Paris Fails Gris Test

Almost overcome by sunshine, Yoko, Bob and Jim.

Secretary Faces Water Torture

Paris:– Thursday, 15. March:–  I would have been basking in the sunshine yesterday if I hadn't been waiting for a plumber to show up and fix my leaking kitchen tap. But he didn't show. I would have been basking in the sunshine today if I hadn't been at the weekly club meeting, worried sick about my new leaking tap – the one you are supposed to shut off to stop the kitchen tap from leaking.

Where it is not leaking at all is in the sky over Paris. Yesterday the temperature probably reached 17 degrees and today it must have climbed up to 16.5 at least. If it wasn't for my various leaking taps I would feel pretty mellow.

Same with the young guy on France–2's TV–news and weather. His name is Laurent and I think, Romejko. I have been watching like a hawk, an eagle, a spy–in–the–sky, but they run the name so quick I can't keep up. Call him Laurent for short, with or without a tie.

So tonight he shows this huge pile of muck out in the Atlantic but it's just for show. Here we will have a high, at least for the next couple of days. But it will be cooler with a high temperature of only 14 forecast for Friday, which should begin completely sunny and become less so as the day turns into afternoon.

The Beer of the Week, again.

Winds will puff along the Channel on Saturday, there will be serious clouds around Luxembourg, and around here there will be clouds interfering with the sunshine. We are supposed to stick with a high of 14 degrees. For Sunday the wind switches to blow here from the northwest and the temperature will crash to 11 degrees. Like Saturday, expect Sunday to be fairly bright with some blue winking at us from between the clouds.

Even the Riviera will be cooler after flirting with highs in the 20's. Sunday night's TV–news is unlikely to be teasing us with images of the topless things frolicking in the surf while waiters run around the beach passing out colorful cocktails with little parasols sticking out of them, but we'll all have hot croissants in Paris, won't we?

The Paris Fails Gris Test Report

This morning counting green things across the street in the cemetery was far from my mind as I bailed out my bathroom, threatened as it is by a miserable but determined leak. It was so bad that the patented beer can I am using as an emergency hose is rusting to smithereens even though it appears to be made of non–magnetic plastic.

I rigged it up as best I could and swung out the door. I figured I would have about three hours before its primary basin and backup basin fill up and flooding becomes a possibility. To make extra certain I crossed some of my lucky fingers going down the stairs three at a time.

The Cocktail of the Week.

Outside the weather was perfect and the sidewalk was fairly clean. When all the Parisians go away on their skiing holidays the sidewalks get dirty because the broom men have to go up in the Alps to sweep the pistes so the Parisians don't get wiped out by avalanches, which they will if the ski trails are obscured by snow. If you ask me, they could go to Martinique and waterski instead.

But the sportsreport is not our mission today. Today calls for getting to the club's café, holding a regulation meeting, and getting back pronto to save my neighbors from cascades of city water. Which, if you ask me, is safe to drink, but tastes like it needs getting used to, so why bother?

I was so anxious I got to the café early. When I do this I hide outside somewhere. The union is fussy about secretaries putting in extra unpaid time. Still, it is boring, looking at the boring east end of the Louvre, so I went in and met the new waiter who would function as the Waiter of the Week. I told him the rules and he agreed. "Thirty rich Americans will be here any minute!"

Then I settled down to read Le Parisien. I didn't get far because member Robert Alter, known to club members as Bob, sat down and started talking about photos of famous trash in the basement of the Maison Européenne de la Photographie or MEP for short. He said the photos of trash were life–sized, just like real trash.

The big Canon of the Week.

But that isn't why Bob is in town. He said he comes every year when it is dismal and grey and foggy in March. He wanted to capture the dismal essence of the city when it is dismal gris. This year he is striking out. All the same he said he was in La Défense yesterday, taking pictures of the dismal buildings out there. I wished him all the best.

In reality Bob is a professor at the Framingham State College near where he lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Actually he didn't say it was close. What he said was that he teaches photography there. I don't think this has anything directly to do with photos of trash, or buildings at La Défense, and it is too sunny anyway. Where has our drizzle gone? How are we to get our romantically moody photos? We can't all go to Rungis at 5 am.

While we were waiting for our cocktails Bob showed me some of his photos. They were in neat little boxes, mounted in cardboard frames. In fact they looked like slides, or diapositives, and tey were all grey. He got the Tour Eiffel on a dismal day. But no – and Bob explained where he gets black and white slide film. This is not digital black and white slide film but real slide film. Trust a professor, a member of this club, to have something like this.