Mid Week Update

Since Maxine and D got back from Provence we've been busy with restaurants and sightseeing with D before she headed back to San Diego...

Saturday night we went to dinner at a restaurant called "Willi's Wine Bar. http://www.williswinebar.com/. It has been here for 26 years and is run by a British guy. The point is that the wait staff speaks English which simply makes it easier to order French food -- fewer surprises*. Along with good food and wine another unique thing about Willi's is that every year they issue a new poster advertising the restaurant (you can see them on the website). Willi's is a special place for me -- in the early 1980's I was living in New Jersey and saw their original poster and to this day it reminds me of Paris. Yes, the irony of a poster for a British-run restaurant reminding me of Paris... Over the years we've been to Willi's 6 or 7 times and have always been pleased with both the meal as well as (for Tom) the reminder of the link to New Jersey.

*Maxine ordered what sounded like 'goat' the other day and got 'cod' instead. No bad intentions on anyone's part. We just misunderstood the English pronounciation of the French waitress.

Sunday Maxine, D, and I went someplace differend, to "dinner at Jim's". Here's an article that describes the dinners: http://www.jim-haynes.com/press/articles/2006TripReport.htm. We'd read about these dinners, oddly enough, in the United Airlines flight magazine 10+ years ago and Maxine put the article into her "France" file (which is between the "Finland" and the "Germany" files -- she has good travel files!). When we were in Paris 8 years ago we went, cautiously at first. We really enjoyed it. What happens is that he organizes Sunday night dinners at his place, somewhere between 50 and 80 people, 'bulk' food (as opposed to individually ordered dinners), and the widest span of English language conversations and people you could imagine! Plus, Jim is really an interesting character as you can see from his website. At this past Sunday's dinner we talked to a 23 year old French structural engineering student, a retired guy from Philadelphia, an Alsatian-Parisian woman (who Maxine ran into again Tuesday at a completely different type of event), and many others.

Monday our friend D helped us out by accompanying us on the bus from our apartment over to the Eiffel Tower. We wanted some pictures of Maxine, Tom and Cassie in front of it. You can see some of the results in this entry! Cassie has become a real trouper. The process of travelling outside the neighborhood with her goes like this: We walk her on her leash to the bus stop, open up her bag and she hops in as fast as she can move. I carry her onto the bus and ride with her in her bag on my lap. When we get to our destination we open the bag back up and pull her out -- she's both shy and comfortable in the bag and would prefer staying in it to facing whatever 'world' awaits her at our latest destination. However, we get such a kick out of taking her out in Paris that we have occasionally been making her part of our excursions!

Tuesday morning we said goodbye to D. In the evening Maxine & I went two different directions. She went to a knitting group organized by our new friend V (Tom had been to V and B's for dinner while Maxine was in Provence). One of the 12 people there was the Alsatian-Parisian woman we'd met on Sunday! Tom went to Notre Dame for the first concert of the fall season at the church (http://www.cathedraledeparis.com/FR/e2.asp). It was pretty extraordinary to hear a concert inside Notre Dame, with a choir of 30 and music from both an orchestra and the church organ overhead!

Wednesday evening we decided once more to treat Paris like home -- Maxine made dinner and we've spent the evening reading and catching up.