Virtually Home

I feel incredibly conflicted. The last few days has passed in a haze of nostalgia and trying to see everyone before they or I leave. After the British girls left, I met up with Lucy and some English/Italian friends at Jardin Publique. The weather was beautifully hot, and I stayed in the shade so as not to make my sunburn worse. I went to open mic night at the Connemara for the last time, which was pretty sad. I played "This Year" by the Mountain Goats and U2's "One", that last with Lawrence Collins and my friends Nath and Clémentine singing along. It wasn't the best rendition, in part from my lack of preparation and in part from their lyrics covering my tab on the music stand, but it all worked out. We played some more guitar in the park across the street after the bar closed. I walked home. It stormed a bit that night, and a cold front came in. It's now in the mid 60s at midday and pretty cold in the morning and the evening. Last night was Wednesd...

But that's not really the theme of this post. I just thought it was funny. The photo on the left is just down the street from my house, as they were finishing a building-cleaning job on both sides of the street. I was intrigued by the catwalk between projects, but I guess when the scaffolding gets to a certain height that might be a good idea. What seems to not be a good idea is the way they build and tear down the scaffolding, throwing lengths of steel piping at one another from a great height. It looks like a lawsuit waiting to happen. I cringed every time I had to walk by a guy tossing something heavy down at the street. I have definitely fallen down on my blogging job. Since my last post I have endured a few more days of incompetent workmen to end up with a kitchen that is less leaky and also less waterproof, as our countertops have now changed from laminate to wood, varnished with a single coat. I like the visual effect. They're less ugly and easier to keep clean. Not th...

Grace decided to come visit me on her spring break. And so she arrived, after having missed her international connection in Atlanta due to weather and about five hours late, for a pretty calm evening. We walked around the city a little. We ate delicious crêpes (galettes, really) at a place very near my house. We drank cider. And then we slept until she no longer felt tired. Her resiliency to jetlag, on a first time abroad, was to be commended. That afternoon, we had a lunch of thoroughly French cheeses (some of which were growing Penicillium) and bread, and Vianney met us, complete with rollerblades, at my place. He brought a milk bottle full of canelé dough, which was delicious and which inspired us to get some canelés while we were in Bordeaux. We climbed the 231 stairs of the Tour de Pey-Berland, which is associated with the cathedral right next to my apartment. The view was spectacular, though there was some considerable haze obscuring the horizon line. We walked to Place des Q...