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January 24, 2002 The picture of Hans on the back page was an excellent comment on the New Year. I went to bed at 7:30 p.m. so I could forget about our (s)elected pResident and the knuckle-draggers in Congress and our legislature. Re: the Paris sewer, or, Why I Started Smoking Cigars I tried smoking one cigarette when I was about ten. One puff and I quit. The decades passed. About 1955 I was working at the university as an electrician. Married student housing in those days was a trailer court where the Farmers Loop parking lot is now. They had water and sewer as well as electricity (top class, eh?). There was a "sewage lift station" where a 600-volt DC pump forced the sewage uphill so it would flow down the other side to the sewage plant. Someone flushed a diaper (or two or three) which made it through the pipes to the lift station, where they (or it) plugged the intake to the pump. The sludge and floating shit rose inexorably until they inundated the brushes and commutator of the 600-volt DC pump motor, causing a hot electric arc. Being direct current it did not blow the fuses right away but lasted long enough to ignite the floating debris (and turds). The power plant boys cut off the current and the fire crew used CO2 to douse the flames. Frank Stowman was the head electrician and, at that point, I was the whole crew. So after the mess was pumped out (was Bud Hilton —"have hose, will travel"—around then?) the electric crew (i.e., me) went down to replace the wiring, the brushes, re-smooth the commutator (file and sandpaper), flush out the garbage in the frame, replace the controls, etc. I went in—and came right out. After clearing my lungs with cold winter air, I marched up the hill to the Eielson Building, where the campus supply store and post office was located. I bought a box of Robert Burns cigars, went outside, lit up and smoked seven (7) of them, exhaling through my nose, paralyzing my olfactory organs so I could stink, but not smell (anything, including myself). And so the sewage lift station was put back into operation. January 22, 2002 While perusing my copy of the latest Ester Republic I was appalled to read that our Alaskans in Paris could find "nothing to eat" in that world capital of gastronomy, or, as they admitted, "nothing familiar enough to be appetizing." "Impossible!" I cried. Why, if I were in Paris tonight I would be sitting at a little table by the window in my favorite restaurant in all of Paris, the Bistro du Peintre, at the corner of the Rue de Charonne and the Rue Ledru Rollin, behind the Bastille, sipping a glass of the house Bordeaux or perhaps the wine of the week and enjoying a luscious steak tartare, served with a salad and real french fried potatoes, peeled and sliced in the kitchen and cooked to a light, golden brown in olive oil. I might be having the osso buco, great big slabs of bone from which you dip out the rich, dripping marrow and spread it like butter on fresh bread. I might even go for something really exotic and get the chef's special of the day... Back in the sixth arrondissement, exquisite but expensive frogs’ legs can be had at Roger la Grenouille (Roger the Frog) on the Rue des Grands Augustins, and just around the corner in the Rue Gregoire de Tours there is a cheap little student restaurant called Orestes, where they still serve wild boar. The waiter there cries out, "HELLO MY FRIEND!" in a booming voice as soon as he suspects you are American, and if you don't want the wild boar you can just take the fixed price menu and a quarter carafe of red wine and pay a total of only $9 for your dinner. Then you can afford a wonderful but expensive drink before or after dinner near the Metro Port Royale, at the Closerie des Lilas (described by Hemingway in A Moveable Feast). Don't forget to stop by the Shakespeare and Company bookstore on the Rue de la Bucherie and oh, by the way, don't put ketchup on your Greek sandwich, use some of that marvelous white sauce on it the way the Greeks do... they'll show you how at the Souvelaki Athenien, near the Rue du Chat qui Peche (The Street of the Fishing Cat). Just tell them I sent you... As a seasoned traveler, I also couldn't help but shake my head at Peter McRoy’s obvious mistake as I read the lamentable account of his air travel this fall. You should have flown Air France, Peter! I, too, was traveling late in November and as I relaxed in my economy class seat on an Air France flight to Paris, not five minutes after take-off, a beautiful young French stewardess was asking me if I would like a drink before dinner? Complimentary, of course. Scotch on the rocks? Would I like a double? As I sipped my scotch, looked out the window and munched on peanuts, I could smell the dinner warming up in the galley. Here was the stewardess back again with a menu. It seems I would have to choose between French regional cuisine (Saumon poche a la parisienne, Blanquette de Veau a l'ancienne, riz valencienne, etc.) and Italian specialties (Jambon cru, tomate et mozzarelle au basilic, Lasagnes aux deux fromages, etc.). I could only imagine what they were eating up in first class... Here was the stewardess again, asking me what kind of wine I would like with dinner, please? A nice red from the south of France? Something from the Loire Valley? But of course, monsieur. No sooner had they served dinner than there was someone with a bread box asking me if I would like some more french bread? They cleared my tray away and as I sat there full and happy, here was that beautiful stewardess again asking if I would like an after dinner drink? Complimentary, of course. Grand Marnier? Benedictine? A little more coffee, perhaps? Ah, I thought, there are some things the French will never give up, terrorists or no terrorists! And yes, Peter, there was a movie... John David Ragan
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