Typically, we would be looking at another couple of weeks before the wine-producers haul out their monstrous vine-shakers and start bringing in the 2020 harvest. However, a dry, hot summer has the local producers are thinking later this week more than later this month. Which reinforces what I come to understand about making wine, while […]

[Read more →]

A reader asked for information about the experience of finding and consuming the often-quite economical wines of the Languedoc region of southern France. In theory, I should be an expert, after four-plus years based among the rolling hills and vineyards in this part of Occitanie, but that would be an error. I like wine well […]

[Read more →]

If you are reading this in the U.S., brace yourself. In France, all employees get five weeks of paid vacation per year. Five weeks. More than a month. And that does not include one-day public holidays, which can reach double digits in a given year. We know about France and its summer vacations because we […]

[Read more →]

In the United States, a traveling circus is a historical curiosity. The age of the portable “big tops”, which came into U.S. cities and towns, usually by train, often announcing their presence by parading down Main Street … that age is so last millennium. It was two years ago that the Ringling Bros. and Barnum […]

[Read more →]

Living in western Europe, the assumption by most Americans, including this one, is that professional soccer teams must not be far from any point on the maps of England, Spain, Germany, Italy and France. That assumption would be wrong. Where we live, in the Occitanie region (previously known as the Languedoc) of southern France, plenty […]

[Read more →]

At the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, in 1918, World War I came to an end. That is, the long and bloody war ended at 11 a.m. on November 11. One hundred years later, France celebrated its century-old victory over Germany by instructing all churches to ring their bells for […]

[Read more →]

France is the biggest country in western Europe, in terms of area, which is nothing to sneeze at, considering it is nearly as big as Texas. A person can visit here many times, or live here for a year or two, without getting around to setting foot in even half the country’s wide array of […]

[Read more →]

The bells rang on the hour, as they always do, here in “our” French village. And then a few minutes later the bells at the 300-year-old church rang out again, and this was a gusher of clanging and banging that could mean only one thing at 4 p.m. on a Saturday: A wedding! And the […]

[Read more →]

(Photo credit: Domaine de Arjolle ) When most of the planet’s people hear “France” they think “Paris”. Certainly that is the case for Americans.  And I don’t see why it would not be true across the spectrum of humanity. France and Paris, Paris and France … a duo. But only about one-sixth of French people — […]

[Read more →]

We are in Southern California, where the weather has been a bit raw. It snowed a bit in the mountains. Yikes! But nothing like it has been back in the south of France. Where we live has been getting inches (inches!) of snow. This does not happen there. Certainly not to the extent we have […]

[Read more →]