Tag Archives: Orléans

Three-teen!

19 June

(Photos)

I stayed the night in the apartment of Dominique who lives on the second floor (or first floor depending on how you count them).

Rise at 9 in the morning. Some of you are thinking “man, that’s sleeping pretty late” and others are thinking “damn, that’s still early”, but for my part I was thinking “not bad for no alarm clock and yet another late night”.

I went downstairs to Flo and Olivier’s apartment and Flo offered me some chocolate mousse for breakfast. Who would say no to that?

We walked through the streets of Orléans enjoying the sights and sounds. For my edification, Eric reenacted some of the route of Joan d’Arc while I clapped horse sounds. “You Brits; I will fuck you up!” She really said that.

I also noticed that the bicycles here are a different color than those rented in Toulouse. We stopped in to see a Canadian friend of Eric’s (from Montréal) (XXXXXX) of whom I neglected to shoot a picture. However, I did take a picture of the largest tub of crème fraîche I have ever seen.

We saw a wedding party spilling into the streets and having a grand time. There were also more preparations for music for the evening going on all around.

Floflo had to do some shopping or something equally important so Eric and I split off at some point. We met Galette (another Eric) et Domie (another though female Dominique) while walking about and hung with them until dinner time.

We ran into an ex-girlfriend of Eric’s brother named Frederique (better known as Puce) and talked with her for maybe twenty minutes. She was a bundle of kinetic energy and I liked her a lot. She went off to do her thing and we continued our ambling.

Later we met with Jean Paul Duché and toured his studio, taking time out to sample some of the last of the NW weed on the roof deck of the studio.

Finally, we walked back to chez Olivier et Florence to get ready for dinner out. That meant back to town for dinner at a restaurant specializing in fondue. One of the appetizers was a plate of breaded and fried tiny whole fish served with a sort of tartar sauce. I loved it. Flo refused to eat them because of the eyes. Sometimes I feel bad for Flo, but not very much (because I ate what she wouldn’t) and not very long.

I had a charcuterie plate for my fondue. You know how I feel about cured meats.

There was a problem with my pot as the torch had gone out. For a while there I felt like Jacques Tati fumbling about with my cheese being much less runny than everyone else’s and being very confused by the whole process. Eventually I realized what was not right and got it lit. Again the impossible became possible.

For desert, there was chocolate fondue though I opted for something like a lava cake with crème anglaise. Very yummy.

The music festival was already started when we finished dinner. We were four who broke off to pursue the tunage: Eric, Gallette, Dominique, et moi. Jazz was the order of the day. We watched some decent music during the day, but it was too cold as the evening set in to enjoy much of it and we ended up in bars.

We ran into FF (François Fougeroux friend of Dominique’s daughter Lisa). FF had a guitar and I played guitar and sang until proprietor asked as to stop for the sake of the neighbors as it was rather late and they didn’t have the proper license for music. I guess that was a kind of compliment.

I took a picture of this distinct cat a local graffiti artist painted (and paints all over the world) in this bar.

Then we played shut the box (12 tile version) and drank some tequila and rum drink until even later. Not requiring anything more, especially after the previous night, we went to another pub for beer. (I tried to pass but drank about 2/3 of a beer.)

Eric complained girls in Orleans were not as pretty as those in Toulouse, and it was probably true; but there was still plenty to see in the way of girls I could hardly call myself disappointed.

Eric became very excited to show us ‘something’ at the bar (remember, this is the town in which he grew up). So we went into this utterly black spiral stair well and began to climb. I have a little LED flashlight in my pocket (IT Nerd, at your service) and that was helpful as we four ascended the four flights of stairs winding up into the darkness to find:

An old washing machine.

Apparently this is not what he was expecting but I’ll be damned if any of us could understand what he was trying to say through all the laughter.

Not a bad day, all in all.

JamesIsIn