Kris and Jo go to Paris

Site changes

The site changes I talked about earlier have been implemented.

Based on Stew's suggestion, I've added a search feature to the right column. Typepad makes this pretty easy, which was nice. Type "Vichy France" into the search box and you'll see the appropriate entry at the top of the list.

I've also kept the FeedBlitz subscription box since a couple people have actually used it. (Welcome Mom and Uncle Steve!)

I did remove the MapStats and TopBlogSites counters. MapStats just never worked properly and TopBlogSites didn't really bring any traffic to the site, and that place is just ugly.

I've also started a "daily publish" schedule for my posts. From now on, you should see one post a day, and it should appear at noon Paris time. Some days you'll get something interesting, and some days you'll get boring crap like this. Sorry about that. Jo's posts will still appear as she creates them.

Dessert

I'm beginning to think that I can start a blog that consists soley of funny pictures of my father.

This is from the first night of our Loire trip, which you can read more about here.

Free ... Works Good

I'm back in Seattle. Sorry about the lack of posts. I've been suffering from a combination of jet lag and massive amounts of work. When I return to Seattle, most of my time at work is spent meeting with people I haven't seen for months. This means I have to do my "real" work late at night or early in the morning.

The picture above is actually from the last time I was staying with Stew in the summer of 2005. The microwave was gone a few hours later, but the next day appeared on the sidewalk in front of another house with the same "works good" note attached. The "free" sign was different.

Today, as I was out running errands, I came along this (pictured below) on the very same street corner. (My camera was accidentally set to black and white mode when I took this. Sorry about that.)

See you in a few days

We're heading to the Loire to look at the chateaus. We may be able to continue updating from the road, but it looks unlikely.

We'll be back to our regular posting schedule on Friday. However, on Saturday I head back to Seattle, so things may get wonky again.

The Umbrellas of Luxembourg

A lot of today was spent in the rain, which had me thinking a lot about umbrellas. However, before I start on my umbrella rant, let me tell you where we went.

We started at the Musée Rodin, which is one of my favorite museums in this city. Unfortunately, the garden is closed ("for security reasons", whatever that means), but on Sundays it's only €5, which even without the garden is still a great deal.

After that, we went to the Musée national Picasso Paris. Mom and Dad went straight in thanks to their museum passes, but Jo and I had to wait in the rain for 20 minutes to get tickets. (This is where I took the picture above.) Still, it's a pretty nice museum, though probably not worth €7.50 (that's €7,50 for you Europeans) and 20 minutes in the rain.

We then grabbed a very early (at least by Parisian standards) dinner at an Asian Traiteur and then walked around Jardin du Luxembourg in the rain. There's a really cool photography exhibit currently on display along the northeast wall (outside the park).

On the way home we walked past Place Saint-Sulpice and took a few pictures, but didn't go into the church.

Click on "continue" if you want to read my umbrella rant. (It's a short rant.)

Out and About

Mom, Dad, Jo, and I wandered around the city today. After meeting outside the Musée d'Orsay we walked through the Jardin des Tuileries and took some photos. Above is Dad taking my picture. Below the fold is the view from the other camera.

Hail Mary

I know you can't tell from the picture, but we had a hailstorm today. (How exactly do you take a picture of hail?) I'm pretty sure Jo was in class when it happened, but my parents may have been outside, and they didn't take their rain gear when they left this morning. Of course, I don't think rain gear would have been much help anyway.

You gonna drink that?

Raoul and Donna are back in Geneva. This picture was taken on the last day of their visit, at a cafe near Luxembourg Gardens. In the 5 days they were here, Donna and Raoul met more Parisians than I have in 5 months (my official tally is 2). The locals loved Raoul and declared him: "magnifique", "beau", "mignon". Oh la la, why don't they say that about me?  Maybe it's because I lack the cool green collar.

All in all, we had a great visit. John is still off waging war against the Bird Flu. Donna, meanwhile, is preparing for a vist from her Chicago/Seattle friend.  As for us, we are getting the place ready for the arrival of Kris's parents--tomorrow! I really don't know when I am going to get my thesis written.

Raoul and Friends

Raoul and I got to hang out today while Donna and Jo explored the city. (By "explored the city", I mean "shopped".) After Raoul finished his treat, he took a nap on the chair, and then for excitement, took a nap on the couch with his pals.

Donna and Raoul are visitng for the weekend while John (Donna's husband) is busy protecting the world from (or preparing the world for) the bird flu, kind of like some sort of superhero would.

I'd like to apologize for my skimpy posts the last few days. I've been feeling under the weather, and haven't had the energy for much beyond work and watching The Office via iTunes.

The Cost of Living in Paris

Chocolat Chaud at the Café de la Paix: 7 euros

Erik in the Herald

There's a nice article about Erik in the Boston Herald today. You can read more about Erik at L'Espalier's website. (Be sure to check out Sel de la Terre's site as well.)

I hope you love your monkey

This is a birthday present Jo got from our nephew Derek, whom she refers to as "Monkey", and it may very well be her favorite birthday present of all time. He's pictured with Louis Jr., who used to have a different name, but I've forgotten what it was.

Probably the best thing about the monkey is that when you squeeze his hand, you he plays a recording of Derek saying, "Happy birthday. I love you, I miss you, and I hope you love your monkey."

More pics of "Monkey" (who just turned 5) and his Mom are below the fold.

Puppy power

Continuing a theme of a few of my recent posts, here's a picture of my parent's dog Jack. This picture is actually a few months old and Jack has grown quite a bit. Below the fold is a more recent photo of Jack and with my dad.

Who are you?

UPDATED: Click the "continue" link for some updates.

We're approaching our second week of daily posts, and as best as I can tell, we've attracted (or re-attracted) some regular readers. We'd like to know who you are, how you found the site, how you read the site, and what you do and don't like about the site. More details and an example are below the fold.

Louis the pug

Since I've been posting pictures of some other pugs recently, I thought I should post a picture of our pug, Louis. (It's pronounced Louie, like if he were French.)

While we're in Paris, Louis is staying with my parents in West Virgina. If we end up staying another year, Louis will come over in the fall. Despite his name, Louis is not a very French dog, but I'm sure he would appreciate the opportunity to visit his buddy in Raoul in Geneva.

You can find more pictures below the fold.

Happy birthday Raoul!

Today is Raoul's birthday.

Happy birthday, Raoul.
Happy birthday, Raoul.
May you find a smoked ham bone
And have a nap too.

This picture is from our trip to visit Raoul in October. Below the fold is another picture from the same trip.

Weekend update

I'll provide more detail later (yeah right!), but I just wanted to quickly say that we had a fantastic weekend in Geneva with Donna, John, and Raoul. John and Donna are a fun couple and I look forward to spending more time with them. Of course, Raoul is a great dog. Here's a picture to prove it in case you don't believe me.

In addition to Stew and Jon, Donna has created a flickr site, so you can go there for more pictures of Raoul, including some shots of when he came to visit Jo in Paris.

In other news, we found a down-step voltage converter, so I was able to set up the XBox and it looks like it's working, though I haven't had any time to play anything.

Like I said before, I'll post more later (including my first ever picture of a toilet!), but right now I have to get to bed.

Quick update

I know I have some catching up to do, but this is just a quick update.

Today we're leaving for Geneva to visit Donna, John, and Raoul. They came to visit Jo in Paris before I got here, so now we're going to visit them in Geneva.

A couple other interesting happenings:

First, we had Korean barbecue the other night and it was delicious. I don't know the name of the restaurant, but it's just down the street.

Also, last night we went to La Rotisserie d'enface, a restaurant right across the street from Christine's. It was full of Americans, and we were seated next to a table with a couple of loud ones. Jo and I try and keep our voices low in public (it's the French thing to do), so we were talking quietly to ourselves when the couple from the table on the other side of us leaned over and asked, "So where in Canada are you from?"

I'll try and post some pictures from this weekend, but that's what I said about last weekend and I have yet to do it.

Surprise Saturday

Peter and Lee came by for a visit this weekend and we had an absolute blast. It made me realize a couple things. First, I'm pretty much living a fantasy life. I am living in one of the greatest cities in the world, and I have people to share it with. Second, nothing is more fun than spending time with people you love. Jo, Peter, Lee and I could be stuck in a bomb shelter with nothing but pickled tomatoes and canned milk, but so long as we had a few decks of cards (and maybe some indoor plumbing), we would have a fun time. Even without the cards, we could probably manage to not kill one another, which is more than I can say for some people. And when I really think about it, I actually decently sized list of "bomb shelter friends", and that includes my family, which is a lot more than some people get.

Anyway, enough with the schlock, I have a weekend of exploits and adventure to regale you with, but this post will only cover Saturday because I already know it's going to take a couple hours to write, and I'm getting behind at work. I'll cover Sunday later.

After a bit of a wrong turn, Peter and Lee arrived Saturday evening and we had some appetizers before dinner. Neither of the Randalls had tried foie gras before, and we nearly had to hold Peter down and force feed him to get him to eat it. He didn't like it, but admitted that it was "mostly mental".

We had reservations at a very close restaurant called Christine's (it's on Rue Christine), which has special glasses just for drinking Kir Royal. We all has some, and it was delicious. It was so good, in fact, that it turned our eyes red as you'll see. The picture doesn't really do the classes justice because you can't see the base. You'll just have to take my word for it that these glasses were cool. (Or you could come visit and see for yourself.)

First surprise of the night: Peter's French. Peter actually speaks French pretty well. I knew he spoke some, and he even took a class or two when we were roommates, but I'm the kind of person who doesn't believe something until I see it with my own eyes. (It's a quality that drives Johanna crazy.) So even though I should have known better, it surprised me to see Peter conversing with the waiter.

Second surprise of the night: Raw scallops. Peter, Jo, and I ordered an appetizer that consisted of scallops and much to our surprise, they were delivered raw. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, given sushi and all, but all it takes to make really delicious scallops is some butter, salt, and heat, while raw scallops taste like seawater.

To help me over the disappointment of the scallops, I'm posting a picture of some beautiful people enjoying themselves. Blame the red eyes on the aperitif.

 

Third surprise of the night: A bowl of mushrooms. Peter's entree consisted entirely of a bowl of mushrooms. He new it was something with mushrooms, but didn't realize it was only mushrooms. (There was actually a bit of garlic and salt in the bowl as well.) Not that there's anything wrong with a bowl of mushrooms. It was actually really good; better than my steak, which was quite bland.

Fourth surprise of the night: How small the world is. As I was taking pictures during dinner, someone from the next table offered to take a picture of all of us. In return, Lee took a picture of their table. It turned out that two of them were from Charlottesville, and the third was going to school in London! (For those of you who don't know, Peter and Lee moved from Charlottesville to London.) In fact, Peter and Lee and the two Virginians lived in the same housing development outside of town.

Okay, I have to go to bed, but I still have three more surprises to go. I'll try posting the rest tomorrow.

Preparing for guests

Peter and Lee arrive today!

We're straightening up the apartment to get ready for their arrival. Fortunately, the apartment is tiny, so it's not  taking very long, and I'm busy writing this post, so Jo is doing all the work. ;-)

We have to head out to buy an inflatable mattress today. It's something we've been meaning to pick up since I got here, but our hand has finally been forced.

If you want to visit, we are (or soon will be) readily able to handle overnight guests, but I October is nearly full and November is filling up. I think we'll be heading to Geneva some weekend this month to visit friends, but I don't know the details. Jo handles the social calendar for us, I just go where I'm told.

Alright, I need to get back to helping. I'll try and take some pictures this weekend and post them.

The monitor has arrived

Well it finally made it, along with a package from Stew (fifty points for Stew!). Still no keyboard or XBox yet. I called FedEx and they said I had to pay about €80 in duties and they had left a message for the recipient in France to that effect. I explained that I was the recipient and I was in fact in France and I had not recieved any such message. So I got the phone number for FedEx in France and Jo is going to give them a call tomorrow. She thinks we can fight the duties, but with what I've heard about French beauracracies, I have my doubts.

We have the computer set up in the armoir, so it is hidden away when I'm not working. As you can see, I clearly need a keyboard. I have one, but it's stuck in customs. Also, we'll be ordering an office chair from Ikea to replace the one in the picture.

Recent adventures

Friday was our fifth anniversary. After our honeymoon way back in the fall of 2000 we decided we would come back to France for our fifth anniversary, and we made it.

We went to a casual and very popular restaurant called Fish. If you get the impression from the name that this place is "American friendly", you would be correct. Apparently one of the owners is an American. The waitstaff were speaking as much English as French, and I think nearly half of the patrons were Americans. (In our neighborhood, you're almost as likely to hear English spoken on the street as French.)

After waiting what seemed like an hour for a table, we were seated. This place has a huge and very expensive (especially by French standards) wine list. Expect to pay the equivalent of American restaurant prices for wine, which is to say, "expect to pay a lot". We had a good dinner and decent wine. I started with foie gras and Jo got a duck salad. The foie gras was yummy. Jo ordered the duck salad because the other salad contained pine nuts according to the menu, but this one ended up having pine nuts as well. We both had pork with mushrooms for the entree. It was good, but nothing special. Jo thought the pork tasted too European, like kidneys. I wouldn't really know, having never had kidneys. (We'll I have kidneys, I just have never eaten any.) I really liked the vin du jour which we drank while waiting for our table. To go with dinner we got an Alsatian Riesling which was a bit too sweet and not very interesting.

It was filling and fun, and all in all a worthy celebration of five years of marriage. I also got Jo a necklace and some diamond earrings.

The next day, after sleeping in far later than we'd planned to, we went to Ikea to buy some furniture and some household items. (You know ... Ikea stuff.) If you're ever in Paris and have the opportunity to visit the Ikea, don't bother. It's exactly like every Ikea in the US (and probably everywhere) except they smoke in the restaurant. (Do they sell beer and wine in the restaurants of American Ikeas? Ten blog points to the first person who posts the correct answer.) Also, the meatball sauce is made with real cream and is quite rich.

We went to the restaurant first because it was after 1:00 and we hadn't had any breakfast. We spent the rest of the shopping trip going "against the flow", which if you know Ikea, you know it's all about following the flow. We even ended up going down the up staircase and some sweaty french man (an Ikea employee) start having a fit because we were on the wrong side of the checkout with our yellow bag. We got a lot of stuff (a breadbox, two folding chairs, bedding, a few baskets, and other miscellany) and had to get it all back to the apartment on a very crowded bus and RER. It was a stressful experience to say the least. Also, my arms are still sore from hauling all that stuff around.

Next time, we're just using the web site and having the stuff delivered.

How to contact us

There are several ways to reach us while we're in Paris. This post outlines your options.

0. Post to the  blog
Remember that you can get blog points for posting comments to the blog. It's a great way to send a message to us and all our friends.

1. Email
We'll both be checking our email pretty regularly, now that we no longer have to go to the "boy basement" to do so. I'm at krismarkel at gmail dot com and Jo's at jomarkel at gmail dot com. (You'll have to break the "anti-spambot secret code" in order to figure out our real addresses. Trust me, it's not hard unless you're a spambot. Also, don't take Jo's email address as a sign that she's planning on changing her name. She keeps threatening to, but has yet to actually go through with it.)

2. Snail mail
You can send us cards or care packages a the address below. USPS works fine for letters and packages, but it's slow. (It took two weeks to get a package here from Boston.) UPS and FedEx are faster, but a lot more expensive. If you use FedEx, check both the overnight and economy rates; sometimes the overnight is cheaper even though it's faster. It all has to do with what space is available on which planes.

You'll get 5 blog points for a post card, 10 for a letter, and 20 for a care package. This puts Rebecca way in the lead for blog points, but I'm too tired to work the math tonight.

Johanna TROBOUGH
5 rue du Pont de Lodi
75006 PARIS
FRANCE

75006 is the postal code if you need to specify one. You should address the package to Johanna since her name is the one on the concierge's list.

4. Skype
Skype is a really cool and totally free VOIP program that let's you talk to people over the Internet. The sound quality is amazing; it sounds like you're in the same room. Everyone I know who has used it really likes it. You can download the software from http://skype.com. I'd recommend the beta version, but any version will work. You'll also want to get a headset (headphones and a microphone) for your computer. Once you get the software and headset installed, just add "krismarkel" and "jomarkel" to your contacts. You'll be able to see when we're on-line and leave us voice-mail when we're not.

Three blog points to anyone who contacts us via Skype. I think Frank is the only one who's done this yet.

5. Phone
We have two phone numbers. The first is the number at our Paris apartment: 33-1-46-34-75-71. To dial this from the US, dial 011 first. If you're already in Europe and don't desperately need to get in touch with us, this is a good number to use. There's no voice-mail or answering machine yet, so you'll have to call when we're at home. The second number is for those in the US: 206 965 8134. This number will reach me (not necessarily Jo) in France or the US, so long as I have a computer and an Internet connection. You can leave a voice-mail and I should get it within a day, if I don't pick it up directly. (This number is courtesy of Skype In, one of Skype's pay services.) Just remember that there's a time difference when you call. Paris is +1 GMT, while the East Coast is -5 and the West Coast is -7. So our time will be 6 to 9 hours after your time depending on where you are.

Two blog points for anyone who calls us, but you can only get a maximum of two points a day this way, so it does pay to call us more than daily. Also, we we're not here to get your call, you're out of luck. No points for missed calls.

6. Visit
Compared to what I was expecting, our apartment is huge. We can easily accommodate anyone willing to sleep on the couch and once we get an inflatable mattress, we can accommodate more. We could probably even fit two mattresses in our living room if we need to. From our apartment you can walk to Notre Dame, the Louvre, and the Orsay. Notre Dame is actually really, really close. The Eiffel Tower is a bit of a hike, but very close using the Metro. We've already had two sets of visitors and have a couple more lined up for October.

You can earn 50 blog points for every visit. Only two visits and you earn the opportunity to post to the blog!

Lots and lots of pictures

Stew and I have no Internets connection at home, so there haven't been any posts lately. Also, I haven't really had a lot of time.

Here's a sort of cheap catch up: Download Catchup.zip

(WARNING: It's a huge file. The download may take a while.)

The pictures are of four types: What I've been eating; packing and moving, birthday celebration, and miscellaneous.

The really interesting ones I'll pull out into separate posts. Also, I apologize for the sideways movie. I didn't know you couldn't rotate a movie file.

Lots and lots of stuff

Sorry about the lack of posts. I was trying to do this new thing where I wait until I get home to post, but by the time I made it home, I was too tired to write a decent post. Hopefully I'll soon be able to efficiently upload pictures at work, which will make posting easier.

In the meantime, here are all the pictures I've taken since my last post. This isn't everything I've eaten, or everything I've done, but it's an easy way for me to feel caught up.

I think this is a grande drip and lemon poppy seed loaf, but this is from Friday morning, so I don't remember exactly.

 

I have desks at work in two different buildings, about six blocks apart. In one building, I just moved to a new desk. (I call this desk "desk number two" because compared my other desk, this is the crappy one. Get it?) Desk number one is near the DAWN snack bar, where you can purchase a variety of snacks for fifty cents. Desk number two is now near a snack bar that has Red Vines, Hershey's Miniatures, and other high-calorie, low nutrient snacks, all for free. So far I've been pretty good at resisting temptation, but I had some Red Vines. I don't know how I'm going to resist these every day. They're literally sitting two feet away from my cubical. I really like Red Vines, but I'm not sure why. If I had to guess the main ingredient, I would have to say "plastic".

This is my lunch from Friday. It's a tuna salad sandwich and a small chocolate chip cookie from Il Fornaio. The sandwich is good, and the cookie is best chocolate chip cookie you can get, but I really hate this place, mainly because it's so expensive.

Here's a close up of the cookie. Il Fornaio makes their cookies thin and crispy instead of thick and chewy like most other places. I really love these chocolate chip cookies. I honestly haven't had better, even though I can make a pretty mean cookie. (It's probably the only area in the kitchen where my skill surpasses Jo's.)

This appeared on the snack bar near desk number two on Friday. It's a bag full of fortune cookie rejects. There's even a few fortunes in here, but I haven't tried to see what they are. I wonder if they're rejected fortunes to go along with the rejected cookies. "You will lose at the lottery yet again." I have a thing about not eating food that's been rejected by other people, so I don't think I'll be trying these.

The Monorail got stuck on Friday afternoon, which must have totally sucked for people trying to reach the Bite of Seattle that started on Friday. I was walking home and noticed it sitting on the track so I took a couple pictures. This was after they had unloaded everyone by pulling the second train up next to the stuck one, and having everyone move over. "Mind the gap!"

Another picture of the stuck Monorail. You can see the two trains together at komo news.

 

My new camera can take short movies, so I filmed (Do you call it "filming"? There's no film involved.) some kids playing in the International Fountain. This was at the Bite, but there wasn't much in the way of crowds. Probably because it was still relatively early on Friday (around 5:00 PM), and it had been raining most of the morning, which may have scared people away. Normally, the Bite is shoulder to shoulder people.

On Thursday night, Stew took me down to pick up some stuff at UPS and FedEx, and then we went to Snappy Dragon for dinner, which was delicious. I have some really good food (and some not so good food) at Snappy Dragon, but this meal was one of their best. I didn't have my camera, so I couldn't take any pictures, but on Friday evening I reheated some vegetable chow mien with homemade noodles and fried tofu. It was fantastic.

On Saturday morning I had some corn flakes with sugar. I had accidentally left the milk out on the counter for a good chunk of the previous evening, so I didn't trust it and had to eat my cereal dry.

 

Stew was yet again helping me run errands on Saturday morning, and when we stopped for lunch, we noticed that they were filming a movie on a bus parked across the street. This picture was taken using a digital zoom, which is why it's a bit fuzzy, but I think it still looks pretty good.

 

Stew was playing around with the "portrait" mode on my camera. Five blog points if you can name the restaurant we were at. (I should probably give you five points just for reading this far.) There's a pretty big hint in the picture.

 

Another portrait by Stew.

 

 

Here's my burger. This is another clue as to where we were eating.

 

 

This was my dinner on Saturday. Angel hair pasta with Emeril's Vodka sauce. The drink is Sierra Mist Free mixed with orange juice and ice cubes. Nothing special, but good and satisfying nonetheless.

Microwave kettle corn for dessert. Delicious and un-nutritious.

 

More orange juice and Sierra Mist Free to wash down the kettle corn.

 

 

 

Here's a "self-portrait" of my new camera. So far I really like it. I don't know if you can tell from the picture, but it is really, really small. It fits in my pocket, even when it's in the case.

Another picture of the camera. Can you see me peeking around the corner?

 

Because this blog isn't boring enough, I've decided to start posting pictures of the groceries I buy. This is milk from Safeway. Johanna doesn't like this brand of milk "because it tastes too much like cow". I normally get non-fat, but for some reason I've been picking up low-fat recently.

I was down to zero garbage bags in the house, though I didn't really want to buy 42 bags (I'm only here for another week), I figured I'll need some for packing and cleaning, and the rest I can take to Stew's.

 

 

Still with me? Because it's about to get "off the hook" as they say. ("Hey brother." Ten blog points if you can identify that reference.)

Something that probably only my wife knows about me (until now) is that I'm a toothbrush fanatic. I generally get a new toothbrush every month, and I always get the Oral-B CrossAction Vitalizer, size 40 regular, soft. My wife thinks this is a bit crazy, but she's not the one who the dentist says has "super teeth" and never any cavities. So when I saw the Pulsar sitting seductively in the grocery store display, I had to give it a try. It's essentially the toothbrush version of the Mach 3 Power, which is the razor I use. (Oral-B is owned by Gillette. The razor is okay. The Power blades are fantastic, but vibrating razor actually nicks me more often so I use razor with the vibration turned off. I wonder if Gillette will get sued over the toothbrush as well.) As a toothbrush, it's pretty nice, but my teeth don't feel as clean as with the CrossAction Vitalizer, and the vibrating is pretty annoying. I don't like electric toothbrushes for the same reason. (According to Consumer Reports, studies show that electric toothbrushes aren't any better if you know how to use a manual toothbrush properly.)

Conditioner. In the land of hair care, "Full and Thick" is code for "makes you look less bald". I don't think it really does anything for perceived baldness, but it does make my hair feel silky.

 

 

I was down to my last vitamin, so I picked up some more. "With lycopene", so I no longer have to worry about lychanthropy. I have a rant about vitamins that's been going on in my head for several years. If this post weren't already so long, I'd include it here.

Cinnamon Life for breakfast, and grape nuts to include in yogurt.

 

 

Still with me? That's it for groceries for now.

Sunday morning breakfast. Cinnamon Life with milk.

 

 

Sunday lunch. Strawberry yogurt with Grape-nuts.

 

 

Sunday afternoon snack. More Life with milk.

 

Monday breakfast. Strawberry scone with some soft of grande Starbucks drink. I suspect it's a drip, but I really can't remember. I have no idea what I had for dinner Sunday night.

Monday lunch. Market House reuben with a pickle and coleslaw. I didn't touch the coleslaw, but I did eat the tiny oatmeal raisin cookie that came with the meal.

 

Afternoon Starbucks. Again, I don't remember the exact drink.

 

 

 

Monday dinner. This is why I shouldn't buy sweetened cereal. The empty glass had Metamucil in it a few moments before I took the picture.

 

This was my drink with dinner. Sierra Mist Free with orange juice.

 

 

 

 

Tuesday breakfast. Not really! This little guy was waiting for me in the shower on Tuesday morning. This picture is also taken with the digital zoom, which is why it's so blurry. I didn't really feel like going into macro mode on this fella.

This is the real Tuesday breakfast. That's a latte and a croissant if it isn't clear.

 

Tuesday lunch. I hate Subway, both because they're evil, and the food is terrible. But if I'm jonesing for something hot and I don't want to leave the building, a toasted six-inch meatball sub on white bread with no cheese, lettuce, cucumber, green peppers, salt, pepper, Parmesan (which isn't a cheese as far as Subway is concerned), and oregano gets the job done.

When I start getting emotionally unbalanced, I start to eat crap (hence the Subway sandwich), which further unbalances me, which leads to eating more crap. I picked these up from the DAWN snack bar (next to desk number one) and scarfed them down right away.

Of course, if you really want to eat crap, it's hard to beat McDonald's. This is a Quarter Pounder with Cheese meal. I think I got Sprite to drink. Of course I felt terrible after eating it, and I didn't really enjoy eating it to begin with. Also, whenever I eat at McDonald's, I take a look at the other people in the restaurant and think "this is what I'm going to end up looking like if I continue to eat here". That usually keeps me out of a McDonald's for a few months, at least. Next time you're in a McDonald's, take a good look at the other patrons and you'll see what I mean.

More groceries! I really wanted to get ice cream, but I settled for Power Bars instead. Johanna likes to tell me that Power Bars are really just candy bars, but I don't think that's really true. I'm not saying that I think they're healthy, but they're certainly better for you than a Snickers bar (or a 100 Grand and a bag of Bit-O-Honeys for that matter).

Lots and lots of yogurt. There's no way I'll eat all this before I move, especially since there's already some yogurt in the fridge. To the extent that I was thinking at all when I bought this, I was thinking, "I have an entire box of Grape-nuts. I'm going to need a lot of yogurt to go with it."

Tuesday dessert, part one. This is the chocolate peanut butter flavor. Do they no longer make chocolate Power Bars? I've been keeping my eyes open, but haven't seen any recently.

Dessert, part two. This one is peanut butter, which represents the pinnacle of Power Bar gastronomic experience.

 

Wednesday morning coffee, though this is really tea. Grande iced soy chai latte from Caffe Ladro. Best chai in Seattle, but you need to use soy milk to get that sweet and spicy thing going. Unlike most chai, Ladro's is very spicy and not particularly sweet. Just the way chai should be, unlike that treacle you get at Starbucks.

Wednesday lunch. I really hate getting lunch from Starbucks, so this gives you a good idea of how my day was going. I don't know exactly what grants this chicken club sandwich an "NW" designation, but it was pretty good. The drink is a grande mocha.

Wednesday dinner. Pork tacos from Taco Del Mar. This time I got the "small" drink, so the portions were much better suited to my appetite. All the staff in the store were wearing "in training" tee-shirts, which made me wonder who was doing the training. The tacos were good even if the guy didn't really know what he was doing.

I took this picture because I saw it and thought, "Why does Taco Del Mar have a profile of Darth Vader on the wall?" Does it look like Darth Vader to anyone else, or is it just me?

 

 

Wednesday dessert. Grape-nuts in orange cream flavored yogurt. I don't know why I got this flavor of yogurt. I know I don't like it, but when I was in the grocery store I was thinking, "It will probably taste good with Grape-nuts." Why I thought Grape-nuts and orange was a good pairing is beyond me. I think I must have a brain tumor.

More ketchup (this time it's kinda sideways)

This time, I'm just going to cover Saturday, and it's not going to be in any particular order. So instead of Memento, this is more like Pulp Fiction.

Food
For breakfast, Stew came over and we went to the 5-Spot. I got the Toulouse Street Scram which includes hash browns and whole grain toast. It was good. I was starving and it hit the spot. I also had coffee and water to drink. I don't remember exactly what Stew got, but I think it was two eggs over-easy, coffee, and grapefruit juice. I'm pretty sure he got something else as well, but I can't remember what. That's what happens when you wait four days before posting.

We got to the 5-Spot just as they opened, but we still had to wait for a table. Usually there's no line until around 9:30. I don't think it was the lack of empty tables, but rather they were taking forever to seat people. Also, the fact that the sun rises at 5:30 AM these days makes 8:30 seems a lot later than it normally does, so there may have been a lot of early risers waiting for breakfast as well.

At some point during the day I had to leave because the apartment was being shown, so I went do Caffe Ladro and got an orange Italian cream soda, which is what I get when I'm not interested in caffeine.

I have no clue what else I ate on Saturday, and I would have completely forgotten about the trip to Ladro if I hadn't taken a picture.

Technology
Stew drove me to Fry's so I could buy the parts to fix the Internets. I also picked up a part that I thought would give me faster transfers from my Tivo, but after playing around with it, my transfer rates are the same.

After getting some work done (and leaving the house for a bit), I made some "improvements" to the blog.

1. I added some javascript to the pages so that I could use StatCounter.com to track site usage. You can see who's been viewing the site by clicking here. You can also use the link that appears at the bottom of the column on the right. See if you can find your visit!
2. I switched the RSS feed link to use FeedBurner, so I can get some stats on who is subscribing to the site. Unfortunately, it doesn't yet work with Firefox's Live Bookmarks, so if you're using that to see the feed, it's not showing up in the logs. This is really no big deal, since I'm pretty sure that I'm the only one with a subscription to the site. (Note: If you want to use the FeedBurner feed within Firefox, simply click on the "Subscribe to this site" link on the left from within Firefox, and then use that page to create the live bookmark. Or you can manually subscribe to "http://feeds.feedburner.com/KrisAndJoGoToParis".)
3. I got tired of waiting for this site to appear in a Google search, so I bought some AdWords. If you search on "Kris Markel", "Kris", "Markel", "Johanna Trobough", "Johanna", or "Trobough", you may see an add for this site. There one ad for me and one for Jo. My daily budget is set really, really low, so the ads stop showing up after about five people click on them. Jo's ad has a much higher click-through rate (the percentage of people who see the ad and actually click on it), which is a little ironic since she never posts anything.

Movies
As I alluded to in the post about Sunday, I rented Shaolin Soccer and watched the American Edit. (As I also said on Sunday, the original edit is better, but it's missing subtitles in places.) I liked it, but not as much as Kung Fu Hustle, which I watched the previous weekend.

Getting to Paris
(I'm saving the best for last.) Jo and I accepted an offer on the house! I don't want to say too much because we still have to deal with the inspection and some other paperwork, and I'm worried about jinxing it. However, I am pretty pleased with the offer.

I promise to do a better job of staying on top of posts, at least for a little while. I'm not going to talk about what I've been eating recently, but tomorrow I'll resume my regular meal postings.

Erik in the Globe

Erik is quoted in the Boston Globe! Of course, they also mention Boston's two best restaurants: L'Espalier and Sel  de la Terre. Can't wait to try a Yellow Jersey sometime, but I think they should add some Metamucil.

Photo courtesy of the L'Espalier web site.