Teeth!

Zoe's second tooth came out today and thankfully did not end up getting ingested.  In France, it is a mouse, rather than a fairy that exchanges cash for teeth, but since Zoe is a bicultural girl, she managed to get visited by both the tooth fairy *and* the French mouse.  Happily there were no turf wars or other unpleasantness over the tooth and the tooth fairy and mouse came to an agreement on the distribution of teeth.

Poo

For the poo-averse (i.e. non parents), stop reading here.  Zoe's teeth have been getting loose, and we have all been excitedly waiting for the first of her baby teeth to fall out.  She of course already knows about the tooth fairy and indeed has already mentally spent the cash that she knows will show up.  Unfortunately, the loose tooth fell out while she was eating at some unknown time a day ago.  It was therefore with extreme disgust, but a strong sense of paternal duty that I instructed Zoe to poo into the baby toilet instead of the normal toilet and then got to work.  Twenty minutes later, after a process that I can only describe as like panning for gold, only with a slurry of poo instead of water and a tooth instead of gold, I was left with profound sense of failure, watering eyes, and no tooth.

Catching up

It's been a tumultuous few weeks, to put it mildly.  I have another week of business, and then I will hopefully be able to start catching up, and post some stuff retroactively.  In the interest of not getting too backed up, I think I will just start posting as usual and then fill in the past few weeks little by little.  The big news is that my dad died on the 13th of May.  I had flown in the previous night and so I was able to see him before he passed away.  We had a memorial service for him shortly afterwards.  He has been in my thoughts every day, but I have luckily been incredibly busy, so it has taken my mind off of things a bit.  I miss him a lot.

A big ride

I did a big ride yesterday with some expats and locals, organized by Russell, the guy behind www.grenoblecycling.com.  It was some of the most beautiful and empty countryside I have ridden in.  It always amazes me how sparsely populated some of these areas are despite being a short drive from Grenoble.  We spent most of the time in the Trieves, winding through small roads and a few familiar places like Mens.  The English guys would sprint for almost every town sign, with me usually getting dropped, but I got a few of them at the top of climbs (after the strong climber herd had been thinned a bit!).  There were options for 100, 130 and 150 km (a bit over 90 miles) and it took a lot of motivation to keep choosing the harder option, particularly because my legs felt like lead weights after around 90km.  The last half was pretty intense, with a group of three of us alternatively running out of gas and then getting some new power and contesting town lines.

Along the way, they had feed zones, where the organizers had set up stands with water, juice, oranges, cakes, bread, and of course wine.  They seemed very surprised to see so many English guys, and even more surprised to see an American!  At each feed zone, you get a stamp (above) on your card.

It started raining pretty hard in the last 10 or so km, so we were totally soaked by the end, but the mild discomfort of the rain was eclipsed by the leg cramps.

All told, a great day in a beautiful area.  150km and 3000 meters of gain.  Best of all, no debilitating knee pain, like my last big ride.

trailer

Here in Grenoble, trimming trees apparently involves shutting down roads completeley for almost a week.  Of course the road in question is the way we drop off and pick up the kids!  The alternative is the main road, which is a mess of construction and traffic lights every 10 meters.  So today I decided to pick up the kids in the bike trailer.  It's not far, but there is a little hill in between our place and the nounou, which it turns out is pretty damn difficult to ride up with a trailer and two kids.  I did get some "A-llez papa!" chants though, which helped

Dinner

at le Fantin LaTour:  a beautiful place with pretty good food.

Bike ride

Knives

Having sharp knives was always a matter of pride for Kenji, and later on myself.  Kenji's favorite test was to slice a sheet of newspaper of paper towel in half with one of his newly sharpened blades.  As he got older, he had less inclination to go through the rigourous three stone sharpening that he always used to, and it made me happy to tsk disapprovingly at his dull knives and then sharpen them all for him.  The knife sharpness thing, despite causing a few accidents in the kitchen was something that we shared, and I was  happy to see the appreciation in his eyes when I showed him his yanagi (and occasionally deba) knives brought back to a mirror polish.  After coming home, I was dicing an onion for risotto when I noticed that my knives were in a  deplorable state: bruising the onion instead of slicing through it.  I stopped what I was doing, soaked all my stones and got to work sharpening.  I used the technique that Kenji had taught me many years ago, and a few new tricks that I had learned myself.  It was a bittersweet mix of happiness at the memory of our shared obsession and sadness.

No training wheels!

Zoe is riding without training wheels!

Lunch with mom

A ride with Hank

Email dispatched to Hank to see if he wants to ride. He's taking some people around town, but game. I hop on the bike to meet him at the cemetery across town. He pulls up, smile on his face as usual and it's like we just rode yesterday (even though it was a month and a half ago). Car parked, onto the bike path and its up one of Hank's usual roads, and it is fantastic. Perfect pavement, reasonable grades for once, and wonderful views for the upper section. Halfway up I can't help stopping to take a photo. Hank continues on and I send my heart into the red sprinting to get back to him. I think it's my favorite among the several ways that I have ridden to get into the Belledonne plateau. From there, easy rolling until Hank casually suggests that it's time for "the wall" with a smirk. "How long"? I ask, looking at the wall winding up into the hills above. "Long enough". And it was indeed long enough, with some pretty steep sections throughout. Next, descending time, during which Hank almost collides with a dude who is on the wrong side of the road (in the video), then more descending followed by a brutally steep short uphill section and then another sweet downhill.

Peuil, 4 Seigneurs

more crazy weather

I did a short ride which felt *terrible* possibly because of all the added weight.  Pretty though

Florence, day 3

I really wanted to ride in the morning, but my hopes were dashed by heavy rain, as forecasted.  As the day unfolded, we would see bright summer sunshine, thunderstorms and clouds.  Crazy weather, in short.

We started by heading back to the Boboli gardens *again* in the rain.  We stopped along the way at a map store and bought a beautiful engraving of a lamprey and an unusual but stunning map of Bilbao.  We even did the bargaining in French!   I really love the pedestrian areas that are slightly away from the major sites.  There are so many art supply stores in Florence -- you really get a sense that it is still very much dominated by fine art.  In other words, fine art has not been relegated to the History of the city.

After a lot of kid carrying, who were by now even more tired than before, we arrived at the Pitti palace/Boboli gardens to find… another line!  Yay.  By the time we got our tickets, the rain had stopped.  It was a very, very dirty rain apparently and I noticed brown spots all over the hoods of the kids' jackets where it had dried out.

The Boboli gardens were impressive.

Then it was back to Vini e Vecchi Sapori, where more incredible food was consumed.  One big difference was that he offered us the zucchini saffron pasta which was not on the menu!  We also had an arugula salad with parmesan and raw artichoke.  Having never had raw artichoke before, I did not know what to expect, but it has a delightful snap and flavor.  I'll definitely be trying to re-create that one

There was also more caprese salad

More risotto, this time with truffle oil

The Most Perfect Pasta Ever, i.e. saffron and zucchini flower pasta

potato and butter ravioli with sage

Tiramisu before

and after

and a little wine of course.  By this time it was a beautiful sunny day outside and I was lightheaded from all the food (and possibly the wine), but it felt like I was in a movie.  The young manager (I think his name is Thomasso) was singing along to Imagine as he ran back and forth between the tables, the sunlight was streaming in, the kids were … not as loud as usual.  It felt pretty good.

Next, the long walk back to the hotel with kids on shoulders, then packing of the car, then seven and a half hours of driving to get home.  Some of the Rube Golberg autoroute had caught fire, so we had to reroute.  We got in around 10 PM after leaving before three.  When Zoe saw our exit she started chanting "We love Ben-to, and not the car!  We love Ben-to and not the car!".   Indeed.

Florence, day two

A new day, rife with possibilities for us to get fat!  But first, I went for an early morning ride.  I left at 6:30 and rode around the hills just west of the city.  The previous evening I did a little recon to avoid getting totally lost (and did in fact get a bit lost) and it all went pretty well.  The cobbles beat the hell out of me, but it felt glorious anyway bumping along the ancient streets on my bike.

I don't know why, but there is something magical about riding in Italy.  I think it has something to do with how passionate the Italians are about the sport and the bicycle.  As I was turning the cranks up a steep section of climbing through olive groves and huge sprawling villas, it brought back memories of evening rides through wheat fields in the Loire valley.  It was a lovely way to start the day

After having an excellent breakfast we walked to the Duomo where we were confronted with the first of several mega lines.  Even without kids, once lines get to a certain length I just give up.  Note to self:  April is too late to visit Florence!  Next time we will go back in winter again.

We continued on toward the Old Bridge:

Chloe wanted to buy me some big braided gold chains, but I demurred.  Instead, I wanted some of those David boxer shorts but Chloe mouthed the word "Noooooo".

Next: to Boboli gardens, which were unfortunately closed.  Chloe and I, having carried the kids a lot of the way there were nearly in tears.  At least we got this picture

Chloe and I noticed how easy it would be to climb up the walls, but I resisted the temptation in favor of not spending the night in jail again (just kidding mom!)

And then went to get espressos and gelato

By the time we were done, it was lunch time.  We found a small place with a river view which was fine.  I don't even remember the name

We then wandered around the pedestrian area 

until we got to the Duomo museum

which was pretty nice.  It was interesting to see all the models for proposed façades for the Duomo.

We went into the Duomo itself, the basement mini museum and the Baptistry.  I love the gruesome depiction of the devil tearing up and eating little bad dudes.

By this time, the kids were almost dead, so we went back to the room to prepare for the main event:  dinner at Vini e Vecchi Sapori.  

It's always a good sign when the salad mis-en-place looks like this

We started with local ham (hand cut a few seconds earlier by the grandpa) with mozzarella

And then we continued through a dizzying array of food so amazing that I forgot to take pictures of a lot of it.  There were hand made ravioli with potato, butter and sage.  A caprese salad, an absolutely unbelievable frittata with artichoke hearts, and finally a superlative asparagus risotto.  

The risotto itself was of course perfectly cooked -- no mushiness and a slight hardness in the center.  The small tender slivers of asparagus were magically firm and flavorful, and there was a small amount of Taleggio mixed in.  We also ordered a Tagliatelle with meat sauce for the kids.  Dessert was the same wonderful raspberry tiramisu as last time, which is to say probably the best tiramisu we have eaten (and we somehow end up eating a lot of tiramisu).  I received some pretty dirty looks from Zoe for taking a few spoonfuls of hers.  Also, there was a meringue ice cream cake

We also went through a healthy amount of Chianti.  It might have been the wine talking but Chloe and I agreed that there is pretty much no where else in the world at which we would rather eat except perhaps sushi at the tokyo fish market.   The price for all of this, including wine?  87 euros.  Anyway, the meal was so good that despite our plans to leave early tomorrow, I asked for reservations for lunch the following day.

Grenoble to Florence

We drove to Florence today.  There's no getting around the fact that it is an expensive slog.  At least the section through the Maurienne is beautiful and I scan daydream about riding the high cols.  The section after the tunnel is a maddening section of pay booths every 10km or so with inexplicably different fees to pay.  The road from the foothills down to Genoa is just tedious and awful.  The causeways and viaducts around Genoa however are kind of amazing, if a bit bewildering.  I really felt like I was in a Rube Goldberg machine a few times.  We passed Carrera and the amazing never ending fields of tree farms before eventually reaching the city outskirts.  There, the Tomtom GPS happily delivered us to a nondescript alley which was supposed to house the parking garage.  Of course, there was no parking garage -- it was actually several blocks away and on the other side of an impassable avenue.  I guess I shouldn't be surprised by that kind of thing anymore.

After five more minutes of exciting Florentine traffic, we made it to the parking garage, unpacked the car and walked the stuff over to the hotel -- the Residenza il Villino.  The room was not as opulent as Villa Antea, but the location was much better.  And when you have two kids that are not particularly willing to walk, that is an important consideration.  The owner/operator was very nice and showed us around,  Zoe impressed us both by instant memorizing the electronic keypad combination and would let us in ever time we came in and out of the hotel.

First order of business: Gelato

At Rivareno.  "Service with a sneer" is the motto here, but damn is that some amazing gelato.  Especially the nocciola.

We wandered around for a while and then went back to the hotel before going to our first dinner reservation at Acquacottam just down the road.  The first problem was that between the time we sat down and when we received our appetizers, one and a quarter hours passed by.  Meanwhile people were served out of order and the general demeanor of the patrons started to border on rebellion.  The kids were of course going completely nuts, as expected.  The food itself was fine, but not what I would call wonderful.  I really don't understand how it gets so highly reviewed.  Perhaps it's another case of people who are unused to how good Italian food *can* be pumping up the ratings for a decent but unexceptional restaurant.  Chloe and I were disappointed not just because it was such a let down, but because we worried that perhaps our stellar memories of the food of Vini e Vechhi Sapori had just grown with time, and that it would also be a let down.