Un déjeuner avec mes soeurs

A Real Nice Lunch

Last night I had a pleasant surprise when I received a text message from my sister, Jeanne. My sister, Susan, from Syracuse, was at Jeanne's house in Katonah, NY (that's in Westchester, north of New York City) and they wanted to come to see us for lunch.

How delightful for a Monday! Richard and I busied ourselves putting the apartment in order. Jeanne texted: did I want Fern to come? Fern is Jeanne's black lab. I love Fern, and she loves me. Even though Fern does not like to ride in a car, she made the trip just for me.

Fern Herself.

Fern's Bowl of Water

Jeanne and Susan brought us this beautiful hydrangea plant,

one of my favorites.

My sisters got a take-out lunch from WM. Nicholas & Co. in Katonah. I am sorry that I did not take photos of the lunch spread, but here is the menu:

Everything was very tasty. I especially loved the big blackberries. Richard and I shared the turkey wrap, and Jeanne ate half of the big, messy roast beef on brioche. Susan had half of the vegetable wrap.

Sister Sue. Sue just spent 3 months in Naples, Florida,

where she and her husband, Rick, rented a house with a pool.

Sister Jeanne. Jeanne, her husband, Chris Wedge, and son Jack 

are going to Beijing, China on Friday for the Beijing Film Festival.

Chris will be promoting his new film, Epic, due out in May.

The cover of Misadventures -- in my interpretation, the author

as a cypher, except that she is wearing a

decorated, red dress, emblematic of

her creative self.

Jeanne loaned me two books. Above, is a book called Misadventures by Sylvia Smith. Ms. Smith, who died in February in London, published this memoir in 2001. Until that time she had worked at secretarial jobs. She was able to start writing when she became ill and stopped working. Jeanne and I learned about this book when Ms. Smith's obit was published in The New York Times. The memoir is a series of short vignettes about actual experiences in her life, written in short, declarative sentences in a matter-of-fact way. Paul Vitello, in the Times obit, says:

"The book, a plainly written, deadpan chronicle of an ordinary life, seemed to push the allowable boundaries of ordinary, entering an edge-of-space world where critics quarrel over literary metaphysics."

But Ms. Smith intended only that her books be "hysterically funny." And they are as her observations are given with a dose of the absurd.

Here is an example:

"My father had a habit of smoking in the car. Whilst driving the short distance to work one morning he threw his lighted cigarette butt out the window but unbeknown to him the wind blew it back in again. Some minutes later he saw smoke coming up from underneath him and looked down to see his cushion on fire. He stopped immediately, threw the cushion onto the pavement and jumped up and down on it until he had put the flames out. In full view of a very interested group of people standing at a nearby bus stop." Misadventures, by Sylvia Smith, published by Canongate Books.

The second book
is a collection of stories about

Parisians, both well-known and of modest origin.

Can't wait to read it.

Susan returned my DVD of Season 3 of Mad Men, the

last season for which I purchased a DVD.

I just signed up for Netflix and am now

catching up with Season 4.

Susan brought Richard two giant

Hershey Bars.

Which, of course, he loved.

I did manage a photo of dessert.
Chocolate babka.

Les Trois Soeurs.
Jeanne, me and Susan.

À Bientôt!

On my Inspiration Board...

Lily
Lily Pulitzer died this week. She's the lady who put pink and green on map. She was an hieress living in Palm Beach when she practically went crazy with nothing to do. So she and a friend started an orange juice stand. When the juice splashed on their clothes, they came up with the idea of doing colorful patterns (like you would have on your kitchen curtains) to camouflage the stains. Et voila.
The Lily Pulitzer brand was born.

My homage to Lily.

Getting ready to go to lunch with Richard.

Agnes B jacket, vintage bead necklace

and Yves St. Laurent brooch.

Beady Eyed

 Some of my bead necklaces.

 With an Amanda Fatherazi brooch.

A new drawing....

Happy Spring, mes amis.

Adventure in Orly

Un hôtel excentrique
Returning home from France, our plan was to fly to Orly Airport from Nice, stay overnight in a nearby hotel, and fly out of Orly the next morning. I found a hotel online called Hotel Air Plus which appeared to be near the airport. And the hotel had a free shuttle service.

 A plethora of poisson at Nice Airport.

It was all I could do to resist this Hermès hat at the duty-free shop.

Euros were burning a hole in my poche.

On arrival at Orly Airport, we found the shuttle (navette). Malheureusement, it was 3 p.m. and the next shuttle pick up would be at 5. To the taxi stand. When we got in the taxi and told the driver that we were going to the village of Orly -- mon dieu! The driver was not happy. "I waited for 2 hours for a fare, and you are only going 2 miles," he uttered ever so charmingly in French. But gallantly, he drove us, me wondering just what I was getting us in to. All I could think of was that we were out in the strange exurbs of Paris and our taxi driver didn't like us. So I said, " Je suis desolée." (I am sorry.) He said, "Je vous en prie." (Basically, it's OK.)

We arrive at Hotel Air Plus. 

 "Art" installation.

It's actually quite charming in an ivy-covered sort of way.

Check in.

The walls are covered with airplane-related pictures and memorabilia.

The owner of the hotel must be a pilot.

Orly is 7.9 miles from the center of Paris and 
about 20 minutes by train. 

This hotel is a good, money-saving option for travelers on a budget.
Our room was 110 euros.

Almost looks like an early Miro.

We missed la navette and ran afoul of a taxi driver.

These are the houses near the hotel.

Orly turned out to be a charming place.

We were quite hungry, but the hotel restaurant was not open. We were told there were restaurants in town, so we set off to discover Orly, on foot, of course. We found a bar, Le Narval.

 We went in for a glass of wine. They were out of sandwiches.

We began to explore the town. What we quickly realized, though, was that we were in the old, original part of Orly. There was another, modern part, not far away, with pizza parlors. And the old part of town was being gentrified. It seems we had discovered a gem. The name Orly derives from Latin Aureliacum, "The villa of Aurelius." The population of Orly is 21,691.

 Cute, little houses, and alley-like streets in Orly.

 A fixed-up building.

Perhaps the type of person who might settle in

 Greenpoint, Brooklyn if they

were American appreciates the charm of old Orly.

This épicerie just popped open like a mushroom about 4 p.m.

 Ripe for renovation. The old stone houses of Orly.

Dinner at the famed L'envol restaurant in the Hotel Air Plus.

The next morning we were on our way home on Open Skies Airline, 

business class, bien sûr.

 Sun dried tomatoes and mozzarella for an appetizer.

 Le dîner.

Dessert and coffee.

Movies. I watched "2 days in New York." It was good.

 I drew on a magazine page.

À Bientôt!