Bleak midwinter

Lest you think evil is dead, Polish police report that someone has stolen the iron sign over the main gate to Auschwitz. That would be the Arbeit Macht Frei (work makes you free) sign.

Sadly, it’s not difficult for me to imagine why someone might want to take it. In fact, the possibilities of creeps, anti-Semites, ignorant thrill-seekers, opportunists and others are really too abundant.

I just hope to God that the Polish authorities—who have their own challenges with their welcoming of the Holocaust when the Germans came—at least recognize the potential loss of tourist and investment zlotys if they don’t get this sign back and prosecute the thieves.

This is so much more than a property crime.

Friend me? I don't think so

Social networking media have a lot to answer for. They’re like entering a lunatic asylum & being engulfed by the inmates.

I created a Twitter profile about a year ago, solely so I could follow a colleague’s tweets. I’ve never posted so much as a syllable. (For one thing—imagine me being limited to 140 characters to express my thoughts. Not going to happen.) I’m not even sure I know how to log back in to my account.

So why is it that a couple of times a week I receive notifications announcing that Tami Someone or Peggy Whosis (always females) is now following me on Twitter?

Following what, exactly?

(I know, they’re hoping I’ll reciprocate & jack up their numbers. But that’s not going to happen, either.)

& then there’s Facebook…

It’s bad enough when people you worked with for a short time try to “friend” you. You can just hit the ignore button there & forget about it.

But the other day I received one of those chirpy messages from Facebook saying I had a message from [Guy I Used To Go Out With Just Out Of College]. Now, that relationship was pretty fractious, back & forth, forth & back; together tight & break up. Finally I put enough distance between us that I didn’t have to think about him any more.

At one point, about 15 years ago, he tracked me down in Virginia (through a brother-in-law who was way too free with handing out my contact number) & called. Evidently just to chat, because there didn’t seem to be any purpose in that conversation. He did, however, mention he’d been in Adult Children of Alcoholics (as well as a couple of “men’s groups”, which—because he was in them—were not in any way ridiculous).

After we hung up I pieced together the idea that he must be in some sort of 12-step program, & one of them is to make amends to the people you’ve hurt or treated badly. So I bunged off a card saying if that’s what he was doing, his behavior was no longer an issue for me.

Then didn’t hear from him until 2002, when I found his phone number in some old calendars. I called, just for ducks, & we reconnected, long-distance.

Well, that lasted a few months, until he took issue with a comment one of my other friends made to an email I’d mass-sent. There was some verbal flipping off between them (both suffering from testosterone poisoning), & then GIUTGOWJOOC turned on me, for somehow having a connection to “this clown”.

At that point I’d had enough. My last, emailed, words to him were, “Grow the hell up.” He replied but I never opened it; just filed it in the appropriate place.

So imagine my surprise to get that Facebook message from GIUTGOWJOOC, slugged “reestablish contact”: “Are you open to that? If not, I understand, and it’s okay.”

Well, where to begin?

First, I was shocked, because in 2003 he not only didn’t have cable TV, he was using a PC with DOS only, & certainly had no internet connection. (He had email via his employer.) He just used the computer for “writing” (& the less said about that, the better).

So, evidently he’s now moved onto the Information Superhighway in his 1957 Chevy—unless he’s still accessing via work.

Second, that whole “I understand & it’s okay” is typical of his arrogant, condescending belief that he’s somehow superior instead of stunted emotionally. This is his persona: he has much stronger relationships with animals than with humans. (Doesn’t much like men; keeps women at a distance. But animals? He holds true to them to death.)

So, no, he doesn’t understand & it’s completely immaterial to me whether he thinks it’s okay or not.

I looked at his profile, which he has open to the public (which says pretty much everything right there—he’s always had an unlisted phone number, but splashes himself all over Facebook?). Sunday he had 12 friends (one being his dog); today he has 13. So he’s basically just trying to build up his “friends”, even if they’re just electrons on a monitor.

& remember what I said about animals? He lists eight of them as living with him. In an 1100 sq ft two-bedroom/one-bath 1950s rancher, which hasn’t ever been updated.

Will I “reestablish contact”? Uh, no. Will I reply? I can’t think of anything that would completely convey my indifference to ever hearing from him.

I’m going to go wash my fingers, now. Because this has been a foray into the underside of social media & they feel slimy.

Dental health

I have a question, which I’m hoping someone out there can help me with.

Why is it that my employer’s health insurance will cover 100% of just about any medical expense that isn’t blatantly frivolous (including 100% of prescriptions), but only half of dental costs?

I’ve noticed this with pretty much all my health insurance—previous plans certainly didn’t go the 100%-no-co-pay route, but there was still this disconnect between how much they’d pay for doctors and how much for dentists.

What is up with this? Do these insurance wallahs think we go to the dentist for any reason other than because we absolutely have to? Do they think we’re getting fillings for fun? If the billing statement says anything other than “vanity procedure”, do they really think we’re trying to game the system?

I ask as I’ve just had to shell out nearly $700 for a crown, allegedly half the total cost. It’s not like I said to myself, “Hmm, feeling like spending 90 minutes up close and personal with the dentist and his staff, and paying several hundreds for the privilege.” And when the bill goes to the insurance company, it’ll say, “piece of tooth broke off”, so it’s clear I’m not getting veneers.

I’m not sure whether the various healthcare reform bills swirling around the Congressional bowl include dental care; but they ought to.

Neighborscapes

Perhaps you’ll recall that Higher Powers tried to keep me from returning to Seattle from Europe.

And rightly so.

Imagine my sense of pleasure upon pulling up to the house to find that my neighbor, Abbi, has decided to leave all her trash and recycling bins out in front of our shared fence, right between our two gates.

I’ve noticed that people in this particular neighborhood just leave their bins out on the curb all the time. Which means they have to schlep their trash, yard waste and recycling out there several times between collection, rather than keeping them at home and wheeling out the bins once a week (or every two, in the case of recycling).

This has all the charm of living in the projects, but with a higher mortgage payment.

But, since we don’t get pick-up from our house fronts (we have to wheel the containers about 75 yards out to an actual, you know, curb), it’s not clear to me what the advantage of leaving the bins out in public, instead of inside her property line, is. I mean, it’s not as though she’s actually landscaped her 20 square feet of land and consequently has aesthetic objections to keeping them there (as she’s done for the past six months).

It seems I unwittingly moved into a trailer park. Lucky me.

Canine Christmas

I interrupt this string of posts about France to bring you this video. Just think of it as a holiday gift.

I wouldn’t hold out hopes that your own four-footed friends will do the same for you, though.

Champs Elysées

On my last day in Paris I headed over toward the Arc de Triomphe—hadn’t been there since my first visit 30 years ago, when I’d been overwhelmed by what I termed the “belligerent patriotism” expressed all over that monument.

I got off the Métro at the Champs Elysées/Clemenceau station and ascended to…a marché de Noël.

That put paid to the idea of me walking all the way down to the Arc. I am a sucker for Christmas Markets. I’ve taken two separate trips to Germany just to see the Christkindlmärkte: Nürnberg, Köln, Augsburg, Dresden, München. It’s wonderful, being in the crisp cold air, sipping a nice hot Glühwein, occasionally indulging in a bratwurst and just walking up and down the rows of merchant huts.

These days much of the merchandise comes from China, and the EU has probably cracked down on hygiene standards for the food products sold so flavor has disappeared. But those markets are still wondrous.

They were setting up a marché in Bordeaux, but it didn’t open until the day I had to leave, so I missed out on it. And I hadn’t even considered Paris, much less le plus grand boulevard de la ville.

Well, I had to wander up one side, down the other and then back up again. I must have looked like Gomer Pyle, oohing and ahing over all the goods on offer. There’s a lot of the same stuff scattered about, but I did find things suitable for Christmas and Chanukah gifts. And of course I had a cup of Glühwein.

(In Germany they serve it in an actual cup; they charge you a deposit and then you get it back when you return it to one of the many Glühwein stands in a market. Here it was in a paper cup.)

In addition to the vendors, there were carrousels and other little rides for children. Didn’t have the cozy feel or a market crowded into one of the town squares, but it was still a find.

Never made it to the Arc de Triomphe; but it’ll be waiting for me the next time I go there.

Bump in the road

Back in Seattle. Deep joy.

It was a close-run thing. I had a 0640 flight from LHR to CDG, which was to arrive at 0900, plenty of time for me to make the 1030 flight to the States. I set two alarms for 0345 to ensure I got to Heathrow by 0500 to get myself & my bags checked in & be well ready for boarding at 0605.

Only for some unfathomable reason, they held up take-off for 40 minutes, for six people. An entire A321 full of passengers blown off for six.

Naturally the delay lost us our take-off slot, so more wait. & then, descending over Paris we lost power in one engine, so a complete circuit to come in upwind.

The upshot was that we docked about five minutes after boarding started for the Seattle flight.

I sprinted across two very long sections of Terminal 4E, flinging myself through yet another security screening, & barely got on the aircraft before they closed the doors.

My checked bags, of course, weren’t as fast as I, which is what I’d expected.

(I should be grateful, I suppose, that I made the connection—many of my fellow Paris passengers didn’t make theirs at all.)

Well, I’m putting it down to the concept that Forces there are that don’t want me in the Emerald City. With which I fully concur.

London & London

Greetings from London. Quite the change from 30 years ago—it’s amazing what an American Express card can do for a girl.

And regular showers.

It was a bit of a comedy getting out of Paris—for some reason my hotel reception gave me a wake-up call at 0430.

They got the wrong room.

Well, couldn’t get to sleep after that, so at 0630 I just got up and got ready to get to the airport. At 0700 it took only about 25 minutes, which is pretty fast for central Paris to Charles de Gaulle.

I have to say that the flight, while far superior to the boat train I took in 1979, was something of a damp squib. I’d been thinking of the trips I used to take on BA on the LHR-CDG run. In this respect the Brits had it all over Air France.

Of course, that could have changed, too—last time I took BA was in 2001.

Once here it was a bit of a struggle—although I had a first class ticket for the Heathrow Express, the first class coaches were locked and I couldn’t get in to them. Interesting marketing ploy.

Then, the cabbie didn’t appear interested in helping me get my three bags into the cab—what’s up with that?

I’m staying at the Park Lane Hilton—a far cry indeed from 30 years ago when I shared a room at a cheap flop (WC down the hall) with an American woman returning from Greece whom I met on the ferry. She and I took a ride on a double-decker bus as our entertainment that evening, and were both aghast at the fact that it cost 50p (about $1 then).

(I’m not actually paying Park Lane prices for this—I used some of my Amex points that I couldn’t use for the air fare for this. Not that I have to apologize, but it’s just such a contrast to that very first stay.)

Back then I was waiting for my bike to catch up with me, checking constantly at the Victoria Station baggage office. I was very worried about how long my money would hold out (no credit cards, remember). When it finally came in (minus a few tools out of the panniers), I went to a removals company to get a carton for it, and then to Woolworth’s to get a wrench (one of the tools that had disappeared) and went to work right there to get the bike into the carton.

Then out to Gatwick, where I spent the night right there, waiting for the next day’s Laker flight to LA. (Lying across some seats at the airport is cheaper than even the cheapest student share; probably not markedly more uncomfortable, either.) My splurge was a paperback copy of The Long Goodbye, which turned out to be my favorite Raymond Chandler book.

One final discovery on that trip.

I’m off now, to have a stomp through some of the places I liked when I lived here, and then dinner tonight with a friend. Another good way to end a trip.

(Posted at 0957 on Tuesday 2 December, London W1.)

Paris sera toujours Paris

I still have to officially get myself back to Paris/London from Santiago in 1979.

As you’ll recall, I bought a train ticket and trusted l’Escargot Rouge to the baggage car.

At first one of the porters situated me in a first-class car. Despite my attire I think he figured out I was an American and therefore would not be with the riff-raff. Then a conductor came along and rousted me—he was suspicious that I had ideas above my station and was trying to sneak a first class ride.

He conducted me to my appropriate compartment—where I did have a reserved seat, amongst three Portuguese guys going back to jobs in France and Spain from time off at home.

I’ll tell you what—no one needs entertainment devices when you’re in second- (or maybe it was third-) class compartment with three Portuguese workers. One spoke only Portuguese, one Portuguese and Spanish & the third Portuguese and French. The latter two were translating for the former and asking their own questions. I was in a blizzard of multi-lingualism.

Plus—they were going back to their jobs (I got the impression that the only way they could support their families was to go outside Portugal) completely laden with food and drink from home. They gave me pork sandwiches, and each seemed to have a different type of Portuguese wine; in plastic five-gallon (it seemed) jugs. And I had to try each one. (There was one that I think was vintage Sunday—I mean, several layers peeled right off the enamel of my teeth.)

It seems that Portuguese wine is much better than any plonk you can get in Spain, or France. We spit on your French or Spanish wine.

There were also Portuguese cookies and Portuguese cognac. I shudder to think of that combination now, but it didn’t seem to do me any harm at the time.

A fourth Portuguese guy joined us in the morning—he was working in Germany.

At Hendaye I said adios/au revoir to my new friends and changed to a Paris train. I took the time to buy some bread and cheese for the trip. I planned on staying in the train station in Paris to save money on a hotel, so I thought I might be able to have a hot meal at a restaurant when I got there.

On the journey I spent some time talking with a young Spaniard who confirmed my observations that the Spanish weren’t too concerned with history; they wanted to forget the past and were into novelty. As he put in: afuera, afuera.

At the Gare du Nord I put my sleeping bag and lunch in the consigné, then went looking for dinner.

I was at an Italian place, really minding my own business; I was. Two Swedish businessmen started a conversation with me. Well, one of them did, in English, the other may or may not have understood the language and he just didn’t speak. I thought of them as Paul Bunyan (this guy was enormous) and Babe the Blue Ox.

Well, Paul told me they’d been to Paris 12 times in the previous year (one week at a time), and hated it. Paul bought me a Grand Marnier and would have paid for my dinner if I’d let him. (I try to follow the dictum that if you can afford to buy your own beer you don’t have to rassle for it.)

Paul invited me to see Paris at night. I thought, what the hell, and schlepped my rucksack and handlebar bag (the panniers were still on the bike) and went. He drove like the insane—at one point cranking the little Renault up to 100kph on the Champs Elysées. We went to a cabaret, where they insulted the maître d’hôtel, resulting in us getting a table. The show was a mix of striptease and vaudeville. I noted that “the strip part wasn’t really interesting, except for the costumes and the fact that they were doing routines on a tiny stage. But the two vaudeville acts (one with puppets) were fun.”

We drove back to their hotel, across from the station; the ride was even wilder than the one before. Babe, who’d fallen asleep at the cabaret went straight to his room; I had an orange juice with Paul in the hotel bar.

Seems his company (he was president) was a subsidiary of some firm in Connecticut. He specialized in a metallurgical treatment to strengthen nuclear turbines. (I’m not making this up; I’m just reporting it.)

He invited me to spend the night in the extra bed in his room—no funny business, etc. Just a bed.

Then he said, “There’s a bath tub.”

Okay, it’s good to know what one’s price is, and sometimes a girl’s just gotta do what a girl’s gotta do. So I accepted.

I must have spent half an hour in that tub; I don’t even want to think what dirt was left on the fixture. When I got out, Paul was already asleep, so I crawled into the extra bed and did likewise.

In the morning he insisted on me having breakfast at the hotel. I felt a little awkward, dragging in my gypsy bags and looking like a ragamuffin, but Paul and Babe were oblivious. In the end I decided I’d never see any of these people again, so who cares?

The waitress took a very dim view of me there getting breakfast amongst all those businessmen, however. When Paul gave her his room number, she went away to check, and then returned to say, “Monsieur has a single room!” and Paul said he’d pay for my meal; to which she sniffed, obviously thinking me no better than I should be. And it cost 12F50, which was a huge sum to me at the time. And it fortified me for the trip to London.

And it was a very nice way for me to end the Continental part of my journey. I mean, really: a bath, a bed and breakfast. What better is there in life?

I’m headed to London myself in the morning. No boat train for me this time; Air France. Business class. (Here’s how whacked air fares are: I looked into business class prices SEA-CDG and took a deep breath. Then I checked out RT on the EuroStar, Paris-London; and that was more than $700. So I took a look at what flying RT, to get back to CDG to return to Seattle, would cost. And can you feature: the total fare for SEA-CDG-LHR-CDG-SEA went down by 25%?)

The hotel breakfast here is pretty good; but I’m guessing the one I had with Paul and Babe was just spectacular, by comparison.

I did indulge at the hotel’s chocolates bar this afternoon, after walking 19K steps. Had chamomile tea and three exquisite dark chocolates (one with raspberry filling, one with vanilla and one with coffee). Mon Dieu—magnifique! And tonight I’m going to a place nearby for bouillabaisse.

No vaudeville, though.

(Posted at 1800 Monday 30 November, 7ème arrondisement, Paris)

Arrival in Paris

It’s Black Friday in the US, and I’m writing this in my hotel room in Paris. I’m so glad I’m missing all that michegoss, although the Net does keep you apprised whether you will or not of all the bargains to be had and how you can actually save more by not going into stores but ordering online.

I took the TGV, Bordeaux-Paris/Montparnasse in a skosh over three hours (stops in Angoulême and Poitiers). It took me four days to drive from Paris to Bordeaux this past week, and 12 to do it n vélo 30 years ago.

There’s nothing like riding in a train at high speed, countryside whizzing past you too fast to really take in to make you contemplative. I’d had a whole list of things to see/do in Paris, but decided that maybe I should just slow down and be here, just as I was on the train.

I’m here for four nights, I don’t have to do anything.

Insight number four: even in Paris I don’t have to rush about at Mach 2.

(Posted at 1632 Friday 27 November, 7ème arrondissement)