ok, so i finished the chair by the time that mr. bingley proposed to jane bennett, and was able to casually watch the rest of P&P with a glass of wine while gazing smugly at the newly covered chair. well, not too smugly, as any fool can tell that it was not done by a professional. but it is done, and i can move on. and i can put back the P&P tapes for another project......

i also watched the end of the tour de france. the end of anti-climactic- like we didn't know that lance was going to win again. when you are that far ahead, it takes a fluke to lose. he really won last week when heras paced him up the mountain in the south of france and lance fought back when belocki tried to attack on the same climb. that was the defining moment- and basically the ride was all downhill from there. i enjoyed the brief footage from vaux-le-vicomte, a fabulous chateaux in melun, where the tour started on the last leg. i visited there in 1989 on one of my trips with deedra. i took the train to melun, then a taxi to the chateaux (a $16 taxi as i recall.....) it was built just before versailles was reborn as a super-chateaux by the finance minister for louis XIV- he of course paid for it with embezzled funds- so louis took it from him after a big open-house party, and through the finance guy in jail- then took all of his work crew (architects, gardeners, etc.) to versailles to work for him. andre le notre did the gardens- just like her did the gardens at versailles and the tuilleries- these gardens are so french- with series of fountains and parterres and with very little lawn- certainly no lawn to tread upon- just lawn to look upon. the house is quite lovely, with less gold and frou frou and more nice touches like caned chairs. it is worth a visit if you are ever in the area....