Port d'Envaux

We drove (through the snow) to the commune of Portd'Envaux from Angoulême yesterday and are staying with our good friends Marco, and his son, Titi. Marco is involved with bike tours in France (mostly for cyclists from Norway and Sweden) - see more here. If ever you, Dear Reader, want a bike or hiking tour in France (even if you are not Norse) plan to contact Erik (Marco's boss and owner of Merlot in Oslo) - the hiking trips, which are a new addition to their catalog, look very appealing - there is a hike around Mont Blanc and another on the "The Way of Saint James" (Santiago de Compostela).

Tomorrow we plan to drive back to Paris - which we hear is under quite a bit of snow - as you can see from the photo.

ANGOULÊME

We've traveled to Angoulême (me for the first time) to visit our dear friend "Dr. Phil". The area is a leading industrial pole between Nantes and Bordeaux, they have a good focus on TPEs via their economic development organization.

Abd el-Keller

At Le Baron Rouge at 2pm for oysters and wine with Frank & Brenda, Larry & Carole ... for a rollicking good time until early evening. We then decamped and had a fine dinner at Le Café Moderne (19 rue Keller - famed for their "couscous franco-algérien") - you can appreciate their nice bar in the photo above. To appreciate their food (I had tajine d’agneau aux pruneaux - as did Frank) you'll just have to go there!

Fried Day

Off to a photo expo by one of the Commedia regular, Danièle Mottet. It is entitled "Lieux Communs et Autres Clichés ... du côté de la Porte de Vanves" at Association Florimont (5 et 9, place Marcel-Paul 75014 Paris - M° Pernety) from 7pm onwards.

Later tonight, from 8pm onwards, we are over to La Commedia for some great music with our friends: Alain, Cécile and Eric. See you there? More info on facebook. Also a link here to a short video of their closing song.

Oh, and "Fried" Day is my lame reference to a loooong week of celebrating friendships (current and truncated).

Hamlet

This afternoon we went up to the town of Pantin to see our dear friend Geneviève in a new play put on by La Compagnie de la Yole entitled "Hamlet, Affirmation" - Shakespeare with some added modern-day texts interleaved.The play was put on in a fascinating space that used to be a "laverie" that is now called Le Théâtre des Loges.The play runs through this Sunday so, if you are in town, drop on by.

Nice Day 7 -> Italy

We drove over from Nice to the Italian town of Bordighera where we had a delicious lunch on the beach-front Lido restaurant with the sun shinning in on us.

After a stop at a local fruit tree nursery (to pick up 5 saplings for Pierrefeu) we returned to Nice and a late-night DVD (The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind).

Nice - Day 6 - Pierrefeu

OK, this was just a spectacular day as we all drove up from Nice via the town of Gilette, seen in the old-time photo (where the Armistice Day celebration was underway as we had our cafés) to arrive at Pierrefeu, where our friends have a wonderful home perched on the mountainside. However, they prefer the village remain a secret, so I shan't tell you, Dear Reader, anymore. Other than to say the views are magnificent and the lunch we had was one of the most convivial and delicious I've had in a long time.

Nice - Day 5 - Monaco

Late morning we wandered around the market in Vieux Nice, had a light lunch at the charming Bar de la Dégustation and then met Max, an artist friend who divides his time between Paris and Nice, who took us for a driving tour - we finally ended up at Monaco/Monte Carlo (and its casino) before returning along the coast.

Nice - Day 4 - La Gaude

I woke up feeling not too bad after yesterday's grueling marathon ... I can actually walk, even though I am a bit sore and stiff. We took the train from Nice in the late morning to Saint Laurent du Var where Lulu picked us up, at the Magique Pub (Le Goff's sister is the owner), to drive up to La Gaude. We had a nice lunch at the terrace of L'Auberge du Marronnier with him and Bernard (our bearded, deep-voiced singer friend).

From the bistro one can look up towards the church tower shown in the photo above (Lulu lives right next door - so he gets the hourly chimes).

Nice - Day 3 - Marathon Day!

Here I am arriving at Cannes after running all along the coast from Nice (42 kilometers+) ... I look semi-alive here, but it was a tough marathon as I had bad cramps in my calves for more than half the run. Thank God for my friends (especially Lulu who ran with me a goodly distance).

Nice - Day 2

Another fine day in Nice with a trip to the open-air market down at Libération with Jean-Pierre. The air was as crisp as the apples you see in the photo at left. Jean-Pierre has his favorite vendors (especially for cheese and wine) - who are garrulous and also incredibly knowledgable about their products and providers.

On the menu: a light lunch, rest in the afternoon then a pasta, pasta, pasta dinner (not too late) to load up for tomorrow's running of the Nice-Cannes marathon.

By the way, I am bib number 11537. The gun goes off at 8am (yikes!) and I should be doing around 4h30m (or a tad more). You can follow me (in your mind) on the map of the route shown here. Will appreciate any and all postive energy you can send my way!

Nice 2009 - Day 1

Noonish and sitting at the sun-drenched dining room table at our friends' spacious home overlooking the bay of Nice (see the photo in yesterday's posting).

Later this afternoon we're going down into the old city (see photo above) to the Marathon Village to pick up my race bib (I'll give the number later). The weather is just spectacular and will hopefully hold for Sunday's run.

Nice 2009

We're taking the TGV down to Nice today (I've only been there once before - way back in 1976) for my running in Sunday's "Marathon des Alpes-Maritimes Nice-Cannes" (their website is here). During our week there we also plan to go to Aix-en-Provence and, perhaps, Pierrefeu. Gotta run pack now!

Jardin d'Arts

Our friend and neighbor, Eva, was one of a select group of artists on display in the gardens of the /th arrondissement town-hall.

Afterwards dinner at Mian Fan - our new "regular" restaurant for imaginative and delicious Asian Fusion.

Documentaries +

This afternoon I'm off to la Bourse de Commerce (photo on left) to attend the Read Digital event focused on e-books.

Then this early evening we'll meet at the Scam (La société civile des auteurs multimedia) to see "Gulliver a tout faux" - a series of documentaries.

Finally back to La Commedia to hear Dare-Dare (Alain Aithnard and Eric Joco) playing rock/pop tunes.

Danny le rouge ... le vert?

Paris 14ème :Grande Soirée Europe Ecologie Place Jacques Demy ( quartier de la mairie)

It's not quite everyday life here, but I needed to "park" this video somewhere.

"Immeubles en fête - la fête des voisins"

Twitter update

What do you mean that you are not following me on Twitter?!

Pauvre France

We're off to Dannemarie-les-Lys to see Odile's cousin in this "hoary chestnut" of a play.

"Un standard de la comédie de boulevard..." Dire que ce rôle est fait pour Bernard MENEZ n'est pas exagéré quand on connaît son jeu d'acteur.

Mais vous connaissez l'histoire : On sonne... C'est Victor le père de Michel qui débarque à l'improviste de Limoges pour lui annoncer que sa femme l'a quitté pour son propre frère! Mais une autre surprise l'attend : il ignore que son fils vit avec un homme. Victor va essayer par tous les moyens de lui faire entendre raison...