New suite of drawings and how delivery works in France

 

I have begun work on my next set of drawings. This is a long process that starts out in groups, of photos, and complicated and slightly tedious image generations and organizing. It then carries on to drawings in photoshop, then layering and erasing of versions of the same image, finished with more drawing. I guess the idea is to get the picture to the place where one can't tell quite what it's made of. It takes awhile, and though at some point I may have too many pictures to show you, now there are absolutely none.

This is one of them:

For those readers not hugely interested in my drawings, I can't resist pointing out that this lack of drawing above is not particularly more compelling than having one.

But maybe that's just me.

Up until now I have had to use a mouse to do my drawing, but I have ordered a drawing pad so I can draw with a stylus on my computer screen. I am eagerly awaiting this device! Unfortunately it's delivery to a local fruit and vegetable stand was derailed by my shipment mysteriously becoming "too damaged for delilvery". I had to reorder it and now it is coming to a nearby hair salon. I think this presents us a nice opportunity to briefly discuss the mail and delivery system here in France.

Mail is pretty much like mail from the USA. It is mostly unaddressed junkmail for us, but we do get occasional real things. Our t-shirts with my designs came right into our generously sized apartment lobby box. Once I thought I saw our postal carrier delivering food to someone I think might have been an elderly shut in. A couple of things we received notes for that we had to pick them up at the post office, which for us is a stunning and enormous brick art deco building up the street and near the train station. It was pretty simple once we figured it out. The guard was very cross when we asked him where to go, but quite friendly when we au revoired him.

We had a delivery once at home of large things from Ikea. It went pretty horribly, with a fairly nice delivery person without anyplace very good to put his van needing a fair bit of help. After getting the stuff into our building lobby we had to sign for the nine items, which, because they were of course parts of ikea items to be assembled and couldn't be counted conventionally, only revealed their missing element when we went to assemble. For that we went to Ikea where we were told by a, well, I'm reluctant to use the word, person, that because we signed off on the delivery we were screwed.

Shout out to my homies at the French Ikea: You suck and are going to hell where you will burn for all eternithy. 

But stop me before I grow impolite here.

Most places, like Amazon or Darty (a local Best Buy kind of place), don't deliver to apartments. Instead it just goes to some local contracted storefront: a vegetable stand, a Russian imports grocery, a hair salon, and it's pretty simple to pick up from there. Sometimes one can choose where and sometimes its simply... assigned, but it's not a big deal because everything is rididulously close here.

Overall I would say all the delivery things pretty much work, but by the same token they all seem to to me to produce packages that are pretty banged up, like maybe they fell off a truck a few times and were lightly run over, and accidentally dipped in lotion perahps? The fact that the package I am so eagerly awaiting was too damaged for delivery does much to support my feeling on this.

And that covers it. 

Now that you know how delivery works in France, feel free to send me stuff.

Make it sturdy.

We will all complain eventually

 

I have had a lovely couple of days here in my Belle Epoque city. The sun came out and the temperature has been in the mid sixties. It is asparkle with brilliance! Yesterday in the early evening we went to a  restaurant sprawling along a charming and completely pedestrianized street, where, from the chairs at our table, we sized up the comfortable looking linen clothes displayed in front of the store a few unobstructed steps from our table. Between those clothes and us, life's rich pageant promenaded along providing an endless entertainment.  

People really aren't so bad when they are, um, walking. 

At this restaurant/cafe, we had a coffee and a St. Germain Spritz. The spritz came with a rather generous plate of what seemed to be pan fried pita that was quite nice, and a small bowl of pretty good olives!

We spent an hour there. The bill was 9.50. Happy hour. C'est normal.

Today we wandered the breadth of our city. My wife had a couple things she was shopping for, but there was no urgency. I took some aimless pictures while she was in the stores. We ventured twice to the beach, alive with an almost summery quality for the first time since we've lived here, people in bathing suits and something verging on crowds. I'm not sure about that in a foreboding kind of way. We covered the ancient town fully, stopping for coffee at The Claque, which was almost as good as the first time we were there. We stopped for a really good street musician who caught our attention by nostalgically playing "Purple Rain".

Aw.

We spent 34 years in Minnesota.

How did he know?

Then he played "With or Without You" very nicely and mournfully. He accompanied himself on the guitar but did not augment with recordings or "karaoke" style backing, which we always deeply appreciate. We tossed money in his case and went our way while he played an equally good third song maybe by Radiohead. He didn't acknowledge the money, which isn't best form, but maybe he was really into the singing? And, after all, it's not like he was begging.

Last stretch home along the gambetta we investigated a really nicely laid out vegetable stand for possible future use. We picked up a package waiting for us at a randomly assigned store. And we got gelato from my, so far, second favorite gelateria. The banana and mango ones were as much fruit as gelato, but with a perfectly blurred line. The white chocolate gelato went very nicely with the banana and was a lot of fun.

I wanted to tell you all of this to set the stage for some complaining about this city.

But let's just enjoy ourselves and leave that for another time...

Seven years ago...

 

Every once in awhile I like to see what we were up to at clerkmanifesto on this day some years ago. I haven't done this for awhile, perhaps because there is a lot going on in keeping up with my adventures of living in France. But that very thing is what has made me wonder today, when everything is not so brilliantly new here, but still feels like a strange dream, what was it like on a clerkmanifesto of seven years ago.

That doesn't mean I'll find anything useful. This is a grab bag moment. My choice is random. It even makes me a bit nervous. When I pull up the clerkmanifesto post for March 17, 2019 we could find absolutely anything!

And then we'll have to read it!

All of the sudden I understand the sheer terror of opening up clerkmanifesto to see what's there: it could be a lot of fun or, 

it could be A DEVASTATING ASSASSINATION OF OUR MOST CHERISHED INSTITUTIONS!

It might also be boring.

You never know.

March 17, 2019 (if you read this already, don't worry, you will have forgotten it)

"The Great Pothole"

You peoples out in the weather gentle states might not know so much about potholes. But out here in Minnesota, especially as the Spring comes, and the frozen ground opens up, we get real potholes, legendary potholes, potholes that nearly made the great buffalo herds go extinct. Let me put it this way: We are known as the land of 10,000 lakes, but they're not lakes really, they're just really big potholes. We got one pothole up here that is 1,332 feet deep and 350 miles across. You hit that sucker and guaranteed you will crack your axle in two.

One of the worst problems with these early Spring potholes is that there is so much water everywhere from the melting snow and frequent rains that half the time one can't see the potholes to avoid them. The road is a shallow river and one drives blindly on the tar road until, BAM! you nosedive into a crater that'll either crack your jaw with the impact or leave you to struggle to undo your seat belt in time to allow you to swim for the surface. 

Out on the river road we've memorized all the really bad invisible potholes, but there's one that's worse than any of the others. My wife and I have both hit it once and it's not something we'll easily forget. I'm surprised our car is still intact. It's not terribly wide, but it's deep, deeper than one would even think possible.

The other day I was out walking and slipping and splashing, as I do, along the river, and I was thinking about this deep pothole. I thought I might like to have a look at it seeing as I was so nearby. I thought I might like to see just how deep it went. So I waited till the road was all clear of cars, and I carefully found my way to the edge of it. A few clear, slightly colder days had cleared some of the waters and I had an unobstructed view into this epically deep hole in the road. I peered down.

It was dark in there.

I peered down and down and down and down.

It was a deep pothole!

I searched for the bottom. I dropped in a pebble that never made any sound. I looked and looked for some sign of the floor. And then, at the very end, way down below, I finally saw something that blew my mind:


Stars.

Rain and after

 

It rained for a day and a half here. On the day where it rained start to finish we finally managed to go outside in the middle of the afternoon. It was coming down steadily and the people of this teeming city were maybe affected by it, but it didn't appear to stop anyone from going out in it. The streets, especially the main street, were teeming with people as ever, only it was more annoying for all the umbrellas and gushing awnings.

We tried to be non plussed too. We did some clothes shopping with no success and then went into the glorious and moody old city to have a coffee at our new find there, The Claque, where we had been recently dazzled by a perfectly made rosemary latte. Unfortunately we couldn't manage to track the place down before we had to give up in a fit of pique. We made our way to the ocean as we headed home, and though we were wet, cold, and under caffeinated we could still take some interest in the Paillon River flooding out into the Mediterranean and staining a section of it an unaccustomed brown, churned over by high and beautiful dark waves.

When the rain stopped the next day we went out before going to an afternoon movie showing of "Projet Dernier Chance", a pastime we used to do a lot in Saint Minneapolis in the 90's and now do again in France. The sun was fighting its way out and all the colors seemed to reemerge twice as strong for all it having been hidden by the rain.

I took four pictures at the beach, that I left as is from the camera, and they do or don't tell the story, depending on what the story is, just like this account.

Leave inquiries under doormat

 

For a sleepy Sunday, when it gets pretty quiet at clerkmanifesto, which is already in one of the deepest backwaters of the worldwide web, I thought I'd like to try and show you a picture of where it all happens. 

You found this place, which maybe gives you the mistaken idea that it is easy to end up here.

But look around.

Do you see anyone else?

Besides the fox and the skunk and that one comment eleven days ago.

Exactly.

And with my work done for the day, I head back to the Belle Epoque for some cheese.

Some cat

 

No, there is no picture of a cat today. I'm going to tell you a story.

In this busy city I see many people. They are very interesting. I like best when they are from everywhere and not just French, which is more true the closer one gets to the water here. Japanese American German Syrian Indian Senegalese Chinese, beggers, rich people, people falling apart in wheel chairs, young people, working people, old people, and people bursting with life! It is amazing.

I also see a lot of dogs, and they are largely well behaved and interesting too! I see pigeons, who I am very fond of, and seagulls, who are dazzling expressions of the wind. And less often, if I am very, very lucky, I run into a cat.

Today I saw a cat!

Yes yes yes yes, big deal, I saw a cat. There are lots of cats. And I would grudgingly accept your tepid, non cat obsessed view of the universe, and move on to complain about cars or something, but...

BUT

This was some cat.

If this cat knew a spider, the spider might weave a web that spelled out "Some Cat!".

But the literary spiderweb would have mostly been confusing because this cat was on the move! If you saw the web in the corner of a building saying "Some Cat!" you might look around and mutter "What cat?". 

Unless you read clerkmanifesto.

Which is why it is a good idea to read clerkmanifesto.

Tell your friends.

Let me set the scene:

My darling wife and I had morning business on the computer in our cozy little apartment. So we didn't get going until afternoon. We then had a few life supplies to pick up so we went and bought:

Toilet paper

Garbage bags

Sparkling water

Champagne

Tonic Water

A chocolate patisserie

These were heavy (well, not the patisserie, but it was delicate). So we decided we would stop home to drop them all off.

Also, and I'm sorry about this. It is crude. But I cannot hide it from you:

We had to pee.

But when we got home we were hungry, so we made lunch.

I had potatoes, onion, fennel, with very aged gouda. And then we were feeling very cozy indeed and not so keen to go out again. But we have an informal rule: go see the water every day! So we made a plan:

What if I took us out for a drink at the fabulous sidewalk cafe Verragno? And then we sat there drinking our drinks. Then we went to the water. Then we came home?

So we did.

Which sets our scene.

A table was available where we sit side by side on a short pedestrian street that goes but one block to the ocean. It is a pageant of humanity! We watched the people go by. We talked about stuff.

What stuff?

Wouldn't you like to know!

My darling wife had a rose'. I had a Campari Spritz. It was large and bitter. I like their strong spritzes at Verragno. They are seven euros during happy hour.

And then a pigeon landed in the road, or the pedestrian way. And we heard a great and terrible yowl.

What a yowl. I didn't think a pigeon could make such a noise, but it was definitely animal, not human.

The pigeon left hurriedly.

And that's when it happened.

The cat appeared.

With a terrible and discordant bellow, he strutted into view on the busy way, headed away from the ocean, into the city. He wore an astonishing necklace full of large diamonds. His coloring was unlike any I've ever seen on a housecat, more like that of a leopard, with sleek and dangerous brown ringed spots on a lighter fur background.

Some cat!

And he had business!

Without hesitating he walked on, ropey and sleek, yowling occasionally, never hesitating, and soon he was out of view, swallowed up in the crowds and noise and tumult of the Rue De France.

What on earth did we just see?

A cat.

We finished our drinks and walked to the ocean.

We came home and I told you about it.

Welcome to my web.

Je parle francais

 

Je parle francais.

Tu parles francais?

Don't worry, there are things on your phone or computer that can translate that for you.

I speak French!

But no one understands me when I do.

I understand French!

But not when other people speak it.

This creates some tricky situations. One of my favorites is the "everyone knows the easy part" conundrum. Like I'm talking with a French person who speaks as much English as I speak French. Maybe we're not understanding each other. I can say some part okay in French, but not enough to communicate the whole thing. They say a bunch of French, and then, seemingly triumphantly, they say the same thing I said in French, with great empahsis, in English.

Here. How about this to explain. Say the emergency room person is directing us to walk to another hospital. They'll say: 

"Vous devez aller bien au-dela de l'endroit ou la rue est defoncee, ignorer le mendiant agressif, puis tourner a droite."

I don't know about you, but I can understand way, way better reading French than hearing French, but either way this has too many odd words and I'd be lost even then. Spoken? I can only clearly understand the end of that where the person says "Then you go right" (puis tourner a droite). And so it is uniquely disappointing when the French person, as if they're super helpful, adds to their long incomprehensible string of French, a bit of slow English, "You... go... right... there."

Yes, that was the part I got.

But okay, they speak a bit of English. Maybe we can muddle through. So I ask, reaching deep "Ou je dois aller a droite?" Which means 'where do I go right?' except I think the syntax might be bad on that. And the person, now frustrated that after all their copious English I still don't understand, says in an irritated tone ""Vous devez aller bien au-dela de l'endroit ou la rue est defoncee, ignorer le mendiant agressif, then   you    go     right!" 

So we head off.

"Merci, au revoir. Bonne journee." We say.

"Goodbye." They respond. "Have a nice day!"

The lovely Chagall Museum cafe and I mean it this time!

 

I can't manage to go to the Chagall Museum near here without mentioning how pretty I find their garden cafe. But last time we went to it, and I tried to show you a picture of the cafe, I was distracted by a cat there, so I ended up showing you a picture I made of the cat, just emerging from behind a big tree in front of the cafe. 

I didn't show you the cafe at all.

Today we rectify that!

I have been working my little heart out with my layers of drawing and effects and I'm thinking I might buy a drawing tablet to make this easier, maybe, a little. Or I might buy one to at least give me a little more control since I am not great at drawing with a mouse!

Anyway...

Is today's picture every bit as good as those by Marc Chagall?

Hmmmm.

I guess I'm not as vain as I once was.

No.

No no no no no.

But you knew that.

Still, that doesn't mean that we might nevertheless like looking at it. 

And it even has the cat!

On the promenade at night

 

I don't know how you get to the secret city.

Down on the Promenade Anglais the sun is bright even in the pouring rain. This city is pretty with all its makeup and nice clothes. But it also smells like pee and cracks run through every inch of it. So I took a picture later in the night than we usually manage to be out. The Carnaval wall was still up along the beach, but it was a quiet night. It had the nice look of a wrong turn in Venice. I wanted to get a picture, but in the darkness it didn't seem likely.

I managed to smuggle this one out.

I think this place looks better just as it really is.

My favorite park

I'm afraid my Belle Epoque city lacks for parks. Maybe because it has wonderfully long, and sometimes astonishing promenades, like the famous one along the ocean, or the long parkway that covers over the Paillon River right through the heart of the city, and then as well because it has the lovely Castle Hill with its waterfall in the sky towering at its edge, maybe my city doesn't feel like much is required in the way of parks. But I do have a feeling of a lacking green space in this dense thrall of people and restaurants, bakeries and offices, grand buildings and gelaterias. This city is just so popular, and teeming with humanity, that when it finds space, it defaults to open places and wide paths, and they all quickly fill with people too. Aside from the ocean, glorious, but at a remove, this is a hard place to feel like one is walking through nature, or really even has much to do with it.

It is a mild complaint, and I have bigger ones, because... that's my nature, but after a few months of living here, I feel it. We have small parks here, gated, locked at night, on small single city blocks. The good ones have a fountain at the center, with a nice sculpture. A wide path circles around said sculpture a little as if it is meandering about through trees and greenery, but, let's face it, these places are never big enough for meandering. The path is short, wide, full of well used benches, and streets and people are always close by.

But even though this is all true, there is one park, not all that much bigger than the others I've declaimed, and not functionally so very different, that I am growing to love anyway.

But maybe I didn't have to start this post with a rundown about how there aren't enough parks I love here? I could have just said:

There is a delightful little park here, not far down the street from us. It has some grand old trees and a magnolia that is just finishing its blooming of pale violet and white flowers even as I write. And though this park has several different interesting large sculptures, its central fountain takes the prize. I don't know what prize that is, maybe one for serenity?  The sculpture sits in a large, lovely pool with a darling asymmetrical fall in it. Its central figure is a woman holding her knees, head bowed against them in sadness. 

Everytime I see this sculputre I think "That's exactly how I feel sometimes."

Occasionally I even think "That's how I feel now." 

I think I may eventually come to think of this city as one of impossibly lovely sadness.

I have taken a lot of pictures of this main fountain and now, over the last two days, I have made one of my sketches of it. I don't know if I've done it justice. I may even try again sometime.

City falling apart

 

This city is falling apart.

It's also a city in great shape.

Money pours through this city. Though as money does, it flows unevenly, surging through its open veins while other arteries are completely blocked. Grand and detailed, expensive repair jobs scramble to maintain buildings on every street. Meanwhile buildings in some of the most sought after locations in the country seem to be hanging on by a thread, with walls peeling and post apocalyptic shutters hanging outside of every crumbling window.

Which, by way of introduction, is a little of what I tried to photograph today. 

And though maybe these are merely an indulgence in abstract photography, some working better than others, they are also an opportunity taken from the old city here, where what sometimes looks perfectly and charmingly maintained is really built from 300 years of crude, but effective, patch jobs. And as I took these pictures, looking closely at window frames and walls, no new repair seemed to have ever entirely occluded the old ones, and most of the new ones had a clock already ticking on the due date for the next.