hey jud

After a good and seemingly quick flight while enthralled with The Girl Who Played with Fire by Stieg Larsson, I arrived at the apartment much earlier than expected. As the taxi driver looked for rue Galande, I noticed a coffee/breakfast place with outdoor seating, so when he dropped me off I went, suitcase and all, to sit outside with a decaf creme. I hadn't had any luck connecting with wifi to do a text message in the airport and when it came time to meet and be let into the apartment, I still had no service to send a text message and was stuck outside at the door. In desperation I stopped a woman walking by, asked if she spoke English, beginning of course with the all purpose French plea, 'excusez moi de vous deranger, mai j'ai un probleme'. She did speak English, listened to my explanation and promptly said, I'll call upstairs for you. I gave her the number, she called and a minute later, someone came down to let me in.

Fortunately, the network connection in the apartment worked smoothly and my email to Meg got me the answer for how to make my phone work - turn on the free expanded international roaming. I did, the bars reappeared on my iPhone and I was back in the fully connected world, at least for texting.

The next problem was figuring out how to lock the apartment door so I could get out to the market before everything was closed on Sunday. I couldn't get it locked, so I dashed out anyway, with the door just closed but still safely beyond two other coded entry doors. With food in the pantry and sleep overwhelming me, I settled in for a restorative nap. It was so good that when I woke up I immediately figured out the door locking problem - just don't push the key all the way in. The sweet spot was about a quarter inch out, and then it worked as smoothly as a door that looked to be from a century earlier should work.

Here are some very quick shots from my late afternoon walk.