Again, I realize that most people will find this extremely boring, but you have to understand how beautiful this armoire is! The best way to appreciate it is by checking out the pictures (I guess I'm now officially the guy who shows you the bad vacation photos, but what the hell)
without the cornice or doors or shelves:
and some other views:
The antique dealer called on tuesday morning to cancel because of the rain, and since then, I've been more than a little nervous that we were getting ripped off. After all, we had already written a check for half of the money and it had been promptly deposited. I guess I need to have more confidence in my fellow man (and woman), because it was delivered promptly this morning, as promised! I actually had a dream last night that the antique dealer showed up with a faux wood armoire and tried to pass it off as the one that we had bought. When confronted, he admitted that it wasnt the same one, but would we like it for 100 euro?! I know, I need to lighten up a little.
Anyway, two very tired looking guys knocked on our door at 8:15, having carried the damn thing up all the stairs. It made my complaining about carrying a table and wine up seem a little ridiculous. They scooted it in, sliding it under the door with about 2 cm to spare, then brought up the doors, shelves and cornice. Theres nothing else to say really, except that its magnificent. I'll post pictures when I get back from work.
I have had several childhood experiences which I think steered me unconsciously towards living in France. The first was living in Paris for several months in the late seventies during my fathers sabbatical. Although I can't boast the same kind of memory that Nabokov had, I'm certain that at the very least, the croissants, gateaux and pain au chocolat made an indelible imprint on my brain: A bookmark to come back to. There were other bookmarks: the kids who would knock down my sand castles and bury my toys, the vast playground of the UN school that I went to (Somewhat tellingly, I have no memory whatsoever of the inside of the classrooms), the many flights of stairs that we had to climb to get to the apartment and the bright studio in which I would happily paint and draw. As a rule, these memories are hazy and dark, but together they form a content, if a bit confused whole.
Later on, I went to a middle school that had a bit of an identity crisis. Sometimes it was the caring liberal berkeley hippy school with the second grade Poetry class. Other times it was the hyper competitive give-gold-stars-for-memorizing-your-multiplication-tables school. Amd occasionally it was the math-is-grooovey kind of place. As you moved up through the "Levels" (not "Grades"! bite your tongue!) things started getting a little more serious, and I think that the school felt the obligation to at least appear stuffy and focused, even if their approach was to simply hire more teachers with posh english accents. Another thing that started happening around fifth grade,(not sure about this, but it was pretty early) was French classes. We had a troop of French teachers: about one per year, and they ranged the gamut from dour and matronly (Marie) to borderline french prostitute(Crystale). Our classes consisted largely of "Dictation" and memorizing vocabularly, and were remarkable in their lack of effectiveness. Occasionally we would watch the odd Truffaut film. And while I don't remember very much about these classes, other than my friend Andrej Krikovic and I carefully stuffing his yugoslavian fish fillets (never pack fish in your childrens lunch) down through the heating vents, I do remember one moment from one of these movies. The moment, which is actually quite famous, comes from "Small Change" and is when young Gregory falls (or jumps? I dont remember) out of a building, walks away unscathed and exclaims "Gregory go Boum!". For a long time, I actually thought that this movie was called "Gregory go Boum", and it wasnt until reading Paris to the Moon that I found the real title.
and the fish fillets? Well, later that fall when the heating was finally turned on, a putrid fish reek began permeating the building. Andrej and I kept a low profile; we both knew that the heating grate re-filleted fish was sitting in a pile in a bend in the heating duct nearest to the window. Things probably would have gotten worse and worse, if not for the fact that the French classroom was also the Math classroom. And while Crystale was perhaps not the most vigilant teacher, the Math teacher was an entirely different type of beast. Irving Lubliner. My fingers clench just typing his name. He was in retrospect a fantastic teacher, but he was also a fearsome disciplinarian. And, while other teachers might have been satisfied to just deal with the smell, Irving tracked it down like a bloodhound. I'll never forget the day that we were all upstairs in computer class, hunched over our PET computers when Irving burst in through the door. His arm was triumphantly raised, and dripping with the black sludge that had been Andrej's fish and various other less palatable things. "At first", he said, "I couldn't feel anything, but then I got down on the floor, and got my arm into the duct waaaay up to my shoulder, and look what I found". A little bit of sludge dripped onto the floor and I seem to remember a barely perceptable twitch in one of his eyes. It was nice, because earlier in the semester, our english teacher had taught us about "pregnant pauses" (by having the secretary call him a "stupid Irish git"), so we knew what was going on. We were all deadly quiet, and Andrej and I were thankful that no one besides my best friend Keith had seen us jamming the fish into the heating system, because they would have turned us over to Irving in a flash.
hmm. well a post about how I came to france has ended up being about fish sludge. Oh well.
also, no ceuse today b/c I couldnt sleep last night... bleh
Grenoble is fairly typical of French cities in its ridiculous number of cafes. Although by no means an afficionado, I am particular about my coffee, and despite expectations, not every café is created equal. Its a little frustrating actually, because you can walk into a beautiful marble floored café in the Hyper-centre of town, and get served the same nasty food service coffee that we get at work (ok, still 500 times better than the typical american coffee, which the French derisively call "Tisanes": herbal teas). But today, I think I made a breakthrough: go to the one without the home depot (Monsieur Bricolage is the French equivalent) plastic chairs out front. Using this highly scientific criteria, we found a cafe in Place de la Tribunale with the unlikely name of "Habanero" that makes great espresso:
mmmm. Tomorrow we go to Céüse for the first time in a long while. Yes, we're living a fairy tale climbers life.
I read Paris to the Moon before I came to France, but I started reading it again recently. Since I first read it, I've seen Gopnik's name in a lot of unexpected places. For example, although I like to visit New York, I have never really been interested in the myth and lore of it, and generally find New Yorkers (except you, mom!!!) too overbearing, and for that reason never felt compelled to read the New Yorker... That is, until recently, when my parents started sending me issues of it. And as most people who have lived abroad for long periods of time can tell you, gifts in your native language are some of the most precious gifts. As a result, I tore into these New Yorkers because were written in my own simple and melifluous English, but soon found to my surprise that I really liked them. This brings me back to Gopnik, who writes for the New Yorker, which was the first surprise. The second surprise came when I read a story by him about a football team that Kirk Varnedoe had coached. Kirk Varnedoe was (he died much too young last year) somewhat of a legend in art circles, and although I never met him, felt a connection to him because of a late spring day in 1994 at Williams College. It was on this day that he gave the best graduation speech I have ever heard. I've tried to find the text of it many times, but havent succeded. I just remember feeling inspired, and thankful that there was no talk of "reaching" or "climbing" or "pushing" or "aiming": just earnest advice, beautifully written, delivered in deadpan. And then I felt cheated because it wasn't MY graduation, but my girlfriends. I don't even remember who delivered my own graduation speech the next year. And now I return to Adam Gopnik, who it turns out was a protégé of Kirks. Kirk was also the godfather of Adams son, who plays a prominent role in Paris to the Moon.
Paris to the Moon is something I'll definitely come back to. Its wonderfully written, and my only complaint is that he's not very careful about equating Paris with France and Parisians with the French. Of course, its understood what hes talking about in the title, but I still find it a little vexing. My second complaint (ok, so there are two) is with the sneaky way in which literary theory pervades his essays. I get the uncomfortable feeling that I am being "educated" when I see Benjamin and Baudrillard used to discuss weather forecasting.
this is an account of a 2 day trip Chloe and I took to go canyoneering in grad school.
The pictures here are all digital, so you wont really get a sense of how beautiful it is. Hopefully I will upload some better photos (scans from medium format) soon.
We began what would prove to be an exciting day of hiking, car extrication and canyoneering by cramming our water bottle with ice from the hotel ice machine, reorganizing our dry bags in a somewhat logical manner (rope, harnesses, ATCs in one bag, food in the other). We set out in our chevy Cavalier south along 188 to the A+ road and after a wrong turn were soon making our way in the general direction of the Jug trailhead (according to my GPS). Unfortunately, we soon came upon tonto creek, which was fairly deep and looked impassable in our compact car. Chloe and I both got our water shoes on and waded out to the middle to confirm that we would probably fill the engine with water and have to be winched out if we tried crossing here.
An elderly fisherman (upper right) instructed us to get back on 188 and go north to the Bar X crossing, which we did. Much to our dismay, we found another river crossing:
We watched several old ladies in 4x4s ford the river without any difficulty, and the bottom didnt look exceptionally deep, so I took a deep breath, shifted into low gear and drove across it. We were more than a little relieved to make it to the other side without the engine cutting out. Invigorated by our success, I put the accelerator down and began practicing my rally car driving techniques with only the occasional protest from Chloe. However, our happy mood was soon thwarted by the appearance of another, still larger river to ford!
We stood staring at this one for a while, and then noticed that a lower clearance truck went to the right of the main crossing. He then drove around to us and informed us that it was much shallower where he crossed, so we reversed, shifted into L again, and drove through the water. Heres one of us midway through:
.
After taking a few seconds to mentally regroup, I resumed rally car driving mode, a little nonplussed by being behind schedule (but thankful that we were not stuck in a river). We followed the road for a while, noticing a dirt road leading due east, but passed it in favor of staying on the paved road. Soon the pavement snaked through a camping area, and then turned into a dirt road. The dirt road became a slightly worse pebbly road, which in turn became a cobbley nightmare that skirted the north tip of lake roosevelt. In fairly short order the front wheels got stuck, and after 30 minutes of cursing, hitting of the dashboard with fists, digging, getting hit in the head with rocks shot out by the spinning wheels and sulking, we started hiking out. The decision to hike out came when, during an attempt to dig out the wheels, a small scorpion crawled out of the hole we had just made.
Miraculously, my cell phone started working about 100 feet down the road, so I called Sprint PCS roadside assistance, who, after taking 5 minutes to take down all my information (you have a Gee Pee what?) asked me what state I was in. I hung up, called the hotel we had stayed at, and handed the phone to Chloe (who had been waylaid by the chatty innkeeper earlier that morning), who described where we were, and a tow truck arrived 30 minutes later. The truck pulled us out
and we were on our way again. It was 11:00. At this point I was in full rally car mode, doing big sweeping turns at high speed and catching air off of crests. I was determined to get us to the trailhead in enough time to do the Jug trail. The A cross road looked like a superhighway in comparison to the cobble filled road I had gotten us mired in, and I took full advantage of this fact. We reached the trail head, but the GPS coordinates I had for the trailhead were still about a mile away, so despite Chloes confused looks, we got back in the car and drove to the published waypoint which appeared to be a Saguero cactus (even with selective availability, thats not a very accurate position! My reading, with 16 foot accuracy is closer to lat=33.77124 long=="-111.1356"). At my urging, we drove a little further, but didnt see any trailheads, so we drove back to the one labelled "A cross trailhead" with a sign limiting the number of people and livestock to 15, made sure we had everything and had not gone over quota on the livestock, and started down the trail at a brisk pace at 12:00 noon. I looked nervously back at the car wondering if during our earlier misadventures, I hadn't whacked a hole in some key conduit which was now draining.
From this point on, we were either wading or swimming most of the time. At the eastern end there were a fair amount of cattails and reeds. After this point we slowly made our way down the canyon. I took some decent 6x4.5 transparancies but unfortunately dont have scans of them at the moment (hopefully I will in the next month or so), so here is the sole image I have, about halfway through:
Its incredibly beautiful, and we were completely alone the whole way down. In Europe, a
canyon like this would be mobbed; particularly on the weekend.
Finally, we arrived at the much talked about final (only!~) rappell. The anchor consists of several bolts with tattered webbing in between them (I didnt have a knife or I would have cut it off). We got our harnesses on and Chloe rapped off first.
I knew she was at the bottom by the shrieking (The water was quite cold at this point) that emanated from the canyon walls. "Bah" I thought. "It cant be that cold". I belayed the backpacks down into the water, which chloe retrieved, and then it was finally my turn to go. I was somewhat surprised to find that the water had an almost jacuzzi like warmth to it. Or wait, maybe I'm confusing "Jacuzzi like" with "Glacial runoff like".
We pulled the rope (30 meter rope which reached the water with ~5 meters total in the water.), quickly coiled it, and started the swim for the canyon exit. This last part of the jug was truly spectacular; it is the deepest part, with smooth pink granite walls reaching up almost into a roof. I think I would be able to appreciate it more if I had a wetsuit though. We finally emerged from the canyon and repacked. After dumping out most of our remaining water, I pulled the rope through my ATC to drain some of the water. When we got back to the car at 5:00 pm, and after a brief discussion, decided to try to take A cross south to Globe this time, in order to avoid fording Tonto creek again. I was delighted when the car started with a mild groan. We made it back to Phoenix by 7:30 and found the nearest gas station to the airport, where we refuelled and tried to clean up the by now battered and dirty rental car. In the gas station as we were surreptitiously using the window squeegees to scoop the dirt off the car, the cops rolled up to the corner and arrested a hooker. We were in the good part of town, apparently. At the very least, it provided some contrast with the Jug. A few hours earlier we were completeley alone in a cathedral of water carved pink granite, and now we were surrounded by thugs, cops and prostitutes with heat visibly radiating off the ubiquitous pavement.
Luckily, there was no attendant at the rental car drop off, so we checked in with the guys in
the airport, who thankfully did not go outside to look at their car.
This morning, on our bike ride to work, I was stopped at a crosswalk, waiting to cross. Cars were going by at the typical formula 1 speeds common in France, and I noticed a strange thing: there was a car in the bike lane across the street. This is not necessarily unusual, because he was using what Chloe and I call the "French Parking Pass": your hazard lights. Parked on the sidewalk in front of a fire hydrant? Fine as long as your hazards are on. Parked in the middle of the road blocking traffic? No problem with the blinkers on.
Anyway, when the little walking man turned green, I watched as this car CROSSED THE STREET BY DRIVING IN THE CROSSWALK. It then continued driving down the sidewalk and into the road, partially blocking the bike lane as it did this.
The strange thing about this is that it didnt seem that odd to me: I'm no longer
shocked by French driving! This brings up an interesting question, though: why are the french (they are certainly not alone in this) apparently completeley unencumbered by the laws of the road? I think the answer can be found in the motto of the French Republic: Liberté , égalité , fraternité . This motto is taken much more to heart than, for example "In God we Trust", and in most parts of French life its rather refreshing. When applied to driving, its a little less so:
Liberté to do whatever the hell you want: the road signs are just humble suggestions, which should not impeach on your liberté to drive in reverse at 100 kmph against traffic on a one way street to get into a parking spot. Égalité of right of way (when you dont have it): the road belongs to all of us, so even though the law states that the person in the roundabout has the right-of-way, égalité argues that we all have the right of way, and I am affirming that by lurching into the roundabout and cutting everyone off. Fraternité : ok this is where my theory fizzles; there is simply nothing approaching fraternité on French roads. But two out of three ain't bad.
No blog about life in france can be considered complete without a post on the driving, so thats out of the way.
Earlier in the week we saw signs for a "Brocante et Jambon" fair: Antiques and... Ham?! No of our friends really knew what this meant, but I thought it was probably some colorful french expression dating back several centuries. You know; back when hams were cured in armoires... that type of thing. It turned out that they were actually selling ham and antiques, and was a pretty big deal -- almost the same scale as Isle-sur-la-Sorgue.
Anyway, we passed through the normal market at La Halle (photo above and below)
and on to the Ham and Antiques fair:
And WELL WELL WELL! Look who we have here!
heres an enlargement:
The retiring crazy antique lady #2! Still very much in the game, I'd say. A few moments after I surreptitiously took this photo she produced a huge wad of cash, and started peeling off bills to pay for something or other.
We found some decent chairs which were not too old, but better than our shabby folding chairs: $40 euro for 3, so we werent really that motivated to find chairs. There were some nice brasserie chairs next door:
with cool designs on the seats, and very solid: 800 euro for 8. A few stalls down we saw these:
(the ones on the right). These were in Oak, quite solid, with newly redone seats, 5 for 300 euro. After some hemming and hawing, we bought them! It took two tram rides back and forth to get them home (we had the other three chairs as well), but they provided convenient seating at the tram stop:
although it was a little tight in the elevator:
The big big news for us was that we found an armoire that we both loved, and got a decent deal on it! Okay, I realize furniture purchases might not be exciting to everyone, but after spending so much time looking at them, its exciting to finally find one. They gave us a deal on the delivery too. Here it is:
Original metal hardware and lock, in Walnut with Ash panels in the front and the original Fir back. Mid 1800's from Bresse. WOOHOOOO! Delivery a week from now.
Also on todays menu: A Louis 15 (i think) armoire in oak from Bresse (i think) with the original metal hardware and a beautiful patina for 1900 euro:
which seems like a reasonable price. One pane from the front had been repaired, as had the cornice. This thing was MASSIVE.
We also went back to the store that has the coveted (but 2590 euro) armoire with the two crazy ladies. It felt a little like "Ground Hogs Day" walking in to the store, since neither of them remembered having shown us the armoire before. As a result, we were compelled to go through the whole simultalking thing again. Its not really as bad as it sounds, because they're both charming and hilarious. The mother was sitting in the same chair as last time, and insisted that we move the tables out in order to make room to view the armoire, thereby blocking herself in the midst of the antiques:
Heres some shots of the awesome armoire of expensiveness: louis15/16, all in walnut, yadda yadda yadda
And of their homme debout in merisier like our new table, which is also very beautiful , and a little less money (2300 euro):
The ladies were in high spirits today, and went into more detail about the origins of the name "homme debout", and how it comes from the fact that royalists used to hide in them when the republicans came to kill them. I think I missed something, because it doesnt seem like it would fool anyone, but maybe the republicans were in a hurry.
I was on the verge of laughter throughout our conversation, and at one point the older lady exclaimed "Oui! Je suis une GRAND MUZZERE!!", but I dont remember the context. Honestly, I was a little lost for most of it. Also, I find the whole simultalking thing a little stressful, since I dont want to seem like I'm being rude to one of them by not listening to them. When I took the picture of her, she started talking about how another american had taken her picture: when Grenoble was liberated! Apparently it was a funny picture, because she was next to another GI, who was very tall. She, by contrast was "TRES PETITE!" as she practically jumped up from her chair in the sea of antiques to show us. They questioned us about whether Americans support the war in Iraq, and why, and we had to explain that its because americans are very, very, stupid. On the way out, the mother told us how much she loved being in her daughters shop, and how she (her daughter) had such beautiful things, and how much it pleased her; it was very touching.
yeah thats right: busted. Today we went to that consignment place again, and who did we see when we walked in? Crazy antique lady #2, who supposedly was going into retirement (apparently a ploy to think that you can get her to let go of stuff for cheaper). After we passed her, I turned my head to chloe and mouthed "Did you see who that was?", but halfway through, I could see in her expression that she had seen the same thing. Crazy antique lady doesnt look very retired here:
here:
or here:
more like shes looking for more stuff to mark up 200%! At least we know we are in the right place. Todays gem:
I dont know if footstool is a pun in french too... I have to check that out
We sent off our absentee ballots today. We're not registered in a swing state, but its the principle of it.
Also I made a firm commitment to never buy Decathlon (quechua) branded gear ever again. Sure, I was willing to put up with our decathlon bikes that don't shift anymore. I was a little less happy that Chloes fancy Quechua carbon fibre trekking poles exploded after one use. This morning, however, my "waterproof" biking pants ended up being "not waterproof at all" and my ass has been wet all morning.
yes, we even took monday off! So we headed off early to get some climbing in at St Leger again, and did some nice climbs in sector Al Andaluze, and then I got another thrashing on Kiwasi. SERENITY NOW! On the way back to the Mas Solige, we stopped at another winery called Le Domaine Morand near le Mont Ventoux. This one was in the middle of the vineyards and olive groves, and the woman running it was very nice. We bought a few bottles here too. the funny thing is that you could buy AOC wine in bulk out of huge steel containers with wine-guns:
1.40 euro a litre!
We also stopped by a small town called Baumes-de-Venise, and bought some great olive oil with one of those cool curved dispenser tops (little things keep me happy).
After cramming the table back into the clio, we drove north through Orange to visit the woman who sold us the table in Mornas. She had some cool armoires:
The second one had a secret drawer that you access after removing a drawer, sliding a secret panel to the right, and sliding the bottom of the drawer towards you. Its kind of obvious that theres something there:
but cool nevertheless. The insignia at the bottom is a chestnut, and is apparently common in armoires from the Ardeche region.
By the time we made it home, we were completeley exhausted. After climbing for 4 or five hours and touring around, we were ready to fall asleep as soon as we walked in the door. Unfortunately, we had to keep circling the block because no parking was to be found. We finally found a space, and to our dismay discovered that the elevator was broken! Several refreshing trips later (up 7 flights of stairs), we collapsed. Although I didnt think it was possible, I discovered that an antique table and fifteen bottles of wine lose some of their charm after the fourth landing. Here are some pictures of our booty:
