I ain't dead yet!

I'm not gone yet, people, so stop sending me goodbye emails. You're depressing me.  My last post did not mean I was going to leave the minute I finished it.  Do you realize how long it takes just to cancel TV service around here?  Like five years! My departure is not THAT imminent, I assure you, because they're going to make us work for it, earn it, pay for it in clumps of pulled-out hair.

Last week got a little hectic so I ran out of time for blogging.  We had Seattle friends in town (same friends who were here back when Alex fought for the lobster) and they came over for dinner Friday night.  That meant I had to take a trip to our favorite wine store Friday afternoon with Little Miss Grabbyhands in her stroller.  That's always exciting.

I apologized to the rest of the patrons in teeny-tiny wine shop and explained I had to leave Coco and her stroller right in the middle of the store so she couldn't reach any bottles of wine.  They didn't seem to understand the gravity of the situation until Little Miss Whirlyarms got all fired up and started doing her thing.  Then they were like, "Holy hell! That child is part helicopter and part bear! Save the wine!"

While we were discussing the impressive danger of such a small person, we realized all of us in the store were American.  All American ex-pats, living here anywhere from six months up to twenty-five years.  In two seconds, all patrons of teeny-tiny wine store changed from polite calm French speakers into excitable loud-voiced Americans.  We shared a good laugh over our near-instantaneous transformations.  It was a fun day in the wine store, and I'm pleased to report Coco did zero damage, though she tried oh, how she tried....

Alex and I attended the Mad Men party Saturday night.  Here's what happens when you ask your five-year-old son to take a picture of you before you leave --

nailed it

Alex fared a bit better.  He took this one as I was taking the smelly garbage to the dumpster before the babysitter got here --

That ribbon around my waist is courtesy of Virginia Mom.  It helped cinch the crap out of my too-big dress that smelled like mothballs.  From the front I looked OK.  From the back, I was all bunchy fabric and safety pins.  I solved this problem by sliding along walls at the party so I never had my back turned to anyone.  Leaning on walls also helped with the "standing in high heels for a long period of time" problem.  I love walls -- they're super handy.

This is Alex smoking a tiny cigar --

Al Draper in a bow tie and so much pomade in his hair, his head is still greasy several days and five dozen showers later.  

We went out for a drink before the party.  We thought we'd attract lots of attention in our 1960s finery but no one even blinked an eye.  I think you can pretty much wear a plastic bag out in Paris and nobody will care. 

Everyone at the party said they liked our outfits.  There was a lot of champagne flowing, so that explains that.  Alex made an enemy of the DJ right away when he bumped into his table and skipped the record.  In Al's defense, the party was dark and he couldn't see anything.  We never did hear our requested "Who Let the Dogs Out," though, and I'm guessing that's why.

It was too dark for good stealth photos, but can you see that French lady there on the left, the one with the 'do?  She wins all sorts of authenticity awards.  Well played, lady with the hair, well played --

We stepped outside for some fresh air and at that very moment received a frantic phone call from our babysitter.  She had come down with the flu, badly, and was throwing up in our apartment.  She kinda wanted to go home.  A taxi came by so we grabbed it.  We totally disappeared from that party without saying goodbye to anyone.  I'm sure they all wondered where the woman who slides along walls and the man who killed the music went.

My parents recently sent Lucien this box.  It's hard for them to be so far away from Lucien during his dinosaur phase because they love dinosaurs as much as he does.  Mom used to be a teacher and dinosaurs were part of the curriculum.  My dad wanted to be a paleontologist when he was a small boy; the fact he became a lawyer still seems to pain him greatly.

I think the box they sent accurately represents the level of dinosaur enthusiasm in my family --

 

 

The box, of course, was full of dinosaurs.  We have since staged several epic dinosaur battles.  Lucien got mad when I told him the T-Rex and the Stegosaurus were in love and made them kiss.  He huffed out of the room.  When he came back, I did it again, and told him he had no right to stand in the way of true love.  He huffed back out of the room.

You're right, grandma and grandpa, dinosaurs ARE fun!

and dino love is beautiful

Sunday was a perfect day so we went to the park.  Lucien took all his new dinosaurs and buried them in the sandbox.  He then "excavated" them with my very nice and expensive paintbrushes ("WHERE THE HELL DID YOU GET THOSE?" bellowed me in the middle of the park. Kids! So fun!)

Lucien's paleontology game was popular and everything was great until a riot broke out.  There were many French kids beating each other senseless over (my previously very nice) paintbrushes.  They all wanted to excavate the goddamn dinosaurs.  Our family was super popular yet at the same time we were instigators of violence.  That sums up our Paris lives nicely.

Good news is I got some good shots of father and daughter playing together.  I especially like this one.  Coco has just gone down the slide, Alex has caught her at the end, picked her up, and she has shrieked, "ENCORE!" at a very high decibel level right into his ear --

I think I'm almost done with this post but I'm not really sure. 

I met with Kasia Dietz, Paris blogger and handbag designer, for coffee Friday morning because I bought one of her reversible canvas "rive gauche" totes as a goodbye present to myself.  Here it is, and goodbye to me --

I've since suggested that all people who've bought Kasia's "rive gauche" bags and all the people who've bought her "rive droite" bags fill their totes with day-old baguettes and meet at the Seine to duke it out.  It's time for this "rive" rivalry to end so let's have it out once and for all. (Gauche will win.  We're smaller but we're hella feisty.)

Speaking of goodbye presents, Virginia Mom bought me a goodbye present while we were out together last week, but since we refused to acknowledge why she was buying it for me it was kinda like, "thanks for my hat...weirdo buying me gifts for no reason....so weird..."

There's going to be a lot of denial going on over here for the foreseeable future.  

In the meantime, may your weeks be full of hot dino love,

MJ