Madame LeMonde's take on it all 2-28-15

Paris, From Deb.  There’s a certain suspended animation quality to travelling by plane. It’s a buffer zone between where you left and where you’re going, with almost no control and almost no responsibility. You just go all Zen, and let it happen. Not all the armrest clutching in the world will raise the plane by an inch, so you can just peaceful out and ride. I could almost feel the stress of the last few weeks ebbing away as we flew across the Atlantic. So much so that I slept most of the way. It didn’t hurt that Warren had gotten us Business First class tickets with miles so that we could bring our obscene amount of luggage.

    With a fast tailwind, we arrived over an hour early, and sped through customs - amazingly even remembering to be sure they stamped our yearlong visas. We were so early that we took our landlady Carol by surprise. She recovered and gave us a thorough tour of the apartment. She left us to our unpacking. I took a nap and Warren a walk, and our first day ended with a dinner of the nice food Carol had left for us, along with her fresh flowers.

     Our second day was a busy one. With our little red shopping cart behind us, we walked about 15 minutes up to a major shopping street. We got some small necessities at Castorama – similar to an urban version of Lowe’s. A couple of helpful lady clerks joined us in an amusing pantomime of a sink strainer. Success! We ended up with just what we needed and laughter all around. Realized yet again that we know all sorts of arcane art terms in French and don’t know the word for “kitchen sink” (evier.) On to Monoprix, a sort of smallish Target or K-Mart store that handles wine, groceries, clothes and housewares. Got some lunch makings and a beginning stash of wine.

     After a pleasant lunch of 3 types of cheeses, my favorite rillettes (a sort of pulled-pork), a bit of ham (Spanish – we couldn’t resist), apples, tomato and a baguette, we got back to organizing and disposed of our giant suitcases down into the cave, a basement storage area for the apartment. Put a hard-side suitcase of Carol’s that she wanted rid of, out on the street with a “libre” sign on it. It was gone in minutes. Recycling, Paris-style.

     Hit the Metro station to recharge our electronic cards for the next month. With our French and the helpful clerk’s bit of English we got it all figured out (that we wanted a month, not a week which is what nearly all tourists want, and that we wanted all three districts not just downtown Paris.) So now, we have the freedom of the city Metro and busses for March.

     Then off to the Louvre to buy our year memberships. We celebrated by taking a fifteen-minute walk through of Roman portrait busts and walked out shamelessly, knowing that we can now come and go as we choose for a year. Those first couple of visits are really pricy, but they keep getting more and more reasonable.

    Finished the day with a Valentine’s Day celebration (which we’d been too busy to observe) at a favorite restaurant, Spring. It was a splurge and not one we can often indulge in, but the food there is always so special that I couldn’t conjure up any regret. Six light courses of Daniel Rose’s delightful cuisine. Two fish courses and pigeon as the main. Dessert was 4 small offerings – a pistachio pate with whole nuts and orange peel, a tiny Meyer lemon tart, then fresh and broiled pineapple marinated in ginger and dressed with fresh sage, and lastly, chocolate gelato with chocolate granita, whipped cream and grated chocolate. All small and perfect.

    Wandered home through a damp but mild Paris night, and so to bed. Fortunately a good bed and Warren’s feet don’t hang over. All it’s missing is a black cat joining us.