art brut

Pic Saint Loup [Clos Marie]

la finale

A very pleasant stroll through central Paris this afternoon, during “la” finale, when France was playing Croatia. Bars were all overflowing onto the pavements and sometimes the streets, each action was echoed throughout town, and we certainly did not miss any goal, even from the heart of the Luxembourg gardens! Which were deserted except for the occasional tourist, just as the main thoroughfares, except for police cars and emergency vehicles. Since the game ended, horns have been honking almost nonstop, even in the quietest suburbs.

Arbois [Domaine de la Borde]

in the street for a year

Just like about every year, I sent two of my pictures to the photography competition of Paris Dauphine, with not much consideration for the theme “green the future”, and was hence quite surprised to get selected this time! (Almost as much surprised as last year when an almost perfect copy of my picture of the Alcazar Baths of Lady María de Padilla got selected!) As I could travel back from Oxford to attend the opening ceremony, I went there last night, wondering at which of my pictures had been selected (Lac Pavin, Auvergne versus the Quinrang, Skye)…

And so this picture will remain exposed in the street, boulevard Lannes, for the incoming year, meaning I will cross it each time I bike to the university! The 22 other pictures were more in tune with the theme of a green future, like the winning one of a fast moving métro carriage at the station Chemin Vert. Or this simple blade of grass growing from ashes…

 
And thus the winner is…

Vélib’surdity!

On January 1, 2018, the official purveyor of short term rental bikes in Paris, the Vélib‘, changed, due to Smovengo winning the official bid for the renovation of the 2007 structure, against the contender JCDecaux. I almost never use these bikes as I travel with mine(s), except when stuck in a broken train or sudden industrial action! But I find amazing that the bid comparison did not consider the ecological cost of switching operators, as every single slot of every Vélib’ station had to be changed to accommodate the new bicycles. Some of which are electric bikes, requiring electricity plugs on every slot, two other ecological fallacies. And this is not even accounting for the disposal of tens of thousands of the older bikes (which were already suffering from a very high failure rate). Given the slow pace of the switch, free floating bike services like Ofo, Gobee, and OBike tried to take a share of the market, but they suffered so many degradations that they are gone or about to go. Another mountain of used bikes to dispose off…

St. Augustine [jatp]