Portes ouvertes

From Steve's and my trip to France (and Germany) 2003

close-up of the downy woodpecker who spent most of the day here

The city is in chaos: streets are blocked. Bombs are going off.  Shots are being fired.  You are in the middle of this. Where to go?
You check your twitter account and give your location. Suddenly nearby safe houses appear on your screen where you can go in and wait  in a Porte Ouverte.

Friday night, Shanna's friend who lives in Paris now was in a panic. Her husband was out  celebrating a birthday with friends and the slaughter started. She couldn't reach him for a while and wasn't sure if his concert venue was not a target. He did contact her to say he was safe finally but then made the long ride home through lots of traffic and chaos not far from the terrorism while she worriedly typed stuff on Facebook. He was fine.

When we were in London in 2007, bombs were discovered in Piccadilly Circus shutting down some of the transportation making our sight-seeing difficult and scary. I worried about the Underground which had been a target in the past. sure they have cameras all around but they are so crowded, they make NYC's subways look deserted.

We missed the Madrid train bombings by less than a week in 2004.

Somehow our buyers have access to our house (there is a lockbox that their realtor must have given them the code, which is forbidden). They leave the lights on and the heat on high. We pay the utilities until the closing. I will pay one last visit sometime this week to clean up after viewers stomped through the house with dirty feet, etc. but will be so glad when this ordeal will be over and live in fear that somehow it won't.

I am still waiting for more woodpeckers though now I have two nuthatches and two downies. The rarer red breasted nuthatch has not made reappearance yet. It was calm and sunny during my early morning run. The flock of cedar wax wings was still feasting on bittersweet along The Deliverance road though I didn't see the woodpeckers in the nearby dead tree. I did find 3 crows tearing apart a hornet's nest presumably to get at larvae. It will be almost warm enough for a bike ride today. My friend who has less tolerance for cold will come with me so I will go later instead of being out there right now.

Daniel wanted to see the house one more time and insisted on saying goodbye. They discovered the clothes chute, a feature no longer in modern houses as no one wants to go downstairs to do laundry. Another by-gone feature, milk doors when milk was delivered daily. The kids then stopped by here fighting for their turn on the trampoline.

Then off to an open house for one of the Mom's kids. It is fun to see the babies all grown up. This baby is Josh's age. We toured their house and had Bloody Marys. All of the Moms where there. Then I took one of the Moms out for her birthday at a Moroccan restaurant. Very tasty.

A nice day.