Nice was nice. And seeing my niece was nice too. (But that was not in Nice.)

From France to Scotland: planes, trains, and automobiles

So…vacation…I was in the middle of one when I last spoke with you and what a difference a week and a day makes. Now that vacation has concluded, I’m back home, the laundry is done, and I’ve got 3/5ths of the work week in the rearview. It’s been a whirlwind (massive understatement) since then, so a Thursday missive is well-timed as I’ve got thoughts a-plenty.

When I left you last Wednesday it was a bit rainy and overcast, but the day wasn’t a total wash. We did some shopping in between showers, made it into old town (Vieux Nice), and had a great dinner outside and undercover. After we walked back home and got my mom settled, my sisters and I set back out on foot to see a bit more of the maze of back alleys in the old town and to have a nightcap at the place right across the street from the apartment. We needed to strategize for Thursday…the plan called for a day at Baia Bella, a beach in Beaulieu-sur-mer, a bit of a ride (by Uber or by train) away, meaning that we were fully committed to a long day of beach and lunch and cocktails and beach and ahhhhhhhh...so we needed to ensure sisterly alignment on the detailed agenda, to keep my mom on task. 🤣🤣🤣 Off to bed we went, with a rock-solid plan, all-systems go.

Thursday morning was a picture-perfect day, ripped from the pages of a Condé Nast travel rag. Our Uber driver Yossi was great, and told us that at the best vantage point he’d pull over so we could take it all in.

The view from Yossi’s overlook, of Villefranche-sur-Mer.

After unloading for some pics (including the one above) off we went on to Baia Bella and quickly settled in on our chaises under a brilliant blue sky surrounded by a sea of brilliant blues and greens. We swam to a rock formation a couple hundred yards offshore (mom watched)…took more pics, engaged in general revelry, enjoyed some some frolicking among the barely perceptible waves…settled back into the chaises and shortly thereafter enjoyed a seaside cocktail. The Fiero Spritz, a close relative of the Aperol Spritz, was delicious! Around 2pm we headed up to the on-premise restaurant, were seated quickly, and after going back-and-forth because everything looked like a must-try, we placed our lunch order…sheer bliss…everything was great…

Baia Bella aka sheer bliss.

…until it wasn’t. “Oh shit,” my sister said, staring at her phone, mouth agape. “They cancelled our flight tomorrow.” It quickly became clear that this wasn’t a run-of-the-mill travel disruption. We were heading to Glasgow for 2 nights and 1.5 days on the way home, to visit my niece who is studying at U of G for the semester, and were flying home from there on Sunday. My sisters and I feverishly researched options while British Airways completely f-cked us over…and despite repeated assurance of assistance and satisfaction, they were only able to assist us with re-booking our exact itinerary…on Sunday, which was very not bien as it wouldn’t have allowed us to catch our flight home.

Long story short, after three hours of the three of us plus my brother-in-law (our stateside concierge) trying everything (and yes, we ate while all this was going on but didn’t fully enjoy the delicious lunch simultaneously, obvi), we had booked ourselves a flight from Paris to Glasgow through Heathrow…that flight was Friday night with an overnight layover at LHR…not optimal but our only semi-viable option. With the flight confirmed that left us only with a matter of getting ourselves the 600 miles from Nice to Paris for our flight. So we took the train back to Nice so that when we arrived we could look into an early-morning train the next morning…and (of course) no trains were available. All were fully booked. Out only option left was renting a car. (Who in their right mind would drive 10 hours to catch a shitty flight? We had to. We had no alternative. When you have to do something, you do it.) Costco Travel (unlimited mileage! free additional driver!) for the win…and mom and I stayed to shop for car snacks while my sisters went to the airport to get the car. They navigated back, garaged the Renault wagon for the night, we grabbed some dinner, preloaded the car, and at 5AM we set off on the roughly 10 hour, exactly 600 mile trek to CDG. With an 80-year-old. (Who, as expected, was locked in right there with us—in for a penny, in for a pound. She’s amazing.)

Top to bottom: a castle, a house of some sort, and a Mary Kay converted taxi.

Words won’t do that leg of the trip justice, but one delayed takeoff (close to 2 hours), a 35-minute flight, a 90-minute wait on the tarmac after landing, and another 4:30AM wake-up later, we made it to Glasgow…where we had a fantastic day with my niece before heading home Sunday.

U of G, where my niece is studying for the semester as part of Northeastern’s NU.In program.

The trek home was one thing after another but by the grace of God my sister made her last flight home to Detroit (involving a run from Terminal E to Terminal A—too much traffic for the shuttle) and we got home after being diverted way North of the city on account of both airport access tunnels being closed. What a shitshow…but home sweet home it was, and is. So that’s how the rest of the trip went. And I need to say again what an amazing job my mom did—clearly we will never regret this trip, the time we spent, the laughs we had. All of it pure gold.

And in case you were wondering, we’re all still speaking—as a matter of fact, my mom, sis, and bro-in-law are coming over for dinner tonight.

Anyhow, here are some picked up pieces along the way:

1. I’ve always asserted that the three greatest sounds in the world are crashing waves, baby/little kid giggles, and the sound of a bag of ice hitting the patio on a hot summer day, and I stand by that assertion. That said, the rocky beaches of Nice introduced a bit of a twist—same melody of the waves, but with the added harmony of rocks rolling back into the sea. It was pretty fantastic. I mean, I thought nothing could top the soothing crashing waves but crashing waves with rolling rock harmony??? It was extra.

   

   WaveRock Harmony Orchestra.

2. Physically carrying my passport anywhere really super-charges my self-diagnosed, low-level OCD. The day in Glasgow I had it secured in an inside chest pocket of my jacket…and I spent roamed the city looking like a TSA agent giving myself a pat down, making sure it was still there. All…day…long. 🤦🏼‍♀️

3. As previously noted, despite being born without anything remotely resembling a fashion gene, I feel very well-suited to the low-key European cafe lifestyle. There’s something about the pace (leisurely), the volume (little noise, no cacophony), and the depth (enjoyment) of how they live. This point was emphasized immediately upon returning home—in the shitshow of the airport, there were so many drivers leaning on their horns, as if somehow that would magically resolve the traffic jam. Anyway, those Eurovibes gave me a certain feeling of longing…not regret, not a sense of having mis-lived any part of my life, but something else I can’t put my finger on…so I guess no better place than France to acutely feel that certain je ne sais quoi. This is not a reflection of any dissatisfaction with the current state of my life but more a mental exploration of what opportunities to experience life differently might lie ahead. No, I’m not thinking of moving…but I def need to be more proactive about creating chances and enjoying more of things that bring me extreme peace. We came from the Old World, yet somehow we maintain a general feeling of superiority and entitlement. I hate that. And I hate how it makes me feel.

4. The European airports have shopping for the elite and apparently they don’t need to eat. The best possible alternative for food at both CDG and AMS was…McDonald’s. I probably haven’t eaten McDonald’s in 15 years, then had it twice in three days. The Big Mac was fantastic. And don’t get me started on the fries.

5. Glasgow is really hilly.

6. It was interesting being in the UK during the period of mourning for the Queen. There were lots of tributes in the form of photos and messages in virtually all of the storefronts, but there was no active sense of mourning. It’s sad when anyone dies…but now that there’s a new monarch in town, maybe some of those ugly historical colonization wrongs might be quasi-righted.

7. It still counts as a vacation, even if it involves back-to-back 4:30AM wakeups smack in the middle of it.

8. I know you have to pay to play, but still…the AVBs (After-Vacation Blues) are real…and they are painful. This won’t be the last time I say this—I am very good with leisurehood. If only I had the means to finance life as a woman of leisure…I’d be busier and happier than ever I suspect.

9. I didn’t stay on top of any news while away and am I glad about that. But WTF is up with DeSantis selling pipe dreams to immigrants and shipping them north to Martha’s Vineyard‽

10. The people in Scotland are ridiculously nice and equally difficult to understand. Lots of nodding and smiling, maybe even more so than in France.

11. Weird that I was craving a peanut butter and banana sandwich when I got home and damn was it good. Not sure when or why that ever got cut from my breakfast-sandwich repertoire. Highly recommend—toast the bread!

12. It’s so frustrating when people who should know something (and you know they should know it because you already told them what they should know) act all put out about not being in the know of that thing like it’s your fault…when you already f-cking told them. And that’s why “see attached” or “per my previous email” is a popular reply. But still people don’t catch on tho the fact that they “missed the memo.” I’m not the conductor of the gravy train, nor is my job to spoon-feed you. Oy. A little “I think you may have told me this but I’m on overload” goes a long way—a little self-awareness please, people.

13. Boy, there’s a real kerfuffle about the Black Little Mermaid. What’s up with that? She’s a cartoon. Of course she can be re-colored, for chrissakes. And speaking of Jesus, he’s been whitewashed…and I don’t recall a single outcry about that. The hypocrisy! Meanwhile the aforementioned superiority and entitlement rear their very ugly heads again.

14. While I’m grateful to have a reliable landscaper, I could have done without the delivery and unloading of who-knows-how-much riprap (rocks of assorted sizes) all day long on Tuesday. The noise. The racket. Not a good fit with my jet-lagged brain. It was too much. (Speaking of noise, how about that flight to Hawaii where passengers got free ukuleles and ukulele lessons? Just saw a teaser for the story on the Today show and the hair on my neck stood up and my jaw clenched. No noise-cancelling headphones can cancel that much noise. You’d just have to go with it as a a passenger…the more you tried to block it out the more the noise would bother you…and that’s true of many of life’s unpleasantries. Go with it more, and resist it less…because in the end it’s all beyond our control.)) Anyway, the landscaper really trusts us...he left this in the yard since Tuesday:

    

    I’d love to joyride but with my luck I’d take down the fence.

15. What good is doing your best for someone who doesn’t give a crap if your best is given? I don’t like to be motivated to underperform; I can’t bring my C game to anything. Our collective standards have dropped, I think, and they’ve dropped so far. As much as we “progress” in so many ways, in so many ways we’ve regressed, I think. And it’s sad. I guess whether things are good or bad depends on what you value and what brings you happiness. Perspective is real.

16. I saw a news story about a school district in TX implementing a controversial new no-cellphone policy that requires students to lock them up during class. My first reaction was “um, shouldn’t students not be scrolling during class?” But then when they interviewed upset parents, they were all, “Yeah maybe they’ll learn more/better, but what if there’s a hostile event at the school and they can’t call 9–1-1?” D’oh. That’s the world we live in. How about a sensible “keep you cellphone in your backpack during class” policy? Seems reasonable to me. Sad commentary on society when the primary reason for kids to need a cellphone in school is to call dispatch for help.

17. Anyone else seriously dislike their AirPods?

18. That’s awful that Trump and his offspring are being sued for $250M. Those poor people. 😂😂😂 (The Cheeto’s repeated assertions that he’s been gravely wronged (“I think they even took my will”) is doing nothing to make his supporters question the validity of his hyperbolic claims but rather strengthening them in solidarity, in their incredulity that anyone could be so egregiously wronged. I don’t want to wish the days away, but I can’t be the only one petrified about the 2024 election. Shouldn’t there be a few electable candidates on the front of American political consciousness?)

19. Since the Queen died, I’ve been going deep into The Smiths catalog. Something about upbeat, happy melodies accompanied by cheeky/angry/bitter/melancholy lyrics that I can relate to more than I maybe should admit. Lingering late teen-/early-20s angst? Head on over to Spotify and crank ’em up.

20. Not much better in life than when your adult nephew quickly replies to your text with “Love you, too.”

Happy Friday Eve and thanks for being here, again. Words fail me when it comes to expressing my appreciation for you, for your attention. Know that your presence here fills a portion of my heart, every time.

And speaking of “love you too” well, love you too.