Hang on, I'll just check my diary

You can buy a lot of great things in France, including suitcases, which I had cause to do while I was there. However, suitcases don't enchant me so much so I left Mr Baxter in BHV to choose the right one and anyway, his French is better than mine.

I oozed my way over to the stationary shelves nearby where I found this:

There was only one - all its brothers and sisters had been sold. Diary? Notebook? I opened it up and quite a number of my wishes came true at that moment.

A Filofax! But slim and light and eminently portable! With a comprehensive diary! In leather! Pink leather!

With all the saints' days included! In French! And a notebook too! And a jotting pad!

And room for business cards and things you tear out of magazines in the doctor's waiting room! (I don't do that.)

This is one of the most important purchases I have ever made. I haul kilograms of stuff around with me and for the sake of my shoulders have had to pare down the weight of my work bag. It was with great regret that I tucked my faithful red Filofax into my desk drawer and started relying on my phone to store phone numbers and grocery lists. This grieved me because I am a note taker, a pen user, someone who likes to keep written records of things. Such archives are easier to maintain in a notebook than on a phone. For me, anyway.

And this sliver of an agenda is perfect - light and comprehensive. To give you an idea, here it is in context with other purse inhabitants,  including my terrifying intelligent phone that sighs with boredom every time it sees me.

I love my Filofax Flex. They're not available in Australia but you can buy them, and the refils,  on the Filofax website (if I don't clear them out before you get there).

The French appreciate fine stationary. At ever pen counter in every store - even the most jam packed, modern, prosaic supermarket - you will fountain pens alongside the biros. I know this because I am obsessed with pens and own hundreds, many of which I've bought in France. I have been known to befriend people simply to get closer to their pens. I bought quite a few on my recent trip - some cheapies in lovely colours..

 ...and four rather posh ones:

There are no prizes for guessing my favourite. The second and fourth pen in the above photo are Waterman, my favourite pen company in the world. The third from the top is branded Balmain, although I am guessing it is a licensed product rather than a piece of pret-a-porter from the great fashion house. And the Ines pen ... sigh. That little gold leaf you can see is the clip you attach to your jacket. It doesn't look particularly effective but it clamps your pocket with the tenacity of a cobra.

And I bet you didn't know that all the best hair clips are made in France. This is why, when you are next in a French department store or supermarket buying fabulous pens, you should then make your way to the beauty aisle and fill your basket with handfuls of hair delight, like I did.

There is no keener pleasure than needing a dusty pink bobby pin and being able to find the perfect shade, right there on your bathroom counter.

Incidentally, the suitcase is orange, very light, and has four wheels.

Keeping the colours new

Ah, the French grocer! Whoever organised this fruit display gets my vote as packer-of-the-year. Everything in it's place, everything inviting and useful .

There is no competition for the worst packer in the world - I win hands-down, at least as far as luggage is concerned.  I obsess about it for weeks, make lists, sort through scores of garments, pack far too much and end up wearing about a third of the things I've brought with me.

This trip was no exception, although I'm invoking the Ignorant Southern Hemisphere Resident clause because the weather in Paris was remarkably mild. I'd anticipated temperatures of zero, frozen fountains and maybe even a little snow. Instead I got sun I could actually feel and an average of about 7 or 8 degrees most days.

So packing my thermal underwear was a waste of human endeavour.  The things that weren't bad ideas include two pairs of genius Banana Republic legging-jegging things, Old Navy Sweetheart jeans, two black Mimco dresses, a black and red silk tunic that follows me around the world and the arm warmers I buy from a talented knitting lady in Tasmania.

The other great thing I packed was a copy of Annabel Sims books An Hour from Paris. If you're going to Paris for a longer stay or a return visit, I recommend you grab a copy and take a few of her suggested trips. You'll be surprised and delighted like I was when I visited Conflans-Ste Honorine, a sleepy little suburb dozing by the Seine, and about twenty five minutes on the metro from the centre of Paris.

We were welcome with open arms by the locals.

It's a lovely walk from the station along the Seine into the centre of the town. Who knew so many Parisians lived on boats? Here they are, lined up carefully along the river's edge. 

Each was beautifully decorated. Some had gardens, others had pets. I'm wondering if I shouldn't re-think my new home options. 

Unless of course I find a place with a well. 

Observe: 

*The pea coat as per my last post

*The scarf as per my last post

*Excellent Banana Republic leggings-jeggings things in black

*A black woollen tunic from Witchery (it's there, I promise you)

*Warm soft socks I bought in San Francisco last year (again, trust me on this)

*Palladium boots which you also see more of. 

And the town was delightful. You walk up the hill and before you know it you're touching the ragged remains of a tenth century fort. 

On this day, like most of our days in Paris, we packed a cheese-ham baguette lunch and bought some fruit off the market stall in town. My theory is that if you economise on the smaller things you can go entirely mental in the flea markets and boutiques. 

Another thing I did in Paris was read a lot of French magazines. Here's a shocking fact: French Elle is $27 in Australia. I paw over the airmail copies in a local newsagent every fortnight but won't pay that money to basically look at the pictures. This grieves me, for the fashion layouts are fabulous. Needless to say, I snapped up as many copies as I could while I was there. 

Tonight though, I sat down with a pile of American magazines and a pack of Twizzlers I found hidden in the cupboard and devoured both greedily. Although I love robes and chemises and French magazines, it was nice in some ways to be back in the land of dresses and shirts. 

Thankful for the hum of traffic

Kate is many things but not untruthful in her blogging: I was unwell, I was busy, I was unable to spread myself as thoroughly as I wanted to.  The end of year in my job is always ghastly; this year it was combined with a series of tedious health issues that were fuelled by a lot of thin blood , my first published story (in a newspaper! With my name and no typos!)  a very full Christmas calendar and a much longed-for overseas trip from December 27. 

Thank you all so much for tuning in again. Blogging is a strange thing - you spend so much time and energy building up your little diary and establishing a rapport with clever people, only to have to disappear (seemingly) mysteriously when life and possibly your bones make demands of you.  My apologies for the gap and my deepest gratitude to you for reading again. 

Thank you for coming back - I will endeavour to make that worthwhile for you. The first thing I'll do is keep my holiday pictures to a stringently edited minimum.  

We went to a country where there are lots of good cafes....

...lots of traffic and lots of distinctive landmarks.....

....lots of intelligent use of public space and lots of reason to be rugged up.

In this instance it is 3 degrees Celsius so the ruggee is staring with real love towards a vendor who sells hot chocolate. She wears:  

*the old faithful woollen peacoat - thrifted in Sydney for $30 four years ago

*a black merino woollen sweater (from Monoprix, 18 euros)

*A vintage varuna wool Liberty skirt (Ebay UK, 20 quid)

*Extremely thick tights (Wolford)

*Boots (vintage, Ebay USA, $40) and 

*Scarf, wool and cotton from BHV ( a rather lovely Parisian department store).  

That little milk chocolate bag is Prada (Ebay years ago) and the the big grey bag bears testament to the fact that I really, really love shopping at COS. 

Get used to the peacoat and the bag for you'll see a lot of them over the coming days. The boots, not so much. 

And just in case you've ever wondered what my feet look like, here is an excellent illustration of them: 

Well, the right one at any rate. I think I have a rather striking big toe.

Guest post from Kate

I have to do everything around here: shed on the towels, eat unattended butter, keep the insect community in check and stare needlessly at blank spaces at the wall until the roundears are half mad with distraction.

Yesterday she said to the big roundears, the tom, " I really want to blog again but I don't know how to start after a long absence." And he said, "Well, get Kate to do it. She's blogged before."

Hmmmph.

She really was sick. It was like a crime scene here for a while. I wasn't allowed to use my claws, not even in a nice way.

Mostly I didn't pay much attention because, well, she's not a mouse and frankly I am a cat. My attention span is limited.

But she's not sick anymore and she has more scarves which means I have even better warmth and insulation when I sleep in the good room.

She went away for a while and I got beaten up by a tomcat with one ear and no respect. I'm better now and she's come home. She bought me a present which I completely ignored.

"It's the year of the Dragon," she said, "maybe Kate could blog about that."

Oh, as if. AS IF. It is only ever the Year of the Cat as far as I'm concerned because 1) I can lick a dragon any day and 2) dragons are mythical and I'm not.

Nothing if not a fabulous reason

Forgive my tardiness but I can explain.

Work went back to normal but unfortunately I didn't. These ugly little orange fellows have all had a bite of me over the last week. One in the morning , one in the afternoon. 

I've got to get through another box. My belly looks like a monochrome Monet painting. 


When I've gone back to being the my standard blank canvas self, I'll tell you about more about more of my staples, explain why this spring is a denim skirt season and invite your critiques of & suggestions for my packing for my next trip. 


On the up side, it's spring and the local florist is selling the elusive and adored flannel flowers. 

It is only the mind that is a trifle shaken

Forgive the sparse posting. At this point in history I am occupied with many dreary office things and cannot carve out enough time for quality blogging. I hope this tyranny will have passed within the next week; meanwhile, please snack on of one of my most highly regarded staples. 

So many staples, so little time

There's not much to be said for Mondays. Very few of us like them. 


This morning, as I stumbled from room to room wondering where I had left my coffee, I got to thinking about the little habits and rituals we all adapt to make our days bearable. The thinking didn't stop. All through the day I made mental notes of all the small procedures and staples that I use, week in and week out, to keep my life ticking over. 


There's so many. Here's a few. 

I reach for this every weekday morning. It's an old sweeties tin ....

...and it holds whatever makeup items I'm currently favouring, I'm especially fond of creamy things that I can dab on with my fingers. 

Magazines. I'm always thinking about buying magazines, stockpiling magazines for a magazine fest or working out when I can sit down and re-read a pile of magazines. A lot of magazines come out on Mondays and thank God for that, I say. 

Clean handkerchiefs. I never leave home without them. The last thing I do before I leave the house is tuck a hankie into my pocket and another into my bag. I have dozens, most of which came from op-shops. You generally find them on the counter at op-shops in a little basket. I always rifle through the hankie basket and when I get them home I'll wash them in wool wash and press them into nice triangles with an unforgiving iron. Bonus: sometimes you find embroidered ones. Other bonus: they cost pennies and are far more elegant than tissues. Specific bonus: how cute is that bird? 


That's the tip of my staples ice berg. Coming soon: the desk breakfast, Platform 1 and quinoa soup.