Le Petite Dejeuner

So Mary Hodder, Doc Searls and I had breakfast in the shadow of Tour Montparnasse at a working man’s café called Le Marine.

A white plate of two sunnyside up eggs with jambon (ham that is) and croissant and chocolat chaud (hot chocolate in a way only French people make) and tartines (exquisite french bread long and thin like a canoe slathered with fresh butter) and a most fine glass of grapefruit juice.

Our last meal in Paris which was bittersweet -- it’s hard to leave since it’s been such a fun trip – but we all miss kith and kin and our own beds in our own homes and will be glad to regain them.

I don’t remember what we were saying that had Doc LOL’ing but Mary is so funny, she’s like hanging out with some combination of Lucille Ball and Jerry Seinfeld. We were mimicking the incrediblely gracious language the French use to address you in business language. I had emailed the government student “maison des etudiants” where I had lived as a college student to see if for old times sake they would rent me a room during my visit to Paris. It was actually a stone’s throw from the place we were chowing down on breakfast.

They had replied something like:

It is with enormous esteem and the utmost respect that we have received your eloquent email and appreciate the delicacy of the situation and your enjoyment of the nostalgie and souvenirs, both passionate and complimentary to our institution, which you hold in your heart for La Maison des Etudiantes. We must, however, with regret, inform you that we are unable to make rooms available to those other than students inscribed in the Universite de Paris.

In other words, in American language, they told me “No Frigging Way.”


[editor's note: En route home to Boston -- got a tiny drop of wifi in London Heathrow, in Boston for dinner.]