Lost in the City

It feels good to be back in Chitown. I arrived a few hours ago after some time in a couple of planes from Paris to the Windy City via London. Mary picked me up at the airport. It was great to see her, and great to have a friend to meet at O'Hare. It really makes an arrival nicer. As we talked and exchanged news, driving towards downtown, I watched the city growing bigger and bigger through the windshield. Back in Chicago... that is a very nice feeling.
Mary dropped me off at my hotel on Wacker Drive and had to run. It wasn't too late yet, so I decided to take a quick shower and head out to enjoy the city. For this first outing, I stayed in the Loop. The previous trip had given me a few pointers, and even though I wasn't quite at home yet, I was still familiar with the area. I walked around the Theater District, going from the infamous Chicago Theater tp the Goodman Theater, to the Palace... catching a sight of the Thompson Center and its Miro sculpture, snapping many pictures for the surrounding buildings, the numerous bridges and their reflection in the River. The walk that had started with daylight ended at night amidst the neon signs. That was a good start!

Somehow, the excitement gave way to apprehension over the past few days. It's natural I guess: last time I was so excited about a trip was last year, when I left for California (the Christmas trip to Chicago doesn't count, it was a short one and I had my man to protect me!). The thing is... the California trip didn't end that well. So I'm a little bit disturbed about that. But I'm not going to let this feeling linger. No way!!!
Chicago, here I come! I'm looking forward to my first game at the Friendly Confines, obviously. I'm also looking forward to see Mary, walk around, run around, bike around, ride the El... and so many other things! Now let's hope that my leg will end this trip in better shape than last time!

Yes, the Cubbies did it, they slid in the first spot of the Central Division!!! It took a victory against the Phillies while the Brewers lost to the Mets. Yes, I know, there are still two months to go… and that’s a loooooong time. But that won’t prevent me from savoring today’s good news!! Nope, no one will spoil my fun! It’s so good to see the cubs’ flag up that pole at Wrigley Field!
Now to get back to the real life (wait… the cubbies wouldn’t be for real???)… it has kept being insane lately… which is why I’m posting some news here and hope you’ll cut me some slack while I’m dealing with my backup and not replying your (always interesting, of course) emails.
Work has been really busy for what should have been a slow month of July, and it's barely starting to slow down. This was for a couple of good reasons though. Perhaps more on that later… For now, I have to say that the most insane thing I have been dealing with lately is the bus situation. It’s August, Parisians are supposed to be away, so they cut down the number of busses. That means a bus every 15 minutes on my route if you’re lucky... and that's for peak hour. Bottom line: on the way in and one the way out, it’s 30 minutes in a packed bus. NOT a great way to start and end a day, particularly with a bum leg that tends to swell in the heat. So, nope, Ludi is not a happy camper when coming out of the bus.
Still on the work front, I got some very good news. Well, not me so much as a great colleague of mine, who just got the nod from the adoption commission to launch an adoption procedure. See, when you want to adopt, you first have to get this commission’s agreement that you are fit to adopt. It’s particularly difficult when you are single, which is my friend’s case. She faced the commission on Tuesday and got the decision yesterday. She took me out for lunch to celebrate. Great great news! Any kid would be lucky to have her as a mom.
The thesis is progressing. Some good work got done today as I finished the second subsection of my segregation chapter. I’ll start working on the third and last subsection tomorrow.
Finally, the marathon training is going great. I decided to give a real training a chance even if I'm not completely healed yet. I put to good used the long hours put in studying track and field training in the past and made my own training program. This is going very well for now. Let's hope my leg, knee and ankle will play nice and let me train properly!
And… I guess that will do it for today. I am totally pooped and have to get ready for my parents' arrival tomorrow evening.

Another reunion took place tonight, with the Montréal connection this time. Dominic and Patricia came to visit at the end of a whirling French trip. It was the occasion for me to finally meet Patricia, after having heard many good things about her from Dominic. Of course, it was also great to see Dominic again! Last time around was a few years ago, when we took a trip to Brussels together.
We had some diner at a brasserie on Daguerre Street, a busy street not very far from my place. We then took a nice walk to Montparnasse, Rennes Street, before ending up at Saint-Germain. Walking by the Montparnasse train station, we saw quite a few people on rollerblades. That reminded me of the customary Friday night Roller Ride that takes place here in Paris… apparently starting from Montparnasse around 10 PM.
Sure enough, as we walked down Rennes Street, we stumbled upon said Roller Ride, which was riding down Raspail Boulevard. It was pretty cool to watch them all. The first ones were really fast, and even if the pace was slowing down toward the end, they were still pretty speedy. Anyway… nice to witness that. It was a first for me. I don’t even know if the ride takes place all year long or only for the summer.

One more visit from the DC connection… and not any visit: I got to see my running mate and dear friend Rachel! She will be in France for a couple of months, so it’ll give us time to get the running gear on again, in Paris this time. I’m looking forward to that!!
We just spent a great night out with Rachel’s mom and her aunt. We met at the Saint Michel Fountain, got a crepe at the Saint Andre des Arts Creperie and walked around for a while through the Latin Quarters, Odeon, and a few other places.

Bastille Day is the name under which our national holiday is known in the US. We, French people just call it "July 14th". On that day, there are fireworks in most of the French cities and towns (well, some are having them on July 13th now... kind of strange if you ask me, but that's the way it is...). There are also many balls (as in dances) organized in most of the cities or neighborhoods, either by the cities themselves or by some organizations, the firemen's balls probably being the most famous. The other national highlight is the military parade down the Champs-Elysees.
It's the first year I was in Paris for Bastille Day, so even if I was pretty tired (what can I say... story of the past year!!) I decided to give the fireworks a shot. Plus, I just bought a new camera (yes, the fourth!) that I was eager to test. On top of that, my cousin Cedric is in town for a few days to take a couple of exams, and he doesn't know Paris at all, so the fireworks were a cool experience to have.

I told you we'd get there...
Once again, I took advantage of a short trip to my parents' to play some baseball. We went to the municipal stadium up the hill and played catch for a while before hitting a bit. We had a lot of fun.
Now to talk about serious baseball, I am quite amazed at all that happened in June for the Cubs. I am still loyaly following the game from the other side of the pond, and it has been quite eventful lately. Zambrano and his catcher Barrett throwing some punches, the manager Lou Piniella getting ejected from a game the next day. Ted Lilly getting ejected from a game after 10 pitches for supposedly purposefully hitting a slugger. D. Lee getting hit by a ball and then initiating a fight with Padres' pitcher Chris Young... well, you can say stuff happened! On top of that, we had a couple of amazing come-from-behind wins, including a 9th inning 2-run homer by Ramirez against the Brewers (Central Division leaders). Lots of emotions in June... lots of good game too, allowing the Cubs to stay within reach of the Brewers for the Division Title. I'm telling you: this is the year!

... and NO, this one is not about baseball. No worries though, we'll deal with baseball soon (of course ! Whose blog did you think you were reading??).
So if it's not a baseball kind of bat I'm talking about, what am I actually talking about? Well... just what's on the picture. What do you mean, you can't see? Take a closer look. See it now? It's a bat. Not just any bat: a bat I held in my hand for a while.
I'm at my parents' this weekend, taking an extended weekend to visit family and see my osteopath. For a few years, we have had bats at home. Not in the house, but right outside: they nest (do bats nest? no idea, but they sure spend their days in there) in a hole under the roof, 1 foot away from the sundeck. I like those bats: they aren't bothering at all, and since we've had them we haven't had mosquitos around. That works for me !
Anyway... back to the bat: we saw one of them hanging right out of the hole as we were having lunch on the sundeck. A little while later, it fell down on the ground. My mom, animal rescuer in chief (birds, ducks, bats, you name it), picked it up and put it back next to the hole, into which the bat disappeared. A couple of hours later though, my mom came to me in the living room. She was coming from outside, phone in one hand, bat in the other, and put the bat in my hand. That was weird. The little thing kept moving and trying to get out of my hand. Taking a closer look, I noticed that one of it's "arms" was dysfunctional, which might explain why it always ended up out the hole. I put it back up there... and in it went. We didn't see it after that. I'm hoping all is well!!

My health is gradually improving. I threw the crutches away back in March and started running for real a few weeks after. I have made good progress since then. I started with occasional 5-minute runs. It quickly morphed into 10 or 15-minute runs every other day. Now, my average run is 30-minute long. I tend to run 5 times a week… even if I sometimes happen to run every single day of the week. Well, that may be pushing it, so I’m trying to stay reasonable, particularly since my knee has been bothering me during the past week. It doesn’t mean I won’t try for a new record soon. For now, my longer run (last Saturday) lasted an hour. Not bad, right?
Oh, and I have a running mate! Well, for now at least…. We’ll see if this lasts. Thierry is a colleague from IRSN. We aren’t in the same department, but we are on the same floor. I had spotted him at the stadium before, but he hadn’t figured out who I was (well, I _do_ look different in running gear compared to work clothes!). The seminar solved that problem. Since then, we ran a couple of times together, as we were at the stadium at the same time. It would be nice if we could do that a few times a week. First because time passes more quickly this way, second, because he runs slowly, which is good to keep me in check, third, because I don’t have to walk all the way back to IRSN alone!

Third trip on the job. After Cherbourg and Grenoble, here comes Arcachon. The whole division spent three days there for the yearly internal seminar. We all flew in on Monday afternoon and flew back home on Wednesday afternoon. Frankly, I’m not sure such expenses were needed for what it was… we could have done the same work in a single day in some Parisian location. That said, I had a good time. It was pretty intense, with the workshops starting early and ending at 9 PM the second day, but a very nice experience overall. Since I am still quite new I didn’t know everyone in the division yet. The seminar was a good opportunity to get to know people, and get to know better those I already knew.