The word on the street (communicated via text message with Ella) is that Chloe is not feeling well. 
A temperature of 102! No fun! She’s trying to compete with Seattle’s record-setting heat, I guess.
So as Chloe is at home not well, I present her this little photo test. It comes with two questions:
#1) Where was this picture taken?
#2) What do I call this place?
Don’t tell Chloe that I altered this photo to make it look strange. She might think it’s her fever.
So after this incredibly interesting tour of La Maison Radieuse with Bernard & Christine (and Claire!!), we got to go into one of the actual apartments in the building. 
A colleague of Bernard’s lives there and so we went in for a little tour / glass of wine / taste of cheese. His name is Manu and he turned out to be very interesting.
Not only is he an artist (he showed us the studio space he shares with others and their various silk screening projects), he has great taste in music.
As cool as his apartment is, the first thing I noticed was his copy of Swordfishtrombones, the absolute classic Tom Waits record from 1983. Not only that, it was on vinyl. Not only that, Manu has a turntable.
Not only that, he put the vinyl copy of Swordfishtrombones on the turntable. Not only that, he played it. Music came out of these wooden boxes.
I pronounced it good.
Manu and I speak the same language. The language of Tom Waits.
Stop the presses. Your intrepid reporter has finally answered a long held question, one that has been three years in the asking. Just how did Christine Bertail arrive in France?
We have all seen her interest in things from the middle of the 20th century – her manner of dress, her sense of style, her preference for shaken over stirred, even her love of Mad Men (part of the era from which she came, no doubt!).
Today she inadvertently let the cat out of the bag, she along with her genius husband Bernard. Likely to try to steer this reporter off the trail, they decided to take me, along with my crack colleague Dr. Mendelssohn, to the town of Rezé to see La Maison Radieuse, what is billed as an apartment complex built in 1955.
In no time at all we discovered that La Maison Radieuse is a time machine and is the device used by Christine to transport her from the past into the present. We can only guess at what nefarious activities Christine and her minions have undertaken.
Consider yourself warned.
These two pictures require your captions. They scare me too much to explain.
Maybe this is what Chloe had in mind??
Chloe told me that she wanted more photos of people and I’m only too eager to oblige. I just wonder if these are the people she wants pictures of…
Chloe & Ella, I promised you some challenges. Here they are. In each photo, identify the location. If it requires context, provide it. FYI, all the photos were taken by me today.
Ready?
Begin.
I took this picture this afternoon while walking from the Boudeau’s to the InterMarché, the large grocery store/department store near their house (think Fred Meyer in terms of variety). It shows the construction taking place for a bike lane. 
But this is not just an ordinary bike lane.
“This is not just an ordinary bike lane?”
This is a laser bike lane.
“This is a laser bike lane?”
At least Scott is laughing… I hope.
Nantes is redesigning many of its roads to accommodate bicycles and is doing it in a way that is quite smart. I mean, I give credit to Seattle for the work it’s doing but it’s nothing like Nantes, what with its raised bike lanes and pavement.
Learn more here.
(First, let me say that this is a test post, the first one I’ve tried from my iPad Mini. I’m curious to see if I can do this easily from the Mini so next week, when we are in Paris, I can leave my laptop at the Boudeaus. Fascinating for all of you, I know.)
So yesterday we went shopping, like I said. One of the stores Melinda wanted to go to was Habitat (big surprise, eh Brenda?). You may recall that this time of the year is one of the big sale seasons in France, too, so finding bargains at Habitat is like “winning” something on eBay.
So anyway, while Melinda was busy trying to win something at Habitat, I discovered that Poppie was on sale. 50% off!!
I kid you not and have the photo to prove it.
Andy Smallman 