Truffle time!

The expert truffle hunters were out in full force this weekend in a local pasture, rooting away in search of the elusive and tres chere truffle. Those are pigs by the way - the picture is weak. Meanwhile, I continue to train Chico to be a Truffle Dog, further inspired by our recent trip to the Musee des Truffes in Menerbes.

Christmas street market in Aix

Beaujolais Nouveau est arrivé

It's a big deal when the new vintage of this fruity drink-it-while-we-got-it French wine is made available and a tradition that its coming out party is always on the 3rd Thursday of November. There wasn't all that much fanfare around Aix - a few restaurants had specials on, and Toni picked up a bottle at the local wine store.

In fact we might not have even noted the event were it not for the turkey hunt we were on - no gun, just looking for a boucherie that had the apparently rare dinde in stock. Turkey is not a big seller in France, and US Thanksgiving is certainly not celebrated here (but wait, an extra 2 and half days off of work, hmmm, the unions might go for that), so we had to special order a bird. Who know what we'll end up with.

Anyway, the French media claims than almost 40 million bottles of Beaujolais Nouveau will be drunk in the next three weeks. "Corks popped around the world just after midnight as the fruity new-harvested wine was sampled by millions: with six million bottles going to Japan alone amongst 110 countries."

Bertrand Chatelet, head of Sicarex research institute for the study of Beaujolais wines, describes the 2010 wine as “very aromatic with strong hints of wild strawberries, raspberries and redcurrants."

We're stalking up for Thanksgiving because we've been told it goes well with turkey.

Les Honeymooners

The perfect French honeymoon spot: the Irish pub.

Molly and Dodge, our next door neighbors and good friends from TCI, arrived today on a leg of the European honeymoon trip. I take full credit for steering them to this side of the pond for their post wedding shenanigans, convincing Molly during a couple of late night wine-fests last spring that it would be the best way to get their life together off on the right foot.

After stops in Rome, Siena and Santa Margarita in Italy, they met me during a driving rainstorm at the Nice train station. First stop (after a quick call on a local cafe to let the rain slow down a bit):  a place to get some roadies for the hour or so drive. Today's lesson in French culture is that the truck stops (or whatever they are called here) on French highways don't sell alcohol. However much that makes sense, it's still inconvenient during times such as this. Ever the creative improvisers, the newlyweds quickly produced a special bottle of Chianti they had bought for us from Italy (sorry Toni), got three plastic cups out of the gas station coffee machine and we were set for the ride home.

Savannah bestows the newlyweds with wedding gifts from Provence (not including my socks)

We had fun the next couple of days catching up on the island gossip and getting a first-hand recap of the wedding (held on the same day that category 1 Hurricane Tomas struck the island - hey, if your wedding can't survive a little 80 mph wind, the marriage is doomed anyway.). Savannah and Lindsey showed off their improving piano skills (Molly is something of a mentor and inspiration to them in this area). I tried to convince Dodge that Pastis actually tastes good. We drank at a cool little Irish pub that we discovered in Aix, and ate at one of our new favorite restaurants in town - Le Poivre D'Ane. And Chico happily reminisced with the parents of his friends - Buck and Basset (the boys), who he dominates despite being a fraction of their size.

And we all got a little homesick

It was a nice pit stop for all of us, and two days later we put them on a train to Paris (with Dodge having successfully stolen a pair of my prized sweat socks) for a fittingly romantic conclusion to their honeymoon.

(TCI visitor count: 10 and 11)

Bi-lingual birthdays

Lindsey's Lucky 7 birthday is in a couple of weeks and Mom had the bright idea of having it at our house. So she has been busy with the plans, while I desperately look for an excuse to be out of the house that afternoon. Bi-lingual invitations for 18 kids in her class, activities and games for all of them, and now we are on the hunt for a clown (or some other suitable artiste de fete).
Luckily, Aunt Candie will be here to keep order.
Here's the link to her party invitation.

Lindsey's Tour de France career begins

Lindsey at the head of the pieton

MARSEILLE - Big day on the kid milestone marker today as Lindsey rode - I mean really rode - a bike for the first time. First a few laps around the parking lot at the local supermarket (closed, of course - it's Sunday!), and then some more laps around a piazza in Marseille where we went for lunch. She did awesome, only a couple minor spills, and is well on her way to Tour de France caliber.

Bike riding is obviously taken very seriously here and everyone does it. Lindsey and Savannah are both late bloomers when it comes to biking because we weren't really set up too well to learn and practice such things on the island. Both of them have taken to the two wheelin' enthusiastically - and sans training wheels. There's plenty of places to ride around here so I'm sure they'll be touring the French countryside in no time.

Dad will stick to 4 wheels for the time being...

A Giants Triomphe

Hummmm baby - New meaning to Arc de Triomphe

PARIS - I found myself in the City of Light on the day the San Francisco Giants won their first World Series since they moved to the West Coast. The Tuesday morning crowds along the Champs Des Elysees were probably a bit more subdued in their reaction than the throngs that jammed Market Street in the City by the Bay at about 11PM or so their time (yes, it was about that time judging by the stream of text and calls that starting coming in on my cell phone), but I did see a couple of the black-and-orange wearing faithful wandering about with subtle smiles.
I am bummed I didn't get to see a game in the playoffs - I sold my Game 1 ticket, and was torn the rest of the Series since I had tickets for game 7, too. Luckily or unluckily, depending on your point of view, the Giants wrapped it up in 5 games so I didn't get out of Paris. Not a bad place to be stuck, mind you, and I have to consider myself pretty fortunate for having experienced two of the world's greatest cities in such a parallel way on this day.

Driving Monsieur Chico

Chico awaits his driver, Mike G. (landlord extra-ordinaire and disco king), to tour him around in the classic Citreon Traction.

Mike has taken the Traction all over the place, including a big road trip to Russia. The white stickers above the door show which countries he's visited in the car.

Chico just wants to go to MacDonalds (where he actually did end up later when he visited the Sisters in Montgardin while we hobnobbed in Paris).