FONDUE!
This morning I woke up ridiculously early as usual (jet lag is KILLING me this time) and hung out in the jardin de ville, working on my iphone app. I also had a video chat with my friend Paul in Davis, which was fun. After getting my fill of free wifi, I headed to Enrique and Leslie's place, but managed to end up in the wrong building. Lolo had given me the building access code the previous evening, which I punched into the keypad. I heard the buzz of the door lock clicking open and walked into a dark corridor. I wasn't sure if I had copied the number down correctly last night, so I was relieved to be spared the embarrassment of yelling up at the window to try to get Enrique's attention. As I walked through the hall, I noticed that the building was in a pretty appalling state. Huge curls of paint were peeling off of the walls, and -- horror of horrors -- the nameplates on doors were written on paper! Shocking! Anyway, I didn't see the name that lolo had given me on any of the doors, and I was beginning to think that something was very wrong indeed. As I left the building, I noticed a plaque commemorating the fact that Stendhal had lived there. I'm sure he would be disappointed. Anyway, it turned out that Enrique +family were in the next building over which curiously had an identical door code. Their building and apartment were a lot nicer. After a tour of the apartment, I showed them the local amenities: market at places aux herbes (special care taken to point out the pouletmobile), Arthaud, K-store, Dalbe, Talemelerie (sp? I never get that one right), and finally, Les Alpages. In my absence, the cheese man has apparently won some kind of major fromagier honor, and so has his lieutenant (take a look at their website and video). They also have a sous vide machine, so I ordered almost a kilogram of comte de montagne and some tomme crayeuse as well. The Lt even recognized me, which was heartwarming. I love that place.
We made one last stop at the children's clothing store, where I couldn't resist buying another outfit for ZZN and then had lunch along the tramway.
After lunch, we headed back to Enrique and Leslie's place and had some cheese and wine, and then it was time for me to head over to the EMBL. I did make a stop at Etam to get Chloe a few things and then I hopped on the 34 bus.
After a little kerfuffle at the guard gate because I had lost my badge (edit: it turned up in my back pocket a week later), I hung out in the newly refurbished EMBL library. A view of the Chartreuse is a pretty sweet environment to be working on an iphone app! A bit later I met up with Franck, headed to St. Egreve to pick up his son Artur, and then on to his house at the foot of the Neron. I've mentioned it before, but Franck is extremely fortunate to live in a beautiful stone house which shares a large grass field with several other people. It's an amazing piece of wilderness ten minutes from the synchrotron. This time he showed me a few of the trails that lead up to a spring and I got to try out his VX125.
Even before I arrived, Franck had promised me a fondue, but he didn't tell me that it was going to be a very special one made of amazing cheese from the Laiterie Bayard. I did my best, but was not able to help Franck finish the fondue. I think I did ok for a ricain, though. As usual, there was an incredible bottle of wine involved. I had previously not been a big fan of white wines, but this one has changed my mind forever. It was a burgundy (I think it was a "St. Aubin"), and not only was it delicious, but it was a perfect complement to the fondue. Dessert was an entire cake made of ice cream from the green arch ice cream place near the jardin de ville. All the flavors were good, but the cassis in particular was out of this world. Thanks, Franck!!
