Paris to Honolulu to Paris in less than a week

Not too much to write about today.... Just got back from Paris and am dead tired after a LONG, endless flight.... going to check out shortly!

As if it was not tiring enough, I am flying to Honolulu HI tomorrow, returning thursday morning and yet flying back to Paris on Friday!!!!

Damn! I must be crazy!

Honolulu is definitely NOT my favorite place in the Pacific for a plethora of reasons and we stay in Waikiki, in one butt ugly tower hotel with a parking lot view.... quite exotic indeed!!!! Yet I must confess however that it beats staying in equally crappy hotels in Detroit, Hartford and the likes.... I have plenty of admin work for the restaurant and besides, I can go around wearing shorts to watch trashy Japanese and white middle class America max up their over-the-limit credit cards at cheesy souvenir malls and graze "en masse" at Ihop and Red Lobster!!!! HAHAHA!!!!

Feel the glamour......

Quick update while I am waiting for my flight briefing on Tuesday morning: It is snowing outside for the first time of the year... the weather outside is ungodly, the traffic on the highway is an utter mess.... Am I going to miss Utah for the next 48 hours? NAAAHH!

Happy Birthday Eric!!!!

Today is your special day. This coming up year is your special year with lots of exciting projects coming to fruition!

I am very proud, grateful and privileged to know that you call me your best friend....

From the bottom of my heart I wish you the very best...

With much Love and Admiration.....

Eman

Then and now...

The other day, Eric took me to the Utah State Archives where we both had the privilege to attend a lecture on the development of our neighborhood (the SLC East bench) between 1860 and the 1930's. The lecture was presented by retired paleontologist/"citizen historian" Laurie Bryant, who happens to be a neighbor of Eric's....

It was most fascinating and wonderful to find out about how our neighborhood was build around natural springs at first, then grew thanks in part to a water canal stretching from the Jordan River to the City Creek (close by downtown) and also the electric power. It was exciting to find out which houses were constructed first and which ones are still standing today. It was amazing to find out that a streetcar line was running on 1500 south, right in front of the Paris Bistro

Street Car in Salt lake City ca. 1912

Included in Laurie's presentation was a gem of a photograph.... The Folland Drugs and the East Bench Market Building as it was back in 1937 and still stands today. It houses, you guessed it..... the Paris Bistro.... Eric and I were utterly blown away....

Below this are the two pictures next to one another... In the old picture, the part that boasts an awning is the part that later became our bar some 70 years later.... also with an awning! What is even more amazing is the fact that Eric designed the Paris Bistro without having ever seen this picture before.... Also look at the mailbox and the postman collecting the mail by the corner of the building. The mailbox also still stands there after all this time.... Unbelievable!

The Folland Drug Store and East bench Market ca. 1937

The Paris Bistro as it stands today... Check out the mailbox!

My new house!!! (well, kinda...)

Not really a new house, but a dining and living room full of beautiful Arts & Craft / Mission style furnishings bought over the past year at antique sales and stores, and finally put together by Eric and his wonderful sense of style....

Like mother like son, I have inherited a deep love for old furniture that have traveled though time being handed down from generation to generation.... While modern style might work for some, I find it has no soul and becomes broken and worthless as time passes by. Think about modern appointments of the seventies.....

Over the past couple of years, I have been following Eric to numerous antique shows and stores and became "infected" by his passion for beautiful, early 20th century american furniture. I knew nothing about the arts and crafts style and movement (I thought it was all about mormon scrap-booking and quilting at first)


He somehow managed to strongly coerce me into saving most of my earnings from the Paris Bistro and invest them into something more durable than a couple of evenings out. I have to admit that I am very glad I listened to him for my house now looks fantastic, and very much in tune with the style of my neighborhood, which boasts quite a few centenarian American bungalows....

Click here to view a slideshow of my new antiques furniture and my dining room. I am so proud and excited!!! My next purchase will be a chandelier to be installed above my dining room table and replace the current eyesore that hangs there now....

Autumn!!!!

I have been lazy lately....

Yes, I confess!!!! I have been busy, I have flown around quite a bit and been busy with the restaurant.... Canned more tomatoes, went to the market, did a lot of paperwork, spent some time in the kitchen.....

Eric has been busy with Tartine, our wine bar project next to The Paris, and also Sea Salt, our next Italian venture....

We have enjoyed a wonderfully warm weather up to last week.... On Monday September 28th it was 85ºF and I was going around wearing a T-shirt, shorts and no socks... When I woke up the following day, Fall had moved in overnight. It was raining cats and dogs, the wind was blowing and the temperature outside was an amazing 55ºF.

Over the next couple of days, the sun played hide and seek and Fall most definitely claimed its presence.... We saw a lot of rain and experienced much colder weather, especially at night... We sadly had to stop serving customers out on the patio at the Paris Bistro.

Eric came to my house one night, coiffed with a high powered headlamp, in an effort to salvage the last of the heirloom tomatoes. He harvested a whopping 70lbs. I must say he was very inspired to do so, for it almost froze that very night. Over the next couple of days, we cut the last of our basil. Last night was the hardest freeze to date.... My entire lawn was covered with white frost this morning....A view of 1500 South (Emerson Ave), where The Paris sits.

Fall is my favorite season.... especially here in Utah. Mother Nature displays an astonishing palette of gold, red, yellow and orange hues, and the mountains are simply superb...Check out these pictures (click here to view a collection of landscapes my friends and I have taken over the past couple of years).

Cuban Sandwiches!!!

Eric and I were watching an episode of Anthony Bourdain's "No Reservation" on the travel channel the other day. Anthony was in San Francisco and had a humongous Cuban sandwich with his buddy at a liquor store in the mission district.

We both got excited and Eric made us his interpretation of Cuban sandwiches.... We went to Caputo's Deli and bought some ham, some mortadella, then got some pork chops from the butcher's, then used tomatoes from our garden, red gypsy peppers and jalapeños from the farmer's market....

This may very well have been the best sandwich I have ever had.... no kidding!

Check out pictures below...