L’Observateur du Jour

Martini Rosato is one tasty aperitif. If you can find it in the United States, I’d like to hear about it.

I was on my bike in a steady drizzle underneath the arches near the roundabout on the north side of the Louvre when a middle-aged man on a moped pulled up next to me at a red light. He pulled out an iPhone, dialed a number, and then wedged it between the interior padding of his helmet and his ear, shut the visor on his helmet, started talking to someone, and sped off. Allez-y.

There is a French cell phone commercial that has “The W.A.N.D.” by Oklahoma’s Flaming Lips in it. The “characters” seemed to be taking the lyrical content of the song literally, which I thought strange, but not nearly as strange as hearing the Lips in a French TV commercial.

The French call Edinburgh “Edimbourg,” and Scotland “L’Ecosse.”

Three bulbs of garlic cost 1.5 euros at the corner store.

This column is a loose homage to R.U. Steinberg’s Mr. Smarty Pants Knows, which, when read in URL, says: “Mrs. Marty Pants Knows.”