Internet Makes it Up Stairs to The Bonapartment

...And boy, was he huffin' and puffin'. The pair of installation techs were hating life when they had to make multiple trips back down the stairs to their supply wagon, (and where this was parked, I have no idea, but I figured they parked illegally in the street, as empowered by Noos and the Republic of France).

Dear Wife and ONE of the Noos Technicians. It took a little bit to get everything working. I had to switch my computer to French. That's always a panicky operation, ("If I can't read the commands and instructions, what if I hit the wrong button and do something disasterous and irrevocable--like make the computer permanently run in French?"). Unnerving that the junior technician assigned to my machine seemed to have no idea how to configure a Mac. I watched him dither and fiddle from over his shoulder, and I kept saying, "Let's just wait...nous attends...for votre ami." He just kept fiddling and dithering. Finally his partner came over and straightened things out.

And so we have l'Internet again.

First let me thank those who have commented, and those who have written. The messages I have received via the blogger interface come from seemingly unlisted emails, and I have yet to figure out a way to track down the addresses for those I don't know. I will respond. I want to, but this may take a little bit. So thank you for your patience.

Also, we have been offline for the last few days. There's lots of material I've been working on for you, but I haven't gotten it up yet. Some of this stuff will be back-filled, meaning I am going to put up posts for days that have already passed. This may seem like cheating to some, but I'm going to bend the rules of blogging, (of which I have only a hack understanding anyway), and ignore the writing-in-continuity, "put it down the day it happened and never go back" blogger's code. My purpose here is to create an account of living over here--if it takes a few days or a week (or more) to properly commemorate certain events and thoughts, so be it. I hope you'll understand, and be willing to spin through the current page to make sure you haven't missed a new, possibly essential post. When everything gets caught up, I will let everyone know. There is just too much interesting stuff going on over here, and as it is I have been neglecting other work so I can commit some of it to "blog," if not to actual paper.

Actually, my working method has been to keep a diary of every days' events, written out in long-hand, and then condense these notes into an entry or two. This takes longer, but seems to work best for me.

And I will not neglect the requests for more drawings--I'd like to have much more, but I've been spending all my time writing!

Lastly, we have our first visitors in town, and and I won't be able to write as I like for the next week or so. In this time, we will be out of town (a trip to London to see The Mountain Goats!), and I have no idea if I'll be able to post--or if I'll even take my computer.

Look forward to some exciting reports about our first visitors, and what we saw in England, a place I've never been.

FUNNY ANECDOTE: Dear Wife and I were walking up Rue Monsiuer le Prince, coming home from a Le Luxemburg lunch, (the Mc Donald's is closed for remodel!), and on our way to the boulangerie Pain au Prince, where they are responsible for the best chocolate moelleaux in Paris. A very chic older lady appeared walking beside us. Her lower legs were wrapped tight in knee-high black leather boots, and she was sassy-stepping with a jaunty hip movement, a look of total self-possesion on her slightly stretched face. As we looked at her, she unexpectedly asked us if we knew where the Cremerie Polidor was located. Dear Wife and I stopped, debated this a second, unsure: it sounded familiar, but we'd never been. We continued debating, and Dear Wife became certain it was ahead of us, I figured she was right, and together we all walked a block up the street to the eatery Polidor, just where brilliant Dear Wife thought it was. I believe this place had been recommended in some New York Times article as a very authentic locals-only type bistro. The lady was restrained in her thanks--kind of dismissive, really, considering the way we walked her to her destination (they don't even do that at Home Depot anymore); but she must have been under the impression she was among locals, and decided to ask one last thing of us: was there anyplace in this neighborhood we'd recommend seeing?

We looked at each other: "Uh...." Dear Wife and I were suddenly bewildered, not a single good suggestion between us. "Uh, uh..." we stalled. We really didn't have anything. For us, just walking down the street in our little hipster shi-shi (chi-chi?) neighborhood was fascinating and life-affirming. What else could we really recommend?

"The Cluny?" we finally offered, half-heartedly suggesting this local Middle Age museum which we'd never even visited.

Uh hmm, she sniffed, already looking past us and moving away without a word of thanks or goodbye.

Clearly, we'd failed this test.

Humbled, we walked home racking our brains for some better response, in case anyone is ever silly enough to ask us again for advice on a local attraction worth visiting.

Still no dice.