Today I bought a pedometer. I am missing biking and I think a pedometer may arouse my self-competitiveness enough to ensure I get out for a walk every day. Today it was down the Boulevard St Germain to the Institut du Monde Arabe and back, past a sporting goods shop, hence the pedometer. My destination was a lighting store to check out reading lamps. When I got home it occurred to me that I could attach a clip on lamp we have to a music stand et voilà! The end of the sofa is transformed into a good place to read these long dark nights.

The temperatures have warmed up 10 degrees (F), but the sky is mostly still grey, with every now and then a perfectly beautiful day, as this past Sunday when we ventured to the suburbs (Ville d’Avray on the edge of the Parc de St Cloud, west of downtown) to see friends who moved from their small Paris apartment two years ago to a luxuriously large fixer-up outside the city.

Dusk. Church bells ringing. As of this week, masks are no longer necessary outdoors, but lots wearing them them. Streets quiet, café terraces populated. I don’t hear any tourists.