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Post by Deleted on Apr 11, 2009 15:36:09 GMT
In Paris, we are not allowed to dry laundry out our window or on balconies.
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Post by bixaorellana on Apr 11, 2009 17:13:14 GMT
Drying clothes in front of the house or apartment does rather lower the tone. (and I'm not being facetious here, either)
The reason there are laws about visual or auditory nuisances is because of all the people who can't observe simple common decency.
I used to live in a tiny river-side community in rural North Carolina. Everyone in the neighborhood got along well because there was such a high level of regard for the comfort of others. For instance, even though it was extremely dark at night, we all decided to turn down the county's offer of street lights. That was because everyone liked sitting out on their porches at night and didn't want glaring lights obscuring the moon and stars. The best, though, was discovering that all the wives -- independent of each other -- had laid down the law about no power tools or mechanized gardening apparatus before 9:30 on a weekend morning.
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Post by Jazz on Apr 11, 2009 23:58:15 GMT
I love the sound of your North Carolina community. We are not so fortunate and are often tormented on weekend mornings with eager beavers firing up the whippersnappers, weedwhackers and lawnmowers at 6AM! I had to go into deep negotiations with my new neighbor and bribe him to turn his spotlight away from my yard. It ruined evenings in my garden. My brother has a cottage on the Bruce peninsula and they have a 'dark night law'. It is illegal to have bright outdoor cottage lights etc. This is for the reasons you expressed and it is beautiful to sit and enjoy the night.
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Post by bixaorellana on Apr 12, 2009 3:09:57 GMT
The neighbor towards the back of the field on which I live built a monster three story house and installed something with the intensity of a lighthouse lens right up by the roofline. I talked to him when he was moving in and told him about the white owl that hunts the field at night. He's never turned the light on again!
I lived in a pretty nice subdivision in Louisiana. One night around 11:30 the neighbor behind me cranked up his Skil saw. Dogs barked frantically, babies cried, and there was a huge chorus of "For Christ sakes, Steve, turn that damned thing off!!!!" coming from all sides.
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Post by bixaorellana on Apr 12, 2009 3:15:13 GMT
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Post by hwinpp on Apr 13, 2009 2:26:21 GMT
Can you believe the Phnom Penh governor has issued an edict here forbidding hanging out the laundry? He wants to make the city nicer, bloody moron...
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Post by lola on Apr 13, 2009 2:41:25 GMT
Oh, dear. Last time we were in Paris I'm pretty sure I draped damp towels on the railing of our balcony and left them to dry in the sun all day. Maybe because it faced a courtyard and not the street we got away with it.
I like the looks of clothes on lines, though, and use the one in our yard a lot. I sometimes do paintings including hanging laundry.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 13, 2009 4:57:50 GMT
I think that inner courtyards are pretty much tolerated for laundry at the window in Paris. You'd have to have some awfully petty neighbors for someone to call the police on such a matter!
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Post by Jazz on Apr 13, 2009 6:22:21 GMT
Me too, Lola. I rented an apartment for a month on rue de la Roquette. My apartment faced the inner courtyard and we all hung our laundry out on our small balconies....no problem.
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Post by bixaorellana on Apr 13, 2009 12:01:31 GMT
Even when I lived in the States, where washer-and-dryer is practically a single word, I preferred to hang my clothes to dry. I lived in a subdivision that specified no clotheslines, but I hung them in my fenced backyard nonetheless.
Lola ~~ you're a painter?!
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Post by Deleted on Apr 24, 2009 5:21:50 GMT
Friday afternoon will be warm and sunny, they say.... before our rainy weekend.
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Post by rikita on Apr 24, 2009 6:10:36 GMT
yay, going to see the bf tonight, for the weekend. didn't see him last weekend, so by now i am missing him a lot.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 24, 2009 10:45:41 GMT
Can't believe it's Friday already. Hope to continue work on prepping for the biggest fall/winter vegetable garden ever. Will probably go see a movie. It's a toss up between Cherie and Public Enemies. Will more than likely choose Cherie as I think it will be gone soon and Public Enemies will hang around. Afterwards will stroll through the French Quarter as I haven't done so in a while.
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Post by spindrift on Jul 24, 2009 10:55:10 GMT
I have been invited to have afternoon tea with friends who live in Romsey. If the rain stays away I might be able to stroll around the Abbey to take some pictures.
Saturday I'm going to visit a friend for lunch at her house and then in the evening I'll be meditating at the monastery.
Sunday I'll drive up to London to have lunch with my daughter.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 24, 2009 14:02:46 GMT
I'm going to a baby shower tomorrow. I'm still knackered from playing volley ball yesterday evening.
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Post by bixaorellana on Jul 24, 2009 15:48:29 GMT
Glum, overly cool and overcast day here. Someone is burning something and the smoke is hanging in the air and giving me a headache.
In a while I'm off to visit former neighbors, who are holding my invitation for the wedding I'm to attend tomorrow.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 24, 2009 23:06:03 GMT
Baby Showers and Weddings. I remember a time when most every other weekend was consumed with those. Not too many these days.
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Post by hwinpp on Jul 25, 2009 1:45:49 GMT
It's already Saturday morning here. I'm going to have dinner with some people from the office, an ex- manager has just returned from America.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 25, 2009 1:50:21 GMT
Hw,always ahead of our time.How does that feel to know we're behind you?
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Post by bixaorellana on Jul 25, 2009 1:56:54 GMT
That's so strange. It's not even nine o'clock Friday night here.
I found out the wedding is on Sunday, not Saturday, which is fine with me.
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Post by traveler63 on Jul 25, 2009 1:57:20 GMT
We have been invited to our friends for dinner tomorrow. Just waiting to see what her menu is so I can take something. We will have to decide what wine to take. We have about 150 bottles to choose from. It is always fun to share our selections.
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Post by hwinpp on Jul 25, 2009 3:04:41 GMT
Hw,always ahead of our time.How does that feel to know we're behind you? I think the only one who's ahead of me is Mokchoc on the east coast of Oz. Of course I never get to join in on the action during your afternoons/evenings, there are pros and cons.
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Post by lola on Jul 26, 2009 1:12:22 GMT
I went to a high school reunion last night, so naturally am depressed today and saying NEVER AGAIN.
Compensatory highlights: 1) The cutest boy in our class, Mr. Hearthrob Incarnate, flirted with me for a long time. I said he was always the cutest, and he said no, I was. (and not that much alcohol involved, either!) If I'd only known he would ever in the misty future act that way, it would have benefited the old Self Esteem quite a lot.
2) Another object of my silent crushes was there with his very sweet wife, and he now looks like his old dad and is still a dear. 3) I got to stay at my old pal's mother's house, scene of old sleepovers, and have coffee with her and her mother before driving back to the city this morning.
3) Some of them are out doing interesting things.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 26, 2009 1:32:02 GMT
Was there a large turnout lola? I always wonder about these events.have only read about them or seen scenes in films about them (my high school class was only 24 people so no one has ever bothered to put together a reunion,those who care to see someone other then about four of us need only to go to the town itself and there they still are). I'm glad Mr. Heartthrob finally fessed up to what we, in a very brief time ,already knew about our darling lola.
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Post by bixaorellana on Jul 26, 2009 3:25:40 GMT
Mr. Hearthrob was probably just as insecure as you were ~~ afraid to approach the immeasurably cute and perfect teen Lola.
Ah, if we'd only known then what we know now.
It sounds as though it was a fun evening, night, and morning. Why are you depressed?
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Post by Deleted on Jul 26, 2009 15:58:04 GMT
I would not ever go to a high school reunion. My brother, on the other hand, has been to two of his and finally got to sleep with the girl he had craved for so many years. Last time he checked, she had died of cancer, so I guess he did the right thing.
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Post by lola on Jul 26, 2009 22:09:20 GMT
Casi and bixa, you dears.
I lucked out by not having boyfriends in HS, unwillingly of course but in retrospect a good thing. I had lots of pals among boys and was considered a good egg. My older brother got drunk one night and told me that I intimidated them by being too smart.
Our class graduated about 375, and ~55 people showed up, including spouses. My brother, who's 3 years younger, came too. It's a small town, where you knew people's siblings, and their parents were your doctors or sold you shoes. So the inter relatedness makes it interesting to keep up.
At the reunion: flashes of joy and affection along with the painful hint that just possibly I might look so thoroughly No Longer Young as most of them. It's harder to maintain my cherished illusions when surrounded by people my own age. One got the impression that many of them have spent the remaining years with a bag of chips in front of the TV, though.
Mostly, you realize that what you loved about people then you still love, senses of humor or whatever.
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Post by lola on Jul 26, 2009 22:10:21 GMT
kerouac, good for your brother and the girl for that matter.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 26, 2009 22:24:50 GMT
And here you are lola ,whipping up costumes for one daughter's theatrical pursuits, galavanting around the English countryside with another,attending the Royal Opera,sketching and painting. Certainly more cultivated,cultured,enlightened and intelligent pursuits compared to TV with a bag of chips! Please! Don't be so hard on yourself. I grew up in a small town too, and for a brief time I wondered if I had made the "right" choice by leaving. I'd go back and the ones who were (are )still there are all doing the same things they were 30+ years ago.
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Post by Jazz on Jul 27, 2009 0:10:52 GMT
And here you are lola ,whipping up costumes for one daughter's theatrical pursuits, galavanting around the English countryside with another,attending the Royal Opera,sketching and painting. Certainly more cultivated,cultured,enlightened and intelligent pursuits compared to TV with a bag of chips! Please! Don't be so hard on yourself. I grew up in a small town too, and for a brief time I wondered if I had made the "right" choice by leaving. I'd go back and the ones who were (are )still there are all doing the same things they were 30+ years ago. Lola, I agree with Casimira with one exception...I never wondered if I had made the right choice in leaving. I also came from a small town of 3,000 and I lived in the countryside. There were only 25 people in my graduating class and to my knowledge, there was never a reunion. When you first joined, you posted a photo of one of your paintings, the beautiful 'Laundry on the Line'. (if I could find it, I would repost it because it is fresh and lovely.) As Casi notes, you have achieved so much. I feel that any one of us would feel a mix of emotions if we were to be once again with people that we hadn't seen in 20 years or so. Often, an uncertain sadness. Your life seems to be full and rich, and your daughters are beautiful.
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