What a rollickin’ First Friday! Oh the joy of meeting up with old pals, meeting new pals, and sharing Squid with new readers! RJ brought his awesome rice pudding… Mr. Riley brought some Laughing Cow… and Judy made her incredible Absinthe Cake. Deeee-lish. It was a fun night of food and conversation… Pam from La [...]

Getting our luggage down the stairs was much easier than getting them up! It’s amazing that we schlepped all this stuff around Europe by cab, train, subway, plane, and car. What was in’em? Art supplies, gifts, books, bottles of Pastis, absinthe and various other alcohol, pamphlets and maps and stuff… oh, and some clothes. Even [...]

A thunderstorm just swept through here. I watched as dark and gloomy clouds surrounded Sacre-Couer and streams of rain descended upon it. And just as quickly as it came in, it swept out again, dotting our apartment’s windows with just a little wet. It’s hard to believe that today is our last day in Paris. [...]

Okay… I have had a couple of glasses of French Wine (Cote du Rhone, 2008) … so if there are some errors in this blog post, you will excuse me…. (hiccup!) Also… I have a feeling that I am just going to ramble a bit. My apologies. Wine is sooo cheap here! Geez… and it’s [...]

I love the way Parisians live. I love the city… I love the cafes… I love the scooters… I love the bicycles. Did you know that you can rent a bicycle just about anywhere in the city? Velib. There are these bike kiosks all over the city and once you give the little machine your [...]

I look for the funny in everything… and on this trip I have found some things that have amused me… I have photo-documented some and written down others. I will share. In the south of France, Pastis, the anise alcool that is made locally,  is practically a way of life. In the afternoon, when the [...]

Today was our last day in Aix en Provence. I am a bit sad to leave as I have enjoyed the city muchly. But Paris awaits us. As it was la jour finale, there were a few things I wanted to accomplish before leaving. One: Eat pizza provencal. Peter Mayle mentioned the pizza pie in [...]

This day, thursday, one day after Bastille Day, was an adventure. To start off, my people and I walked down to Hertz Rental Car on Rue Victor Hugo to try to retrieve a lost item. The day before Bastille Day, we rented a car (a Chevy, if you can believe that!) and went to see [...]