We started off the New Year with a delicious dinner of Chicken Dijon, Garlic Potatoes and Steamed Buttered Brocolli. Simple crisp white wine along with a good talk of what we personally hoped for this coming year. Good health and generally shorter-length travels. It is becoming difficult to do more than 12 days (14 with travel) in a row, such long tours, requiring goodly blocks of time and crack of dawn schedules, are probably going to be more rare this year. As much as we’ve traveled in the last 7 years, what we haven’t really seen has been the interior of France. So, we have decided to focus on the train travel that we can do within, which will easily be met with a series of one week jaunts.
The month, overall, was very cold, some days with wind chill factors came in at 20- 25° F. It rained a lot but also snowed a few days as well. Dark days required me to pull out the SAD light for myself. Stews and soups were still the go-to meals. We actually got 6 Christmas cards and a couple of those cards arrived before the holiday. It takes 2 to 3 weeks to get mail from the US. It has been 1 or 2 Christmas cards in the past. so this was a really nice surprise. We used to send cards but not always happy with our choices here in English, we’ve turned to Ecards which have some animated ones that we really like.
No travel this month so not much to talk about but boy-oh-boy, let’s begin with the email message from our landlord:
It’s amazing how quickly your brain processes some things. My heart stopped, several scenarios flashed before my eyes – visa revoked, savings depleted for a lawyer for the court case, losing said court case, spending time behind bars. Oh, yes. My brain may move as fast as a three-legged ant when it comes to learning French but it took off like the Roadrunner in a Wile-E-Coyote cartoon, faced with the threat of a police arrest. Opening the email, we have this image:
Apparently supporting a protest, this banner was hung and the police were making an inquiry regarding the residents (that would be us) at this address (which they had as ours). Fortunately Fabrice recognized the building and the banner as it is easily seen outside the window of his office. He steered them to the correct address, thus saving us from having to answer questions regarding a banner that we couldn’t make heads or tails of. I thought it had to do with the Christmas Market or festival. It was actually a plea to Santa to remove immigrants who, according to this banner, were rapists and criminals. G being the librarian down to his soul, decided to check the statistics on the criminal activity but found that there was no official system in France for tracking what nationality was responsible, foreign or not, for any crimes. Much like the podcasts in the US loaded with factual errors and immigrant-blame, any group identification linked to crimes was pure speculation. Both interesting and frightening.
Back to our problem, it would have been extremely difficult to translate “We only hung boughs and lights on our balcony for the holidays” into French, for police at our door and given my lack of success, we’d be back to paying out our savings to a lawyer for a court case. If I’m going to speculate on anything, it might be that French prison could possibly have better food than most, not that I have any first-hand knowledge. But hey, if I’m going to make stuff up – that subject may be worth my time and efforts.
Apparently, the group that put up the banner, Collectif NĂ©mĂ©sis, is a far-right, anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant, ‘feminist’ organization that some have characterized as more racist, transphobic and xenophobic than pro-women. We’re glad we didn’t get involved in that !
Next on the agenda was G going to a sleep apnea study overnight at a nearby hospital. Good news is he doesn’t have it and better news, they fed him dinner and then breakfast the following morning. He sent pictures of all the wires and probes on the bed that they stuck all over him and the meals he was served. He said the coffee was great!
We turned our attention to getting the next door studio up to some decent quality for incoming February visitors. The windows, we had already covered in gauze curtain panels and tied silk faux ivy to the outside bars, to hide the incredibly ugly view of the outside vents covered in pigeon droppings. But the windows had privacy curtains from the previous occupant that hung 2 feet longer than needed, heaped, dragging on the floor. A quick iron on hemming tape took care of that issue. G also put up a shelf over the sparse clothes rack for the bed linens. Stick on towel hooks went in the bathroom, a clock and a couple of art pieces went in the kitchen which was then outfitted with the bare minimum of cookware, utensils, plates and an electric teapot – oh and the all important wine opener. Certainly not the Ritz but a bit more welcoming than a Motel 6. Lastly I stuck a prominent note warning guests that the bedroom had NO privacy – all can be easily seen from the adjacent apartments, including the bathroom, which is why the previous tenant threw on privacy curtains in haste which were 2 feet too long. He did that (I’m speculating here) after I informed Fabrice that he might want to let the tenant know we could see him running around nude, including toilet trips. No one wants to see that and we were sure he didn’t want to show it either. The curtains went up one day after I passed that information on to Fabrice. So, back to the studio, the addition of teas, wine, cheeses in the fridge and ice in the freezer, we were ready. Some before and after shots follow.
The Christmas Market rides continued through the month before they broke them down on the 21st. It’s always nice to see the plazas opened up again. With the cold weather continuing, no language classes on the calendar, I turned to baking again since the neighbors and friends enjoy the finished products. One week I made a persimmon bread and the next I made a spiced Anjou pear bread – got lots of thumbs up for them both.
This month also marked the transition of the Grand Place (Place du Général de Gaulle), here in our neighborhood, to ban all cars from the square. Vehicles still have access for delivery and for underground parking, but this multi-year transition has been happening in Lille Centre with the addition of more green spaces, landscaping and bike lanes. It’s a welcome change for us walkers.
We had a change over in upstair’s neighbors and invited the new ones down along with Simon, who has lived there the longest and was leaving at the end of the month. They are bright, intelligent students and we had a great time hanging out for a couple of hours. When the subject of troublesome roommates came up, I regaled them with a few tricks I’d learned from friends in college. They were laughing, surprised at the idea of making a roommate miserable enough to move on. Ingenuity in problem-solving, at its best.
The last week of the month played out with cold, windy days and we started gathering tax documents, another sign that we were finishing up January. Unfortunately we were notified that our expected February visitors had to cancel their trip due to passport restrictions. They were short of the required buffer of 6 months before their next renewal. It was quite a blow since it is G’s buddy from high school days and his wife. Wonderful company, we had the pleasure of meeting them in the US six years previously. Hopefully the day will come when they can try again to pass our way.
Finally on the 30th, we were treated to a wonderful dinner party held by Bret and Caren and six other guests. With the variety resulting in a delightful blend of Spanish, French and English conversation that included one and all. There was enough food to feed the Ottoman Empire starting with an endless charcuterie palette of meats, nuts, cheeses and fresh vegetables. There was a wonderful large shrimp cocktail bowl, stuffed garlicky mushroom caps and a brocolli cheddar soup with salt & pepper baguette. We’re just sorry not to think of taking pictures of the huge menu until after we’d decimated most of the food but I snuck in a sad picture of the remains of a mixed-berry crumble that was served with vanilla ice cream – (which like all of it was utterly delicious – trust me if there’d been any more room, that would have been gone too) and then one shot of the group as it was winding down with the last glass of wine. We went home happily satiated. It was a wonderful evening to end the cold, grey month !
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