Settling In

A place to lay my head

Settling in…what a relief.  Once the last of my possessions made the trip up the stairs on Monday, the 19^th, I could feel the stress draining out of the soles of my feet.  I apologize to Andrew and Lauren for not being able to relax and enjoy Carcassonne with them—but I had to get the old apartment vacated and cleaned by noon on the 19^th, since Maureen, Jason’s next long-term tenant was arriving on the 12:45 from London!

The gardenia in the bedroom

The cactus and jade plant like the living room

We managed, and now I can sort and organize and oh yes, continue to wash floors at a more relaxed pace.  I have to admit that I really had no idea how much work would be involved with getting the floors to a point where I can live with them.  I have washed the kitchen floor 4 times and it is now ready to be steam cleaned.  Only 4 more rooms to go, but those floors weren’t as grimy as the kitchen.  

I like having coffee and my paper at the kitchen window

Clean kitchen, working stove, a pot of soup

And a KNIFE BLOCK!!!!

And I did even manage to get the space for the stove cleaned before the electrician came and wired it into the wall.  Interestingly enough, some stoves (of course the one I bought) don’t have cords to simply plug into the wall, like the ones in the US…nope, this one had to have a cable wired to it and then wired into the jus, (same word as in English—juice) by a licensed electrician.  The “guy” that the property management agency sent to me took one look at it and said, “I am a plumber, not an electrician.”  But he was working on a job with an electrician and went to fetch him right away.  Christophe made short work of my wiring job.  I have some other wiring projects I want to have him do, and he’s very happy to do so.  Mostly I want to change the light bulbs to LED lights, but I need an expert to help me purchase light bulbs.  There is no standard size—and I mean of the part that screws into the fixture.  Some are longer and skinny, others are the fatter, rounder ends that would be familiar to someone from the States.  I think I have said it before, so much of this past year’s time and energy has been devoted to learning.  I expected a lot of it, but I never dreamed stove cables and light bulbs would be included in the curriculum.

My first flowers

Things are shaping up, at least in the kitchen

Now the next big “to-do” item is to get my wifi up and running.  Here the company, Orange, has a plan that combines Internet, a land line telephone and television into one reasonably priced package.  The only catch, and I do mean as in “22” is that you have to initialize your account using the Internet—but that’s why I am signing up, because I don’t have Internet…..I swear, my next book is going to be about all of these “Catch-22” situations that the French consider normal.  

The "guest" room as of last week

Early morning light touches St Vincent as seen from the "guest" room

But for now, I made a delicious pot of soup on my new stove, the fridge is humming along, I have a place to lay my head at night and I got my red etagere assembled.  I am really pleased with the way my nest is shaping up.  I found my missing dark blue Tupperware container in the bag that contained my “dressy” clothes, and I am writing this at the kitchen table by the window while enjoying a small glass of wine.  Today, in the Sunday paper supplement, there was an article entitled, “Tell Me Where You Sleep.”  When I looked at some of the places (Nepal, Senegal, Brazil) I realized afresh just how blessed and truly rich I am.  

My neighbor across the street...like the ledge two stories up