs holding it all together.

Here's the inside of the lock. I don't have a key so I can't know if it works.  It seems a key can be made.

This is the outside of the lock. 

There are places where it is in poor condition. That's why it was so inexpensive.

Garlic in your belly button

Lots of friends are talking about ways to beat the flu. But our nanny has it all figured out. All you need to do is take an unpeeled clove of garlic and put it in your belly button. Put a band aid over it so it can't fall out. Leave it there three days. Works for her every time!

NO PHOTOS! :)

Snowy Days: Scary for Everyone

Actual French Driver, do not try this at home

The French like to joke about how unprepared they are for snow, and how when it snows everything stops. After watching this driver wind her terrified way down a fully passable street, I have a single simple suggestion for road safety. She's cleared herself a 2" by 5" peephole on her windshield, perhaps a bit more snow removal would go a long way for safety?

That said, I'm happy that the local expectation is that everything stops. If these drivers are on the road I most certainly want to stay home.

Oh Happy Day!

The cold has ended. This morning we threw open the windows and they're still open.

That is all. Hurray!!!

How cold is your apartment?

This sounds like a 'Yo Mama' game. How cold is our apartment? The olive oil went solid in the pantry...

Primroses are the only organisms happy at this temperature

Rave of the Day: Pre-made garlic and herbs in butter

Today's rave is for a convenience food I never knew I was missing. What you see here is a log of pretty good butter, already infused with a healthy dose of garlic and parsley.

My cell phone photo was terrible so why not add a filter?

This product is meant to live in your freezer. You take it out and cut off a slice whenever you need to sauté something, for grilling, or prepare a few snails as Escargot de Bourgogne. Certainly, it is something you could make yourself, but that defeats a little bit of the purpose here. This is a convenience to make daily life more tasty. If I'm spending an afternoon cooking up something special I don't mind peeling garlic and chopping herbs. It's when I'm rushing to make some kind of food item after a day of work and with a toddler commanding one arm and hip, that is when this product rocks my world.

25 Ways to Wear a Scarf

When in France, don't forget to wear a scarf!

Here's a fun video to perfect your scarf tying. I find I tend to the Bunny Ear and the European Loop. But I want to remember to try the Infinity!

Quick Foie Gras Burger

Perhaps all I really need to do for this post is translate the text of the ad. The rest of it sorta speaks for itself...

The Quick Foie Gras burger

Quick'n Foie Gras
Block of Foie Gras from France

GOOD RESOLUTIONS CAN WAIT

With the Quick'n Foie Gras good resolutions can wait!
A real slab of French foie gras delicately pan fried on a pure beef burger with onion sauce and lettuce on a whole wheat bun with split wheat. Here is a good way to prolong the pleasure of the holidays, at a low price!

Indeed 2€90 converts today to $3.86. I would worry about any steak and foie gras that cheap.

Checking things off the list

My New Year's resolution is to have a more positive attitude about life, and specifically this adventure in France. I know that things are what we make of them, and I know I don't want to look back on this time with regret. So I just have to buckle down and do the things I'd hoped to do. Easier said than done but here's a start.

One thing I've wanted to do for a while is make another set of Clotilde's Napkins. I say 'another' because I made an orange-themed set and immediately gave them away to Michele, the mother of Eric's best guy-friend Malo. So I ordered some more fabric and my sister brought it when she visited in September and then it sat for four months. Let's say it was marinating.

The finished product

What finally brought the project to fruition was an antiques market in the Marais. I always hunt down the antique linen stall and continue my quest for white-on-white bed linens with my own monogram (have to keep it challenging or I'd bring home too many beautiful pillowcases and linen sheets...) In that stall was an alphabetical box of labels that had been manufactured to mark one's clothes back when garments were sent to a communal laundry. Here is my set of "CT" initials:

Antique garment labels

They just happen to be the perfect size to 'label' my napkins. It makes me happy to mark them as my work, since Anonymous was a Woman. (note, I do not consider these to be masterpieces of American art, just my own pretty napkins).

Napkin labels are sewn into the existing seam. Doubled over there is no raw edge.

To add to our lovely tablescape we have these pretty napkin rings. They should be redundant since the point of the mismatched napkins is to ensure that each person has his or her own print, but since we already had 'Madame' and 'Monsieur' rings I include them in the photo.

The labels came in a gross (144 labels, what was happening with the metric system back then?) so I have plenty more for plenty more napkins. But that will be a much later project.

Plenty more labels!

While I was sitting here sewing these, on Sunday January 13, 2013, I got a text message from my sister. Her water had broken and she was sitting in a hospital bed awaiting the arrival of my nephew Edward. I finished the sewing thinking of her labor and chatting with her when she was available. Now I can't look at these napkins without thinking of him. Edward's birthday napkins. I suspect this is another set I will be giving away....

Happy Halloween!

Eric's nanny told me on no uncertain terms that she is NOT a fan of Halloween and will not be celebrating it at her house. As an American I thought that was a spoil-sport position but didn't tell her so, just tried to tell her about why I personally like the holiday.

Then we saw how it is celebrated in France and came to understand her position a bit better. We went for a walk and saw a few groups of children out trick or treating. They seemed happy and it seemed just like home. We got home and had one pair of trick or treaters, a witch and Spiderman. When we opened the door these two 6 year olds exclaimed

"Bonbons ou le souffle de la mort!"

Wait, what??? They translate 'trick or treat' as "Candy or the breath of Death"??? I see why she thinks it's morbid.

The next morning I took Eric over to her house as usual. There was a lot of vandalism in this tiny town of few inhabitants. I have just looked and can't find a good link but in the time we've been here (before and this sojourn) we have noticed that it does seem like there is more vandalism and car burning in France than we're accustomed to in America. It seems that Halloween is simply used as an excuse for even more vandalism, which is really too bad because for me it was never that, it was always dressing up and eating candy and bobbing for apples and carving pumpkins and hay rides and autumn fun.

Some of the joy of our holiday was lost in its translation across the Atlantic, and that's really too bad.

A Sign

This is a Pedestrian Crossing sign warning drivers to be aware of pedestrians exiting the train station. After getting the photo home and really looking at it I guess that figure has an identifiable gender but just glancing at it I got some very conflicting gender cues. I'm not sure why a pedestrian sign needs a gender at all?

Jargon

Daddy just forwarded me an email I could hardly decipher, having something to do with the astounding mountain of paperwork he has to complete.

I responded that it looked like a TPS report to me.

His response: "Not at all. This is a TIS of my EdT for L2 in the SFA of the UFR. Not kidding."

Daily Life with Poetry

This photo was taken on a Metro train somewhere beneath Paris. I took it because in the front of the car on the right hand side we had a standard subway advertisement. However on the left hand side we see a white panel with a blue field. Sadly my phone did not have to resolution to capture the words, which were a poem describing a person's need for poetry like a daily vitamin.

Here is another poem, this time on the platform. I took this photo for Eric, but it illustrates my point here today.

Je suis un enfant de partout

un enfant de Paris, de Cotonou,

un enfant des montagnes

des plis rouges d’un pagne.

Je suis un enfant des nids de moineaux,

de Mulhouse, de Baltimore,

des petits bateaux de la baie de Rio

et pire encore

je suis un enfant de quelque part

né de l’amour entre la chance

et le hasard.

Un enfant avec un nom,

un prénom,

mais un enfant qu’on appelle Terrien

parce que, sans moi,

cette planète n’est rien.

I have different photos to show the incredible flowers in public places, but I think these things - public poetry, flowered towns - are the real genius of French urban dwelling. We have good baguettes in America now, but we haven't yet made as much of an effort to add art in our lives. I wish we'd do more of it.

And we're back...

It's the "rentrée" here in France, or well, technically Tuesday will be. It's the time when everyone, young and old, comes back from 1,000 weeks of summer holiday and gets back to work. There's still a festive feeling to it, as people greet friends and neighbors they haven't seen in a very long time. Think 'Back to School' with all the outfit planning and excitement, except everyone goes back on the same day and the grownups are doing it all too.

It's particularly nice for me now because the nannies and shopkeepers are back. Living in the countryside is often delightful, but when the only real grocery store within 10 miles is closed and you don't have a car, well, it starts to get complicated. Today I was finally able to pick up some food easily. It was light and wonderful, the new spring in my step makes me feel like I've lost 5 pounds. Actually, come to think of it, I probably have.

Wedding Cars

A beautiful Saturday afternoon in August is the perfect time for a wedding. We live in the shadow of a church so we weren't surprised to exit our apartment today and see these cars parked. 

Two cars were parked in the Place in front of the church

One looked like you'd expect for a wedding, I assume the bride and groom arrived in this car festooned with ribbons and white flowers

 There are many wedding customs here that are familiar to me (I'm still charmed when I see the wedding guests following the bride and groom and honking, like I remember doing when I was young, now weddings rarely move venues in the USA so I haven't seen that in years). Sometimes it's just the execution of the custom that makes it strange. Take for example this getaway car. I've seen getaway cars decorated, but never like this. I've heard of brooms used at weddings, but never like this.

The getaway car was a lot more festive. I don't yet understand the significance of the various items included in the decoration.

They have two brooms, one with the bride's photo and one with the groom's. There are many different stickers used in road work, and additional photos of the bride and groom, all funny and/or compromising.

Each day surprises us in its own way!

A "Triple"

French apartments come unfurnished. And by 'unfurnished' I mean there is NOTHING there, I think that even the door knobs are optional. We used to wonder why all the apartment listings had photos of the toilet. Now we know - that is, sadly, an optional feature! Our current apartment has no lights, and certainly no appliances (but it does have a toilet). 

I have gotten a fridge, and a washing machine, but we're still living without a stove or oven. That's ok, it's summer, right? Time to eat lots of salads.... It's amazing how often one actually uses the stove.

So I'm shopping for stoves and discovered this crazy contraption - a stove, oven, and dishwasher all-in-one. They are never cheap, even second-hand, so I don't think I'm going to live my new dream of washing my dishes in the compartment underneath my oven, but I do think that would be a crazy-Euro brand of awesome.

A Bizarre Turn of Events

We don't know what to make of this one. Daddy got called into a meeting first thing in the morning yesterday with the Chair of his department. It didn't have a good feeling so we were prepared for bad news, probably some other big project they were going to make him take on and we were preparing our arguments for why he couldn't possibly take on even more work right now.

When he arrived Daddy saw that the Chair was very unhappy. It seems he had received a letter from the President of the University which declared the processing of a decree sent down from the Central Atomic Agency giving Daddy a "Delegation". The Chair demanded to know why Daddy hadn't told him about this; Daddy countered with 'What the hell is a "Delegation"?'

It seems that this Delegation relieves Daddy of any and all work expectations for a period of 5 years. He has to do absolutely nothing, and if they want him to, for example, teach the classes they had planned for him then they have to pay him an exorbitant sum per hour for this work. Not only that but they have to give him back-pay at that same ridiculous rate for all the teaching they had him do last year. They had him teaching two semester's worth crammed in one semester, starting the very day he arrived on the airplane (no glorious first night of jet-lagged sleep for him!) so this ends up being a lot of money. The Chair was furious that they have to pay this money and also hire someone else to do Daddy's job while Daddy has his Delegation.

This Delegation must be in error, and we imagine it will be reversed. It is certainly not something we were petitioning to get, having never dreamed such a thing could exist!

The University has already begun the processing of his back-pay. This letter is, for the moment, worth a lot more than the paper it's printed on. How completely bizarre!

Politics and Obama

I don't know what this Obama's politics might be, but it seems it's still a name worth having associated with one's candidature. The candidate himself, Julien Delamorte, has an unfortunate last name. Daddy said that if it were his last name he couldn't keep himself from naming his child "Ange" because then the child's name would be Angel of Death. I think it's safe to say we're lucky that's not our last name.