wet winter arives in paris
yes indeed the weather has turned all 'authentic october' on us and there is no escaping the cool wind that blusters down the parisian street; one must enforce high levels of discipline not to step into every cafe but now i remember why these businesses can be profitable even though there is literally one every 20m...
it's actually not that miserable, and i am joyfully wearing those warm clothes i had been lugging begrudgingly around in 30degree heat only 2 months ago. i will admit that am already reminiscing over the warmth of those days but there is much to entertain and distract oneself from with in a town like paris. we are lucky enough to, not only be accomodated generously in birds appartment (the small space of which we are managing in quite deftly), but introduced to and entertained by several of her lovely family friends. we were treated to an expedition by car out to versailles - skipped the palace and went straight to the cute farm of marie antoinette, young hapsburg daughter who's portraits we viewed back in vienna (please place an check next to the last box on the 'hapsburg tour of europe' list: i can now claim official groupie status). the grounds of the palace are quite astounding and speak of incomprehensibly opulent wealth. most unusual was the trivia imparted upon us by our lovely tour guide, an ex western australian journalist friend of lucy's grandma's - also ex journalist - who lives with her husband in paris and spends the weekends sailing from la rochelle. quite a character and she eloquently described the unusual obsession of american's with french national landmarks; where only a couple of years ago they spent numerous (read: gazillions) of dollars planting tree's in the versaille gardens to replace the thousands that were knocked down in a freak storm in 2000. to comemmorate the re-opening of the park all these american top-dog's did a fly-by in their private jets...
weird with a capital i for irony
today we donned the scarves and braved the super-duper flea markets (biggest ever or something) where i picked up a nice little side-bag for my day trips around the city. the markets out the front of our place were on again today so we are cooking pumpkin soup, and if lucy is up for it then we're heading out to the party of one of bird's friend of a friend's son's girlfriend tonight... she starts work tomorrow at 10am so who knows, but as it is already 7:30pm i best be back to cut big slices of bread or something. got to love a country where the cheapest cheese on the market is camembert-style soft white. sensational!
condolensces to labor supporters. not sure if i can face another 4 years of being utterly ashamed of my government. oh well couldn't say i didn't expect it; but sad that one must rely on a the hope of a miracle for a non-conservative government to be elected. fingers crossed that kerry upsets in the US, at least that way howard will be brown-nosing a slightly less conservative u.s administration (can't get any further right anyway so kerry must be a good thing). ok that's enough
it's actually not that miserable, and i am joyfully wearing those warm clothes i had been lugging begrudgingly around in 30degree heat only 2 months ago. i will admit that am already reminiscing over the warmth of those days but there is much to entertain and distract oneself from with in a town like paris. we are lucky enough to, not only be accomodated generously in birds appartment (the small space of which we are managing in quite deftly), but introduced to and entertained by several of her lovely family friends. we were treated to an expedition by car out to versailles - skipped the palace and went straight to the cute farm of marie antoinette, young hapsburg daughter who's portraits we viewed back in vienna (please place an check next to the last box on the 'hapsburg tour of europe' list: i can now claim official groupie status). the grounds of the palace are quite astounding and speak of incomprehensibly opulent wealth. most unusual was the trivia imparted upon us by our lovely tour guide, an ex western australian journalist friend of lucy's grandma's - also ex journalist - who lives with her husband in paris and spends the weekends sailing from la rochelle. quite a character and she eloquently described the unusual obsession of american's with french national landmarks; where only a couple of years ago they spent numerous (read: gazillions) of dollars planting tree's in the versaille gardens to replace the thousands that were knocked down in a freak storm in 2000. to comemmorate the re-opening of the park all these american top-dog's did a fly-by in their private jets...
weird with a capital i for irony
today we donned the scarves and braved the super-duper flea markets (biggest ever or something) where i picked up a nice little side-bag for my day trips around the city. the markets out the front of our place were on again today so we are cooking pumpkin soup, and if lucy is up for it then we're heading out to the party of one of bird's friend of a friend's son's girlfriend tonight... she starts work tomorrow at 10am so who knows, but as it is already 7:30pm i best be back to cut big slices of bread or something. got to love a country where the cheapest cheese on the market is camembert-style soft white. sensational!
condolensces to labor supporters. not sure if i can face another 4 years of being utterly ashamed of my government. oh well couldn't say i didn't expect it; but sad that one must rely on a the hope of a miracle for a non-conservative government to be elected. fingers crossed that kerry upsets in the US, at least that way howard will be brown-nosing a slightly less conservative u.s administration (can't get any further right anyway so kerry must be a good thing). ok that's enough
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