Frontignan

Welcome to "vacance" which of course is vacation in French. I'm currently in Frontignan la plage which is on the beach so to speak in far southern Provence near Montpelier but around 200 km from Aix. I'm here with my old friend Christine who's a bit like the Energizer Bunny and is the ever present tour guide and cheerleader when it looks like I might be getting a little too relaxed. When we arrived Saturday night the wind was howling at a brisk 35 kph pace and it was in the high 50s which is uncharacteristic for this time of year here. It's Thursday now and it's shaping up to be the first day that it's not going to rain since we arrived. No complaints though as I've seen a lot of the countryside (we rented a car) and have eaten lunch and dinner in some very nice restaurants sampling some really good seafood. Christine's house here is quite nice and very new but there is still work taking place here and I've been a little in the center of that too while here this week. Fortunately that's starting to wind down and this Saturday we travel up into the hills around here to visit some friends of Christine's that I will probably end up playing for Saturday evening.

I've attempted to do some writing here but the lighting in the apartment we're staying in which is downstairs is poor in the evening and that has made it difficult for me to focus. Other things have entered into that too but I'm letting them go. I have played some since getting here but never ventured in DADGAD which is something I very much want to do eventually. I'm also preparing here for our show in Chevagny on the 15th with our friends Fred and Claudia and Xavier. We'll be in Burgundy for that entire week which should be a better place for me to write.

I'm still very much enjoying being surrounded by the French with all of their drama and nuance which still pleases me very much even when I should be annoyed by it all. This is the most time I have spent with Christine and she is marvelous as I remember her but also quite vulnerable and I've reminded her a lot since getting here that she's fine and needs to concentrate more on first things first and not try to do everything all at once. Like it is for all of us, sometimes when we continually wring our hands about things we can and can't control everything usually works out in spite of that.

I head back to Paris on the TGV (high speed train.....WOW, 300 kph) Monday afternoon and then will be home for a week until Cassie and the twins return from their USA sojourn. I intend on doing some writing and recording that week also. Christine is and will remain a great friend of mine and this has been a good escape for me from the crowded and polluted streets of Paris. I will endeavor to post again before leaving on Monday.

I did however turn Christine on to Cassie and my current favorite show "Falling Skies" last night which she enjoyed hugely and we'll continue watching this weekend so she's up to date with it. Ah, American TV, just can't seem to live without it!

Hope everyone is well and happy wherever you happen to be.

Love to all everywhere and bonne vacance!

A bientot,

Sid

The Dryer and Vacance.......*

Bonjour pilgrims,

After another extended absence (I know I keep promising not to do that....) I'm back this morning. Cassie and the twins left for the US Thursday morning and I leave for Frontignan in the South of France this afternoon to spend a little over a week there on the beach and in that area with my old friend Christine Holtzbauer who will be helping my write my book about my experiences with the twins in the schools which even on a slow day is quite a story. Christine is who talked me into doing this (I'm NOT a professional writer) and she wants to translate it into French in hopes that it might help others who have similar family situations to ours here. From what I know, France is about 25 years behind just about everyone else on all things that have to do with Autism and frankly, if our sons had been here when they started school they would have been lost in the system immediately. In any event, it should be an interesting 9 days.
Will keep everyone posted as to when and where the book will be published.

There is a really nice young British lady who will be tending to the cats while I'm gone which leaves me with little or no worry to take the trip. Of course even being at the beach will be interesting for me as I'm not supposed to be out in the sun very much so I'm curious how that's going to go. I will endeavor to post again while there and hopefully also post a couple of photos.

The photo above was taken on July 14th (Bastille Day) from a friend's apartment terrace in Saint Germaine but the camera I was using didn't have a wobble fix. It's the Tour Eiffel with fireworks going off around it.

We've been without a clothes dryer now for over a month and have had 3 repair persons come over the last 3 weeks all of who brought parts none of which ever fixed the dryer. Of course now they won't be back until vacance is over. Perhaps we will never have a dryer again while living here. There's no telling.

My illness is pretty much the same although it's migrated to other parts of my body which I will not share today. Needless to say I'm living with it but as life partners go I'd just as soon murder this one......*

Try and stay cool wherever you are. It's been an unnaturally cool Summer here with temps primarily in the high 60s the last 2 weeks and that won't be topping 75 even over the next 10 days. Fall arrives here in August......

Please keep the folks in Norway in your thoughts today and be happy wherever you are.

Love to all,

Sid

Happy Independence Day (But We're Still Not Free.......*)

Of course we all hear about things like this but we never think it will actually happen to us. Americans are famous for this and almost always slow to react until something bad happens to them personally. For those of you that read this blog, you know that in February of this year I was hospitalized for 9 days of intense invasive testing to rule out any damage to my internal organs due to my contracting Dermatomyositis which is a 10 on anyone's "Weirdshitometer".

My health insurance is courtesy of Carefirst Blue Cross out of Maryland through a contract with Cassie's company.

When one accesses health care in the US we pay a co-pay and then whichever entity we got service from would submit the claim for insurance reimbursement whereas here in France with American insurance, WE have pay CASH and THEN WE HAVE TO SUBMIT THE INVOICES FOR REIMBURSEMENT. Soon after that with Carefirst, the debasement and begging begins as we try and get reimbursed for the literally thousands of dollars we have out of pocket for my continued healthcare here. Let's just say that Carefirst has outdone themselves in elevating their "process" to the point that even their own customer service reps can't get answers from their various divisions none of which share information with each other to the point that even their own executives are sandbagged. Not sure how many of you have ever had over $6800.00 in doctors fees out all at once without reimbursement for over 120+ days but I'll bet you'd be hurtin if that happened to you. Once a company like Carefirst get's a hold of your claim you can just about kiss that money goodbye. The mistake that I made was to get sick in France.

Personally, I have never been so marginalized and that's after stints in both the Army and Navy.
So, even though it's American Independence Day, the Founding Fathers never could have imagined that they'd founded an entire nation held hostage by the insurance companies.

The longer I'm alive and see single payer systems in other countries first hand (IE: France) I become even more convinced that the words "profit" and "healthcare" = OXYMORON. Any thinking person knows that anytime the word profit is used humans get either hurt or ignored while the bottom line is worshiped.

So, I wish all of you fellow American hostages a happy Independence Day but with the caveat that if you're not living in a country with a single payer healthcare system you're actually enslaved in the grand tradition of the southern plantation owners and worse from our country's long and checkered history courtesy of insurance companies that are not checked at all by our government. Those of you who may disagree haven't yet had to debase yourselves enough but mark my words......your day is coming.........although I wish I could say that it won't.

Love to all everywhere......*

Sid

London And OMG Are You Kidding Me?

Bonjour Pilgrims......

Last week we spent an amazing long weekend in London and everyone had a great time but WOW was it expensive. Don't worry, no specifics here but let's just say that beers were regularly over 7 pounds (roughly $12.00) and that's for one beer.
We toured The Globe Theater and The Tate Modern Gallery as well as the National Gallery off Trafalgar Square. We also toured the Tower of London and saw the Crown Jewels there and Saturday we spent the entire day in Greenwich and toured the Royal Naval College and went up the hill to the Observatory where the International Date Line is and had lunch up there. It was a beautiful day in fact all of the days we were there were really nice save for the last one which was breezy and cool but we weren't sight seeing that day and just loaded up and went to the train station for lunch and a little light shopping before we caught the Euro-Star back to Paris. Pretty cool to be traveling by train under the English Channel at 300 kph. 2 hours and 15 minutes to Paris from London. Now that's civilization even if it cost a fortune.

The latest on my continuing medical adventure is that the holes in my hands I'd mentioned in the past were actually infections which I'm now undergoing another BIG anti-biotic course of treatment for. Other than that, I'm still taking lots of drugs, and sleeping fitfully but overall doing well. Hopefully as the Summer progresses I'll continue to improve or at least get to a place where managing this disease becomes more routine.

We have more travel planned for this Summer which includes a visit back home for Cassie, Kian and Niall, but like I did back in the 70s, I plan on staying here for the duration as everyone or anyone who might want to see me knows where I am so I hope they decided to visit. If not, I'll catch up with them a couple of years down the line. I truly AM loving living in Paris and the EU even with the foibles that come with that. I'm blessed with a great family and friends here as well as back home. Hopefully one day everyone else will post to this blog besides me but until then you're stuck with me.

Love to all everywhere!

A bientot,

Sid

Ferraris In The Streets And Bugs All Over My Skin

Ahhhhh to have Ferrari's in the streets where one lives........* I know it's been forever since the last blog entry. Hmmmmmmmm, where to begin......... It's been quite busy with guests coming and going, doctor follow up visits, elevators going offline for 2 months, and the never ending day to day navigation of any and all things French here. In the last 2 months, the twins have gotten their Carte de Sejours (French Green Cards) which took 3 different visits (one to the OFII at Bastille and two the main Prefecture de Police at Ile de le Cite) that spanned 6 weeks from start to finish. Learning to interface with Blue Cross on our mounting medical bills that needed insurance reimbursement and the labyrinth of silliness that entails. A "possibly" compromised Carte Blue (ATM Card) that involved several lengthy discussions with French bankers who sort of spoke English that led to spontaneous Abbot and Costello "Who's On First" routines with no resolution at all. A lecture from a new neighbor about how the twins running up and down the steps were ruining the carpets. Cassie availing herself of the SOS Medicines service which is one of the coolest things we've found here that when one is sick, they call the SOS Medicine phone number, do a short interview on what your symptoms are and in an hour a doctor makes a house call at your home for 70 euros. That's another one in your eye TEA Party morons.......* Cassie DID stop for a week during that time and dodged a major bronchitis and possible pneumonia. Plans are in the works for vacation this Summer and the twins are taking the Summer off from college to travel with us.
Our cleaning lady ditched us and now the twins and I are back at it again just like home. I start my first paying mastering job with an American country band from Berlin called Modern Earl this week which should be interesting but of course they're a great band.

Lastly, my disease Dermatomyositis is still very with me and is nowhere near receding into the background yet. Even on good days my skin feels like I have bugs crawling all over me and I have rashes over my torso, on my knees and elbows which I have various creams and lotions to apply that make me a bit more comfortable and fist-fulls of drugs I take every day that hopefully will take this irritating malady into remission. I wish I had more positive news on this. There are other things I could mention but won't as I have no desire to give too much energy to this. Suffice to say I'm following my doctors' orders and doing what I'm told.

Cassie took the photo of my with her new I-Phone last week as we were headed to dinner.

As always, I will endeavor to keep up with this blog better but sometimes it just doesn't work that way.

Love to all everywhere!

Sid

It's rare in anyone's life that they meet someone they're related to after almost an entire lifetime. Last week that happened for me when my 2nd cousin Bruce Boyd Raeburn came to visit with his wife Linda Carroll for a little over 4 days. Bruce's father Boyd "Albert" Raeburn was my Grandfather Hagan'
s sister's son and Boyd was a semi famous groundbreaking big band leader in the early 40s into the 1950s. I heard about his dad for decades from my father and actually heard some of the Boyd Raeburn Orchestra albums my dad had when I was quite young but wasn't smart enough to realize how cool what was actually happening on them. I didn't really explore Boyd Raeburn's music until we were living in Sioux City, IA, in the mid-90s when my dad's cousin Jim made me 15 cassette tapes of all of his old Boyd Raeburn albums. I was totally blown away and found out from Jim at the time the Boyd had a son named Bruce Boyd who was at Tulane University in New Orleans and who ran the Hogan Jazz Archive there. Bruce has a PHD in History but also plays drums and has been playing in Punk and other bands in New Orleans for decades. I told someone earlier this week that meeting Bruce Boyd was like gaining a brother for me and I think he feels the same.

So last week for me was an especially good week here and I plan to keep in better touch with Bruce and interact with him far more than I have in the past.
Bruce's wife Linda was amazing too. She teaches Italian at Tulane but has been on sabbatical in Padua, Italy, for the past 9 months researching 16th century Italian playwrights. Having both of them here last week was a gift plain and simple.

Life is good here in Paris but then, I guess that's not a surprise is it???

A bientot,

Sid

Getting Somewhere And The Rhythm Of The 16th

Good news yesterday.........my staph infection is almost (and I stress.....almost) gone and my doc (the plastic surgeon AKA part of my "Gang Of 4) was certain I didn't need any more anti-biotics and in my new role of far more aggressive self advocate with my French Docteurs, I pushed back and told him while a medic in both the US Army and Navy, it was common practice when treating an infected wound to continue with anti-biotics until the drainage was clear and since mine wasn't clear yet I wanted to continue with another week of anti-biotics. He reluctantly agreed but acquiesced telling me that I seemed to want another prescription. OK THEN............* I don't have to see him for another 2 weeks as he'll be in Bordeaux at a conference. I told him to watch out for the wine and he laughed and said, oui, it is very good and I agreed.

I am and have been in writing mode ever since arriving here over a year ago and am now writing about our neighborhood which is the 16th arrondissement and not so much a tourist destination here in Paris but rather a quite upscale residential enclave which is percieved by almost everyone else in Paris as a Gros Bourgeois hood filled with stuffy rich people. Personally I find the neighborhood charming and find myself and my family including the twins moving in harmony with the rest of the folks who live here. There's something special about living in Paris that defies description in ordinary terms and to me it has most to do with the "rhythm" of the neighborhoods and the people who live in in them. Most definitely after over a year we have settled in and frankly I don't really miss the US or Lynchburg that much although I do miss quite a number of people back in the states it will not take much convincing to keep me here forever which is how I felt in the late 70s when I left Paris to go back to the US and school and never thought I'd return. I immediately found the part of me I left when I got back here a year ago and that part has grown in me completing much that had been left unsaid and undone simply just by living here. I love the French and everything about them, even their strikes and drama.......* They truly know how to live........*

Bon journee all......*

A bientot,

sid