Home again, home again?

View of Mt. Rainier as I waited in SeaTac for my flight to Frankfurt

The mountain "was out," as Pacific Northwesterners put it, for my departure from Olympia last Tuesday.

I was homeward bound again...or was I leaving home?

I have spent every summer in Olympia for 11 years now, and somehow those 5 to 6 week stays always seem like about half of my year.

This year, I'm experiencing something new: coming home alone. My husband and eldest daughter are travelling in New York City; my youngest daughter is enjoying the Côte d'Azur and Barcelona with friends.

I was not so happy about this state of affairs when I had to drag my tired self and lug two suitcases from Toulouse-Blagnac to Rodez, but settling in with no particular demands on my time has been nice.

It has, at least, given me time to toy with the idea of getting back to writing on this blog.

On defining this space and taking (another) break

After a blast of NaBloPoMo at the beginning of the month, I have once again grown weary of blogging.

Part of my problem is that I haven't really defined this new blogging space. I wanted to get away from La France Profonde because all of the underlying "an American in rural France" imagery just wasn't me.

I thought opening up possible vistas in a new blog would fling the windows of inspiration wide open.

It hasn't happened yet, and I suspect it won't now until my summer holiday comes and I have the time to get the architecture of this blog set up a little better.

I also think I need some sort of underlying concept, because blogging without boundaries just leaves me with too many decisions to make at the end of what are already long, busy days.

Until then, I'll no doubt see you on another nearby social network.

Wordless Wednesday

Dropping out...

I'm sorry tut-tut.

This month's NaBloPoMo was always a "maybe" kind of thing, and now I'm thinking "maybe not."

Rodez by (museum) night

Musée Denys-Puech

(All photos courtesy of Thierry Jouanneteau)

My husband and I went to quite the lovely event last night: La Nuit Européenne des Musées.

It's an annual do, but we hadn't attended it for a few years.

We ran into some old friends

We used to go to the Musée Denys-Puech often with the girls when they were little ones. It was a suitable outing for rainy Sundays, and at the time, was Rodez's only functioning museum. (Musée Fenaille was closed for remodeling for years.)

"Post rock" among the menhirs

The principle of La Nuit des Musées is not only to open for free on a Saturday night, but also to provide various types of entertainment inside the establishments. We got in on the tail end of a concert in the Musée Fenaille's stunning inner courtyard.

It was a great evening: we started it out with a light dinner at one of our favorite Rodez eateries, the wine and tapas bar La Gargouille.

We ran into some old friends.

And we finished up with a photo-taking stroll through centre ville.

Signs of Aveyron in Paris

Whenever I go to Paris for work, I go to at least one café or restaurant.

And not always, but often, I see a sign of Aveyron there.

People say that there are more Aveyronnais living in Paris than in Aveyron, and I suspect that this is true.

Many of them work in the catering industry now, and some are major players.

Poverty forced their ancestors to leave their homeland, al pais.

They started as bougnats and worked their way up through the ranks of deliverymen for drink companies, then café workers, then managers, then owners...

I always feel a little at home when I see posters like this on the wall of a restaurant in la capitale.

Wordless Wednesday, one day late due to technical difficulties