After finishing the last post, I shared with my fellow Parisians the Sunday tradition of hunting for the few food stores open on Sunday. In my neighborhood, it’s the Monop store, which was packed, and after that I went to the bakery just down Rue Alphonse Daudet, which makes the most incredible baguettes, which they call “Tradition,” and which are usually still warm when you get them, and absolutely delicious, […]
Referring to this post, a pean to cold weather, which has of course caused the weather to change very much for the worst. The forecast this morning from Le Monde (my attempt at translation below): PARIS, France Mise à jour 08h13 heure de Paris Maintenant -2 °C Frais. Vent – Direction : 6 km/h – SO Humidité : 93% Point de rosée : -3 °C Pression atmosphérique : 1015.24 mb Météo à […]
Being a political junkie, I’ve followed the contest for the leadership of the Socialist Party in France closely. Since the summer, it’s been apparent that the party is split between a more moderate faction, who are amenable to a coalition with the center-left “MoDem” party of Francois Bayrou, and a hard left faction, who believe the party should sharpen its differences with the right. The more moderate faction is lead […]
Based upon anecdotal evidence, it seems that cell phone customers here in France must engage in running battles with their providers. Certainly that has been the case with us. Shortly after we came, we managed to obtain three phones and a relatively inexpensive subscription from Orange, the mobile service trade name of France Telecom. Unfortunately, about two weeks later, we received a letter and text messages telling us that our […]
This is what the past week or so has been like in Paris: The days have been cloudy, foggy, damp, and sometimes rainy, bordering on cold. The kind of weather that some people would call “miserable.” But I love it. There is something about the clouds and the drizzle that is embracing, enfolding, comforting; something about the cold that is cleansing and clarifying. To me it says: Be calm. Be […]
Funny-and-sad-at-the-same-time article in the Times Online today about a discussion in August between French President Nicholas Sarkozy and Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin: With Russian tanks only 30 miles from Tbilisi on August 12, Mr Sarkozy told Mr Putin that the world would not accept the overthrow of Georgia’s Government. According to Mr Levitte, the Russian seemed unconcerned by international reaction. “I am going to hang [Georgian Prime Minister] Saakashvili […]
I realize I haven’t posted any pictures since we returned to France, and since a picture is worth a thousand words (or perhaps worth even more than a thousand of my words), here are a few new ones. As always, more are on my Flickr site. I carried my large telephoto lens all the way to Paris, but didn’t take it out of its case until just this week. Don’t […]
Perhaps a good sign that the Democrats won’t make the same mistakes they made during the first two years of Clinton’s term: This article in the Wall Street Journal, reporting on an interview with Rahm Emanuel, the new White House Chief of Staff. [Obama wants] real solutions to real problems. And if we do an ideological test, we will fail. Our challenge is to work to solve the actual problems […]
On Election Night, Suzie and I attended the official U.S. Election Night party, which was held at a place called the Cineaqua near the Trocadero. Because of the time difference, the party didn’t start until 10:30 p.m., and was scheduled to go through the night, which meant that we were going to have do so something we hadn’t done in a long, long time, namely, staying up past midnight. We […]
Our internet connection was down today, and I was operating on 3 hours sleep, so the complete post of our amazing, wonderful election night in Paris (including goofy and wonderful video) will have to wait until tomorrow. But I will tell you that I was very, very proud to be an American today. I can tell you that the French view of America and Americans has changed. I can tell […]