WIKI MAN STAMPS HIS FEET (AT LEAST, I THINK THEY'RE HIS...)

...suppose they could be WikiPiedia...

WIKI MAN WRITES:-

Here's an impartial view, passed on to me, from a woman:-


“Wiki Man seems great, just my kind of debater! there are many people who run a mile faced with an intellectual challenge - i personally love the game :) Nice Etoile got her knickers in a right twist and he played her like a harp! my husband shares that exact same sense of humour come to think of it...”


MISUNDERSTANDING ABOUT ARGUMENT

I'm sorry to hear that some people have been upset by my enthusiasm for discussion and argument, probably taking a disagreement about ideas as personal criticism of them. It's a pity they didn't raise it with me and it might have been resolved.

A friend here in Nice said that almost the first thing I said to him was: “That's not true” :-) – being mature and secure in his self-confidence, his reaction, he told me later, was to think: “Well, that's interesting” and we went on to discuss a range of things amicably for some time.

Last night he introduced me to a friend of his who he said was intelligent, well-informed and that he would give me a good argument. He is and he did and we had some strong disagreements, e.g. about Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins, but we also had some points of close agreement, e.g. liking the film Cabaret and not liking most recent art. Our chat was very wide-ranging and amicable, like many discussions I have had in Nice.


EDUCATION

Knowing nothing about my teaching NE assumes it must have been almost dictatorial. In fact when I left the university emails from many ex-students were all positive, typical were:

Thanks loads for the oasis of sense in a desert of postmodern waffle

*

Congratulations Wiki Man. Sounds like an excellent move.

Please keep in touch, it's not everyday a student finds a tutor who actually cares about education, inspiring young minds and developing potential.

*

Hey Wiki Man,

Good to hear you're shipping out to France, you're right we should all do that. … Well I hope you take good memories with you, and the knowledge that you inspired and challenged many many students.

*

I think of you and your advice often ... your influence made me the thinking person I am. 

*

Wiki Man,

Good luck to you and your life full of new horizons. You did a lot for *** which many people will never forget... you asked us all to question the things that usually we just go along with, to go out there and find the answers for ourselves and not take someone's opinion as a truth. For this i thank you.

Take care.

*

Maybe NE could at least have the decency to admit her assumption about my approach to education was wrong.


CUT AND PASTE ONLY? 

Even after she actually acknowledged that the two previous long comments of mine (just for example - amongst others) had no cut and paste, she blithely returned to the lie that that's all I do in replying to Sonia:

“Trouble is, Sonia, Wiki Man doesn't do 'good debate'. He posts long paragraphs from Wikipedia and then says 'discuss'. But he's presenting everything as a kind of fact, a bottom line, meaning 'this is how it is'.

If you DO deign to put forward some kind of argument against what he's copied and pasted he'll just come up with some other chunk of other people's conclusions.”

It's patently false that that's all I do (this is yet another example that it's not true) and rather insulting to Sonia and other readers to present them with such an obvious lie. 

In fact if you look back to the beginning of this thread my opening comment had no quotations. Chloe was the first to add a reference to something on wikipedia and spoke about imagining 9 or 10 dimensions. I recalled that string theory involved 11 dimensions, checked it and added a quotation and link to wikipedia.


ARGUING WITH GUYS

I tended be the one in my year who argued most with our philosophy lecturers, no mean debaters. When we had a new head of school at university who was a bully, I was appalled at how easily some senior staff caved in to him. When he tried picking on me I fought back. In the end he relented and said; “You're like me, you're a fighter.”


"SEXIST"?

NE is convinced I must be sexist. Chloe, who knows me far better and for far longer, tells NE that I'm not. Clearly Chloe must be mistaken. Chloe invited me to lunch the other day with a female friend of hers – would she really have done this (not for the first time), after knowing me for years, if I were really “boorish” and “sexist “? It's insulting to Chloe's intelligence to imply that she would. NE conveniently ignored the recent response of a female friend here: “It's always fun to argue with you Wiki Man”. But NE, as usual, thinks she knows better. Is it possible that this kind of attitude might have provoked me to be even more critical of her views in the first place ?

Now, NE, why don't you just stop embarrassing yourself and everybody else ? Comfort yourself that you're leaving the area, you'll get over it in time and apparently you have enough people who admire your wit and erudition to sustain your considerable if rather insecure self-esteem :-)

*

RESPONSE FROM NICE ETOILE

[NOTE: In another rant on the Facebook thread, Wiki Man had accused me of 'learning at the Goebbels school of discussion'.  Always good to throw around the Nazi insults...]

Excellent idea to post your testimonials. I now accept I have been completely mistaken in thinking that you merely copy and paste from Wikipedia. Hadn't realized that as well as painting the walls, you also pasted wallpaper. (Is the wallpaper your own design???)

Anyway, here are some of mine:-

TWISTED

Dear Nice Etoile,

The X-rays have now arrived and clearly show your knickers to be in a twist. I've made an appointment for you next Wednesday at the Oxford Street branch of Marks & Spencer's. 3 o'clock, 1st Floor, Acute Critical Chantilly Lace Department, Dr. Shirley Thong.

EDUCATION

Congratulations on your move to the South of France, Nice Etoile! Any chance you can settle in Australia instead??? Or perhaps Libya???

DEBATING STYLE

Heil Ms Etoile,

I'm sorry to have to tell you that we are unable to award you a certificate of competence for two reasons: you kept goebbling your words and you're too Jewish.

Yours,

The Goebbels School of Public Speaking

CHEESE SANDWICH

That was a delicious cheese sandwich you made me the other day!

XXX Anna Glypta

YOUR FAN CLUB

Just received this email from an anonymous source:-

Nice Etoile, Wiki Man is indeed a great debator. Do you know if he does this just on a one-to-one basis, or also to large groups???  (That might give him mass appeal...)

***

PICKY WIKI MAN

Oh dear, think a cage has been rattled...anyone got some matchsticks to keep my eyes open???


‎"lauded for my wit" ? - I obviously missed that - and it's not what I'm hearing. However I readily acknowledge that you're not alone in not liking quotations longer than a sentence here, some people think fb should only be about what one had for breakfast, etc.. :-)

Fortunately some Egyptians had a broader view of the potential of fb and used it for other purposes, including the dissemination of ideas, including the texts of work by a US expert on non-violent protest, Gene Sharp - you can check him out on wikipedia.

"saying I'm rancorous and repetitive doesn't actually make it true, now does it?" Obviously not, but others only have to look at the evidence to confirm it. You started with an attack, echoing a previous discussion, the rancour is evident. You wearily repeat your stupid point about the use of quotations - NB the thread started with Chloe using one. If you had half a mind you'd note that I use quotations to support points I'm making, as in the first one, an accepted intellectual practice. You do nothing to justify your "pseudo-intellectual" remark, but then you're (on the evidence here) clearly not an intellectual so how would you know the difference ?

When you do move from a boring repetition of "you use a lot of quotations", you fall flat on your face. Clearly it was a lie to say that I try to pass things off as my own when they're in quotation marks and with links, or are you just too stupid to understand that ?

Then you snottily call into question my qualifications, but clearly a degree in philosophy good enough to to accepted immediately to do a Ph D is not bad. So that doesn't work either and you quickly move on - to what ? What positive thing did you contribute to the thread ? A lame comment on the tram in Nice - after that, petty, rancorous repetition and a desperate resort to your qualifications and work record when challenged.

You should have kept to the promise to retire from the discussion early on - when you'd already said all you had to say, even then not worthy of note. You could have spared as all the sad spectacle of intellectual incompetence unaware of its own fatuity.

Oh, and the only quotation is from you - well, that's hardly fair to the remaining readers (if any - apart from you - full marks for dogged determination though :-)), so here's another, moving things on again (a notion quite alien to you), from memory:

"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies." Nietzsche

Imagination, uncontrolled by critical reflection can all too easily become conviction and religious dogma. Romanticism rightly praised the power of imagination, but it was Enlightenment rationalism which helped free us from religious dogma. Science has given us the wonderful combination of really imaginative ideas checked against the severe tests of logic and evidence. So, understood correctly, Chloe's quotation from Einstein is not preferring imagination to logic, just pointing out that this complementary pair work in different ways and that without imagination, logic has nothing to work on.

I know you will feel slighted by this return to the substance of the original quotation and by the reference to imagination and logic, those gaping omissions from your comments.

ZZZzzz...

***

THE WIKI MAN

Anyone recall Eldorado?  No, not El Dorado, the mythical city of gold, but the much-maligned and short-lived UK soap set on the Costa del Sol in the early 90s.

Not really worth going into here, except to say its premise was based around assorted ex-pats living in a small community abroad.  A mythical town of supposed golden opportunity, but which soon turned out to be nothing but quicksilver.  Both metaphorically, in the storyline, and literally, with the swift cancellation of the series once the true horror of the production values turned out not to be a breathtakingly sophisticated ironic satire on the meaning of continuing drama after all.

This is my first time residing amongst ex-pats.  I did live in Paris for a short time in my 20s, and yes, I went to a few parties, but mostly I was alone, exploring the streets and the galleries toute seule, romantically crying my eyes out after a failed, erm, romance.  (If crying my eyes out was so romantic, why wasn't I happy???)

Oh, I did go out with a Sicilian for a while.  But then again, thinking back, going out meant more staying in...


Hmm.  


:-)

What???  Oh yes, the blog.


Well, here in Nice there is, of course, a large ex-pat population. (Although quite a few of us are slim, as it happens). And as, I imagine, in all such 'manufactured' communities, the constituents represent a microcosm of the society we've left behind.  Thus there are representatives of the usual 'types'; a phenomenon of human group existence, as if a higher being took a look and noticed the lack of a small, menopausal Jewish fairy in town. (And how about that, here I am!)


The other day, one of 'the types' around here made (yet another) appearance on a friend's Facebook thread.  Chloe had posted an Einstein quote:  Logic will get you from A to B.  Imagination will take you everywhere.  I made a weak joke about the trams not running from A to B during the Carnival, before the dreaded Wiki Man arrived...


...have to explain about Wiki Man.  He's nothing if not notorious here. I'd heard of him long before I had the misfortune to run into him (sadly, I wasn't in a large truck when that happened).  It was at a rather convivial party, where I was chatting to Santa.  Wiki Man appeared at our sides, completely taking over the conversation, lecturing us on whatever topic he fancied he was an expert in.  Which is everything.


Wiki Man talks in certainties, which have come not from his own conclusions.  Actually, he's one of those people who thinks knowledge is an end in itself, who doesn't see that supposed facts are just the beginning; that educated people use these merely as a starting point for thinking about the world and its meaning.


Ever see the movie The Wicker Man?  Universally slated, it related the story of a character lured by evil sirens to his ultimately grisly death by fire locked inside a giant wicker man.  My Wiki Man is in danger of suffering a similar fate to his brain by way of Wikipedia; if the internet goes down, Wiki Man cannot string one idea together by utilizing his own synapses.  He is completely in the site's enthrall...there is no escape...a slow, horrible melting of the little grey cells...


Analysis?  Isn't that something you swallow for a headache? (CAUTION: Not more than 4 doses to be taken within 24 hours).


Wiki Man is already in the third stage of wrist failure. (Due to his constant cutting and pasting - what did you think I meant???)


Somehow, Wiki Man has failed to locate 'irony' on his favourite website. Along with 'sense of humour'.  Or 'listening', or 'respect for others' opinions'...


...he was so, soooo rude to me at that party - talking over me loudly, butting in every second word in an angry fashion:-


So you FEEL it's like this???  That's rubbish, it's not a question of FEELING, you should try using your brain, it's about THINKING...I told him the words 'I feel' were just the start of my sentence, that I was about to make a particular point, if he'd be so kind as to let me finish...oh, so you're completely saying the opposite now, are you? Changed your mind already??? (How he got that idea I don't know - I wasn't able to say anything.)


Anyway, after 10 minutes of this boorish and arrogant behaviour I turned to Santa and told her I was excusing myself from the conversation, upon which I left the party and went outside to get some air.


There I found some girlfriends enjoying a fag.  They expressed surprise to see me - you don't smoke, NiceEtoile, what are you doing here? and I related to them what had just happened.


Oh, that's just Wiki Man, one of them said.  Whenever he gets like that we just tell him to f*ck off.


Oh.  OK.


Anyway, here are some of the thoughts of Chairman Wiki - all from this one thread on Chloe's quote (don't bother to read it all, it's just meant to give you an idea):-




That's the great thing about imagination, but also the problem, because "everywhere" can include not only mistaken, ineffective ideas, but also dangerous ones - Gadaffi's crazed imaginings are current examples.

So logic, or more generally critical reflection, needs to be applied to imagination. This was the basis of philosopher of science Karl Popper's outline of the scientific process: Bold conjectures followed by rigourous testing of them and rejection of those found to be false, similar to evolution; so that mistaken ideas die instead of us (they could lead to our death if followed).

Einstein was well aware that imagination was not enough by itself; he knew that many scientists had developed imaginative new theories, unfortunately most of them were just weren't correct. Fortunately for him, imagining what it would be like to ride on a beam of light did lead to a theory which, so far, seems to be correct. 

*

String theory involves 11 dimensions - imagine that ! :-) But at the moment it's an untestable theory:

"Five major string theories were formulated. The main differences among them were the number of dimensions in which the strings developed and their characteristics; all of them appeared to be correct, however.

In the mid 1990s a unification of all previous superstring theories, called M-theory, was proposed, which asserted that strings are really 1-dimensional slices of a 2-dimensional membrane vibrating in 11-dimensional space.

... other prominent physicists (e.g. Feynman and Glashow) have criticized string theory for not providing any quantitative experimental predictions."

So it can't be tested.

*

Chloe, while I imagine that some of the stuff done by the Institute of Noetic Sciences might be valuable, from a brief look I tend to sympathise with this guy's distrust:

Stephen Barrett, organizer of the nonprofit organization Quackwatch, whose website describes itself as a "Guide to Quackery, Health Fraud, and Intelligent Decisions," lists the Institute of Noetic Sciences as one of the 729 organizations that he views "with considerable distrust."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institute_of_Noetic_Sciences

*

NICE ETOILE POSTED:-

http://www.ehow.com/how_2000106_become-pseudo-intellectual.html

(Sorry, couldn't help myself at this point.  Mitigating circumstances of Severe Provocation, m'Lud).

*

Chloe, your prodding made me look again at the Galileo trial and in fact one of the Cardinals was quite a scientifically sophisticated guy:

"Cardinal Bellarmine found no problem with heliocentrism so long as it was treated as a purely hypothetical calculating device and not as a physically real phenomenon, but he did not regard it as permissible to advocate the latter unless it could be conclusively proved through current scientific standards. This put Galileo in a difficult position, because he believed that the available evidence strongly favoured heliocentrism, and he wished to be able to publish his arguments, but he did not have the conclusive proof necessary to satisfy Bellarmine's requirements."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galileo_affair#Bellarmine.27s_view

*

Actually very few of us have truly original ideas, and many of those are impractical, insignificant or just plain crazy. But even significant creative ideas are usually the re-combination of existing ideas. This itself is not my idea I confess :-), but that of Arthur Koestler: it is what he called the "bisociation of matrices" in "The Act of Creation".

But then one mark of an intellectual is the use of a wide range of ideas, but also conscious awareness of the sources of many of one's ideas and willingness to check and quote them. Too many people think they are practical and not concerned with ideas, and do not realise that all the time their practice is guided by the ideas of others. I am consciously aware that I owe this insight to Keynes, and it is worth quoting :-)

"Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist. Madmen in authority, who hear voices in the air, are distilling their frenzy from some academic scribbler of a few years back. I am sure that the power of vested interests is vastly exaggerated compared with the gradual encroachment of ideas."

Actually very few of us have truly original ideas, and many of those are impractical, insignificant or just plain crazy. But even significant creative ideas are usually the re-combination of existing ideas. This itself is not my idea I confess :-), but that of Arthur Koestler: it is what he called the "bisociation of matrices" in "The Act of Creation".

But then one mark of an intellectual is the use of a wide range of ideas, but also conscious awareness of the sources of many of one's ideas and willingness to check and quote them. Too many people think they are practical and not concerned with ideas, and do not realise that all the time their practice is guided by the ideas of others. I am consciously aware that I owe this insight to Keynes, and it is worth quoting :-)

"Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist. Madmen in authority, who hear voices in the air, are distilling their frenzy from some academic scribbler of a few years back. I am sure that the power of vested interests is vastly exaggerated compared with the gradual encroachment of ideas."

Time to jump on your tram to retirement :-)   [THIS REMARK WAS DIRECTED AT ME]

Oh that reminds me of something that takes us back to Einstein and is itself an example of an imaginative way to present someone else's ideas. I remember seeing a TV prog which used a tram to illustrate Einstein's ideas, the internet pins the memory down for me:

"An even better explanation of the theory of relativity can be found in the episode of Jacob Bronowski's The Ascent of Man. He shows the tram car in the centre of Berne, where Einstein worked in the patent office, heading away from the clock in the town square. Consider the light carrying the information that shows the time on the clock as it goes from the clock to someone on the tram. Then consider it as the speed of the tram approaches the speed of light. It will take longer and longer for the light from the clock to reach the tram so the person on the tram won't see the time change on the clock so quickly, so time will appear to slow down."

http://www.britmovie.co.uk/forums/looking-video-dvd-film/94426-einsteins-universe.html

Amusingly, someone has evidently seen this programme but confused it with an actual observation by Einstein - in Zurich this time - this in a book for "dummies" :-)

"While leafing through Twentieth Century History For Dummies (don't ask), I came across the following dubious description (pg. 50) of Albert Einstein's contribution to twentieth century physics:

"Albert Einstein (1879-1955) sought to use quantum theory in his work on the nature of matter. Taking the tram to his work in Zürich each day, the German-born Einstein noticed that the buildings he passed appeared tall and thin when the tram was moving but settled into their old shape when the tram stopped. Were his eyes deceiving him, or perhaps did those houses actually change shape? And why didn't they change shape for the people inside them? The answer was that, unlike the people in the houses, Einstein was moving past at speed, so to him, the houses didn't just look thin. They actually were thin. Because of the speed and the direction of the tram, Einstein was looking at the houses in a different combination of space and time from people outside the tram; or, to put it another way, the nature of space and time depend on where you are.
..."

Trams in the early twentieth century must have traveled really fast ;-)"

http://www.martinharrigan.ie/go?o=blog.html

Oh that reminds me of something that takes us back to Einstein and is itself an example of an imaginative way to present someone else's ideas. I remember seeing a TV prog which used a tram to illustrate Einstein's ideas, the internet pins the memory down for me:

"An even better explanation of the theory of relativity can be found in the episode of Jacob Bronowski's The Ascent of Man. He shows the tram car in the centre of Berne, where Einstein worked in the patent office, heading away from the clock in the town square. Consider the light carrying the information that shows the time on the clock as it goes from the clock to someone on the tram. Then consider it as the speed of the tram approaches the speed of light. It will take longer and longer for the light from the clock to reach the tram so the person on the tram won't see the time change on the clock so quickly, so time will appear to slow down."

http://www.britmovie.co.uk/forums/looking-video-dvd-film/94426-einsteins-universe.html

Amusingly, someone has evidently seen this programme but confused it with an actual observation by Einstein - in Zurich this time - this in a book for "dummies" :-)

"While leafing through Twentieth Century History For Dummies (don't ask), I came across the following dubious description (pg. 50) of Albert Einstein's contribution to twentieth century physics:

"Albert Einstein (1879-1955) sought to use quantum theory in his work on the nature of matter. Taking the tram to his work in Zürich each day, the German-born Einstein noticed that the buildings he passed appeared tall and thin when the tram was moving but settled into their old shape when the tram stopped. Were his eyes deceiving him, or perhaps did those houses actually change shape? And why didn't they change shape for the people inside them? The answer was that, unlike the people in the houses, Einstein was moving past at speed, so to him, the houses didn't just look thin. They actually were thin. Because of the speed and the direction of the tram, Einstein was looking at the houses in a different combination of space and time from people outside the tram; or, to put it another way, the nature of space and time depend on where you are.
..."

Trams in the early twentieth century must have traveled really fast ;-)"

http://www.martinharrigan.ie/go?o=blog.html

*

Had never realised that posting (or, rather, reading) on Facebook could be so tiring.  


Wiki Man enlightened us all with the information that he had studied painting.  Secure in the knowledge that he had a robust sense of humour <SNIGGERS> I asked him if he could recommend matt or eggshell for my living room.  


Am currently awaiting a light-hearted, witty response.  


This is what I'm leaving behind, dear Reader (those of you who are still awake).  The group bore, too far up his own encyclopedia to be able to connect with any semblance of creative thought.  Or anyone with a sense of humour.


Oh, incidentally, he was so wound up at one of his own soirees (unaccountably, I'd been left off the guest list) that he spent the following day ringing around all the attendees, apologizing for having been so rude to them all.   


Oh yes, life's just one big party down on the Riveira...

***

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/hector

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pompous

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Know-it-all

AUSTRALIAN RULES - PART II

And so, having been offered a non-existent job in Nice in May 2009 (which didn't exist, funnily enough), I spent the summer residing with the Future Then Husband (don't start). And then, one morning in early September, I was lying asleep in bed minding my own business when the phone went.


It was Malcolm Wombat. You still available for work? he asked. We need someone from next Thursday. The job's yours if you want it.


It was 7.30 am.  It was a Thursday.  Was I available?  You bet I was.


Flew over the following Tuesday.  Comedic scenes at Heathrow Airport, where the nice BA lady (there IS one after all!) told me one of my cases weighed too much, whilst the other had some space.  So the Future Then Husband took charge, as men (and future then husbands) often do...neither of us had enjoyed much sleep, and it was very early in the morning.  Thus we spent ten minutes taking stuff out of the suitcase with not enough stuff in it, and putting it into the suitcase with already too much stuff in it.  


The nice BA lady had obviously dealt with this scenario before (amazing what training they give them these days), and without looking even slightly askance - as if this was an everyday occurrence, three times an hour - told us we'd f*cked it up.  Although in BA-type phraseology.  (My name's Samantha and I'll be your F*ck-Up Monitor for the duration of the check-in...)


We set to again.  Watched in fascination by an ever-growing crowd, happy that Terminal 5 was not the nightmare it had been reported as being in the worldwide press, but actually a place in which you could expect to depart for exotic climes, whilst being entertained by a couple of clowns masquerading as normal members of the public in a somewhat discreet, understated fashion.


Finally, it was time to part.  We said our goodbyes. The Future Ex, with the odd tear in his eye (did you think it was going to be a normal tear???) turned and walked away.  I watched the end of my marriage make its way to the short-stay car park, hoping the luggage farrago wouldn't mean my impending divorce was now deemed long-stay.  

*

Landed in Nice.  Was met by an Italian taxi driver, pre-booked on recommendation.  All I can say is I have no idea of either the Italian or French words for 'mullet'.

We took the coast road to Antibes.  This runs parallel with the beach - virtually on it in fact -  stretching west from Nice.  Antibes was the only place I had been able to find last-minute, long-ish term accommodation: a holiday-let studio in the Old Town.

Impossible to park anywhere near the apartment block, we had to transport on foot huge suitcases and a comedy violin (I'm a former professional comedy violinist, remember?) across the busy square and into the narrow lanes opposite the Carousel.  

The studio (for 'studio', read small cupboard) was on the third floor.  Up narrow, winding, very steep steps.  I'm on the shortish side for a menopausal fairy, I felt like I was training for a highly-physical mission with the French Foreign Legion; one in which it was imperative to hit your chin with your kneecaps on every step.  Hup, hup, hup, hup...  

Let's put it this way, it was where the Hunchback of Notre Dame would have lived had he hailed from Antibes instead of Paris.

I spent 5 weeks there.  Very handy if you felt like turning on the washing machine from the comfort of your bed. And all night long the lamps of the Antibes lighthouse burst into the window opposite where I lay my head....FLASH FLASH.....FLASH FLASH.....FLASH FLASH.....

The electrical supply left something to be desired (flash flash), and the cooking facilities consisted of nothing you could actually cook with. And being a building in the Old Town, the thick walls ensured there was no internet facility, or possibility of a mobile phone conversation.  

But life was about to get a sight worse.

Not feeling sorry for me yet?  Just you wait...

***

IT'S MY LETTUCE, I'LL KEEP IT WHERE I LIKE

Grrr.


Had to do some stuff at the Post Office this morning, where I discovered it's 44 euros to send a letter to the UK to arrive the following day, 4 euros 50-something for a 3-day delivery without signature, and 6 euros odd - and 5 days - if you want someone to sign for it at the other end.


Two days longer for someone to scrawl Mickey Mouse on a piece of paper???


Welcome to France.


Called in at Intermarche on the way back.  Wishing I hadn't.


I'd just bought a lettuce at my local street market. The nice lady had taken my money and placed it into a plastic bag, which I then put into my large, soft-leather shoulder bag.  Walked around the supermaket, picked up a few items - eggs, a couple of pork steaks, a packet of fresh anchovies - and went over to the self-service payment tills. 


After I'd paid I took out my Monoprix nylon shopping bag (we all have them in assorted colours.  Some of us swap them with each other on rainy days; such is the glamour of life on the Med) to carry home my spoils.  I also took out of my leather bag my newly-purchased market lettuce, and placed that, too, into the nylon bag with the other foodstuffs.  


I attempted to leave the building.  The security guard called for me to stop.  He insisted on looking into my leather bag to see how many other vegetables I'd bought at the market without having secured his permission so to do.


He told me I was not to put a lettuce into my shoulder bag. Or something.  I told him I'd bought it at the market, it was nothing to do with Intermarche, or him. He (rudely) told me in future I should take my previously-purchased lettuces and leave them with the woman at reception. (Is she particularly partial to salad?) I smiled sweetly and told him to f*ck off.  No, didn't think he spoke any English.


But he's right.  On the way back to my apartment I thought of an even better place to keep my lettuce.  


That's right.  England.

***

WHERE'S BARBRA STREISAND WHEN YOU NEED HER?

It's the Carnival.  Once again.  Funny how February feels like it comes around every six weeks here.


It's rather famous, this extravaganza.  People arrive from all over the world to experience it.  


Bit of a mystery to me as to why.


Floats supporting gigantic fibreglass figures - more grotesque even than the deformed caricature of the thing Carla Bruni tries to pass off as her face - cruise slower than snails along the seafront, their journey culminating in Place Massena - which is surrounded in its entirety by high blue hoardings, so that if you don't hand over an enormous wad of euros to the council you are excluded from the centuries-old festivities. 


Men dressed as women with fake breasts (don't let on to Michael Winner, we'll never hear the end of it), strangers aiming at each other with cans of silly string in bright neon shades (try that with me, Francois, and you won't be in any doubt as to the practical definition of Menopausal Woman), people in silly jesters hats, horrible street music, litter everywhere.


Believe the theme this year is Pickpockets.


Had to go out today (think I stayed in last February).  On my tram were several performers (at least, I hope they were performers), male, dressed in a costume concoction as follows:-


On top of their heads, a Venetian ceramic mask complete with Savaltore Dali moustache, attached to which was an acre of colourful gingham fabric in folds down their backs; their chests were bedecked as if they were Roman Gladiators - a breastplate comprising hundreds of (real) shiny silver coins; whilst from the waist down they resembled those memorable Greek guards outside the Palace in Athens - white mini skirt with under petticoats, white tights, black shoes with large pom poms.

Forget Coco Chanel, this was more Coco the Clown.

But not a hint of embarrassment, standing as they were amongst the rest of us going about our daily chores. Perhaps there is something to be said for living in a place where being badly dressed is de rigueur for the entire population, after all.  


You can't walk anywhere in the centre of town at Carnival time, the trams are unable to make a complete journey from one end of the line to the other, and the prices in the bars and restaurants become doubly exorbitant.


Naturally, the weather obliged with pouring rain and chilly temperatures last weekend, as if NiceEtoile had waved her wand and ordered the perfect accompaniment to such a dismal activity.


But if the Carnival isn't my kind of thing, dear Reader, it has also been raining on my parade.  For quite some time.


A decision has been made.  I'm leaving Nice.  In the next few weeks.  


Still more to write on this blog - there's much I haven't yet told you - but as Barbra Streisand didn't say, the Carnival is Over.  


What Babs did say was:-


At least I didn't fake it.  Hat, sir?  I guess I didn't make it...


So as NiceEtoile gradually morphs into NotNiceEtoile, I hope you stay and continue to read the rest.  But for me, the light is now a faint glimmer at the end of the Channel Tunnel...

***

MICHAEL WINNER KEEPS ABREAST OF THE SITUATION

MrMichaelWinner Michael Winner 

Just bin phoned by Independent newspaper, riveted by our tweets particularly concerning bosoms and U-know-hoo. They'll be writing sbout it

1 hour ago Favorite Retweet Reply

NiceEtoile Nice Etoile 

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@MrMichaelWinner Will they write about me too if I tweet about my breasts?

17 minutes ago Favorite Reply Delete

MrMichaelWinner Michael Winner 

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@NiceEtoile i would ave to make a full inspection before i can answer gthat question, sweet of you to think of it. LUV from MW

9 minutes ago Favorite Retweet Reply