Odds and Ends
Odds and Ends
When I experienced my rites of passage trip around the western states with my trusty beagle snuffy, my parents gave me one of those 18” Gallo salamis. After 3 weeks or so, they asked how much was left and I said 3 inches, and they said it’s time to come home. They knew that I would eat the salami when my money gave out. For the last week we have seen a bike locked up to a street lamp. Each day, another part of it is missing or broken. Yesterday when we turned the busy corner we noticed that someone had cut the main tubes leaving only the handlebars and the front wheel. Is it time to go?
Paris cannot be planned, organized, and controlled. It’s like an old dragon who quivers, snorts, and lashes out unexpectedly. We’ve learned to always carry our cameras and go with the flow. Yesterday we were on the Metro and I suddenly realized that we could transfer and catch a different line to save us some time. We hopped out, just missing the swishing doors. On the next line, a curtain was hung up between two poles. Suddenly music started, and a muppet show began. The muppet’s in Paris! I am positive that even the blank “Metro stare” of the Parisians was replaced with a smile!
In the Marais, we have heard someone singing opera from our little park. Considering the streets, including sidewalks, are only 20 feet wide and laid out in a curved drunken grid system, we could never pin down the location of the singer. On a trip down a red, yellow, and rust, cobbled alley, a young man on a foot-powered scooter came down the passage singing a sweet portion of “La Boheme”.
Beneath the streets on the tiled subway passages we have encountered a group of 10 Ukranian gypsy musicians and singers, belting out robust, foot stomping tunes. We’ve run into cellists, violinists, classical guitarists, constant accordions, and a Peruvian flute duo playing the theme from the Titanic, hauntingly as our metro leaves the station and disappears into some unknown tunnel.
Have you ever felt that emptiness that occurs when you’ve done something really dumb? First there is disbelief. It can’t be! Then you search for who’s at fault, anyone but “moi”. Then you come up with some crazy scheme to make things right. This week we have been aware that many of the travel guides of Paris we have belong to Kimball and Marilyn who will use them after we leave. Just the other day I said: “We gotta make sure we don’t lose the 20 trips outside Paris or the Rick Steve’s Paris Guide.” So, when we went in search of the hours of the Louvre in the Rick Steve’s Paris Guide, we couldn’t find the book! We looked and looked. Here’s Bob’s thinking after mentally blaming Gayle for this disaster, “O.K., we have a copy of the book at home in Sequim. We’ll call Bruce and have him walk around our house describing what he sees. When he sees the book, we’ll have him give it to Pat and Marty, who will take it to England and bring it on the Eurostar and will give it to Kimball and Marilyn in St Remy.
Gayle being a bit more practical, in addition to being somewhat French-speaking, called the Marmottan museum and they had the book. The lady ended the conversation by saying “you come?” We certainly did, and we encountered the best croissant of the trip, an obligatory accordion player, a puppet show, and Bob with his “chapeau bleu”, by request, took pictures of an Asian tour outside the museum and immediately after that, a German family, while Gayle acquired our guidebook from the friendly museum staff members.
Picture Set
Picture Set
posted by Bob and Gayle @ 4:58 PM
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