Last month in Paris

Ok yall, it's been a while. We are actually in Buenos Aires now, and have been for almost a week. But I didn't really write anything about the two weeks we spent in PARIS, so here's a briefing in a dozen pictures or so.  Also to come, Favorite Art in Paris. As it turns out, this one is mostly about food. How did that happen?

Brace yourself, these are pretty cheezy...

The obligatory Eiffel Tower pic!

We're so fancy

I didn't realize this thing twinkled once an hour once the sun goes down. Now this is romance.

Cutter's roasted Monkfish with olives, potatoes, and Duckfat Cracklins'. Enough said. Wait, one more thing... Have you tried monkfish?  The name makes it sound gross, but it's not. It's delicious, like eating lobster. 

ALL kinds of liver. Cutter focusing deeply, in utter disbelief and amour. I restrained him from getting the 24-pack.

The Sewer Museum. Actually extremely interesting. A historical perspective on where people's poop has gone throughout the centuries in Paris, all the while fresh ones are flowing by underfoot. Cutter is pleased. More pleased than I was with his mustache...

No need for captions here, really. We found our favorite baguette in Paris. (Yes!) And then we never found it again. (No!) It is only a legend in our memories now, documented only in these flattering pictures of me.

A brief visit to the Champagne region with Bri and Matt. TAAASTY! You'll notice that while  the others ordered a delicious plate of cheese, hams, mustards, pickles, fresh baguette, etc (top), I accidentally ordered yet another cylindrical mass of livery gray meat, which came with white toast (bottom). Dang!  French.  Anyway, I "suffered" through, with a little help from my friends Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, and Pinot Meunier.

This is where your Mumm comes from. Pronounced "mooom." Be sure to say it correctly at your next cocktail party when you serve it with fois gras. Oh wait, that's Cutter's dreams.  We always preferred PBR and peanuts, anyway.

Ok this is a stupid picture. BUT, this was one of the coolest things ever.  You hear  "light show at the Cathedral in Reims," and you think, "that will probably be stupid, but we might as well check it out on our way home from dinner." So we did, and HOLY COW!  This is CRAZY! My mind melted. If you're ever in Reims, go see it.

A sycamore after one of the many rainstorms on our walk home from the neighborhood market.  Trés belle!

CHEESE! And delicious butter.  One of these was actually almost too stinky to eat. You just never know til it's too late. No regrets. Never look a gift horse in the tail. Snoozers are losers. Billy Jean was not my lover. Feliz cumpleaños. A tout a l'heure!!

July 6: Sauerkraut & Gewurztraminer

Well, hello. We have arrived in Paris!! (My first time.)  And here's what it looks like in our little apartment...

I did a good job, yes?  SabbaticalHomes.com.  Cheaper than a hostel! 

After our first trip to the market... Yes!

Moving back in time... Cutter looking dapper at our launching pad for the Alsatian Route du Vin, the lovely town of Kayserburg. On the Route for 3 days.   Baby grapes, a castle, some cute German-looking houses... what more could you want?

Oh yes, sausage. This is called choucroute. That's a heap of sauerkraut under there, topped with generous slabs of ham, several types of weenies, and of course potatoes.  If I'm not mistaken, Cutter may be sipping some Gewurztraminer here.

Only the finest accommodations for our fancy wine-tasting vacation. (More sausage money.)

The Alsacian stork was nearly extinct, with only two breeding pairs left.  Now there are 400.  One almost flew into our windshield.  40 years of good luck. (I made that up.) Cutter refused to buy me stork slippers, or a stuffed animal stork, or a stork snowglobe.  Fine!

This one's for Mom, Dad, and Aunt Nancy. This is in Riquewihr. About halfway up the 170km of winding roads and little towns along the foothills of the Vosges. Other stops included Colmar, Turckheim, Ribeauville, Dambach-la-Ville, Eguisheim, Katzenthal, & Strasbourg.  Vins include pino blanc, pino gris, gewurztraminer, sylvaner, muscat, crement, reisling, and pinot noir.  Too lovely...

And so we move back to sauerkraut. This time in Budapest. Not just kraut, but pickles. All kinds. And pickles stuffed with kraut.

Szechenyi baths in Budapest. What a freakin fabulous day.

A nicer view.  Lots of nice views in Budapest, but you can google image those. Budapest was awesome, by the way.

Well, I guess that's it for now. We've settled into our apartment in Paris, where we'll be for 15 days. Wowza! Better figure out what to do.  Lotsa Love--

June 24: Snails, Saxophones, & Mr. Wood

Welcome Mr. Cutter! And congratulations on your discovery of my BEER OF THE DAY: Mort Subite Faro.  A lil sour, a lil sweet, very delicious.

Belgium continues to surprise with its coolness. 1) Did anyone know Belgium could look like this?  2) Did you know this is the home of the saxophone?  Dinant. No kidding.

Adolphe Sax.  1814-1894.

In nearby Famignoul, the home of my new favorite brewery, Caracole. Bestest logo.  Brewery and pub an 18th Century hole in the wall. Lots of old Walloonian men with bad teeth and big smiles. The pinnacle of our Saturday tour through the beautiful Belgian Ardennes, which also included stops to the Abbaye de Floreffe, Abbaye de Maredsous, and Namur.

June 15 Belgium: Pili pili

It's been a week and many things have happened. To keep it brief...

Sgraffiti owl sighting somewhere between the tea shop Tea Me Eat Me
and wherever I got lost looking for the Metro...

Sampling beers at the home of Gouden Carolus!  Not pictured,
the Flemish stew I destroyed shortly thereafter.

Frites. There are so many sauces to choose from. This is  the spicy,
mayonnaisey pili pili sauce and my BFF Bri.

Saw my first hops farms today out about Westveleteren.

"The Explanation". René Magritte. ha.
What a great weirdo! (He's Belgian!)

Tomorrow, the Delirium bar, then GHENT!

June 4: Beaux Arts & The Sixtus of Westvleteren

It's amazing how stupid a foreign metro station can make you feel. Regardless I made it to the Parc du Cinqantenaire for a self-guided Art Nouveau walk, and headed to the Musée Royal des Beaux Arts, where I saw THIS!!!:

The Death of Marat, by Jaque-Louis David, 1793

In real life Charlotte Corday left her knife in his chest, not on the floor.

Also, I was excited to learn about two connections that are favs of mine:

Carravagio. This is "The Entombment of  Christ"

Pietá, Michaelangelo 

Next up I took my first ride on Bri's seafoam green VESPA to the Cauchie House!  Imagine this as your second floor porch.

Brussels calls itself "The Capitol of Art Nouveau".

I learned another iteration of what I only knew as Italian "sgraffito", which is Art Nouveau sgraffito/i.  

All the stuff on this building made by laying a layer of light mortar over a layer of dark mortar, and then scratching the design through the light mortar when it is a just the perfect wetness. Then you paint it.

Cauchi surrounded the living room with sgraffito, one panel for each of the five senses. I wish my living room was this sexy...

And finally, my favorite Beer of the Day:

Westvleteren Blonde!  From the trappist Abbey of Saint Sixtus of Westvleteren, Belgium, founded 1838. They only brew 60,000 cases total of their three beers a year, as they have since 1946. You have to call their "beerphone", which is endlessly busy, to reseve a case.  One of my jobs at Casa Warner is to try to make calls to the beerphone to secure a case of Westvleteren #12.  Today we took our two bottles with a picnic and a round of Yahtzee. Perfecto!

Day 2 Antwerp

Don't worry, I won't be posting every day for the next eight months. I have that early record-keeping ambition, so enjoy it while it lasts. Or sigh with relief.

Today's highlight was an afternoon excursion to Antwerp. Only 45 mins from Brussels in Bri & Matt's car. Everything's closed on Sundays in Belgium, except the antique stores in Antwerp. But this is cool stuff. A hip furniture-shopper's dream! Belgium apparently lacks quite a bit of style (which I noticed coming from Brooklyn to Brussels), but Antwerp is one of the fashion capitols of Europe. So next time I'll have to come on a weekday!

Favorite attractions:

1) The Brabo fountain, showing Brabo with the severed hand of the giant, Druon, who plauged the city by demanding payment for entry, or chopping off your right hand. Brabo saved the day and chopped off Druon's hand and threw it. The fountain has water squirting from the severed wrist (to my right), and hand (at the tippy top about to get chucked by Brabo.) Gross!  Antwerp means "throwing the hand."

2) Jenver tasting. Jenever is the spirit from whence gin was born. Oude Jenever is clear and tastes like a mild gin, and Jonge Jenever is golden and tastes like a mild whiskey. Invented in the 16th Century by a Dutch chemist and alchemist for medicinal purposes, and popularized in the 17th Century with the addition of juniper and improved distilling techniques. Have you tried this? It's great!

3) First glimpses of Rubens, who studied and worked in Antwerp. Affectionately called "P.P. Rubens" on a postcard I was tempted to buy. Here,"The Elevation of the Cross,"1610-1611, at The Cathedral of Our Lady, Antwerp.

First Post: Brussels

Hello friends and fam,
I'm not much of a picture-taker, Tweeter, or Facebook-poster, but I've had many requests to share photos and updates while we are abroad, so I thought I'd give a crack at a blog.

So here's how things started out...

I departed on Friday, June 1st and arrived bright and early Saturday in Brussels, greeted by Bri & Matt with Starbucks (coffee is not an area at which Belgium exceeds).  My first day in Belgium was everything I could hope for...

Stop 1 was Brussels famous brewery, Cantillion. For the beer-geeks,  they make sour Guezue Lambic with an open fermentation, or spontaneous fermentation, process (open vat for wild yeast and bacteria to get in the wort), and the beer is cooled in a shallow open vat over night rather than with cold coils.  They can only make their beer in the winter season because of this, and once a batch is gone, it's gone til next year! Yumm!

Next I got a walking tour of a chunk of the city, which included a street waffle, a visit to the infamous Manneken Pis fountain, a glimpse of the Grand-Place, some fabulous chocolates from Mary's, and a few more beers. An excellent beginning to my travels!