Birthday on the Orient Express

Yesterday was my birthday, and also the day that I had to say goodbye to Katie and Jen and head back to the (other) good life in Paris.

We had quite the train adventure getting from Cesky Krumlov, although most of the excitement was contained on the first train which not only had a broken horn, that blew for the entire two hour trip, but stopped for no apparent reason in the middle of nowhere, and we couldn't get the doors open. Luckily the Czechs are good at fixing broken trains, and about holding trains for you when you're late making your connections, and we arrived in Linz with enough time for Katie and Jen to catch their last train on to Salzburg, and for me to be thoroughly bored for six hours before hopping on my overnight Orient Express train home. No real excitement on the overnight train, aside from its name and the fact that I got free breakfast.

I rolled safely into Gare de l'Est at 10:30 this morning, and Erik was waiting for me, and as always, I was happy to be home. We spent the morning doing some of my favorite Parisian things like shopping at the organic market (which we should do more often), eating crepes and gelato and having lunch at the Marquise. Now Erik's making gigot d'agneau, and we're trying to decide how to best take advantage of the fantastic weather that we have.

That's all I've got for today. There's so much to say about my trip, and lots of photos to organize, so stay tuned...

Birthday Boules Bonanza

On Saturday we celebrated Erik's birthday. On the agenda was a rousing game of petanque followed by some beer and poutine at the Quebec bar.

Unfortunately the weather didn't cooperate, and turned our boules court into a muddy mess. Plan B of heading directly to the Quebec bar was foiled by the fact that the Quebec bar wasn't open yet. Luckily we there was an Irish bar willing to take us in, where we warmed up before moving on to the home favorite. It did eventually stop raining, but by the time it had the parks were all closed. So we set up shop in a square and threw the balls into a fenced off treed area. A good time was had by all, and I'm sad to say that I think the French team won. But who's really keeping score?


At the Irish bar



Some action shots


Collecting the boules




Alex (2) prepares some drinks


Erik enjoys some Pastis, a traditional southern French drink




The 'French' team


The 'Canadian' team

The Johnspiel, en francais

La Première Championnat du Monde
Pétanque - (Division Ultra-Amateur, Intersexe**)

France vs Canada*

(*Pour simplification, toutes les pays qui ne sont pas le France vont etre classifié comme le Canada.
**Et, le gagnant du championnat pourra etre déterminé par des talents autres que le pétanque.)

Sur l'occasion de mon 31ième anniversaire, venez participer au première championnat du monde entre le France et le Canada. Toutes niveaux de competence sont bienvenue, particulièrement si vous savez les règles du jeu, car je ne les connais pas.
Aussi, si vous avez des boules, apportez-les SVP, on aura probablement qu'un ou deux groupes.

Endroit: Arènes de Lutèce , Rue de Navarre et 49, rue Monge
Métro : Place Monge, Jussieu, Cardinal Lemoine
Heure: Samedi, le 31 Mars, 16h00 (4 pm pour les anglo-saxons)

Note: En cas de temps désobligéant, un championnat alternatif sera tenu au bar Quebecois:
L'envol, Rue de Lacepede, 5ième
Concours alternatif: Bière quebecois et poutine

Happy Birthday Alex!

On Saturday night we went out to celebrate Alex's birthday.


We had dinner at a new Thai place in our favorite neighbourhood in the 11th.


Then set off for mojitos (they were out of cilantro! Boo!)


Then we finished off the night at the scary bathroom bar (sorry, no photo). A good time was had by all, especially the birthday girl.