Manifestation

Paris was warm and the chestnut trees were out. Mozilla has a beautiful office. There was a strike but that didn't seem to matter. It just meant a taxi in from Charles de Gaulle and a taxi out to Orly on a beautiful afternoon putting together all the glimpses I have had of the city over the years into a new geography.

Thanks to Kristof Van Tomme at Pronovix for the pictures

Things to note: Montmartre is very hipster as I guess it always has been. Were Alice B.Toklas and Picasso hipsters? I kind of feel that Alexandre Dumas père would have been. Also you can get birch water at Mozilla but I made a coffee instead.

This seems to be a year of revisiting places I have known and assumed I know well. With each one London, Dublin, Belfast, Paris and shortly Vigo there has been a pleasing shake-up and sense of another way of looking.


Last exam and coursework of my master's first year this week and then a summer of possibilities featuring predominantly at the moment: woods, my Indian bird list and APIs.


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Postscript: French woodland makes me dream of martins. Montmartre is the mount of the martins. And on the rive gauche there is a Montsouris - hill of the mouse. Luckily they are separated by the river.

The meaning of woods

What have you written in a wood or after visiting one? As an exercise I would recommend sitting in a wood listening and reflecting and writing then or after. Or sleeping in a wood. Possibly not under a rookery like Roger Deacon. But then again...

The Woodland Trust have a new mini-site dedicated to sharing people's creative interaction with woods. Take a look. Visit your imaginary forest. Make your own journey through trees.

You can find out more here http://visitwoods.org.uk/en/visit-woods/take-part-in-visitwoods/Pages/as-an-individual.aspx#.UMxMMeS6euI.