Carla Bruni Next Door?????

About a week ago I got a message from the young British lady who watches our cats and apartment whenever we travel, that Carla Bruni (the very pregnant wife of Nicholas Sarkozy AKA the French President) was going to have her baby at the Clinique Muette which is the Obstetric Hospital right next door. She was wrong but evidently had seen a news report where Carla's father told the reporter that she was going to have her baby there.

This is the same place previously mentioned here that is SO different than American hospitals in that there is no loading dock nor is there any parking which means that everything either coming or going IE: trash, expectant mothers, supplies, etc. goes through the front door. The news reports also all state that the Clinic has undergone a facelift in preparation for the arrival of the president's wife which led us all to wonder what it was like before and why it needed to be so updated..........*

Needless to say we currently live amidst hoards of paparazzi and media folks including television crews who've staked the clinic out hoping to scoop each other when Carla arrives and perhaps even sneak in and get exclusive photos and film of her in labor and pushing the baby out. It's already a narrow one way through street and this has made it even weirder and more congested.

I doubt if this will make the news in the US but if she does have her baby here you'll all know that it was right next door to our apartment building and we have a birds-eye view of the street where all of the vultures await her arrival.

Love to all!

A bientot,

Sid

Aperock Purveyors Gig, New Dryer, October And Missing A Reunion

September 22nd my band Purveyors such as it is these days played a small bar in the 11th called Aperock Cafe with our new friend, the amazing Andy Guthrie who doesn't really need us but he sure made what we do sound amazing.... It was the first time I'd played in a Parisian bar since 1977 so it was really cool for me. Most of the Parisians were somewhat nonplussed by us but we had a blast as you can see in the photo here which has all of us in motion and that was the way of it the entire evening. Honestly, we didn't much notice who was there for most of the night until the end of the show.

Veiled threats offered as "wolf tickets" to the management company who gets paid by Cassie's company for our apartment here in the 16th and who manages the apartment for the absentee owner, finally produced a new clothes dryer after over 100 days without one and constant foot dragging by everyone concerned save us. The implied threat involved withheld money in substantial amounts finally produced the desired result although it was unfortunate that it had to come to that. So it goes managing things here in France.... We DO love living here and there are many things the French do really well but customer service usually isn't one of them unfortunately.

This month in fact yesterday evening there was a 1971 St. Joe class reunion in Atlanta that I missed but helped out a bit with a bunch of music in MP3 form which I hope added to the festivities. I fondly remember the reunion I attended in 2006 that was really really fun for me and served as a huge reconnect with a whole bunch of folks I hadn't seen in many decades. I wish I could have been at the one last night but did see photos on Facebook today that made me smile. I need to get back in touch with as many of them as I can in the future. It's nice to reconnect and I love seeing those folks. I hope they do it again soon so I can attend.....*

Love to all everywhere....*

Sid