Nov. 2, 2011. There’s something therapeutic about turning the clocks back in the fall—harsh reality therapy. For an hour or two we can fool ourselves into believing that we’ve gained an hour of Saturday night [...]

Paris, July 15, 2011 – I had a delicious nap on the afternoon of le Quatorze Juillet, the French national holiday, known outside of France as Bastille Day. There had been the annual military parade [...]

March 6, 2011. Here are four French lessons that I learned in February on the Riviera and in Alsace. 1. Carnival in Nice Nice’s Carnival, the 3-week period of parades leading up to Mardi Gras [...]

Feb. 25, 2011 – Last weekend I returned to Menton, the town on the French Riviera just over the border from Italy, on the occasion of its annual Lemon Festival. I’d last been to Menton 15 years ago when I’d written about it for my guidebook to France.

The first Saturday in October—tonight—is Nuit Blanche in Paris, an official all-nighter, when City Hall invites visitors and residents to stay up all night and take part in artsy, nightclubby sound and light shows throughout [...]

There is a common misconception that Paris shuts down during the month of August, that it becomes a ghost town abandoned to tourists while Parisians all flee to country homes and nude beaches. Some people [...]

On July 4th I went to Cupcake Camp in a Paris bistro. The event was by proud Americans who seemed to have fogotten that July 4th was also the Fourth of July.

Today is Crepe Day in France as well as in other countries with crepe traditions, such as Belgium and Switzerland. Americans think of it as Groundhog Day. Crepes and groundhogs both mark the midpoint between the winter solstice and the spring equinox. The day’s Catholic name is la Chandeleur in France, in recognition of the candles (chandelles) that are/were brought to the church in remembrance of the day when baby Jesus was first brought to the Temple.