Hello Again:
It only seems appropriate that our 25th chat would be our Aix Christmas visit. Get it? 25th – December 25th. X-Mas in “X”. No matter, it just happened and making those connections won’t make your day any better.
It’s Friday morning, December 21st. I drove Sophia to the bus stop this morning and discussed how dark it was. I mentioned shortest day of the year and winter solstice. I got a blank stare. I then went to June 21st and March 21st..........and, well, the silence and disinterest was deafening. It must be that teen-age thing.
Keaka’s been to the doctor this morning. He has bronchitis and now enough medicine to make things interesting. Hopefully, he’ll be a lot better in a few days. He has three weeks of medicine, so we’ll look like a dispensary during our trip.
Raining this morning, after an all-day rain yesterday. When the weatherman says 100% chance of rain Thursday and Friday, I guess you should expect rain. Marlene observed that yesterday was the first day it had rained all day since we got here. It also followed 11-days of 0% chance of rain and lots of sunshine. I should be a weatherman or at least come up with a past-time that is more interesting.
We’re told that in Paris we should expect about 10% of the holiday festivities you see in the United States. Here in Aix-en Provence the city puts up lots of lights and decorations, especially along Cour Mirabeau, the main drag. They construct holiday stands along both sides of the street where vendors sell food and Christmas goodies, including decorations. Lots of rides for the kids, too. I think I mentioned that they put up a large ferris wheel in both Nice and Marseille. The photos may catch a little of the flavor.
It may have already been mentioned, but no Christmas cards in France. These folks may be on to something.
We figured out the local rules for parking vehicles. There are none. Parking on sidewalks is common, as is parking on part of one-lane of a two-lane road. Parking, leaving your blinkers on and simply blocking a lane of traffic is not that uncommon. It’s dodge-em cars at a high rate of speed.
I found a barber/hairdresser at the local salon, of which there seem to be many, salons that is. The first haircut he trimmed my sides almost bald. I should have figured. Afterwards, I looked around the salon at the all male hairdressers and everyone of them had the sides shaved with longer hair on top, to say nothing of my guy. It’s the old “I’ll give him what I like”, rather than what he has and might like. I had a subsequent haircut and was able to communicate to keep the sides longer, which he did. The haircut he gives is actually very good. So, yesterday I told him the previous haircut was “cest bon”. He was happy to be told it was good. He then, in French, wanted to know how much to cut off (at least I thought that was what he was asking). I said “don’t cut much”, which he probably didn’t understand. I then showed him with my fingers how much to cut off. Well, that’s what I have remaining. You know the retired Marine look ------ short and flat on top. That’s me. It was the style in the 1950s for almost every kid. Marlene keeps telling me to wear my hair shorter and to wear nicer clothes so I’ll look younger, but apparently we went too far this time. I believe she said, “I can’t believe YOU did this just before our Paris trip”. Apparently there’s a photo shoot or something in Paris that I didn’t know about, or there’s people we know in Paris that I’m supposed to impress? It’ll grow out and at this stage I’m thrilled to have hair of any length!
More soon from Paris as we near Christmas Day.
The Wilsons
