AT HOME IN PARIS
2010
It’s getting close to Oswaldo’s trip to Leipzig and he is thinking hard about his talks there. The organizers are bombarding him with e-mails, showing great preparation, better that that of the French, who have curiously left us alone after supplying these great lodgings. He will stay in the poetically named Hotel Vivaldi. I leave him at home working, to stride past the usual long lines outside the Sainte Chapelle - mental note: must get tickets for a concert there! - on Île de la Cité, and walk across the Seine, glittering in the absolutely brilliant sun, to have a look at the Forum Les Halles area. On my way back I buy a pizza fresh out of the oven, and Oswaldo and I lunch on that with a cold beer in our Grand Studio. In the afternoon we do our laundry in the medieval basement and work on our different projects until we stop to go to the movies at 7.30pm. We see the new Woody Allen movie YOU WILL MEET A TALL DARK STRANGER, with great performances from the many famous actors in it. Not a stunning movie, but enjoyable with good tension. We have a list of possible places to eat after the movie, but end up at Les Deux Magots on Blvd. St. Germain, where de Beauvoir and Sartre used to hang out. We are actually sitting in front of their plaques on the wall, when the waiter stumbles and send a whole bottle of water splashing all over me, my coat on the seat, the seat, the table,,,,everything. I jump up to let the water run off me, and more water cascades down on my new shoes. The waiter (who, by the way, looks like Don Draper in Mad Men) is genuinely desolé. He is certainly brought out of any ennui, he might have felt in that existentialist haven. The impossibly slender and stunning black hostess, who looks like a 60’s model with thick black hair caught in a headband, also comes to help. But we wave the whole thing off, happy it wasn’t red wine, and direct our full attention to the best meal we’ve eaten so far: grilled prawns with Basmati rice and a buttery coriander dipping sauce - beautifully presented (why did we not bring the camera?), along with the incredible dessert: plump raspberries stood between two dark pink rose-flavored macaroons with a lychee filling, all with a bottle of Sancerre. We walk home contented.
WORKING MONDAY
Monday, October 11, 2010
CHECK OUT THE TWO MACS, HIS AND HERS, AND THE CONFUSION OF BOOKS, MAPS, DICTIONARIES, AND RECEIPTS.
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