Paris - Day Eight

Window decoration on a Paris restaurant:
buy a bowl of soup and a bird gets a free pair of undies.

I'm writing this while I have some downtime waiting for a series of press announcements before, at 7:00 p.m., there is a public reporting to the world (as it has gathered here at Le Bourget in Paris) of how all the climate negotiations have been going today.

That makes for a long day. I was here at 7:15 a.m. (left my hotel at 6:30) so I could make it to the Environment Canada briefing at 8:00 a.m. The traffic gets sufficiently gummed up in the Paris morning that, unless I go really early, I never make it to the 8:00 a.m. meeting on time.

I assume I'll be hanging around until 9 or so before I make my way back to the hotel. I'll be in my room by 10:00 p.m. and in my bed shortly after that. Just in case anyone thought I was having a tonne of fun in Paris...

Well, yesterday afternoon was pretty good. It was my half day off for good behaviour. I still am not well oriented in Paris, and after I got myself going in the wrong direction for a good forty minutes, I discovered my error, grabbed a taxi and for less than 10 Euros and in less than 20 minutes was where I was supposed to be and only a bit late.

Lost in Paris: maybe because I was allowing myself to be distracted by all the pretty views.

I spent the afternoon with an old friend: had a fine lunch, walked along the Seine and the Champs Elysee, wandered around and found a cafe to rest and have a couple of glasses of wine. Then walked some more until we were hungry again, had a light supper and then hopped in taxis to go back to our hotels. That was a pretty fun day.

The next four days will be less fun than that, but, I'm here to do something useful, which means, for at least Monday, Tuesday and maybe Wednesday, hanging around to hear between seven and nine at night how far we have managed to pull ourselves from the brink.

The blog posts will be midday for this reason. I'll try to find something to tell you that's fun, interesting and hopeful.