Fun Fact: Let us cast a glance, or un coup d'oeil, at the French for this bit of history. In 1830, Charles X, King of France, issued the Four Ordinances of St. Cloud. Apparently the king felt that the elected government was too radical (and he had no desire to serve as a mere constitutional monarch, considering the kingship his birthright by divine right and all). These ordinances abolished freedom of the press, dissolved the newly elected Chamber of Deputies (the lower house of the French parliament which contained a majority elected in opposition to the king's policies), reduced the future number of deputies, curtailed the powers of the deputies, and disfranchised a huge portion of the electorate. You might think that such steps would be ill-advised in a nation that had already demonstrated a willingness ride the regicide railway to the bloody end. You would be right. 

If Charles X considered the citizens revolting before he issued the ordinances, he gained new insights with regard to that opinion almost immediately. The citizens were revolting, and they did. The disfranchised businessmen refused to lend money and closed their factories. The workers now had nothing better to do than to protest (what with the lack of bowling alleys and movie theaters at the time). The newspapers refused to be silenced. The police and military patrolled Paris to maintain order.

The fighting began on the evening of July 27. The fighting continued on the 28th to shouts of "down with the Bourbons," and "to the guillotine." (I don't think the latter phrase was meant as a toast). Charles at St. Cloud ordered Marechal Marmont (who had betrayed Napoleon in 1814) to quell the riot. Marmont, after taking in the situation and demonstrating himself to be the indecisive worm that he was, sent back a note to the king informing him that he no longer faced a riot, but a revolution. Marmont waited for immediate orders, lest delay result in a change of regime. Charles turned to his adviser Jules de Polignac. This minister, having been part Four Ordinances, told the king to double down and to resist rather than compromise. I don't see that the king ever provided Marmont with more specific orders.

By July 29th the populace had acquired weapons from the arms depots and gunpowder factories. They had erected barricades throughout Paris. The tricolor waved from many buildings. Marmont remained inert, failing to call in additional troops. He further handicapped his troops by ordering them not to fire unless fired upon. The populace took the Louvre, the Tuilleries Palace, and the Hotel de Ville. The politicians began the work of establishing a provisional government. Thus completed the second revolution against the Bourbon monarchy. Charles fled to England.

Unable to get out of a familiar rut, the French established a constitutional monarchy and placed Charles' 5th cousin Louis Phillipe, another Bourbon, on the throne. This monarchy would last until 1848 with the birth of the 2nd French Republic.

As long as I'm rolling here: The fall of King Louis Phillipe in 1848 does illustrate some germane points. By 1848, most of the populace could not vote and a third of Paris was on social welfare. Frederic Bastiat argued that political corruption, a complex system of permits, monopolies, and bureaucracy led to the revolt against Louis Phillipe. Political favors and protectionism allowed the privileged to dictate market conditions which resulted in the destruction or bankruptcy of many businesses. Bastiat reported that the French law makers were entirely unaware of the consequences of their radical policies. These factors caused the rise of the socialists and anarchists, and eventually another revolution. 

With political gatherings banned, those in opposition to the government held fundraising banquets. These were subsequently banned in February 1848. The Parisians reacted in the usual way with their anger directed at the king. With the torches and pitchforks converging on the palace, Louis Phillipe abdicated on February 24 and fled to England. By this point, there must be more Bourbons and their spawn in England than in France.

The new republic struggled as its incompatible aims were reduced taxes and greater social benefits. The republic established a work program building roads, planting trees and such, and taxed land to pay the workers. The small land owners and rural peasants could not or would not pay the tax. Turmoil, riots, and armed suppression of factions followed until the election of Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte in December.*

***

But enough revolution. I believe France is in its 5th republic which dates from 1958 and which may soon be its most long-lived republic. It's like they turn out republics like crepes.

Dead Horse Point, twenty-some miles out of Moab Utah. I was there for the third time last week. To clarify: I was only there once last week, but it was the third time that I had ever been there. It was part of a fabulous trip about southern Utah which prevented me from writing. I did however see some sights, visit the college kid, play cribbage with my root and branch, and drive a couple thousand miles. I am back home with my nose to the keyboard, having spewed words to the digital page like half-digested midway snacks on the tilt-a-whirl. I've probably used that simile before, but I still like it.

I have to be honest. As I hit the final third of the dystopian novel, I'm looking forward to slipping back into the Tomahawks and Dragon Fire series in the midst of exciting times in the American Revolutionary War. There I go, back to revolutions. They may not be fun to live through, but they can be fun to write about.

_________

*Most of the above was condensed from various wikipedia articles about the subjects.

Nature changed her mind. She had written a wonderful spring week with abundant sunshine filling days with the warm supple feel of a baby's smooth cheek. She had brought not only green but striking yellow hues about which bees and assorted other insects turned to and fro in their ecstatic aerial dances. She had a change of heart on Friday. She ferociously rewrote, adding plot complications that included gray skies which brooded in a dark funk above the landscape before lashing out with furious winds and unleashing airborne oceans to remind us that April is a capricious child prone to sudden (and sodden) tantrums. Nature is all about character development. She writes in epic colors with the voice of thunder and tempest without ever forgetting the details that bring her characters to life--and yet she is not nearly so eloquent as the empty tomb.

In other words, it was too wet to mow and too wet, windy and rainy to spray the weeds. I did manage to repair a cabinet door and launch into a game of Song of Drums and Shakos (Large Battles) on Saturday while the wretched wetness reigned outside. The Austrians were supposed to be fighting a defensive battle but they seized the initiative and have relentlessly taken the fight to the French. It's a fun and fairly simple game. It's not quite as fun as the wild beast I created by combining Age of Eagles with elements of Rogue Stars, but it is simpler and quicker--although, I think the rules could have been more clearly written that they were.

I should have been writing but I made my thousand words per day during the week. I'm at 19,000 words. That's nearly a quarter of the way through Power to Hurt, the sequel to Threading the Rude Eye. I still expect to have it ready by the end of July this year.

Given recent events, I've included a few pics of Notre Dame Cathedral taken when we were there in May 2017. My other pictures of the place would be from 1983 or 84 (I'll have to find them).

The Last Jet I Flew...and some thoughts looking toward a new year

Here we are. The new year stretches like an immense scroll of blank paper before us, clean and untouched, disappearing into the ether, awaiting the ink and smudges of our daily struggle. The past year stretches out behind us, bearing the print of our thoughts and actions, stained with spills, strikethroughs, blackouts, tears (and tears), rips, beautiful prose, memories (good and bad), pages upon which we would dwell fondly in our thoughts, and pages we would like to forget. Each day is really such spot upon the great scroll of life; we just give it special significance with the turn of the new year. 

The new year is full of promise; we will be better than we have been; we will improve. January begins pregnant with hope and resolution. Before February, most of the hope and all of the resolution expire, stillborn in the face of winter's grim and frigid reality, and our recognition that we would rather embrace our weaknesses than fearlessly forge them into strengths. 

We imagine this:

We discover that it's really going to be like this:

Like water, we choose the path of least resistance. Having followed that path so many times before, the way is worn and easy, with sides too steep and slick to easily overcome. But this year might just be different. Small goals are still goals. Gradual achievement by small increments builds eventually to lofty attainment. Of course, procrastination can be very satisfying in the short term. You decide.

The conclusion of the travelogue
The last jet I flew in was from San Francisco to Boise. I can't remember much about the flight. I think maybe I had the cranapple juice. We arrived at night, several hours later than the original itinerary had promised. My son picked us up. He drove us to my parents' house where we had left our car. We had a nice visit; we shared some of the high points of the trip before loading up and heading home. 

That drive was the last leg of the trip; it was the most difficult. We had risen before 7:00 a.m in France. That was 11:00 p.m. in Boise (of the day before). We arrived back home after midnight. We were awake for over 25 hours (or I was; I'm pretty sure my wife slept on the plane from France). That's not something that I haven't done before (or more plainly stated: I have stayed awake longer than that before). I don't know if it was the travel or what, but I was completely exhausted. So a good nap during the drive would have done me a world of good...except that I was the one driving. I think I did sleep for a millisecond during the drive; I'm pretty sure I had a dream during that minute foray into the twilight zone of consciousness. I've never understood how people can fall asleep while driving...now I understand.

What a great year!

Return - and my wife finds a husband

Our flight was scheduled to leave at 9:00 a.m. We planned to be at the airport by 7:00 a.m.

I received a notification before the chickens (or us either for that matter) were up, that the flight from Paris to San Francisco would be delayed... A little later, another notification...and then another...and then another...Anyway, the flight wasn't leaving until sometime in the afternoon. So, we no longer had to hurry. Instead we got to the airport, where we learned the flight wouldn't leave until even later. We spent 5 hours at the airport waiting for the flight.

I think my wife took this picture at the airport.

When the time to board our flight finally did arrive, my wife and I were pulled from the line and grilled about our backgrounds, jobs, purpose of our trip, etc. I thought there were several other individuals who appeared more deserving of a hasty interrogation...but we were the lucky ones. 

I don't know if our answers mattered, or if the procedure was just to ask the questions and, absent some confession of planned wrongdoing, to let us go on our way. So we never got to be strip searched, or grilled beneath a bright light in a room that smelled of coffee, stale cigarette smoke and fear by a guy with a moustache and an eye-patch, reeking of Brute cologne. (Which makes me wonder, if he were really tough, would his moustache have its own eye-patch, or would his eye-patch have its own moustache? No his cologne would be so strong that it had its own moustache and eye-patch!)

We break now for something completely different:

Just a moment ago, my wife sang our excitedly, "I found a husband!"
For a brief instance I was nonplussed (and I wasn't doing any other exercises in arithmetic either), before I asked hopefully, "Can he support us both?"
She explained that the discovery wasn't for herself; she was doing some family history research, and had found the elusive information on a husband to one of her ancestors. 
No gravy train there. Oh well. Maybe next time.

Back to the regularly scheduled tedious travelogue:

The flight was exactly that for which one hopes when flying over an ocean, or over anything else for that matter: uneventful. Thinking about that, I was about to write that it was both long and monotonous, which recalled to mind Verlaine's Chanson d'automne, which seems fitting (but not because we were hitting the beaches of Normandy):

Les sanglots longs
Des violons
De l'automne
Blessent mon coeur
D'une langueur
Monotone.

Tout suffocant
Et blême, quand
Sonne l'heure,
Je me souviens
Des jours anciens
Et je pleure

Et je m'en vais
Au vent mauvais
Qui m'emporte
Deçà, delà,
Pareil à la
Feuille morte.

Our arrival at SF was more eventful. First we had to do the customs thing. We rushed. I especially rushed to get in front of two ladies dragging suitcases. I just knew that they were going to delay us; it was just a feeling I had. We had another flight to catch that was leaving in less than an hour. I really didn't want to miss it. 

We had to deal with a machine that demanded to scan our passports, which had to be held just so; and it also had to scan our faces; one had to stand just so. The first time I did it, I got the scanning of the passports and faces switched (mine for my wife's), and had to do it over. It went much more smoothly the second time. We did that, and answered a few questions about the purpose of our trip and what we had brought back. It seems like they asked something like, "During your stay abroad, did you abscond with any children or historical artifacts? If so, does the value exceed $200.00?" 

Then we got to wait in line again to see an actual human who would review the answers given to the machine. Can you guess who was immediately in front of us in the line? The two ladies with the big suitcases. They were very nice. I joked that I had seen them earlier and had made a special effort to get ahead of them; apparently they were much faster on the machine, not having had to scan everything twice. They were very nice. When they learned that we were trying to catch a connecting flight set to depart soon, they insisted that we go ahead of them in the line. 

After we got through customs, we met Gandalf. 


Next time: Gandalf at the bridge, and more airport fun

Surprises, pleasant and otherwise

We left the Louvre, but I wasn't sure about our next move. One part of me wanted to find a nice restaurant in Paris where my last remaining wad of euros might be exchanged for a delicious dinner and memorable evening with my bride. I explained my dilemma. She didn't want to find a restaurant. We took the public transit back to the hotel. We arrived in a blustery storm --if that's not the name of an automobile, it should be. The tempest--which is a car name-- lashed us with the wet and windy fury of a thousand scourges. 

We made out way via the bureaucratic elevator back to our room. We had a brief rest, and perused the area for restaurants; it looked like we would have to take a taxi. The storm had ceased, but there didn't seem to be anything other than hotel restaurants within walking distance. We both agreed that we didn't want to eat at our hotel again. The rather bad experience associated with the meal from the previous evening stuck in our memories like a burr in a horse's tail. A short while later, we found ourselves, reluctantly, seated at our hotel restaurant--all of the other options involved more time and energy than we possessed. After traipsing around Paris all day, being taken in ambuscade, intimidating other would-be ambuscaders, repeatedly surmounting insurmountable stairs, wandering through museums, strolling down the Champs-Elysees, and otherwise rollicking and rolling in the history and scenic glory of Paris like dogs in a rotting deer carcass, our search for adventure had been sated; our get up and go had got up and went; our exhaustion rating exceeded our desire for more experience points.

We sat at a different table than we had the previous night. We were next to a window. Of course, it was dark enough outside that we saw little in the glass other than our own reflection. I don't remember now what I had to drink--I know that it was not Orangina. Our waiter was very nice; he was more comfortable speaking French than English. He helped me remember that the word for the bill was l'addition; by which I mean that I asked him and he told me. 

I had steak; I think my wife had the same. We really enjoyed the meal. Our expectations were guarded; by which I mean that we were just hoping not to be sick. It was really quite good. We were glad that we hadn't tried to go elsewhere. Was it overpriced? Certainly. Was it a great meal? Certainly. 

The most interesting part for me was when I took the bill to the register. A woman with whom I had spoken before was working at the register, and took my bill. Another woman who worked there walked up beside her and whispered in French, "Is this the guy you were telling me about?" I guess she either thought that that my French was so poor that I wouldn't understand, or that her whisper would not reach me. The first woman then whispered back, "Oui. C'est lui." I didn't have the nerve to ask what it was about me that they had found worthy of prior conversation. I'm pretending that it was my remarkable rugged good looks coupled with my boyish charm. I wasn't wearing the hat; so it couldn't have been that.

The meal had proved to be a pleasant surprise. The unpleasant surprise came in the dead of the night, ripping me from the comfortable and loving arms of that most pleasant of mistresses, Sleep. My bank called to see if I would like to take a survey about the kind of service that I had received in depositing a check the week before. I had the presence of mind to let the person know that I was in a foreign country, it was the middle of the night, and I did not want to take a survey. 

(Rant Notice: Pointless angry blather with no redeeming qualities follows). Of all the things that irritate me about the bank in question, the calls wanting to ask me questions about the service I have received are the worst. If I want to talk about the service, I'll call them. The calls always come at the most inopportune of times. If I could call the idiot who thought of that stupid survey idea at his/her most inconvenient time and badger him with a bunch of useless questions, I would gladly do it. I would love to have him drag himself from bed, stub his toe, bump his knee, and step on a LEGO on his way to the phone. I would ask if he would mind taking a survey about the interaction during my latest bank visit. Are the tellers able to read my signature without difficulty? Would they prefer that I turn to the left or the right as I lean on the counter while conversing with the teller? Are the camera's catching my best side? Is blue ink a problem for their scanners? On a scale of 1-10, how much would they mind never calling me again to inquire about my willingness to take a survey? 1 being, "Consider it done. It was a colossally moronic idea. We're sorry to have bothered you. It won't happen again." 10 being, "We're only in the banking business to cause you misery. We would like to shoot you in the eye with a staple gun and break your teeth out with an ashtray, but the lawsuits have forced us to settle for bothering you by telephone...forever."

A Day in Paris - part 6

It was still Thursday.
We left the Arc de Triomphe to begin our walk down the Champs-Elysees. 

No trip to Paris is complete without a stroll down the Champs-Elysees. It was a bit of a walk. My wife didn't want to go into the fancy stores along the way. It was getting late, so we just wanted to enjoy the walk to the Louvre. Google tells me that the distance is 4.5 kilometers.

That's just short of 3 miles in real measurement. It wasn't a bad walk...it was a very nice walk...but there were complications. Now that we had left the monument with the free restroom, my companion informed me that she needed to use the bathroom--complication number 1. We were also getting thirsty. I bought another Orangina--the precursor to complication number 2. 

We made an attempt at addressing complication number 1 in the long park that runs along a portion of the thoroughfare. A sign indicted that use of the facility would be 2 euros. The place looked a little off-putting...so we were; off-put, that is. Wife said she could wait.

After we had entered the Tuileries, we were climbing a short set of stairs. At the top, two girls accosted us. One girl said, while holding a map, "You're from here, can you tell us where the nearest subway stop is." I was wondering why she thought I was "from here." Was it the dopey hat? Was it my debonair look and jaunty air of je ne sais quoi? (Who really knows what that is anyway?) When I didn't respond immediately, she whisked the map away and went down the stairs. I don't know if she suddenly realized that I was not in fact "from here." Or if she thought maybe that I was "from here" but didn't speak English. Either way, I was happy with her decision to seek an answer elsewhere. We continued on to the Louvre. 

I was surprised that there was no line at the entrance. My wife thought that it might be closed. I assured her that it was not. I had planned this out; we were arriving at the Louvre on one of the days that it stayed open late. We descended at the entrance beneath the glass pyramid (which wasn't even there the last time I had been to the Louvre). Below, I could see a line. I made some inquiries. That line was for a special exhibit. I didn't care. I wasn't interested in that exhibit...but I did want to see the rest of the great museum. 

The lady told me that the rest of the Louvre had already closed. Only this one special exhibit remained open. I knew that couldn't be true. I knew the museum stayed open till 9:00 or 10:00 p.m on Fridays. I had planned for this. So I told her that I thought the museum was open late on Fridays. She said that it was...but today was Thursday. That's when I remembered...I had originally scheduled our visit to the Louvre for Friday night. Then there had been some complications with the plane tickets, so the tickets we got had a Friday morning rather than a Saturday morning departure...and I had never revised my 22 step day in Paris schedule to account for the change from Friday to Thursday. It was another Maxwell Smart moment. The lady did let me me know that the Musee d'Orsay was still open. I told her that we had already been to that one that morning. Oh well.

On the bright side, the Louvre restrooms were still open. My wife met some nice people from Oregon in her line while resolving complication number 1. Shortly after that, the last bottle of Orangina kicked in. Without going into detail, let me just say that I became very familiar with the men's room in the bottom of the Louvre. It really was complication number 2, and the resolution thereof was not pleasant. I will say that it was one of the nicest restrooms that I was able to use during the trip, it ranked just below the restroom at the Frankfurt airport. While I did not get to see and cannot express my thoughts upon the overabundant oil paintings, or the great number of magnificent statues in bronze and in marble, I give the plain porcelain in the famous museum a plethora of plaudits. I felt much like Rodin's The Thinker--which isn't displayed in the Louvre. 

A Day in Paris - part five

The Thursday continued. 
We left Sacre Coeur, walking down the near infinity steps, down the street, past the little shop where we had purchased the bag, and back to the metro. The red book sheet for the day showed us at step 15 (of 22) getting on the M12 at Anvers. Step 16 had us ride to CDG Etoile; 17 was visiting the Arc de Triomphe. 

And I have no idea who the person in the white jacket with the upraised arms might be; just some other tourist; but it really makes the picture come alive. 

From the outside, the monument seems huge. It seems even taller when one is going up the stairs inside. Before we got to those stairs, we had to take a tunnel under the roundabout and come up in the center where the Arc stands. There was nothing unusual about going through the metal detector... except that I kept setting it off. The people behind us were losing patience. Finally, the guard just passed us through without any groping or stripping...in spite of the rather rude suggestions of the people behind us.

I have said that Paris is a city of stairs. At the Arc, those stairs were a fast and furious experience...by which I mean, when tried to go fast, my wife got furious. Of course, I jest. We were too tired to go fast. The circular stairs go up...and up...and up...and up. Then, when we were just about to collapse with exhaustion, we discovered that there were more stairs. 

Eventually we got to the top...but it wasn't quite the top. It was a place to rest, buy souvenirs, use the bathroom, etc. I needed the latter (and I don't mean the etc.), but I decided to go on to the top after a brief rest. 

More stairs. I only got one or two pictures from the top. I was there about one minute. That earlier need I mentioned suddenly became very, very, extremely urgent. Back down the stairs.

There was a line. It wasn't moving. Even when someone came out of the restroom, no one went in. I was curious. What could be the cause of this strange phenomenon? On the lady's side, there was no line; only the men's side had a line...and it refused to move. Eventually, after about 20 minutes of intense and painful waiting, I unraveled the mystery. A guy with four or five boys had gone into the men's room. There was only one stall. I think he was giving each of them an individualized course in astrophysics, or something.

So, I spent most of step 17 waiting in line...for the loo.

My wife didn't want to go back up to the top. I was in a hurry to lead her down the Champs-Elysees, through the Tuilleries, and to the Louvre; so we left, getting a few pictures before we took the tunnel under the roundabout to the Champs-Elysees.



Next time: A Day in Paris - part six

A Day in Paris - Part Four

It was Thursday.
We had deviated from the planned 22 steps by skipping the Catacombs earlier, and later going to the Eiffel Tower. Getting back on track with the plan put us at step 13 on our page from the day in the red book which was to take the M12 to Abbesses...except we weren't near the M12 because we had not walked from the Musee d'Orsay to the M6 Assemble National. Instead, and I don't remember the first part of the route, but eventually we took the M2 and got off at Anvers. 

My original plan called for us to take the funicular up the slope of Montmartre to Sacre Coeur. It didn't happen that way. From our metro stop, we began walking up the street. The plastic bag that we had received when we had purchased the souvenir shirts (don't ask me what kind of shirts souvenirs wear) had a tendency to make one's arm sweat. We decided to buy a cloth bag in which to carry the shirts. We stopped at a busy shop that sold lots of stuff...lots of stuff that held no interest for us. But it also sold bags. Right outside, hanging on the corner of the building by the entrance, was a small to medium bag. It was tan with black lettering and symbols--the lettering being "Paris" and the symbols being landmarks in Paris. The marked price was 5 euros. It seemed like it would be perfect, just the right capacity--large enough to hold the shirts, and small enough to fit in our backpacks when we boarded the plan for home. 

Problem: The bag wouldn't come off the rack. I discovered that it was actually tied, rather than hooked, to the rack. I didn't know if I was supposed to or not, but I untied the bag and took it into the store waving my 5 franc euro bill. Eventually, a guy saw me waving the note. He saw the bag, took my money, and waved me out. I don't think I even got a receipt.

I didn't see the funicular. I did find stairs...they were hard to miss, what with there being a nearly infinite number of them. Which makes me wonder, how many is "nearly infinite"? At what point does one say, "Whoa, I better not count any more, just 14 more and we hit infinity."? In this case, it's apparently something over 300...that's what wikipedia says about the number of steps up to Sacre Coeur. 

These steps were not only numerous, they also possessed the added quality of steepness. Not quite the steepness of the steps of the Pyramid of the Sun at Teotihuacan, which is a very awesome place, but they were steeper than the steps up to Trocadero. 

Naturally, I thought it would be cool to get a picture of my wife at the bottom of the site before we began the ascent. I took out my cellphone and got a photo. As I snapped the picture, my phone rang. It was my son. As I spoke to him, I looked around and noticed one of several suspicious characters signal to the others and point to me. I call these guys suspicious because they didn't have a blanket of wares to sell, and just seemed to accost people on the stairs to sell them yarn key chains which they would weave on the spot by having the person hold one end while the guy braided the yarn. It seemed suspicious to me. It seemed like a great way to distract someone while a colleague picked their pocket. 

I continued talking on the phone with my son. The suspicious characters ran up the stair ahead of us. Four of them positioned themselves in a line across the next landing. I wasn't sure if they were setting the ambush for me because I was talking on the phone and they thought that I would be distracted, or because they had heard me speak English; maybe it was both...or neither. At any rate, I don't think they were looking for my autograph. It was the least subtle ambush I've ever seen. The guy with the suitcase and the clear container of coins on the sidewalk from earlier in the day had done a much better job.

As I approached the top of the first set of stairs, phone still to my ear, the four men of the ambuscade (see Huckleberry Finn, Chapter 3) closed ranks in front of me. One held out some colored yarn and asked me in English to hold it. I realized that if I had one hand holding my phone, and another hand holding some yarn, I would be quite unable to do anything else; besides, I didn't want a yarn key chain...or my pocket picked, or whatever other end they sought with their lame and nefarious plan. I said, in a firm and convincing voice, "Get away from me!"

They parted like the the Red Sea. 

"Mauvais!" declared one of them with disgust as he backed away. 

My son wondered whether I was talking to him or to someone else. I told him what had happened, and he laughed. 

We continued up the remainder of the stairs, 250 or so; so like only half of infinity at that point. 

The stream into the basilica was steady. I was disappointed by the great number of people; it was crowded. I had hoped to do as I had done many years ago. I wanted to climb up to the top of the building and look over Paris from the central dome, to walk the narrow stairways at the building's edge, to consort with the pigeons in the little cupola's. I didn't see any signs that would allow us to leave the main floor and take the stairs up. I was disappointed. Although it did save us from climbing a bunch more stairs.

Here is video I found of some people who did get to go to some of those places:

We had to content ourselves with pictures of Paris from the top of the near infinity stairs.

Next time: A Day in Paris - Part Five

A Day in Paris - Part 2

It was still Thursday.
We had just left the souvenir shop near the Pantheon. We were on our way to the Luxembourg Gardens. The sidewalk was pretty wide, wide enough for some shops to have racks of goods out on it. There was also a youth sprawled on the sidewalk. He had two suitcases next to him. The suitcases were red. We gave him a wide berth; there was something hinky about the guy. 

I realized what the feeling was when my wife kicked the container, made from the bottom quarter of a clear plastic water bottle, which held a few coins, and which he had placed out in the center of the walk. The container was virtually invisible. She hit it solidly, like an opening kickoff. The bit of bottle went tumbling; the coins went skittering. Did I mention the grate across the sidewalk? Most of the coins went down the grate that was located about six or eight feet from the ambush site. 

I found two of his missing coins that the grate had not consumed, both one centime pieces. I could see that we had walked right into the trap. My wife was very apologetic. I thought about explaining to the guy that he should be more careful about where he puts his stuff. I'm not sure if he wasn't much of an actor, or if he was just saving the theatrics in case they were needed; he didn't seem very upset...and I was still packing about two pounds of change in my pocket. So...I asked how much he had had in the bottle bottom. He said, "Quatre." He didn't say whether it was euros or centimes. So I pulled out a handful of coins and gave to him...it was probably a little more than four euros worth. He seemed happy. We moved on, having fallen victim to a scam, but not feeling too badly about it.

Luxembourg Gardens welcomed us. In my memory, it had always been bright and sunny at Luxembourg Gardens; it was where I had spoken with an American writer all those years ago; if I remember correctly, he had told me that he had helped write the script for the movie version of An American in Paris. 

It was Thursday, and the sky had begun to take on a battleship hue. We were both hungry, having skipped step one (breakfast) of our planned 22 steps for the day. We bought ham and cheese crepes and ate them in the park, admiring the greenery, and getting lightly sprinkled with rain.

According to the daily sheet from the red book, our next step, number 7, was to take the metro to the catacombs; exploring the catacombs was step 8. Problem: step 9 involved leaving the catacombs via the M4 to the Musee d'Orsay. The M4 was nonfunctional; we would lose more time in circuitous travel. We scratched the catacombs from our list. I had been there: bones, lots and lots of bones, macabre. Besides, I had already decided to add another destination to our list. We skipped steps 7 through 10, substituting a new metro route to get us to step 11, the Musee d'Orsay.

There were two or three lines to get into the museum. I noticed that the shortest line was specifically labeled for British and Americans. We got in quickly (using our Paris Museum Pass)...after the usual frisk and bag examination, but no body cavity search. The museum was seriously awesome. Tons of stuff. We took our time, trying to enjoy the moment, examining lots of paintings and objets d'arts. Some of them are pictured below. We looked until we could look no more, to the point that the thought of gazing upon one more framed canvas, or one more likeness in clay, bronze, or stone caused our eyes to roll back in their sockets, our knees to collapse, and the bowels to loosen. So we were there a good twelve or thirteen minutes. No. Seriously, we were there for an hour or two. It's really a place to spend an entire day...but it was Thursday, and we had 22 steps to complete.

This one was sculpted after the model stepped on a LEGO.

 I'm pretty sure this one was entitled "Selfie with Dead Girl."

Aerobics can be so exhausting.

When we left the museum, we purchased drinks. My wife chose a bottle of water. I, remembering the sweet citrus bite of the drink from dinner the night before, chose an Orangina. And we were off to the destination that I had added to our schedule. A guy on a rickshaw bike offered to give us a ride there...but we already had plenty of metro tickets, which were much cheaper than the price of the ride...so we went under ground once more.

Next time: A Day in Paris - part 3.

A Day in Paris - part 1

It was a Thursday. 
According to the red book, we had 22 steps for the day's events. I had constructed the red book before we had left home. Every day had been planned with destinations, addresses, telephone numbers, flight numbers, airports, arrival times, etc, from the departure day of May 11 to the return day of May 19--all tucked into clear plastic page protectors. Each day had a schedule page, subsequent pages contained the documents that we might need for that day. The red book had served us well. At hotels, I had pulled out the reservations previously made online; at the car rental when the girl insisted on asking me every question that I had already answered online, I showed her the page from the red book and everything went smoothly. My advice regarding the red book, in the voice of Karl Malden: Don't leave home without it. 

But this was Thursday. 
We were going to Paris. We would be at Notre Dame by step 3. Step one consisted of breakfast...and we skipped that, going right to step two: RER B to St. Michel/Notre Dame. I had constructed the plan for the days events by going over the Paris map and the Paris metro map. We knew where we were going, and exactly how we were getting there. I just didn't know how long we would be at each destination. I knew the plan was ambitious, but a man's reach must exceed his grasp, n'est-ce pas? We were Maxwell Smart and 99 in the city of lights. What could possibly go wrong?

Notre Dame was fabulous. It was much like the other old churches that we had visited, but even more so--yes, I really mean that.

It was about three weeks later that the hammer-wielding terrorist struck at that location, and many tourists were locked inside the cathedral for much longer than they had planned. I suggest marking the sans marteau box on all tours to this location. 

I spent many months in Paris many years ago. I have a clear memory of eating chicken and frites in the middle of the day with a friend from Ireland on a bench near the cathedral. 

There was some kind of bread making exhibition going on in a large shelter in the square. We walked through it, but didn't stay long. We had a schedule to keep. On to the Latin Quarter.

Step four had us walking to the Cluny Museum, a distance of a few blocks. I wanted my wife to have that part of the experience of Paris, walking both the grand avenues as well as the narrow side streets. The Cluny is a medieval history museum. We spent a short time there. One room contained the six tapestries of The Lady and the Unicorn. That room held a certain sense of mystery, as if the true meaning of the tapestries would manifest itself to the perceptive viewer. We thought it was cool, but apparently weren't perceptive enough to gather any deeper meaning. 

From the Cluny, pursuant to step five, we walked to the Pantheon. Things were proceeding quite nicely.

This massive block of stone is quite breathtaking within. I could see it as a superb location for filming a battle between a character played by Alain Delon, or Jean Claude Van Damme, and some enemy with the weapons being swords and Frankish throwing axes. It struck me as a celebration of the nation, a place to worship the France of the past, its history, and prominent persons. Although there was a picture of Clovis, I must have missed the paintings of those most famous of Gauls, Asterix and Obelix.

Step six of the red book directed us to walk to the Luxembourg Gardens. We deviated slightly from that mandate by going into a souvenir shop to get shirts. The shop was right there, and I knew with our ambitious schedule, if we waited to pick up some souvenirs for ourselves and our kids, we probably wouldn't get any. The young gentleman at the store was extremely helpful. He sold us all of the cheap, over-priced items that we wanted; they were quite nice...and as I couldn't find any stamps or tags indicating the country of manufacture, I assumed they were probably all made in China...but we bought them in Paris; that's what counts.

We set out again for the Luxembourg Gardens. Little did we know that just a short few dozen meters down the street, a trap had been cunningly placed in our path.

Next time: A Day in Paris -- part two

Hamburger Surpise

This was on the wall of our room at the bureaucratic hotel:

It's not the exact picture; I found this one on the internet. In fact, I remembering the moon as being bigger.

Another thing we found in the room (along with the bottle of water and candy) was a menu.

I also found this one on the internet, as I did not consider the menu something of which I wanted a picture when we were there. This picture is too small for me to accurately read. The actual menu that we found in the room suffered from a similar problem--not legibility, but accuracy. We spent some time deciding what we would have. I forget now what we finally decided to have...but it sounded good.

When we arrived in the restaurant, we discovered a completely different menu. Apparently, the menu in the room was outdated; the selection upon which we had decided was not to be found on the new menu. We couldn't find anything on the new menu that interested us. Nevertheless, in our famished condition, not having eaten much of anything since our massive breakfast in Bayeux, we ordered something.

It was the kind of mistake that Americans probably make with frequency; we ordered hamburgers. They were one of the cheapest things on the menu. Our first meal at Versailles had been from McDonald's; in fact, our evening meal on the second night had been from McDonald's; both of those meals were fine. We failed to account for the fact that although the hamburgers were the cheapest things on the menu, they were way overpriced. Overpriced hamburgers are never good. We didn't account for the fact that a "chef" rather than a simple cook was preparing these burgers. A simple hamburger is beneath contempt for a "chef." A "chef" must expand, magnify, and supplement the plain ordinary hamburger. Rather than a simple but filling meal, the "chef" must concoct a masterpiece...and thereby completely ruin that acme of ordinary meat. 

They patties glistened like varnished mahogany...and were nearly as tasty. Seriously, they had been seasoned, not unpleasantly so. But they were thick. It was like trying to eat a doorjamb in a bun. I removed the lettuce; it was that single, thin, dry-but-green leaf from the outermost edge of the plant; it's the kind of lettuce that many restaurants use to hide the real food, the throw-away wrapper--it gives color to the plate but is completely unpalatable.

The burger wasn't awful; it was just thick and strange tasting. A burger should be fun to eat, with dripping condiments that complement the flavor of the beef, the bun, the tomato, and the onion. (I don't enjoy pickles on hamburgers--this one was on the side). The ground beef should be the star in this culinary play; the other performers should all be in love with the meat and cling to it longingly. Instead, this burger was a real ham, upstaging all the supporting cast, and stinking up the show. None of the other players could rescue the great ground round patty from itself. 

The fries were those thick, soggy pieces of lumber rejected by CostCo...but they were better than the burger.

The one redeeming aspect of the meal was Orangina. 

They served it in a short bottle just like that one in the picture above, with glasses in which to pour it. I remembered Orangina from my stay some 30 years earlier. I remembered it as a flat, watery, orange-pulpy drink in a blue can. In spite of my rather tepid recollection of the drink, I wanted to try it again for nostalgia's sake. 

The burger gave me a tremendous thirst. The drink hit my mouth like an artillery barrage, exploding with refreshing citrus flavor and carbonation. I fell in love with it. It was nothing like I remembered.

After we finished our meal--we had eaten most of the burgers because hunger had driven us to that extreme--we went back to the room. The aftermath of the meal is best described as extremely unpleasant in a gastrointestinal sense. I blamed the burger. I would later find out that the burger may have received a bad rap for that unpleasantness.


Next time: A Day in Paris

The Bowels of Charles DeGaulle

The title refers, of course, to the airport, not to the guy after whom the airport is named.

We were headed to terminal one. And that sentence reminds me of these lines from ELO's "Here Is The News": 
"Ten Eurotechnicians were today sentenced
By the justice computer to be banished for life
To the prison satellite Penal One..."

(The "one" is repeated two more times, as can be heard here.)

Like two hobbits returning a cursed ring, we entered the dark recesses of the terminal--but without the elven cloaks and glowing sword. I saw a sign that said something about the red zone rental car return, and the green zone car return. Naturally, I had no idea which zone I needed to chose. Why was this decision suddenly being thrust upon me? Who were they to insist that I chose a zone? Could I chose to be zone neutral, or elect to be fluid in zone? Apparently not. Sometimes choices are binary. 

I made a command decision. I can't remember now which zone I chose; I can't remember what factors I used to reach the decision. Like many of life's decisions, it was based upon incomplete information, a quick assessment of facts and the inferences to be reasonably drawn therefrom, previous life experience, common sense, and that nebulous je ne sais quoi sometimes called intuition, or gut instinct. Like many of those other decisions in life, I wouldn't know immediately if my decision had been correct.

I backed the car into a tight parking spot. I congratulated myself on an excellent parking job, and got out to go find the desk. Before I got more than a few steps, a man told me that I couldn't park there. That was the parking area for X brand rental cars. The Europcar return area was deeper within the terminal. Back in the car. 

I had chosen the correct zone, I had just parked in the wrong area. We found the Europcar area and parked. There was a young woman dealing with four older Americans (who apparently spoke no French) and their car load of stuff. We waited until she finished with them. Then I approached her, asking in French if she was the person to whom we needed to speak about the return of the car. She said that she was, and directed me to move the car (again) to her location. I did. She inspected the car and pronounced it free of damage...even ignoring the pre-existing damage marked on the rental agreement from the Europcar Compiegne branch. It was quick and painless, except for that whole trying to find the right zone and parking place. 

We took the shuttle (the same one or two car train we had taken from the airport to the train station when we had arrived) from the terminal to our hotel. We didn't know it at the time, but we were headed for the worst meal of our entire stay.

Next time: Hamburger surprise

The Bureaucratic Hotel...and Gas

Stairs. We climbed stairs from the parking garage to the main floor of the hotel. The check-in went fairly easily. The trouble arose when I asked about a nearby gas station. The male clerk gave me directions in French, which, although I understood them, I knew that I wasn't going to remember them. I asked if he knew the name of the place. He did not know the name.

Our room was several floors up. There was an elevator; it was a bureaucratic elevator. The elevator had a sort of silent Gandalf program. One had to put the room key-card near a sensor to get the elevator to function. Without the room key, it was all, "You shall not pass!" Except it didn't say anything...one was left to push buttons without result. Even a simple, "What are you doing, Dave?" would have been preferable to the stubborn silence of the infernal machine. Frequently (i.e., every time), the sensor didn't read the key-card even after several Jedi-like motions with the card. The eye of Sauron was blind.

 It was kind of fun to watch other people attempt it. At times, two or three people would be engaged in the mysterious waving ritual until one of the cards struck the sensor's fancy (we all wanted to strike the bleeping thing somewhere) and the lift would engage. The process did serve to unite the guests against the common enemy; an unspoken bond of brotherhood developed between us as we had banded together in the struggle against the obstinate, un-seeing eye. 

We put our things in the room; it was a bureaucratic room. The lights functioned only when the room key-card was inserted and left in a special slot near the door. At least one would know where one had put the key. It reminded me of Phillip K. Dick's Ubik story where household appliances, and even doors refused to function without payment -- if I'm remembering the correct story.

We were required to fill the tank of our automobile with petrol before returning it. The clerk not having been as helpful as I had hoped--he being unable to download directions directly to my memory banks--I resigned myself to the guidance of our nearly constant companion, that mistress of motivation management, that directrice of direction...you know who I mean. She took us right to the place. And, it was off that wrong turn that I had taken earlier in finding the hotel. I had been crafty like a fox without even realizing it. Here's a picture from the internet of the Total gas station. It was even more crowded than shown here.

And another view at night from a different angle. I was using that vacant pump on the center right...or the one right behind it.

Once I was able to get to the gas pump, a new problem thrust itself into my face. That kind of problem may be better than the type that sneaks up and taps you on the shoulder to say, "Hey, Buddy. You got a real problem here. Let me show you what trouble you've brought upon yourself."

Anyway, the problem: no apparent way to pay for the gas. There was no place to scan a credit card or to put cash in the pump. I looked at other pumps; people were swiping credit cards, and getting gas in return. I looked again. Nope. No place for a credit card. I went to the building. All of the workers inside seemed to be busy selling croissants. It looked like an old Soviet Union breadline. I went back to the pumps. I asked a gentleman who had started pumping gas nearby. He informed me that those other pumps were for credit cards. These were the cash pumps. Just pump, and then go inside to pay.

And it was just that easy. When I went back inside to pay; the bread mongering had died down. A clerk helped me right away. We exchanged greetings. She asked which pump I had used. I told her. She told me the amount. I gave her currency. Transaction completed. She didn't ask me for a loyalty card, my phone number, coupons, my mother's maiden name, my social security number, the secret word of the day, or any of that stuff. I remember when all face-to-face transactions were like that...I miss those days.


Next time: The Bowels of Charles DeGaulle...