Spring Days

I obviously fell out of the blog routine for the past couple of weeks.  Brad was here for a week and we ate ourselves silly and now my Boulder friend, Renee Berberian, has been staying with me and we've been having too much fun to stay inside and blog.  My supplementary class for speeding me along to catch up with the advanced class ended last Friday, so this week I've been back to what I originally signed on for, which is only 2 hours of class each afternoon from 1-3 at L'Ecole L'Etoile , and around an hour of homework -- so I've had time and energy to go fun places and see fun things with Renee and do some of the Parisian things that I've been too busy being a studious French student to do.  I'll write about those experiences, too..

It was great having Brad here for a week.  We were very domestic, keeping with the Amy school night routine, and waiting for the rain to stop.  We walked through the Tuilieries on Sunday and I posted most of those photos in my newly created Photo Album section of my blog, which magically has French labels (Albums Photos).  I’m not sure whether my computer is attaining consciousness and learning French, too?  Or perhaps Blog Jet, my blog software tool, is connecting to some French server that sends codes saying “Hey, you’re in France, make French labels.” 

“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” [Arthur C. Clarke,"Profiles of The Future", 1961 (Clarke's third law) English physicist & science fiction author (1917 - )]

Here are photos of Brad dressed for his Parisian adventures with me, kindly carrying my camera bag.  Although it looks like he’s consulting a guide book, I think he’s sneaking peeks at whatever book he’d rather be reading while waiting for me to finish take pictures of the Place de la Concorde.  He's a very good sport.  I miss him.

               in the Tuilieries                                   at the Place de la Concorde

Comments

[BusterStronghart]

There is a company in France called Bourgeois. Used to be owned by Chanel. Makes a perfume that in the US was a cheap perfume called Evening in Paris. But in France it was (is?) a high end perfume called_____________. Comes in a deep blue package. It's French name is probably a direct translation of Evening in Paris.

Your blog, and your friend's blog are very interesting. We read many of the same books. Does that mean there are too few books being published and the selection is too narrow? Or does that mean that TLS, NYReview, London Review all review the same books? Or is this proof of another conspiracy?

One author not mentioned on any of your blogs is:
Knut Hamsun, a Norwiegian author of the earlier part of the 20th Century who won a Nobel Prize in the twenties. Unfortunately, for Hansun, he sort of lost his mind at the end and hailed the Nazi invasion of Norway as a good thing.

Hamsun, Knut (kənūt' häm'sʊn) , 1859–1952, Norwegian novelist. In his youth, virtually without formal education, he led a wandering life, and on his second visit to the United States (1886–88) he worked as a streetcar conductor, lecturer, peddler, clerk, and harvest hand. The theme of the wanderer is prominent in many of his novels, including the naturalistic Hunger (1890, tr. 1899), which aroused a furor of criticism and gained him a large audience. He also wrote the highly regarded Mysteries (1892, tr. 1927), the lyrically beautiful Pan (1894), a trilogy of plays, and a volume of poems (1903). The Growth of the Soil (1917, tr. 1921), sets simple agrarian values against those of the new industrial society. It was awarded the 1920 Nobel Prize in Literature. Hamsun's largely autobiographical work reflects an intense love of nature and an interest in the unconscious. His concern is often for the material condition of the individual and its effect on his spirit. During World War II Hamsun acclaimed the Nazi invasion of Norway. In 1946 he was declared by psychiatrists to be permanently mentally disabled; he was fined $80,000 for economic collaboration with the enemy.