We have arrived in France (Nous avons arrivé en France!). We are sitting in our lovely (tiny) apartment enjoying oujr third cup of coffee on a somewhat sunny, slightly cloudy, a soupçon damp morning in Toulouse. We arrived about 8 p.m. last night and Ariane’s mother was there to meet us at the apartment with a bottle of wine, some warm soup, bread and cheese. It was a most civilized greeting. Generally, our flight went well, arriving in Frankfurt a few minutes early (of course, as we had a 6 hour layover!). Actually, we both commented on how smooth the 10-hour flight went. We slept some, I watched Michel Clayton and we read a great deal – Only 125 pages from the end of War and Peace – Really! Polley as you can see got a little bit of shut-eye in Frankfurt. Our flight to Toulouse was about 25 minutes late taking off. But we got in, grabbed the bags and had a taxi ride with a delightful fellow who was so impressed with our French. I have yet to get into a French cab and not have the driver mention George Bush! Actually, this driver referred to his own president, Nicholas Sarkozy as a George Bush clone!
Anyway, Polley and I moved in. Our 4 very heavy bags somewhat overwhelmed the studio space, but, after eating, we stayed up and put everything away. Polley continued with what I call “Playing House” this morning as we try to make each new space out own. I took a lovely hour’s walk in town, along the Garonne River and up one of the main boulevards and back to our place. Now, it will be a little grocery shopping and investigating how weak the dollar really it!
I have included a couple of shots of our place as we looked out from our balcony to the Place d’Europe and the Toulouse School of Business (Lisa Reed, this shot was for you).
That is our first update. More later and as the weather is still very cool, there will probably be more blog time as we have cool weather and no beach!
