Clueless in Paris, or, Angst in France

If it's Thursday, it must be Thanksgiving

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 05:00:04 GMT

And remember, May your stuffing be tasty/ May your turkey be plump/ May your potatoes and gravy/ Have nary a lump/ May your yams be delicious/ And your pies take the prize/ And may your Thanksgiving dinner/ Stay off your thighs!

Seriously, have a good one, be thankful, and stay safe.

Eureka

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 17:21:19 GMT

I found Halloween stuff! We went to Tuttifiesta, a party-supply store in Paris on the rue Saint-Ferdinand(didn't even know party-supply stores existed over here) and there they were! Tons of spooky stuff -- ghosts, plastic spiders, squeaking rats, cobwebs, pumpkin garlands, witch hats, vampire teeth, balloons, plastic skeletons, we bought them all! Halloween, here we come!

There is nothing that gives more assurance than a mask.
-- Colette

Boo! Hoo!

Sun, 25 Oct 2009 10:36:44 GMT

I tried to buy some Halloween decorations for a kid's party yesterday but there was not a spider web or ghost costume to be seen in any of the stores I visited. There was a pumpkin in the grocery store, but it was for making soup! Halloween was really popular here for a few years, to my delight, but there was a big backlash against this so-called American holiday, and now it has fizzled out. That's too bad. Kids seemed to love it. Well, I guess that's that. No more witches and goblins and bon-bons and ringing doorbells. Halloween has been chased out with a broom. But ... shhhh ... don't tell them that Halloween was supposedly celebrated by the Celts in France!

"I would rather sit on a pumpkin and have it all to myself than be crowded on a velvet cushion." Henry David Thoreau

No choo-choo on Tues.

Sun, 18 Oct 2009 17:51:20 GMT

Another train strike on Tuesday. I'm not sure what they're striking about this time. Perhaps somebody stepped on a conductor's foot? Stole their sandwich from the break room refrigerator? At least by law they now have to give you a couple days warning. It's too bad those who can change the laws don't have to take public transport!

Anyway, it seems like there's a strike every day here. There's even a web site listing the strike(s) of the day! The solution? Stay at home in the comfy chair!

“Commuter trains are packed with voyeurs of a similar bent.”
Nigel Andrew

Uneventful day.

Thu, 15 Oct 2009 14:20:04 GMT

Woke up to 3° C outside,and could not find my coat. Went with Chloé to Paris at seven. Did some editing, or, rather, sat there in front of the computer and procrastinated. Waited like a dummy in freezing wind for the post office to open at 1:30, until somebody pointed out the sign on the door: closed this afternoon. Finally, I went to the jewelry store and got my left ear pierced with a third hole so it matches the right one, which has three holes, but I needed that like I need a hole in my head. Now it's time for a cup of coffee.

There are two means of refuge from the miseries of life: music and cats. (Albert Schweitzer)

Days like this ...

Tue, 13 Oct 2009 03:40:21 GMT

Went to Dr. "Tubes" yesterday and got the old ear and snozzle checked out. The ear is on its way to healing and I should be able to hear, one of these days. He was vague. Went to the grocery store for apples, and came out with a bagful of stuff, but no apples. Rebooted laptop six times. Wrote a nasty email to health insurance company, deleted it, wrote a nicer one. All and all, a satisfactory day.

"But my thoughts ran a wool-gathering; and I did like the countryman, who looked for his ass while he was mounted on his back."
Cervantes (Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra)
Don Quixote (pt. II, ch. LVII)

The Friendly Pharmacist

Sat, 10 Oct 2009 02:59:38 GMT

Something very unusual happened to me today. I went into a pharmacy to buy some Tylenol and toothpaste, and the pharmacist began to ask me all sorts of questions, where was I from, and how did I like living in France, and how long have I lived here -... I was surprised by her friendliness. Not that the French aren't friendly, but you get used to everybody being so grim all the time.

“Strangers are friends you have yet to meet” (Anon.)

Strange and Unusual

Mon, 28 Sep 2009 13:42:41 GMT

This is great, but why is it "strange and unusual"?

Strange and Unusual
Blind News Anchor
Mike Adams Created: 9/13/2009 9:51:18 AM Updated: 9/13/2009 9:55:12 AM

http://www.firstcoastnews.com/news/strange/news-article.aspx?storyid=144888&catid=82

Sacrebleu!

Tue, 08 Sep 2009 08:08:29 GMT

I'm glad my cold didn't turn out to be the swine flu, the H1N1 virus, which is making big headlines here. Some French schools have had to close classes, and the French Ministry of Health recommends that people refrain from giving one another cheek kisses. It's gotten so bad that our local high school is actually installing soap and paper towel dispensers in the restrooms.

Midsummer news

Mon, 03 Aug 2009 04:25:48 GMT

Thought I'd drop in and say "bonjour." 'Tis smack in the middle of the summer, for Parisians, that is. Four more weeks until the Rentrée, the new year, when everybody comes back from holiday tanned and in a good mood (well, in theory), school starts, traffic starts getting backed up, and everything goes back to the way it was in June. Alas!

One more week until we're off to Arcachon, where we spent our summer holiday last year. I know my way around the little town now. I know where to find the marché, the supermarket, the boulangerie. Oh, and the ATM machine, very important.

Thursday we're going to Paris Plage, which is a real "beach" set up in the center of Paris on the banks of the Seine, complete with I-don't-know-how-many tons of sand, palm trees, music, chaise lounges, and other beachy things I will describe later. There is supposed to be a heat wave coming, so maybe it will be like touring hell, we shall see.

There was a little drama this week, I accidentally forgot to feed the goldfish I was supposed to be babysitting -- oops -- so I had to go out and buy a replacement one. The new fish is much smaller, and I did not lie, I did not say that this fish was the same fish that had somehow shrunk. It all worked out in the end, to the satisfaction of all parties, not including, of course, the dead fish.

I guess that's all there is. Not much, I know, but hey, it's summer, and I'm slackin'!

Deep summer is when laziness finds respectability. ~Sam Keen

Blue screen of death -- again!

Tue, 21 Jul 2009 16:53:32 GMT

There's nothing I hate more than the blue screen of death, except, maybe, a mouthful of raw garlic!

I just got back from a weekend in Angoulême, in the southwest of France, home of the yearly "International Cartoon Festival" held in January, I think. I like old Angoulême and its narrow cobblestoned streets, lined with restaurants and cafés and little shops. The ambiance reminds me of the Latin Quarter in Paris. There were some Americans at the hotel, business people, I think. It was odd to hear American voices in the dining room, but the hotel restaurant did serve bacon and sausage and eggs, which were delicious. The coffee was terrible, though.

I do not, however, enjoy the long car ride down there, nor do I like the smelly roadside restrooms with the Turkish toilets! But one can't have everything, right?

No one realizes how beautiful it is to travel until he comes home and rests his head on his old, familiar pillow. Lin Yutang

Faites la fete!

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 03:57:46 GMT

Get out those hotdogs and hamburgers, it's Bastille Barbecue Day! It's not supposed to rain on the parade, but you never know. When I was working my office was near the Champs-Elysées and a few days before the parade they'd have a rehearsal. The fighter jets would fly over, so low that it felt like you could almost reach up and touch them.

Went to the Paris Opera the other night. I was afraid it was going to be a 63 euro nap, but it was actually quite nice. I didn't hear anybody snoring like I did when we saw Verdi.

Must away, coffee and comfy chair are calling!

“Opera is where a guy gets stabbed in the back, and instead of dying, he sings.” Robert Burns (Scottish national Poet of Scotland, who wrote lyrics and songs in the Scottish dialect of English. 1759-1796)

Inbox news, keyboard blues

Mon, 29 Jun 2009 03:08:29 GMT

I've found something I didn't even know existed -- the bottom of my inbox!

It has been very warm here. Not that I'm complaining. I just wish the trains and the métro were air-conditioned. You feel so slimy when you get out.

I lost my right arrow key. After the coffee fiasco it was being repaired when it flew across the room, never to be seen again. I have a feeling it was eaten by the vacuum cleaner. Now all I have left is this little rubbery thing and I have to jam my fingernail into it in order to get it to work. I'm going to have to replace the keyboard, I fear. It's all full of canary seeds, anyway.

Well, I've reached the bottom of my coffee cup, so I'm off for a refill!

"But they are useless. They can only give you answers."
Pablo Picasso, about computers

A bird's life

Thu, 18 Jun 2009 09:48:44 GMT

As I was sitting here in the coffee-stained comfy chair, writing an email and minding my own business, the canary dared to fling a seed at my computer. I heard it land somewhere on the keyboard. I wonder if he is trying to tell me something? (Probably, "Let me out of this cage, you jerk!") Why don't I just move the cage, you ask? Because I know he'd get lonely if he wasn't next to the comfy chair. I only wish he didn't enjoy throwing seeds at the computer, or taking a bath and shaking his feathers everywhere. Thus, the life of a bird. Any suggestions for a name? Hyacinth?

P.S. I had coffee grains in my coffee this morning. I must be doing something wrong. Hmmm.

“I wish you could make a friend of me, Lizzie. Do you think you could? I have no more of what they call character, my dear, than a canary-bird, but I know I am trustworthy.”
Charles Dickens quotes

Happiness pulses with every cup of coffee I drink!.

Wed, 17 Jun 2009 07:56:42 GMT

I've not been writing much in my LJ because I've been playing around on Facebook. Facebook is fun for all ages! How did I waste my time before I discovered Facebook? Reading? Writing books? Hmmm. I still haven't figured out the point of Twitter.

My ballet performance was uneventful. I downed two Xanax to help with the stage fright, put on that stupid tutu and danced away. I thought I would blank out and forget the steps, as I did during every rehearsal, but my fellow dancers helpfully guided me through the dance, "Go left, go right, over here! Pssst!"

We now have three coffee pots since the beloved Nespresso machine went kaput. We have a so-called "normal" coffee pot, a new Nespresso machine (capsules -- you know, Nespresso, what else?) and a monster espresso machine. All three are shiny red, like Cadillacs. It's simply coffee heaven! Don't ask me why we have three coffee pots. It's like asking somebody, why do you breathe?

Speaking of COFFEE, I spilled an entire cup of the stuff (demitasse, luckily)on my laptop keyboard. Stupid, stupid, stupid! I wiped it off the best I could, turned it upside down and let it dry. Incredibly, it still works, except the right arrow key, but I think that's because there's a canary seed lodged somewhere beneath it. I need to get one of those spray cans and blast all the seeds out of my keyboard. Hint: keep your canary away from your computer!

Until next time,

All the best!

Schlendrian You wicked child, you disobedient girl,
oh! when will I get my way;
give up coffee!

Lieschen Father, don't be so severe!
If I can't drink
my bowl of coffee three times daily,
then in my torment I will shrivel up
like a piece of roast goat.

J.S. Bach, "Coffee Cantata" BMV211

Growl ... growl ... growl ...

Sat, 13 Jun 2009 14:32:45 GMT

Excuse my French, but fuck a duck, could not get into my account for the longest time due to some dumb form you had to fill out, which refused to let me fill it out. Finally, I exist!

I can't write today as I'm in a bad mood.

I saw this on WikiHow:

"Blind people can not see you, however, they can smell so when interacting with a blind person it is important to shower."

No comment.

“Nothing helps a bad mood like spreading it around.”
Bill Watterson

Seven weeks!

Sat, 30 May 2009 03:40:22 GMT

Dispatch from the Comfy Chair!

Seven weeks since I last updated this LJ? It can't be. But, that's what it says when I log in. Where has the time gone?

Today is Starbucks Day. I haven't been to Starbucks in ages. Seven weeks, exactly. Just kidding. I've been going to this little French café -- I sometimes go there in the morning to have my petit café and read when the place is empty. There's always a crowd at the bar in the back. It's wonderful to hang out in cafés now that they've banned smoking. Before the law went into effect, the non-smoking area consisted of one table in the corner near the kitchen door.

My canary died sometime during the night. I just noticed a while ago. I didn't hear him moving around the cage like he usually does, cheeping and hopping. Sad. He was kind of scruffy with old age but he did sing a few good songs.

I acquired two diamond doves, Colombo and Dr. Carter. They're in a cage in my office. I'm planning to move them outside in an aviary for the summer, as soon as it warms up. I already have two aviaries (is that a word or am I mixing French and English?). My neighbors love me. Anyway, at the first light of dawn, my doves start hoo-hooing happily! To me, it's beautiful, but my family hates me.

I'm still getting up at four (not on purpose) and writing. Needless to say, I'm getting a lot done! I've tried melatonin but it doesn't work. Sleeping pills work ... but I get up at five feeling groggy. I guess I'm just one of those annoying people who get by on little sleep.

My broken toe has healed nicely, considering that I never went to the doctor and continued to dance on it despite the searing pain. It feels like it's straight. Well, in truth, none of my toes is really straight. My feet are so ugly they'd scare your pants off.

Must away, time for café! I will try to post more often.

“The best cure for insomnia is to get a lot of sleep.”
W. C. Fields

Commuter woes

Tue, 07 Apr 2009 16:59:24 GMT

I got kicked off the train this morning halfway home. The train stopped at Ermont because "it was late." Yes, that's what came over the speaker. I was able to find the right platform and I didn't have to wait very long for another train, but I was still hopping mad because it was raining and there is no shelter.

We took the train in with my neighbor, who is an interpreter, on her way to a international business meeting of gas station owners, her head full of gas station vocabulary. I was glad I was not on my way there.

Later, I was in the métro and we were all squished together and sweating like pigs, when a shouting match broke out on the other side of the car. A man bellowed, "When the train is crowed we do not sit! We stand to make room for others! It is written right here!" He was right, but, for cripe's sake, he didn't have to scream it!

Still have not seen head or tails of the big parakeet. I guess he was never mine.

“I knew I was going to take the wrong train, so I left early.”
Yogi Berra

Fri, 03 Apr 2009 02:33:31 GMT

It's 3 am and I can't sleep. Not a creature is stirring ... I'm going to feel like hell today! Sitting here writing on Facebook (hi Caitlin!) -- that thing is addicting and I must stop.

Went to ballet last night, we're rehearsing this silly dance, my God, if you could see what we have to wear! It's worse than embarrassing. It's a 1900s bathing suit, and, believe me, you're not missing anything. Did women really go to the beach wearing those things? The costume includes frilly pants, or shorts, or whatever, and frilly cap. Talk about tan lines! The dance is actually quite funny. Well, got to stay limber somehow!

Taking the twins to see the Paris Opera Ballet School's annual performance tonight. I must not forget my aspirin and bottled water. We get home from Paris on 5 p.m. train and we're off to Paris again at 6. That's cutting it close. Please, trains, work tonight. We have seats in a loge, I'm not sure what the English word is for the little private rooms with chairs. I hate those chairs, they're like kitchen chairs with velvet seats, and they get moved around helter-skelter during intermission. I always manage to get my foot caught on one of them. I'm afraid one day, or evening, rather, the chair and I will go tumbling off the balcony. They should not allow those things.

Nothing else to say, so I shall save this entry and send it into cyberspace!

I had three chairs in my house; one for solitude, two for friendship, three for society. Henry David Thoreau

Happiness is Wellbutrin

Thu, 02 Apr 2009 13:32:12 GMT

Thought I'd write in my LJ -- I haven't written since the beginning of December, I think, before I came down with a bad case of apathy. I think I'm cured of that now. I hope.

Here I am messing around with LJ and Facebook and email, and putting off editing my book because I am damn sick of it! Blah! The blasted thing has looked me in the face for seven years now. Seven years I have been slogging through it every single day, pouring out blood, sweat and tears. 2010 approaches, and I know I won't be finished.

My squawking parakeet flew away. He has a band on his leg, maybe somebody will find him and bring him back.

Must away, going back to the book. Alas!

Oooh, I like this one:

“Apathy is the glove into which evil slips its hand.”
Bodie Thoene

Brin de conversation

Mon, 09 Feb 2009 12:13:21 GMT

Overheard on the métro, a guy snapping,

"So I didn't shave today! What's the big deal?"

Quit yer bellyachin'!

Tue, 09 Dec 2008 18:37:28 GMT

One thing I hate about French salespeople is that, if they are serving another customer, they never say, "I'll be with you in a moment," so you never really know if they've noticed you are waiting or not. They quite literally ignore you. It's very annoying, but that's just the way it is. Not all salespeople are like this, of course. Just most of the ones I've had to deal with in all the years I've lived here! Then you've got the people who come wandering up while you are patiently waiting for your turn, and, the second the salesperson is finished with the first customer, they barge right in front of you. My jaw nearly drops to the floor every time this happens. I need to be more pushy. I need a bigger mouth. Yesterday we went to the pet store to buy goldfish, and we waited twenty minutes -- yes, twenty minutes! -- for the salesgirl to finish serving a customer who seemed to be buying one of every fish in the store, and I'll be damned if a man holding a tree trunk didn't try to cut in front of me!

I'm so tired of my Monday ballet class, which is at a different ballet studio. I only take the class because I've been taking it for years. A habit, I guess. Anyway, I feel like I'm the only person in the class who can count music. I am constantly being told that I'm "late," when I know I'm not. The others ignore the music and dance like they're in a hurry to finish the exercise; they finish before the music and stand there for three counts doing nothing. I don't know why the teacher doesn't say anything. Maybe she can't count music either? All you have to do is to know how to count to eight! Yesterday, after suffering through an hour of this, I got really annoyed, raised my hand and said, "Should I dance on the music or do like the others?" It was rude of me but I couldn't help it, I thought I was going to explode, and you know me, I *never* speak up. So now the girls are mad at me, I can tell, and I feel bad, but I can't disregard the music, I just can't.

I'm finished whining, I've got it out of my system. Getting the Christmas decorations out tonight, if I'm not too lazy. Which I am, of course!

He who hears music, feels his solitude peopled at once. ~ Robert Browning

On this cold winter's day

Sun, 07 Dec 2008 05:25:39 GMT

There isn't much to report on this cold, blustery day. Nothing, except my broken toe is killing me. It has been hurting ever since I bumped it against a stair, just when it was finally starting to heal. I was thinking that maybe I should tape it to a stick or something. I'm always afraid somebody will tread on it in the métro and finish it off. Then I would really yelp.

I had a pleasant surprise today. The people three houses down the street had some decaying onions or something worse in their trash can for weeks. You could smell it when you passed the house, and the odor was so strong and disgusting that you had to hold your breath. They also had an overgrown hedge that whopped me in the face every time I went past, usually it was wet and I got soaked. Nothing like wet leaves in the face to put you in a good mood. I was thinking of trimming the hedge myself, which I have been known to do to other hedges along my route. Well, I'm pleased to inform you that today I -- my nose -- noticed that they had cleaned up the rotting onions and had actually trimmed the hedge!

Today we're going to the Palais Garnier to see the Démonstrations de l'Ecole de danse de l'Opéra de Paris. Should be interesting. After the performance we're going out to lunch with friends, maybe to Pizza Hut, and then, hopefully, a quick trip to Starbucks. Yeah, I know, coffee again, but what can I say?

"I have always noticed that in portraits of really great writers the mouth is always firmly closed." Gertrude Stein

Obama! Obama ...

Wed, 05 Nov 2008 14:19:21 GMT

I was up at 4 am this morning so I tuned in to CNN and watched the live coverage of the elections. I’m not surprised Obama won, Harry’s Bar in Paris predicted that Obama would in, and the straw poll at Harry’s Bar usually predicts the winner. I’m so happy Senator Obama won -- today I’m proud to be an American. I’m going to celebrate Obama’s victory with a double-shot cappuccino, unless Starbucks has a special Obama coffee flavour-of-the-day.

Tomorrow they are having another train strike. I have to go into Paris, which means that, on the way back home, I’ll arrive at the train station an hour and a half before the train gets there. What am I going to do for an hour and a half? I could probably walk home in an hour and a half. I guess I'll find a café and have a coffee. I'm sure it's hard to feel sorry for a person who "has" to find a Parisian café and have a coffee. *grin*

Well, I am off to the ballet studio and to help my little friend with her English homework.

The fact that my 15 minutes of fame has extended a little longer than 15 minutes is somewhat surprising to me and completely baffling to my wife.
(Barack Obama)

Happy Halloween

Fri, 31 Oct 2008 14:30:01 GMT

I went to the Préfecture this morning to pick up my carte de séjour. I was pleasantly surprised when the woman behind the counter told me it was a carte de résident for ten years. I’m so relieved I don’t have to go back there next year -- what a nightmare! While I was waiting this guy got annoyed with one of the clerks behind the counter, probably over missing paperwork. He starting shouting and banging his fist and he and the woman got into a shouting match. I knew how he felt. But, still. I was waiting for him to draw out a gun and shoot the lady, but he just stalked off.

I'm going to take a more advanced ballet class tonight, unless I chicken out. I took a class from this same instructor last Saturday and I thought he was going to kill us. Kill me, at least. He never let us stop for a minute. Usually I stand in the front because I can’t see very well, but this time I stood in the back, out of fear and embarrassment, and of course, didn’t get the steps. My leg muscles seized up from all the stress of it all, I think, and I had trouble with them all in class all week. Dumb way to spend Halloween, eh?

Maybe I’ll have an extra cup of coffee, just in case I need it, then I'm off to take the train.

"I like Paris. My problem is I don't like Parisians." Sir Laurence Olivier