I just love this sculpture of Louis Armstrong by Nikki de St. Phalle in front of the Hotel Negresco in Nice. I didn't have my camera with me last year when we passed this so I was really pleased to get a picture this year.



Louis Armstrong

This is another painting I did in France. I gave this one to Maureen and Roland and just got the picture I took of it back today.



Cassis

Now playing around with Photoshop....this is tremendous fun!
This is the same photo only with a "patchwork" effect.

Playing around with my digital camera


Camus in Beaconhill Park

When we were waiting for the train back to Carqueiranne from Paris I bought this really cool lightweight (about one ounce) digital camera called an "Espion". It's designed to be a keychain. Richard is over for Easter and got it working for me. It can even do little mini videos. These are some of the first pix he took just fooling around with it in the house. It was pretty cheap....69 Euros so I'm pleased it is taking such good pictures. I wanted something very lightweight to always have with me so I can take pix of things for painting.

What I've been reading over the past two months.

"A Whistling Woman" by A.S. Byatt
Quite good and went back to telling a gripping story like in Possession along with all the usual heavy intellectual musings (the good story made all that easier to take). Seemed like things were going to end very very badly but it just ended somewhat badly and wasn't as dark as it could have been. Hope and salvation came through an 11 yr. old boy who managed to see more clearly than others. Interesting that Byatt had a son who died at age 11 - a very black time in her life as one can imagine.

"The House in Paris" by Elizabeth Bowen
Really quite intriguing, somewhat like Henry James. She set the reader up very cleverly...you really wanted to keep reading. In university I felt Henry James was pretty hard slogging. Perhaps I should give him another try now.

"The Magician's Assistant" by Ann Patchett
A very enjoyable read although the ending left me somewhat dissatisfied. I also felt the same way in Bel Canto.

"House of Splendid Isolation" by Edna O'Brien
Very interesting Irish writer and managed to present both sides of the conflict well. I look forward to reading more of her work.

"The Man in the Queue" & "The Singing Sands"
by Josephine Tey
These light little mysteries were just perfect to pass the time on the plane.

I think I've contacted most people who read this blog but just to let anyone I've missed know that we decided to scrub the Louisiana job. After we arrived home Jim received word he received a SSHRC research grant over the next three years to do the Huxley letters project and couldn't keep it if he went to the US. Too good a deal to refuse and we were having second thoughts about the upheaval moving to Louisiana anyway. I think we've made the right decision. The grant allows for lots of subsidized travel to various research libraries in L.A., New York, Houston, Brussels, and England. I think Alexandria could have been a reasonably nice community but already it's 80 degrees with high humidity, severe thunderstorms, and a dangerous storm warning with possible tornados...I don't think so!

One other painting I did while in France.



Pine tree from below

The second to last painting I did in France. My last one was of Cassis which I gave to Maureen and Roland when they were visiting. I have a picture of it and will post that when I get them developed.



Twisted Pines

What...me worry? Perhaps we'll all have to resort to Absinthe to get through these trying times in the world today. I loved this poster and so glad I took a picture of it as I couldn't manage to buy one.

It is great to be home, even if it is 10 degrees and raining. Great to sleep in our own bed and wake up to the birds singing.

We had a wonderful time with Maureen and Roland the last few days we were in Carqueiranne and showed them our favourite places of Cassis and Sanary. We also introduced them to eating raw sea urchins...a big specialty in that area during the season of Jan - Mar. They didn't quite share our enthusiasm for these creatures ( the "hedgehogs" as Maureen called them!) but they did both agree the white wine of the Cassis area is very special.
Thanks again to Maureen and Roland for coming down to visit with us and bringing your "magic box"....a seemingly bottomless box that continued to produce goodies of food and drink all through the visit!

We spent our final two days in Nice basking in the sun, drinking pastis on the Promenade des Anglais and getting our last fill of fish soup and other Mediterranean specialties. Our flights home were long and tiring but good connections and everything on time. The fire alarm went off when we were in the international area of the Vancouver airport...was rather disconcerting (or perhaps not) as there seemed to be no question of letting people pass through customs and immigration without being checked properly. Caused quite a bit of havoc as the luggage shut down and we wondered if we would make our connecting flight to Victoria. Everything worked out in the end.

Back to reality seeing almost all airport employees wearing rubber gloves and to hear about all the anti Canadian sentiment from the US. One seems to be very away from all that in the south of France. I wasn't even sure what year it was when I went to fill out the customs forms....

We came back to an immaculate house, lawns cut, and with home made spaghetti sauce and bread waiting for us.
We are so lucky to have such fabulous renters...thank you, Lynne and Lloyd!