Call me particular, but I like to listen to music when I spay a cat. Having a live band in the operating room would be impractical, but through the miracle of the interwebs, I can listen to anything I like these days. Perusing the playlists on Songza is one of life’s simple pleasures, although choosing a playlist can be challenging.…
Day 10 – Last day in Paris. Exploring Montmartre and the Museum Fragonard at the Veterinary School. (Continued from Day 9) For the last day, I figured we should take the obligatory trek to Montmartre. It’s a trendy neighborhood, and it has so much history. So many struggling artists, poets dreamers and drinkers came here for the cheap rent…
Day 9 – Promenade Plantee, Cat Cafe, and Pompidou Center (Continued from Day 8) Our next-to-last day started at a hip breakfast place called Lockwood. They open early for breakfast, and stay open late for dinner and drinks and music. I started the day with pancakes, which immediately put me into a sugar coma. Next we were off to…
Paris – Day 8, pt 2 (Continued from here) This morning, we spent the day in a suburb of Paris, looking at the graves of beloved pets in the Cemetery of Dog and Other Domestic Animals. This afternoon, we explored the opposite of suburbia. We checked out le petit Manhattan. In other words, La Défense. Although Paris keeps its historic…
Day 8, Part 1 – The Cimitière des Chiens (or, I DO Wanna Be Buried in a Pet Sematary) (Continued from Day 7. Day 1 starts here.) Our eighth day in Paris started with a long train ride to the Northwest of Paris, to a suburb called Asnière-sur-Seine, for what turned out to be the highlight of the trip. Paris…
Day 7 – The Marais, Saint Germaine des Pres, and the Museum of the History of Medicine(Continued from Day 6) Le Musée d’Histoire de la Médecine is one of my favorite finds in all of my time in France. I’d never even heard of it ’til an American friend posted a link to it on my blog, asking me if I’d…
Day 6 – The Canal St. Martin, Belleville, and the Pere Lachaise Cemetery (Continued from Day 5) Our first full day in Paris began with a walk up the Canal St. Martin, and then a visit to the newly hip neighborhood of Belleville. To get to the canal, you take the Metro to Place del la Republique. This is where…
Day 5 – Goodbye Amsterdam, Hello Paris (Continued from Day 4) Day 5 of our trip was mainly a travel day, but we had the entire morning to do something in Amsterdam. I was considering the Rembrandt House, or maybe the zoo, but Udi was free that morning, and offered something pretty neat. He said that if we wanted, he’d…
Day Four in Amsterdam – Markets, Parks, a Cat or Two, and the Eurovision Song Contest (Continued from Day 3) Saturday was our last full day in Amsterdam. We were going to check out the newly renovated Stedelijk Museum, but there was a change of plans. Our friend Udi was free that morning, and he suggested we check out some…
Day 3 in Amsterdam – The Red Light District, Amstelkring Museum, and Westerpark (Continued from Day 2) No trip to Amsterdam is complete without a peek at the city’s oldest neighborhood, which has hosted the world’s oldest profession since the year 1200. The Dutch call this area “De Wallen” or “The Walls”, after the old city walls that once stood…
Day 2 in Amsterdam – The Six Collection, Electric Ladyland (the First Museum of Fluorescent Art), and EyeBar(Continued from Day 1) It’s amazing what 31 hours of being awake, followed by half an ambient and a comfortable bed will do for you. Woke up feeling very rested, and we faced the day with great anticipation, for today we were going…
I love to travel. It’s what I live for. Although I tend to seek out new and exotic lands, it’s nice to go back to familiar places now and then. I get to revisit restaurants and museums that I enjoyed the first time I visited, and I get to check out new neighborhoods, new exhibits, and new shops and stores. …
We had just gotten back from a ten day vacation to Morocco, so this seemed a little indulgent, but Mexico is inexpensive, and we hadn’t been to the beach in years. After my Morocco trip and before this Mexico trip, I did take one more photography class, and the added instruction did make a difference. So this blog post is…
Hard to believe, but our last day in Morocco is upon us. Today’s agenda is to explore as much of Tangier in one day as we can, and then head back home to our own cats, who we miss a lot. We started the day at the Gran Café de Paris. With its tufted brown leather seats impeccable service, and…
I’ve always wanted to visit Tangier. The city is at the meeting point of two continents and two seas, and it defies comparison with any other city in Morocco. For the first half of the 20thcentury, Tangier was an international city, with its own laws and its own administration. It attracted a lot of writers, including Paul Bowles, the American…