Monday, January 16, 2006

Le Retour de l'Indigène

I'm back! The trip was great, I tried to squeeze in everything I possibly could. It started off inauspiciously. I was delayed at the airport because of weather in Philadelphia. (I completed an entire [secret] knitting project while we were sitting on the runway waiting to take off. The other passengers were suitably impressed.) Then, after take off for Paris I started smelling something really bad -- I wondered if the plane was on fire. But no, it didn't smell like something burning. But WHAT, I thought, are they going to serve for dinner? It really smells like stinky feet! Stinky feet? Wait a minute... Sure enough, the guy across the aisle had taken off his shoes. It was REALLY bad. Eventually, the air recycling system kicked in, but still I'd get a whiff of it every now and then during the trip. I didn't get to sleep hardly at all. Every time I'd drift off for a few minutes the guy behind me (who was travelling with Mr. Stinky Feet) would kick my seat. So I arrived in Paris all bleary-eyed and bumbled my way through customs. Really. I followed some people who I thought knew where they were going, and they led me right out of the security area. Without my baggage. (But Dave was there.) I had to go back and explain to the nice French policeman that I needed to get my suitcase. I could just tell from his expression he was thinking "Stupid American!" But I managed to escape from the airport and we made it back to Paris. We decided to spend the day shopping. I of course wanted to go buy yarn. So I looked up the address of the La Droguerie and we consulted several maps and then took La Metropolitan. We walked out of the station and there was La Rue du Jour right there! And La Droguerie! It was like a sign! There was a sign alright:
For those of you who don't read French, it says " La Droguerie will be closed for inventory from Monday January 9th thru Friday the 13th. Reopen Saturday the 14th at 10:30." Can you believe my luck? So Dave and I walked down the street looking for another yarn shop I had read about. We walked for about an hour and a half but never found it. We did find something else though.
So you don't feel too bad for me, it was about here that the day started getting better. We visited Notre Dame (it was like a stone's throw from the hotel)
had a nice lunch and then went to see a concert by Evan Christopher and Tom McDermott at Le Chatelet. Dave had met Evan at a jazz club the night before and he graciously invited us. The jet lag was definately catching up with me, so I was not at my sparkling best. The concert was fabulous, though, definately the highlight of the trip. Afterwards we had dinner and then I collapsed in bed.

Sooo, did I get to shop at La Droguerie? What else did we do? Tune in tomorrow to find out more.

1 comment:

Donna said...

I'm tuning in I'm tuning in! Sorry I am just excited to hear about your trip as I have never left the USA cept to drop in to Cananda in Niagra Falls.