Adventures Abroad: March 2005

Stuart, our helper, taking apart Jeff's boat rack.

Too much work

We counted the days left to get everything done and figured out what had to be finished and simple math told us that we just couldn't do it all. We asked Stuart if we could hire his hands for the day. We were pretty tacky asking him to bring tools too - we discovered that we had packed them all. Didn't even have a hammer or screwdriver. Wait! we found one in Jeffrey's sailing box.
So Stuart showed up with a hammer and a chainsaw. After about 30 minutes, the chainsaw was no longer chaining and no longer sawing. We called Fr. John L. to see if he had one and his chainsaw was no longer chaining. What to do? Call Pat of course. He has everything; the best toys! So I called Pat and his first question was, "Do you need a big one or a small one?" Yay Pat!

Pat to the rescue

More photos of the new place - Bedrooms

There is plenty of room for you to visit. Make your plans now! As you can see, we have 3 bedrooms in our new place. Kate just decided to spend a year abroad in Rome. That's pretty exciting, she can even come home on the weekends! She will be closer to us in Rome than she is at college here in the states.

the carpeted room for the bunk beds

The Jeff-bed room

The Master bedroom

The bathrooms in our new place

More pictures from our new apartment. Two bathrooms are side by side. I call them "his" and "hers". They are small, but one has a shower, the other has a tub. I like that.

"His"

The bathrooms - hers?

This is the bathroom with a tub. It also has a shower head, so I will hang a shower curtain. Yes, that is a bidet. The bathroom has been completely refurbished, all new fixtures, new tile, and very clean. Much nicer than the picure shows.

"Hers"

The kitchen at our new place

For those who don't believe me when I say that the kitchen only has a sink in it, see for yourself. Very strange for us, but it seems the norm in France. Apartments come like this one, or "equipped" (I guess that means with a stove), or they are described as "american". That means they have a stove, oven, and refridgerator. One apartment that we saw even had the wine rack built in. Seems less American, and more French to me, to have the built-in wine rack. And only one apartment that we saw had a dishwasher. The first order of business will be to buy appliances. That really isn't so bad because we can get what we really want.

our kitchen, fully equipped with a sink

Sealing the container. Almost full.

All packed and ready to go!

I just noticed how pretty the yard looks!

The garbage truck shows up too!

Looking inside the container

Will it all fit?

We got a 20 ft container to ship all our stuff. Those packer/mover guys really know how to do this. It's like putting together a jigsaw puzzle so that everything fits in there. There's not much for us to do while they are working. I pulled weeds in the flower beds to stay busy and keep my mind off of the "Are we nuts?" question.

More stuff... this is "to sea"

Movin' on

The trash... so much of it!

The trash!

You wouldn't believe how much trash we generated through all this. Just empying the fridge took a few bags. The refridgerator, washer and dryer, and a chest of drawers went to Liz's brother. Oh, he also took our old bed and I threw in a lamp too. I was very grateful that he came with a trailer and Kevin and that they got the job done.

the crate-building crew

Crating

There were a few things that couldn't just be stored or moved without a crate. The china cabinet was one of them so a special crew came by to make a crate for the cabinet. Pretty interesting job.

The weather has been really nice during all of this. No rain. Really cool weather. It's not over yet though; still lots more to do.

getting it ready

It is really happening

We are back home now. The packers came on Monday. Too much work for me. The packers showed up and worked faster than I could get through things. Every single thing had to have a decision - sea or store. That is what they would ask me. At the end of the day, my brain would not function anymore. Paul wanted a beer, so we went to the neighborhood bar and we were the only ones in there at that time of the day. Crawfish were boiling outside.... mmmm mmmm ... it was tempting to stay but I was just simply too tired.

All packed and ready to go

The storage van and our container

order will come from all this chaos

Dinner with Alain

We went to dinner with a patent attorney who works in Solaize where Paul will be working. He is a patent attorney who lived in D.C. for three years so his English is pretty good. He also understands that our French doesn't come easy just yet. I asked him how he learned English and it was the same story I have heard many times..... He took English in school and thought he knew it but once in America, he quickly realized just how little he knew. What helped him the most? Watching Star Trek.

He drove us to a really nice restaurant named "West" (in English), a brasserie run by Paul Beacous (a very famous French chef) . It was very large with a big-screen TV, a bar, and large crowds too. Tres chic! I have discovered that it doesn't matter what you order to eat because it is all good.

Alain was very interesting and had a lot of good advice for us. I wish we had talked to him about things before we decided where to live, but surprisingly our apartment is located in the area near his, so I guess it's OK.

Yesterday I decided I wanted to try to re-wire a lamp to see if we could do that instead of buy all new lamps. I like my lamps. So I asked Alain about doing that. He wasn't sure about what we should ask for in the store (he obviously hasn't re-wired any lamps lately) so he aske the waiter. Of course, the waiter must have thought we were nuts, but he did tell us where to go and how to ask for a re-wiring kit. Something to ask Pat F. when we get back.

During dinner, I suddenly heard familiar music at a table near us. They were playing Happy Birthday (yes the American Happy Birthday - the one WE aren't allowed to sing or play in a restaurant because of music rights). Those French are so American!

looking out the front entry door

See our place

If you notice the red sign hanging on the window of the apartment on the second floor (actually it is the first floor over there) and if you could read the sign, you would see that it is for rent. Well, not anymore, because we rented it. But that is the place. It is pretty cool being on the point of the building. The sign is hanging out of our living room window. The bedroom windows face the more quiet street on the left. Below the apartment is our bank. Well, it's not OUR bank, but the one where we have an account with no money in it. How convenient is that? There is a Land Rover dealer next door, and a Jaguar dealer down from that. And for Jeffrey and friends, there is a sushi place just around the corner.