le blog

even though i've become quite the blog-slacker over the last few months, i find myself overcome, once again, by the urge to blog from afar, this time from le very small town in france.

the advent of cheap, reliable technology continues to make the world smaller - looking out the window from where i'm sitting you might think you're mere inches (or maybe centimeters) from
falling off the planet, but you're just never that isolated in the presence of high speed internet... especially when your american cell phone is completely functional.

that said, there was no way we were going to wander into town without calling attention to ourselves. i am here with s "i love goat cheese" s and c "six seconds to sunburn" k who were gracious enough to join me on my sojourn in bfe, so i'm doing my best to show them the local sights. i thought we should start in the nearby town of la machine, most famous for it's fall from greatness after the coal mines closed. it's only about 4 kilometers from where we're staying, but the uncharacteristic blazing heat resulted in three loud, sweaty americans appearing out of nowhere, banging down the doors of the mining museum. sore thumb doesn't begin to cover it.

it turns out that the mining museum is open only between 2 and 6 pm, only on sundays and bank holidays. not surprising, really, in a town where the grocery store closes for lunch and the church is open for mass every 4th sunday. but a drag nonetheless, since it meant that i couldn,t come through on my promise of hard hats, head lamps, and a guided tour of a mock coal mine.

not that the day was without excitement. there was a brief moment of panic when we thought we'd come across a naked man on the side of the road, fishing in the nearby creek (it turned out he actually did have pants on), and there was our chance to help out with local law inforcement. as we were walking home on the small road (there isn't so much sidewalk as there is ditch) we got, pulled over by a very little car carrying two very attractive policemen (gendarmes, if you will). while i was still trying to figure out how it was possibly illegal to be walking along the side of the road, they pulled out a flyer with a picture of a man and a separate picture of his motorcycle, with a "excuse me but have you seen him?"

even more surprising than being asked to help out with a french rural man hunt was that we were actually helpful, as we had actually seen him going in the opposite direction about a half hour before. we supplied all the details we could (we're not sure they believed us) and watched as a small legion of law enforcement paraded into town. if there was a newspaper it would be on the front page.

maybe it's the jet-lag talking, but i don't think it gets any better than this.