Birds in a Bird Bath

The alarm was set for 06h00.  I was to rise early to catch a 08h00 TGV au Mans.  I was off to watch the Big Motorcycles run at the MotoGP Grand Prix de France.



06h00 - I'm out of bed and into the shower.  The water is freezing cold.

06h30 - Now I'm freezing cold after a terrible attempt at showering.  I check the fuse.  It looks good.  I check the fuse box.  Hmmm.  Somethings tripped.  Reset the switch and "BANG", we're dark.  The chauffe-eau has died.

06h45 - Email our proprietaires to let them know there's a problem.

07h15 - Breakfast finished.  Wishing Jude "good luck" (after verifying that, yes, there was nothing to be done by me sticking around).  Out the door to catch the metro to the TGV railhead.

Thus begins a rather long story of what it takes to get something fixed in this country.

One of my brothers explained it this way.  In some countries you have 1st world, 2nd world, and 3rd world experiences all in the same place and at the same time.  I am rather unhappy to put France on the list of such countries.

Le moins de Mai has not three (like I originally thought) but FOUR Four Day Weekends.  When did our chauffe-eau die?  Dans le moins de mai!  Zut alors!!

All work slows to a crawl.  No one is around to do anything.  You can't get sick.  The doctors are all out of town.  You can't meet friends.  They're all out of town.  You can't have a Critical Component of Modern Daily Living die on you and expect it will be attended to in a quick manner.  Technicians who manage Critical Components of Modern Daily Living are all out of town.

My father pointed out that if the chauffe-eau died in the US, the job would've been done the next day.  Or if the part wasn't available, certainly the day after.

Here?  Well.  First you have to schedule a man to come take a look and gather the information on what is to be replaced.

Then you need to wait while the contract is written up.

Followed by a review of the contract and verification what all is correct (and not too expensive).

After which the signed contract is returned and the Date of Installation is, well, discussed.

To their credit, our proprietaires did an amazing job.  They were responsive and concerned.  They worked their French Magic as best they could.  They pushed l'entreprise who was doing the work as hard as they could be pushed.  Would couldn't wish for finer landlords.

While things were Thrashed Out, Jude and I heated water on the stove and hauled it into the shower.  We'd then help eachother bathe.  A splash here.  A dunk there.  A little scrubbing where needed.

We were like two little birds splashing about in a bird bath.

In the end, it took four hours to remove the dead chauffe-eau and to install the replacement.  Pipes needed to be removed.  The building water needed to be turned off (for a short time).  New copper plumbing needed to be installed.

At one point we heard a lot of Heavy Work taking place.  So I went to inspect and found two plombieres sweating and breathing hard.  They'd just lowered the old chauffe-eau.  It was exceedingly heavy.  So I went out to inspect the replacement and found it rather light.  I could easily move it around.

After a conversation with le chef plombiere I learned something rather interesting.  What I learned was related to something Jude and I saw when we heated the water on the stove.  If we brought the water to near boiling a surface of "scum" appeared.  When we first saw it I suggested that it was calcium coming out of suspension.  Without fully realizing the implications of this we tried to bring our water to something less than a boil.

Le chef plombier asked what the temperature was set to in the old chauffe-eau.  "Plus de soixante degree" I replied.  "C'est ca, alors."  Our old chauffe-eau's thermostat was set so high that it was bringing calcium out of suspension and depositing it in the ballon of the old system.

I knew, but, again, didn't full appreciate the long term impacts, that Paris' water runs over and through ancient limestone deposits.  You can get a sense of this by descending into the Catacombs.  All you see are limestone walls, steps, paths, ceilings.  That is where the calcium is coming from.  The old rock-bed that Paris sits on is limestone.

Le chef plombier and I talked about what the new chauffe-eau should be set to.  We agreed that 50degrees centigrade was about right.  This temperature would be warm enough to be comfortable and cool enough to avoid calcium build-up.

After a few hours of heating Jude took her first hot shower in eleven days.  I took mine a few hours later.

It was good to rejoin Modern Civilization.

Leaving Tours behind...

After the rather trying 5 days Jude spent in the hospital in Tours, it was time to take a leisurely dinner, spend one last night in the hotel, and catch a late morning TGV back to Paris.


Jude was pretty tired from the Big Thrash.  We reviewed a few of the Big Thrash Details together and here's what we came up with.

Unlike in the States, when Jude was given her room in the hospital no one showed her how the facility worked, what the buttons meant, nor how to turn on the lights.  The French must be born with this kind of information encoded in their DNA.  After 5 days, Jude had figured nearly everything out.

Showering was an interesting exercise in anonymity.  In the States a hospital wrist tag is impervious to nearly every known chemical, element, and natural disaster.  It's function is to help everyone sort out who's who in the zoo.  In France?  Well, when you shower you become anonymous.  Water makes it's way down the wrist tag and wipes the Vital Information carrying paper clean.  Pretty neat trick, eh?


Entertainment in hospital rooms in the US may be limited to a few channels of cr*p, but at least the eyes have something to keep them entertained during sleepless nights.  In France?  Interested Parties need to find their way out of the bed (or rely on a reasonable proxy in the form of a family member who is perhaps more mobile) to head downstairs to visit the young lady who sits behind a wide counter.  Her sole purpose is to sell you access to such things as TV and, um, More TV.  They used to offer WiFi connections for pay, too.  Times change.  An End has been put to that Nonsense.  At times it felt like we'd slipped out of Modern Day France into the depths of Medieval France.  Jude was effectively cut off from the world during her hospital stay.

Ah.  Here's a nice feature.  The water cooler that sat outside the door to Jude's room acted as one of those Bed Vibrators that used to be found in cheap hotels all across that Great Land of America.  We weren't able to work out, however, if this was an intentional benefit.  If The Authorities knew about it, perhaps they'd want to charge for the service.


As for myself, I'd been taking a somewhat expensive taxi between the hotel and hospital.  On Sunday night I called the taxi service and waited and waited and no one showed up.  So I called the service back to see where my ride was and was told they tried to call me and no one answered.  Huh.  I'd not been called before, so why on Sunday night?  At the start of the Spring Break?  During Dinner Hour?  Fortunately I spied a bus, sorted out what needed to be paid, took a seat, and was able to take the Cheap Way home in less time than I could've ever imagined.

After going through the Big Thrash and as Jude was preparing to (finally!) leave the hospital one of the nurses shared with her how they refer to a nurse (which Jude was) who's in a hospital bed.  The French say that "she's crossed over to the Dark Side."

The Terrible Tour of Tours

In the deepest darkest days of winter, Jude and I made plans to visit Tours.  We needed somewhere to go and hopefully enjoy a little springtime warmth and sun in the process.  The Winter had been so dis-spiriting that we needed a little boost to our morale.

After nearly three months of being sick with various virus it felt like we were on the Other Side and getting better.  Little did we know that all was not entirely well.

Our Tour of Tours departure day dawned, well, cold and blustery.  We were determined to get Out of Dodge and so we headed out.

After our arrival in Tours we learned of my uncle's passing.  It'd been expected and it felt strange to be living a wonderful life even as family members were tending to the sick and dying.  There seemed nothing for it but to Keep Going and hope for the best.


We visited two chateaux, met an American couple, and had dinner with them after the tour.  The company was enjoyable and the conversation covered so many of the topics Jude and I are known to wallow in.  Namely, America's view of itself, it's politics, and all these things versus what the Rest of the World sees and does.

The following day we headed out to Amboise to meet a friend of Jude's over lunch.  Pauline is a rare gem of a person.  Though we wouldn't realize just how much of a gem she was until two days later.

Jude and I had a fabulous dinner at Laurenty on rue Colbert in Tours.  Pauline had recommended it and what a "find" it turned out to be.  Not Paris Expensive.  Not Paris Dreck-Tasting.  Just good solid beautifully prepared food for people who love to eat.

The following day was spent recuperating and relaxing around Tours.  That night around 02h00 Jude told me something wasn't right.  Her heart was racing and there seemed to be no way to settle it down.


I called the front desk to order a cab.  We were quickly on our way to Trousseau urgence (ER). In the door and to the first desk.  Hand over our papers to the nice lady behind the glass screen.  Typity type type type goes the keyboard.  Through the double doors we go and into urgence we head.  Leads are quickly applied and... well... yes... things don't look good.  BP 190+/100+ HR110+.  Crap.  We're in Deep Shit, if truth be known.

At one point Jude handed me her glasses and asked I hold onto them in the event they needed to cardio-vert her.  The docs tried several things, including a med that Jude reacted very badly to.  We told eachother how good life had been with one another.  I thought her Goose was Cooked.  But the docs had a short-acting strong relief med trick up their sleeves and they were able to get Jude's heart into a better place

After at least eight hours of waiting the much promised cardiologist failed to materialize.  I'd noticed that (some of) the staff were on greve (strike) and wondered if that included the heart doc.  Realizing Jude needed better attention, the urgence docs had Jude moved to Bretonneau which is the regional teaching hospital.

At 18h00 we demenager'd to Bretonnoeau by ambulance.  The Amazing Pauline had shown up around mid-day at Trousseau to help out and she followed us over by car.  She then took me back into Tours centrale to pick some of Jude's things up from the hotel, before returning to Bretonneau.


Mind you, this is a huge teaching facility.  The ground the buildings cover is vast.  Yes, it was a late Friday afternoon, but one would think the needed blood tests to rule out complications to a thyroid condition would be within easy reach to accomplish.  Nope.  It's the aforementioned Friday. The start of a weekend.  And not just any weekend.  It's a weekend where Parisians started their Spring Break two week vacation and many of the docs on staff and in training have already left.  Figure into the mix the Odd Fact that the teaching docs show up for work only on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and, well, you can begin to see why not only was the blood lab closed, but that Jude saw a new intern with every shift change and there was no clearly articulated plan for her care.  Rather importantly, there was no way to determining if the thyroid was involved or not.  For three whole days!

Protocols were followed, however, and Jude was given another med to try and calm her heart.  Malheursement this failed as miserably as the first drug she was given at Trousseau.  Her BP and HR went through the roof.  For the second time in two days we were looking very seriously at a stroke inducing or heart attack situation.  We'd already said our "goodbyes" and set about trying to get Jude's condition back toward something resembling normal.

It's difficult to not be superstitious sometimes.  With things this screwed up and experiencing two very bad events is it any wonder I was hoping against hope that there wouldn't be a third episode?

Throughout Jude's stay, we were blessed by Pauline's Daily Presence.  She provided Vital Logistical Support, Amazing Translator, and Invaluable Moral Support.  Without her kind help we would've been Foreigners in a Foreign Land.


Finally, on Monday morning after the hospital's lab staff had returned from a no doubt richly deserved rest Jude's blood was drawn.  Alas, they'd not taken into account that many drugs are compounded with corn as a filler.  Jude is terribly allergic to corn and has been three months after the GMO version was introduced into the American food system.  This allergy now includes non-GMO food stuffs as well.  By 15h00 the test results were in.  The docs quickly realized what they were dealing with.

In a conversation with the evening nurse Jude shared her concern for the side-effects of corn on her system.  The nurse scurried away and came back 15 minutes later.  She had Good News.  The docs knew what to do and they had a plan (finally!).  The nurse had even better news.  She'd found a non-corn filled med.  If it worked, this was the Best News part, Jude would be jeter'd out of the hospital the next day (Tuesday).

Long story short, the med worked and we were able to pay the rather expensive bill to an astonished staff at la caisse and return by taxi to the hotel in downtown Tours.  We were now 9 days into a 5 day vacation.  We'd only spent three days actually vacationing.  Jude was very tired, though at first determined to return to Paris and home and hearth.  We quickly realized that it might be a nicer, gentler thing to do to stay the night in Tours.

We visited Pauline's recommended Laurenty restaurant one last time where we regaled the wait staff with details of Judes Terrible Tour of Tours.  Dinner was once again amazing.  It was made even more amazing by the fact that Jude was able, after all she'd been through, to sit across from me and smile.

Sorry. Back on my High Horse.

"...Just last month, in the 31 days of March, police in the United States killed more people than the UK did in the entire 20th century. In fact, it was twice as many; police in the UK only killed 52 people during that 100 year period..."

It's reported that in China, at 4 and a half times the size of the US, police killed 12 people last year, and that the rate at which police in the US kill people is 70 times (!!!) higher than any first world country.

Are people in the US so different from people living in civilized countries that they deserve to die at the hands of those who are supposed to "protect and serve?"  What happened to the ideals of freedom and liberty?  Or are ideals things that only prior generations cared about?

What's happened to America?

Rouen ~ the seat of Norman Kings

Former colleagues and family members sick with cancer are still circling the drain.  That is to say, they remain alive if not well.


Years ago Jude and I went to Vancouver, BC to visit with a Friend From England.  I swore I'd do my best to keep in contact and see folks I'd made friends with over the years.  This, after a different friend died of cancer at a terribly young age.  Both my deceased friend and our Friend From England were and are fellow motorcycle riders, motorheads, intellectual, and wonderful eccentrics.

On the trip to Vancouver a close friend of Jude's had died.  We stayed to see our Friend From England and did the best we could under the circumstances.  Jude's friend was already in the ground after we'd returned home.

So it was with not a little trepidation that we climbed aboard a regional train bound for Rouen.  We were off to see our Friends From England.  I hoped no one passed away while we were out of town.  The odds were stacked against us.

A first thing I noticed when we arrived is that some people are blatantly in-your-face-religious-Catholic.  Such as our taxi driver from la gare a l'hotel. After the staunchly secular Paris (where Catholics tend to be quite reserved, even as some other religious-types stir the waters vigorously), this came as quite a shock.  History is as alive as the people still living it.  Rouen has many hundreds of years of Catholic history.


Things turned instantly for the better at the sight of our Friends From England waiting for us in the bar.  They'd come over from Honfleur to spend the day with Jude and I.  Greetings heartily shared, everyone's well-being inquired after, and luggage safely stowed we set off in search of something to eat.

Jude descends from the Dukes of Normandy.  Rollo the Viking Warrior made Rouen the seat of power.  Like in much earlier times when medieval Provin was an Important Place, so too was medieval Rouen.  The city was at the epicenter of the 100 years war between les anglais et les francais.  It was here that Joan of Arc was burned at the stake.  More recently the Nazis occupied the place and it, in part, took the English and Americans bombing the cathedral to drive the Germans out.


I don't know about anyone else, but I instantly fell in love with Rouen.  Half timbered buildings everywhere.  Ancient stone cathedrals in three places around town.  The place is lousy with warm, cozy eateries.

The four of us stumbled around a late winter deeply cold and drizzly wet town to check out as much as we could see in a day.  We had a cuppa, and ate two large feasts.  The wine and cidre weren't bad either.  Topped off with a wee-dram of Calvados, the local Fire Water, the day ended in Perfect Harmony and Contentment.

We received word that our Friends From England had successfully negotiated the trip back to Honfleur and were off to do a little Calvados tasting of their own.  Jude and I set off in search of her ancestor's tomb.  We read that that Americans bombed the original 10th century tomb during WWII, but that a copy had been installed somewhere in the cathedral.


Alas, No Joy.  The Catholics had the apse gated and locked, no doubt to prepare for the celebration of Fertility Bunny Day (Easter to normal folks).  We could see where Rollo/Robert I's tomb is likely to be found.  But we'll have to await a future trip to see if we can't get the pere to unlock the place.

In all, the locals have kept Jude's ancestry in decent order.  The old parts of the village are clean and beautiful.  The cathedral is mostly repaired and celebrations of mass take place daily.  The bells that the Americans bombed back to molten metal in WWII have been recast, the bell tower rebuilt, and the bells re-installed.

While listening to the bells of Good Friday, we explained to a local what our Friends From England had told us not 5 minutes before.  The bells tolled for the betrayal of Jesus by Judas.  The Frenchman was surprised to learn this, nodded his head in understanding, and wished us a bonne soiree.


Needless to say, seeing our Friends From England was the highlight of the trip.  They are doing well.  We plotted and planned a visit for later this summer when Jude and I will head their direction in search of fan-vaulted ceilings, the likes of which are only found in Merry 'Ol.

I'm glad we can experience these kinds of things with friends.  This is life.  If it's not lived now, when will it be?

Well now...

The proverbial shit is hitting the fan.

I was sick with the dreaded flu for three weeks.  Then Jude came down with the very same flu and it's laid her low for the same amount of time.  We've been house-bound for five weeks.  Further, due to various un-related reasons (end-stage cancers in former colleagues and family members) our energies and moods have been pretty low.

Feeling like I've turned the vastly improved corner on my health I wanted to get out and about. A small packet of coupons arrived just the other day.  The coupons were for free entry and a free glass to the Vigneron Independent.  Free is such a good price, right?


The Fall event is held in the vast spaces of the Paris Expo center down at the Porte de Versailles.  The Spring event is held in the smaller yet sufficiently vast spaces at l'espace Champarret.  L'espace was where my Fiction #19 published images (works in collaboration with Etienne Barillier, Arthur Morgon, and Julien Betain) were shown.  So we knew how to get there by metro.

The question before me was this; have my taste buds recovered sufficiently from the Horrid Crud to accurately sample a few wines?  There was only one way to find out.

Regrettably I would leave Jude at home to continue to recover from her own version of the Horrid Crud.  She and I seem to go everywhere together and my going alone felt like I was missing 1/2 the Fun Team.  This meant my taste buds would have to try and remember Jude's preferences.  Red.  Not too much "jam" flavor.  Robust.  Preferably not from regions that grow the Gamay or Pinot Noir grapes.

Thinking about this a moment, I knew it would be best to buy a bottle or two, bring them home, have Jude taste them, then find the vintners at the Fall event to Buy By The Case should we uncover something really tasty.  For this reason I would leave le diable (the handcart) at home.  A small cloth bag was all I would need.  Something sufficient to hold three or four bottles of the Red Stuff.


Loins Girded, small cloth bag pocketed, and coupons in hand, off I went.

I stubbed my toe at the door entering la foire.  The guard reminded me to "mind my step."  I said something (apparently) funny in reply and we both laughed.  I hadn't yet had a drink.  The guard welcomed me to the show.

Once somewhat safely inside I could see that l'espace Champerret was indeed much smaller than the porte de Versailles independent vinters show.  Still, it looked like there might be enough wine here to slake my thirst.  Hundreds of wineries had tables.

My search criteria included the following parameters.  Red.  Cab/Merlot/Malbec/CabFranc.  Blended (the norm around here, none of that silly single varietal stuff for us!). Biologique (very important to avoid bug killing chemicals).  Sans sulfites ajouter (extremely important, as Jude is allergic to sulfites).


The bio and sans sulfites ajouter requirements really narrowed the field.  The Cab/Merlot/Malbec/CabFranc blends narrowed the field even further.  These grapes are found predominantly around la ville de Bordeaux.  Though, as I would quickly learn, these cépages are also to be found in the south-west of France near the Spanish boarder and further east around le pays d'Oc.

As the show was rather smaller than la porte de Versailles I was able to walk the aisles and get a sense of who was there and what they had on offer.  There was plenty on offer.  Champagnes (the real ones).  Cremant (like champagnes, only without the name nor the region of origin).  Cognac (strong stuff, that). White wine.  Rose wine (yuck!).  Red wine.  A little biologique.  Very little bio-dynamique.  But mostly wines with stuffed with sulfites and other wine altering chemistries.  As one show attendant suggested to me, the chemicals are just like what they add to California wines.  Thank you UC Davis.  You're bastards! for the way you've "enhanced" wines with chemicals that the Gods Themselves abhor.

I found two vendors simply by wandering around and looking carefully at their regions and sign-age, asked a question or two, hauled out my Free Wine Glass, and asked if I could sample a beverage or two.  One vendor was from le pays d'Oc.  The other was from the area south of Bordeaux.  Both, surprisingly enough, offered red wines sans sulfite ajouter.  Both offered blended wines of the right cépages.  Both offered rather healthy pours (my glass was rather filled on each occasion).  Both offered wines that seemed tasty enough to bring home a few bottles for Jude to try.


I had a good laugh with the vintner from le pays d'Oc.  First I apologized for being a foreigner and for my horrid French language skills.  Then I apologized that I was here on a Mission for my wife.  I said I knew this was a wine show, but I myself preferred beer.  At that the two men working the table broke into a deep and hearty laughter.

It turned out that they too, for most things, preferred beer over wine.  I told them this can't, therefore, be France.  Even heartier laughter ensued.  I see now that the French really do love to laugh and have a good time.

When I confessed that I also looking for something to go with sanglier (wild boar) their eyes lit up, they poured me a nice tall glass of something deep red that would likely go with sanglier.  While I sipped that beautiful wine I was regaled with wonderful stories of the two of them trying to hunt sanglier around the fields on their property.  Imagine man avec gun contre les sanglier, all who hid in tall corn.  One trying to find the other in a game of French cache-cache.  There is no way to translate into English what a good time we all seemed to be having.


With a smile on my lips and four bottles in the cloth bag slung over my shoulder, off I went to descend into the metro to make my way back to home and hearth.  

Inequalities...

I suddenly feel the need to climb onto my high horse.  This time the subject is economic inequality.

I started reading Jill Lepore's "Annals of Society - Richer and Poorer" in the March 16, 2015 issue of the New Yorker magazine. The article confirms in numbers (using the Gini coefficient)  what some of us have known intuitively for years.  America has the widest economic inequality of any first world nation.  By comparison England, Sweden, France, and Germany have much much lower rates of income inequality.

One of the "hot button" words in America these days is "socialism."  We've had people tell us that they can't stand President Obama because he is trying to turn America into a "socialist" nation.  But in considering the aforementioned short list of countries only Sweden could fairly be classified as "socialist."  France is anything but a "socialist" state.  According to many people we speak with here (former professors, economist, fonctionaires, engineers) France continues to suffer and lumber on under Napoleonic Law, and nothing could be less "socialist" than Napoleonic Law.  Germany is very similar to the US in that it is a Federalist Republic.  England is clearly more like the US in terms of capitalism and business and banking.  So what is the difference between these European nations and the US?

One area is governmental oversight.  We've had conversations with friends and colleagues where some people feel that it's not the role of the US Government to legislate "morality" or "ethics".  Yet when we look at the data, America's most economically equitable period came with the highest levels of government economic oversight.  Caps on corporate greed (some might call it "profitability") were imposed during the second world war.  Companies were limited to earnings of 10 percent a year (overseen by the Office of Price Administration).  It's no surprise then that as regulations on capitalism dramatically decreased starting in the 1970's income inequality increased equally dramatically.

What are some of the economic effects of disproportionate wealth distribution?  None other the Fortune magazine provides part of the answer.

The gap between the Haves and the Have-nots is so wide now that Jill Lepore says in her article that some economists in America feel that democracy is at risk.  I've come to believe that democracy in America is already dead.  When the Haves can buy access to the system of governance, democracies turn into fascist states.  This is what happened in Italy under Mussolini.  Monied interests became the government.

The AFL-CIO tracks corporate greed on their site Paywatch.  Having worked for several companies in my career where "profitability" was upper-most in the executives mind, I've come to understand the role of executive stock options and quarterly revenue reports as the most significant driving force behind the "rewards" (though some might call it "compensation") corporate leaders in America receive (some might say "steal" from the working classes).  I feel that corporate executive wealth is a good indicator.  With money comes the ability to buy influence and power.  The CEO of the company that laid me off was part of the Tri-Lateral Commission that does more than just lobby the US Government.

The very same things that happened in Fascist Italy have already happened in America.  Money runs Government.  In turn, Government responds to the interests of money.  Period.  The will of the people?  No one seems to pay much attention to it.

One example of the influence of money on the formerly democratic nation is the Koch brothers funding of a vast database of voter information.  The goal is to influence elections and it's capabilities exceed the "official" Republican party database.   The system of information helps Republicans identify individuals (yes, I said that right) who's vote might be influenced.  While many are rightly concerned with NSA data collection and it's impacts on freedom and liberty, I have to ask how the Koch brothers database is any better or any different?   I feel in both cases that too much personal information has been concentrated into the hands of those who seek to use it against us.

In an example more directly fascist in nature, corporate monies influences governmental policies on a global scale.  Business writes policy.  Or in the cases where they've not actually taken pen in hand to physically write the words themselves, money provides the required "incentives" and "lubrication" for politicians to craft language of law.  While it could be argued that Democrats do this less often than Republicans, just look at the vast sums of tax-payer money given to insurance companies as part of the Affordable Care Act and you'll understand how little "say" We The People have in anything that passes for governance.

I cast about for a good example of what might happen next in America and, well, I'm stumped.  While the Greeks and Spaniards can rise up and agitate against German austerity measures, Americans sit on their couches seemingly complacently distracted by anything that passes for news, commentary, movies or video-games.  For this reason I can't see anything but continued economic inequality in America.  Where politics has been consumed by banks, business, and money, those who suffer under fascism seem to know their place and fail to raise a hand in their own favor.