a guy has just come in to negotiate a repas for himself and nine mates to celebrate the end of the university year on thursday night. He sat down with the patron and they worked out a menu, essentially he's offering his lunchtime deal but in the evening, with a couple of additional things on the menu, in particular the steak tartare since he expects it to be hot thursday. But now the guy has gone promising to call tomorrow to confirm, and the patron's wife is giving him a hard time. 'The tartare? but that's expensive!'. The patron's theory is that they'll drink a lot of wine, have aperitifs, maybe digestifs, and that way they'll make some money.. his wife remains unconvinced.

'what wine are they going to take?'
'buh.. we said some beaujolais rosé, I said they could have 4 bottles for 50 euros'
'I don't know..'
'50 euros plus 150 for the food, that makes 200 euros!'
'Bon.. c'est bien'

Le relais de la poste

There are water works in our impasse, very noisy, so I've come to work in the relais de la poste opposite the post office. Free wifi and wimbledon on the TV, quite distracting. Referring to the picture below, i'm sitting in the window, bottom left, just next to the barrel.


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The word on the streets

When I go to the market at boulevard Richard-Lenoir on Sundays, I usually call in for coffee at the bar du marché. In these times of ongoing financial crisis, riots on the streets of Iran, etc., what are the topics of import being discussed at the zinc? 1) why is the renault car not doing better, when the Red Bulls are in positions 1 and 3 on the grid (for Silverstone today) and they use the same engine? This is the cause of much vexation. Subject 2) what is the size of a beer glass in Italy? It was contended that a small beer in Italy is typically 20cl, while a normal beer is 40cl. I could have provided some expert comment on this but obviously someone with the actual answers is superfluous to a discussion like this.

ESORICS

I've had a couple of papers accepted to the conference ESORICS in S Malo in September. This is good news because (in no particular order) it's good to publish papers (my boss says so), one of the papers is the first major publication for which I did all the work in French (it's written in English of course..), and Sam's mum's birthday in Jersey is just afterwards so I can go by boat to the party..

bibliotheque

I decided to staty at home today to avoid another RER B strike (which seems to have been pretty weak in the end). So I'm working in the local public library, Bibliotheque Faidherbe. It's not bad, good wifi, a bit noisy. Parisian universities typically don't provide their students with a great deal of work space, and everyone lives in tiny flats, so the libraries are full of students, especially as its exam/dissertation season.

Also, in an intersting piece of architectural design, this library is on the ground floor of a building wtih an 'ecole maternelle' (i.e. a nursery) on the first floor, so you can hear kids running around upstairs. Thump thump thum scream. Hopefully they'll go home soon.

Notes des frais

Seen in le monde:

Ce qui est drôle, avec ce scandale des notes de frais, c’est qu’on a
le même chaque semaine dans le Canard (sinon pire).

le Canard being the French Private Eye style newspaper, which every week reveals French MPs doing even more crooked things than the UK MPS, to a collective gallic shrug from the general population who go back to fiddling their tax returns.

and in the Economist:

Gloom for Britain’s Labour government became outright humiliation when the party was pushed into third place by the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP), which advocates withdrawal from the European Union. UKIP was a big beneficiary of British voter rage at an expenses scandal that has left the British Parliament reeling. This is ironic, given that of the 12 UKIP members of the European Parliament elected in 2004, one was later jailed for fraud and a second is now facing trial for money laundering and false accounting.

The hard life of a French researcher

Our lab has its 'away days' or team bonding trip next week monday->wednesday. It's in a country hotel in Troyes. We've just received the menu:

Déjeuner: Terrine de truite aux amandes - Sauté de volaille, sauce au
cidre d'Othe - Craquant aux 3 chocolats

Diner: Méli-mélo de crudités de saison - Pavé de saumon au jus de
ciboulette - Dacquoise aux pommes fondantes et miel de Géraudot.

Déjeuner: Bavarois d'écrevisses et coulis de tomates fraîches - Cuisse
de lapin à la moutarde de Meaux - Charlotte aux biscuits de Reims et
fruits de saison.

Diner: Gougère tiède farcie à la poêlée de légumes au basilic et
chaource - Tajine d'agneau de l'Aube aux courgettes - Fondant au
chocolat, glace au nougat et tuiles aux amandes.

Déjeuner: Vol au vent de volaille aux champignons de Paris - Couronne de limande
aux écrevisses et tomates confites - Poire pochée au cidre d'Othe.

Elections

Good news and bad news in the French EU elections - no matter which side your political tartine is buttered. Sarko's party got the single biggest vote, some 20 odd percent, which is unprecedented for a right-wing party in power at a midterm election of any kind. The greens did extremely well, getting close to 16%, a major gain for them. The socialist party did very badly indeed, which is bad news for their recently elected leader. But the left in general did ok, the new anticapitalist party taking 5% in their first tilt. But the 'taux de abstention' was a record high, making all the results somewhat weak.

wifi in the park

It's some sort of semi-holiday here today - Sam has to go to work but my lab is closed. I have a paper to finish so I've come to work outside in Square la petite Roquette, one of Paris' wifi enabled public parks. This is the nearest one, about 2 minutes by Velib from our place. It's very pleasant, lots of seats are under trees so no screen glare and there's good reception everywhere. Background noise of fountain, kids playing 5-a-side, gurgling babies, etc. is quite relaxing.