In the southeast corner of Paris, there is a park called Parc Floral.  We there on Saturday to see the Expo Champignons.  However, I would recommend it to everyone who visits Paris, regardless of any mushroom expositions that might be happening.

French ducks. Also known as “canards.” And if you’re in a good restaurant, also known as “delicious.”

When you think about visiting another city and being a tourist, you probably don’t think about going to city parks.  Chad and I have developed a thing for parks and botanical gardens when we travel.  We started this habit during our 2009 sabbatical.  Back in 2009, we were on a very tight budget as we traveled around Europe.  As a result, anything that was free automatically made it onto our must-see list when we hit a new city.  One of the cool things about seeing the free stuff is that you take time to appreciate aspects of a city that most tourists never see.  For example, free things include parks, churches, strolls through out-of-the-way neighborhoods, picturesque plazas, farmers markets…  You get the picture.

Anyhoo, back to the subject at hand, Chad has declared Parc Floral his favorite park ever.  I agree that it is pretty awesome.  What was surprising was that, even though it was a Saturday morning, Parc Floral was pretty empty.  It was quiet and beautiful, a great place to get away from the hustle and bustle of the city, and just 10 minutes from our apartment by metro.

Check out the giant leaves on this plant behind me.

So, what was so cool about the park?  Well, we had no expectations whatsoever except to go visit the Expo Champignons.  However, there were 3 parts of the park that stick with me.  First of all, when we entered the park, we stumbled upon the Chemin de l’Evolution which was a garden with a prescribed path, and as you walked along the path you saw plants in the order that they evolved biologically.  Sounds goofy, I know.  However, take a look at these photos:

I enjoyed the groupings of plants by color.  I recognized some plants as similar to what we have in Atlanta, and others were new to me.  (Did I mention that I am Science Girl?  I like plants.)

There are approximately 25 small pavilion buildings in the park.  Some are empty, some are used for temporary events like the mushroom thing, and some have permanent exhibits.  We came across one pavilion which had a bonsai exhibit.  The funny thing was, we walked up to this building and the door was unlocked, but there was no one around.  Were we allowed to go in?  We weren’t sure.  So we just went in.  It was so cool!  The room had several different bonsai trees on exhibit, and then there was large courtyard out back with even more trees.  I had never been very interested in bonsai before, but after seeing that exhibit, I have a great appreciation for the art.  There were different species, sizes, shapes, displays…  This might have been the moment when Chad said, “This park destroys the Atlanta Botanical Gardens!”

The final, most breathtaking part of the park for us were the dahlia gardens.  These flower gardens were jaw-dropping.  When we first walked up the garden, we just saw a few plants with lots of colorful flowers.  Then we walked up a couple of steps into the heart of the garden where we could see further, and holy moly it stretched on and on!

In addition to the sheer number and variety of plants, I had no idea that there were so many different kinds of dahlias.  For example, this is a dahlia:

And this is a dahlia:

And this is a dahlia:

And this is a dahlia:

Chad and I each kept finding our favorite flower, and then we would walk 2 more feet and find a new favorite.  And then a new favorite.  Now I have about 157 favorite kinds of dahlia.

The other interesting thing was that one of the gardens was an annual international competition.  Dahlia plants from around the world had been submitted and planted in the garden, and prizes had been awarded both for critics’ choice and people’s choice.  Why does America have hot dog eating contests instead of dahlia cultivation contests?  Looking at dahlias is way more interesting.

Early last week, I saw an ad for “Expo Champignons,” and I knew I had to take Chad to this Mushroom Exposition.  I know, I know, it sounds silly to get excited about a mushroom festival in some random park in Paris, but let me tell you, when you are on vacation in Paris for a few weeks, you have the time to get excited about a mushroom festival.  And you go.  Partially because it’s free and partially becuase you’re all, “Meh, what else are we going to do today?”

We had no idea what to expect from this mushroom event.  Would there be mushrooms growing in the ground?  Would there be mushroom tastings?  Would there be large guys wearing mushroom hats and proclaiming the benefits of mushrooms?  For there record, there was none of this.  However, the mushroom expo was still awesome!

The expo was held in Pavilion 18 in Parc Floral.  Here’s a shot of the pavilion:

There were hundreds of species of mushrooms on display, each in its own tray with its own label.  Okay, okay, so I’m a total science girl, but even I was way nerdy into this expo.  I had no idea there were so many different types of mushrooms!  So many shapes and sizes and colors.  The labels that have a green stripe at the top are “good for cooking.”  The labels with the yellow stripe have “no cooking value.”  The labels with the red stripe indicate mushrooms that are “toxique” or “danger du morte”.  Yeah, I didn’t touch those bad boys.

It looks like just a bunch of tables with stuff on top.  But then here is the good stuff.  Did you know that mushrooms could look like this:

And this:

And this:

And that mushrooms could have red caps white spots in real life and not just from cartoons:

And… now you know why I nerded out.

However, my absolute favorite table was the one labeled “Odeurs”…smells.  Each mushroom on that table was labled with what it was supposed to smell like – candles, soap, garlic, and several words that I didn’t recognize.  One word that I did recognize, however, and which was a very true smell, was “anis”, licorice.  I tell you what, these blue mushrooms in this photo smelled just like black licorice.

It was unbelievable.  And now do you understand why I am so happy that I visited the mushroom exhibit at the park?

As I mentioned in my last post, we are staying in the 4th arrondissement in a neighborhood called Le Marais.  Here’s an excerpt from our guidebook:

<<Jack Kerouac translated “rue des Francs-Bourgeois,” the Marais’ main east-west axis along with rue Rivoli and rue St-Antoine, as “street of the outspoken middle classes,” though the original owners of the mansions lining its length would not have taken kindly to such a slight on their blue-bloodedness.  It was not until the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries that the Marais became a fashionable aristocratic district.  After the Revolution it was abandoned to the masses who, up until some fifty years ago, were living ten to a room on unserviced, squalid streets.  Since then, gentrification has proceeded apace and the middle classes are finally ensconced – mostly media, arty or gay, and definitely outspoken.  The renovated mansions, their grandeur concealed by the narrow streets, have become museums, libraries, offices and chic apartments, flanked by trendy fashion outlets, interior design shops and art galleries.  Though cornered by Haussmann’s boulevards, the Marais itself was spared the baron’s heavy touch and has been left pretty much unspoilt.  This is Paris at its most seductive – old, secluded, as lively by night as it is by day, and with as many alluring shops, bars and places to eat as you could wish for.>>

So, imagine that you are me back in June, and you’re doing research on Paris and trying to figure out where to stay.  Then you read that delectable tidbit in the guidebook.  I was all, “Um, Chad, I don’t think I need to do any more research. Le Marais sounds awesome!”  And, as it turns out, it is indeed awesome!

In addition to being centrally located and within walking distance of so many interesting parts of the city, I have never seen so many restaurants, cafes, bakeries, cheese shops, wine stores, fruit and vegetable stores, butcher shops, and other food vendors in such close proximity.  And don’t even get me started on the number of shoe stores within shouting distance of our apartment.  In fact, Chad and I have barely left our neighborhood this week because we have been busy exploring everything that is close by.  Here are some images from Le Marais:

view of Rue St-Antoine – our street

This is a library in our neighborhood – a library that looks like a chateau! How cool is that!

Ok. Here’s a building with ivy growing up the whole facade. I took this photo for a friend who is a landscape architect.

So this is a big church in our neighborhood called St-Paul.  There is a metro stop right in front called, surprisingly, St-Paul.

Interior of St-Paul church. Notice chairs instead of pews/benches.

Okay.  And then here is a wacky piece of architecture below.  I couldn’t figure out what type of business was in this building.  I could just tell that it was a new piece of architecture.

And then there is this canal:

Did you know that Paris has canals? Why, yes, Paris has canals.

Having an afternoon drink at a cafe…

The produce market across the street!

The fruit display at the produce market – mixed berries on the right, figs on the left, and something called kaki in the middle that looks like persimmons.

Seriously, why would you ever live anywhere else except here.  It’s awesome.

So now that we’ve been here for a week and a half, I’m sure everyone is curious about where we are staying while we’re in Paris.  We’ve rented an apartment in a neighborhood called Le Marais.  Paris is divided into 20 arrondissements, and we are staying in the 4th, very centrally located.  We are about 15 minutes walk from Notre Dame, 20 minutes from the Latin Quarter, 20 minutes from the Louvre.  We can also walk to the Eiffel Tower, although that would probably take 45 minutes to get there.  In any case, we love being in the heart of the city.  During our last visit, we were in the 10th arrondissement which was further out, and while we liked the cultural diversity of that neighborhood (lots if immigrants made for interesting sights and foods), we had to take the metro to get to most of where we wanted to be.  It’s nice to be within walking distance of so many things this time around.

I can’t remember if we rented our apartment on Air BnB or vrbo.com or another rental website.  In any case, when we travel, we prefer to rent apartments rather than stay in hotels.  Of course, on this trip, we never would have been able to afford to stay in a hotel for such a long visit.  However, even when we do short weekend trips in the States, we frequently will rent an apartment.  Apartment rentals are great because you can have more room to spread out than in a typical hotel room, you don’t have to worry about housekeeping interrupting if you want to spend the morning reading or writing blog posts, and you can prepare meals at home instead of eating restaurant meals 3 times a day.  Also, for me, a big reason for this particular trip was to “live” in Paris and be a parisienne, if only for a month.  What better way to do so than to stay in a cozy apartment, go to the grocery store and markets, and develop some daily and weekly habits to go along with it all.  Speaking of weekly habits, our apartment has a washing machine, so one of the weekend tasks is to do laundry.  (See first blog post about traveling lightly.)  Doing laundry is not a glamorous job by any means; however, there is something pretty awesome about being on vacation long enough that you have to do laundry to get through the next week.  I know plenty of people who would hate to do laundry while on vacation.  From my perspective, though, I would much rather do laundry in Paris than in Atlanta.  I’m just saying.

So, here are some photos of our apartment, starting with the exterior.

Our apartment is above the yellow awning on the 4th floor.  You can see Chad in the open window on the left.  What’s interesting is that our apartment is in the yellow-awning building, but we get to our apartment through a door in the building to the left.  If you look closely, there is a guy entering the door behind that dude who is wearing a gray sweater and jeans and waiting to use the crosswalk.

Once you enter the building, you go past the mailboxes and through a gate.

Then you go up some old, tight, uneven spiral stairs for 3 flights and get dizzy.

Inside our apartment, we have 4-ish rooms – living room, bedroom, kitchen, and a bathroom.  To get to the bathroom, you walk through a “bonus room” (in American real estate terms) which is not really a habitable room but which has some storage space and a closet.  Here’s our living rooom:

Here’s the bedroom:

The kitchen:

And then there is this extra room with storage:

In the back left corner is the door to the bathroom:

We also have some great views from our apartment:

The apartment is not huge, but it’s larger than the last apartment we had in Paris which was a teeny-tiny studio apartment in the attic of a building on the 7th floor with no elevator and a sloping roof that you would hit your head on while preparing food in the kitchen.  In any case, Chad and I have shared enough tiny apartments that we can live anywhere together.

When we woke up this morning, it was rainy and cloudy and generally “blech” outside.  So, what do you do when you’re on vacation and it’s yucky outside?  If you’re Juli, then you go to a museum!  You get to spend some time inside out of the rain and you feel like you’re making good use of your time in Paris, getting some “cul-chah” while looking at some artsy-fartsy.

We started the day with breakfast in the apartment – baguette with jam, some yogurt and a glass of juice.  First of all, if you have never eaten a fresh, warm baguette in France, then you have never eaten a real baguette.  Gently crispy on the outside, light and airy on the inside, it is so good.  And it costs the equivalent of a dollar.  Let’s compare this with a “baguette” in the US.  Hard/crunchy, shreds the roof of your mouth, chewy instead of airy on the inside, and costs, what, 3 dollars or something.  Yes, I am a food snob and, yes, I’m sure my brother is reading this and rolling his eyes right now.

Anyway, to get back to the artsy-fartsy.  We debated between the Louvre and the Pompidou Center for a few minutes this morning and then decided to go to the Pompidou because 1) the Louvre seems awfully intidimating and 2) we can walk to the Pompidou from our apartment.  So off to the Pompidou.

The Pompidou Center was built in the 1970s and was the subject of much controversy from the beginning.  First of all, the architects were chosen via competition, and this was the first time that international architects were allowed to participate in a French architectural design competition.  Not only that, the architects who won were NOT FRENCH.  Scandale!  Well, that was only the first scandal, because if you have ever seen the building, you will understand the real scandal.  Here’s a view of the Pompidou Center from down the street:

And here’s a view from the plaza in front of the Pompidou Center:

That worm-looking thing going up the side of the building is the public escalator of the museum.

This is a building where you either love it or hate it.  The genius of the building is that the insides are on the outside.  This means that the mechanical ducts, plumbing, circulation (stairs, escalators, elevators) are all on the outside of the building.  This design frees up the interior of the building completely so that the entire interior can be devoted to gallery spaces for the art, putting the guts of the building on the outside of the building.  Some people consider these exposed guts to be an eyesore, and some consider them to be art in themselves.  For me, I’ve gotta tell you that I love the design in theory, but there are a lot of horizontal surfaces on the outside of the building as a result, and let’s just say that there are lot of pigeons who live around the museum.  And the escalator “tubes” are clear and horizontal or nearly so.  So you can see through the roof above.  With its decorations of pigeon poop.

Anyhoo, we saw some interesting contemporary art today – 1960s to present – Warhol, Kandinsky, Rothko, a bunch of people I’ve never heard of…  I’m pretty open when it comes to contemporary art, so I loved it.  There were some pieces that made me say, “Um, okay, whatever,” but for the most part, I enjoyed it.  Below are some of my favorite pieces.  And I can share these with you because, in France, it’s oddly okay to take photos of art in museums as long as you don’t use a flash.

Here’s a piece of art with a grouping of fluorescent signs all hanging together.  There was something very calming about this art.

Okay.  This next artist is known for painting extracted images of ordinary things on walls.

I’m going to reproduce this on the wall in our basement rec room:

And also this, just for giggles:

This is a significant piece of art where I forgot to write down the artist’s name but it’s made out of pantyhose and bean-baggish things.  I’m not quite sure what to make of it.

This was a “room of art” that you could walk into.  It was titled “Winter Garden.”

And…this is the most contemporary of art, as far as I can tell.  White-tiled interior of a shipping container with a large image of a skull with magnificient lighting.

And by far, my favorite part of the museum exhibition, was the architecture portion.  Surprise!

In 2000, I interviewed for a job in Porto, Portugal with an architect called Eduardo Souto de Moura.   There was an entire room dedicated to him at the museum.  He’s one of my favorite architects – super-cool clean and modern design that merges the indoors with the outdoors.

I honed in on this project because it was under design when I interviewed with him and it’s now built.  It’s a soccer stadium set in a crevice in a hill.  Here’s the architectural model:

Here are a couple of sketches.  Dang!  Wish I could sketch like this!

Since my interview with Souto de Moura in 2000, he has won the Pritzker prize.  In essence, this is the Nobel prize for architecture.  I knew I had good taste when I interviewed with him.  :)

So, I am on vacation, but I am still doing some work from France.  My deal with my firm was that I would continue to do some work and keep my finger on the pulse of the projects while I am in Europe.  But more than that, there’s a part of me that is tied to theses projects and I want to know what’s going on with them.  I’m more than happy to stay in the loop.  In addition, I don’t want to brag, but I’m happy to be on a conference call to discuss the projects that I love, especially when I have this view from my new, temporary home office:

Life is terrible in Paris.

So, we did indeed make it to France.  I haven’t made a blog post in a few days, because I’ve been too busy being in France.  By the way, did you know that I am in France?  Why yes, I am in France.  Since my last blog post, I have traveled to France.  Ok, ok, I’ll shut up about being in France.  Because France is so boring.  It’s terrible.

Whatever you do, don’t ever come to Paris.  Paris is a terrible place to be with its savory food, its delicious wine, its wonderful architecture, its beautiful art…  In fact, it is so terrible that I have simply been too busy to stop and make a blog post.  However, I have recently found myself in the midst of a lazy afternoon with time to stop and reflect on things.

We arrived here a week ago after a long but uneventful flight.  We left Atlanta at 11:20 pm on Saturday night and landed at 2:00 pm on Sunday afternoon.  I’ve discovered that this is the ideal schedule for traveling to Europe, folks!  First of all, you get on the plane, eat a little something, and then fall asleep.  If you’re lucky, you get a few hours of half-sleep.  The best part, however, is that you land early afternoon and can go immediately to your apartment (or hotel).  Almost every other time I’ve come to Europe I’ve landed at 6 or 7 am and have had to kill a few hours wandering the streets with my luggage before I could ditch my bags and freshen up.  This schedule also means that, if you didn’t sleep on the plane, you’re even closer to the local bedtime.

That first afternoon in Paris, we checked into our apartment, spent some time in the cafe downstairs for some wine and snacks (of course), and then went for a long walk through central Paris.  We’re staying in Le Marais neighborhood which is centrally located, and our walk took us past La Mairie (city hall), over the river Seine to Notre Dame cathedral, and then back towards home past the Centre Pompidou.

Chad and Michele in front of the Mairie

There’s a bridge behind Notre Dame where people have locked padlocks onto the railings.  Each padlock has 2 names and a date written in permanent ink and declaring either 1) undying love or 2) undying best-friend-ness.  I don’t remember this from other visits to Paris.  I’m wondering if this is a new tourist trend in the city center.

We’ve seen a couple of bridges in Paris where couples or BFFs have noted their devotion to each other. Reminds me of that one part of the Cinque Terre path.

Late afternoon we popped into a small bistro for some more wine, escargots, and huitres.  “Escargots” is French for “snails served in delicious sauce,” and “huitres” are oysters which are in season right now.  We’ve seen then on the daily specials menu in a few restaurants.  We finished the day with a nice dinner at a crowded restaurant in our neighborhood called Les Philosophes.  I ordered Boeuf Bourgignon (stewed beef and vegetables) and I don’t even remember what Chad and Michele ordered because as soon as my food arrived, all I heard was “blah blah blah, blah blah, blah blah.”  Comfort food + full belly + jet lag = sleep.

Since last Sunday, Chad, Michele and I have been busy playing tourist.  On Monday, we visited the Musee d’Orsay which was a former train station converted into a museum in the 1980s.

Juli and Chad at the upper terrace of Musee d’Orsay

The museum features art of the 19th century, and there is a great exhibit of van Gogh.  Remember that van Gogh “Starry Night” poster you had in your college dorm room?  Saw it in person.  Remember that van Gogh “Self Portrait” that is so famous?  Saw it in person.  (Well, turns out there are 2 that are famous and saw them both.)  Since our last visit to Paris in 2009, the museum has declared photos to be “interdites” (forbidden) so we weren’t able to take photos.  However, if you want to check out the museum’s amazing collection, you can reference this link from our visit in 2009 when I was able to take photos of some of my favorite pieces:

http://chadzilla.com/site/travelog/article/musee_dorsay

The day we visited the Musee d’Orsay was also the day we started taking the metro.   There’s only so far that excitement can take you when you’re on foot.  You quickly reach a point where you say, “Well, I can walk the 3.4 kilometers (2 miles) back home and continue to admire Paris, or I can take the metro and be sitting in a cafe near my apartment drinking wine and eating snacks (hopefully snails) lickedy-split.”  And metro tickets are way cheap.

Stay tuned for the next “catch up” blog post.  It’s been an eventful week…

I spent my junior year of college in southern France.  While there, I perfected my skills at traveling with minimal stuff.  I had arrived in France with a backpacking-size backpack and a duffle bag, and that’s what I had for 9 months.  I lived with a French family and was allowed to do one load of laundry a week.  I quickly fell into a pattern of wearing only white and light-colored clothes for an entire week so I could wash a full load of lights, and then wearing only dark-colored clothes for a whole week so I could do a full load of darks.  Boy howdy, was I sick of those clothes at the end of my year abroad, but I made it all work.

While studying abroad, I did a lot of traveling on weekend and school breaks.  Back then, you could buy a Eurail pass  that allowed 30 days of travel within 3 months, and you could take trains all over Europe.  I explored France, Spain, Italy, Portugal, Germany, Switzerland, Monaco, Greece…  That was a blast.  Sometimes my friends and I had a plan, and sometimes we would go to the train station and see when the next train was leaving and where it was going and then hop on.  Today, I’m so uptight about planning and scheduling that I can’t even imagine how I was that spontaneous when I was younger, but I digress.

Whether traveling for a weekend or a week, I quickly learned that I was packing too much stuff in my bag.  Not only was I packing clothes and shoes that I never wore, that stuff was heavy and I was carrying it around on my back.  I learned to pare down.  I developed the art of wearing the same shirt 3 days in a row.  That sounds disgusting, doesn’t it?  Well, get over it.  It’s Europe.  As long as the shirt doesn’t look dirty, it’s fine.  And even if it smells a little teensy bit used, it’s still fine.  Let’s just say that body odor is not as offensive in certain European countries as it is in the US.  That’s also why France invented perfume.

Ever since that experience, I’ve traveled lightly.  Weekend getaway?  High school book-bag as a suitcase.   Week-long trip?  A small rollerbag.  Two-week trip?  Well, I have to make a wee little confession.  When I went to Bangalore for work in 2011,  I went for 2 weeks and (gasp!) checked my luggage.  The only reason for doing this, though, was because I packed 4 liters of water to take with me.  Americans are not supposed to drink the tap water in India.  In fact, I was told that I shouldn’t even brush my teeth with it.  No, no, no!  And not knowing if there would be a place to buy water near my hotel and what the whole situation would be, I brought water with me.  It turns out that the hotel provided bottled water for international guests, so my checked luggage was all for naught.  And for those of you who are curious about what else I packed for Bangalore – 3 shirts, 3 skirts, 2 pairs of shoes.  Booyah!

So, this post is a very long-winded way of saying what I’m taking to Europe on this trip.  Here’s my luggage:

Inside this backpack are 6 short-sleeve shirts, 4 long-sleeve undershirts and 2 cardigans/wraps for layering when it gets cold, 2 skirts, 1 pants, 1 jeans, 1 dress for fancy restaurants, and 3 pairs shoes.  Of course, there are also the requisite toiletries and socks, camera, Nalgene water bottle, Kindle, small notebook, European hairdryer (bought it on our last trip, hate having wet hair when it’s cold and rainy outside)…  And I have 5 more hours to decide if I bring the France guidebook.  I might leave the guidebook at home because, as Chad put it, France does have internet access.

I have a rule that I must leave the country at least once a year.

Last year, we went to Panama City, Panama for Thanksgiving.  In 2011, I spent 2 weeks in Bangalore, India in June for work.  2010 was Thanksgiving in Ocho Rios, Jamaica.  2009 was our glorious sabbatical where we spent 7 months traveling Spain, Portugal, France and Italy.  2008 was another Thanksgiving week abroad, this time in Oaxaca, Mexico.  You get the drift.

I have another rule.  Don’t be afraid to take time off from work.

When Chad and I were dating, his former college roommate invited us to his wedding in Japan.  I told Chad I couldn’t go with him because I had a major project deadline at the same time.  Big mistake.  Of course, that project deadline got pushed back, and I missed out on a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to experience Japan with native hosts, a traditional wedding, and other unique experiences that I will never be able to recreate.

Rule #3 – When I go to Europe, I’m there for at least 3 weeks.

Last spring, Chad expressed interest in attending a business conference in Milan in October.  This became a great excuse to begin planning our 2013 trip abroad.  After much discussion on where we wanted to vacation in Europe prior to the conference, we settled on Paris.  We had spent 9 days in Paris in 2009 and had a great time.  There is so much to do and see and eat and drink in Paris; we decided we could go back and spend 3 weeks there.  Then Chad would head to Milan, and I would head back to Atlanta.  As we continued to plan, however, things evolved, and we’ll both be in Europe for 5 weeks.

Enough with the rules.  Here’s the plan for the trip.

Saturday, September 28, we fly to Paris with Chad’s sister Michele.  We’ll spend that first week doing all things touristy in Paris, eating great food, and drinking good wine.  Michele will return to Atlanta on Sunday, October 6.  Chad and I will spend another 2+ weeks in Paris, probably at a slower pace.  On Tuesday, October 22, we’ll fly to Milan.  Honestly, I wasn’t planning to go to Milan until I saw the apartment that Chad had rented, and then I decided the balcony was too cool to pass up.  We’ll goof around for a day or so, and then Chad’s conference is on Thursday and Friday.  On Saturday, October 26, we’ll take the train to the Cinque Terre and stay there for 4 days because, well, it’s the Cinque Terre and it’s our favorite place on earth.  Then back to Paris for a final 3 days before flying back home.  Sounds terrible, doesn’t it?  :)

Check back on Saturday for my next post.  We’re going to Europe with carry-on luggage only, no checked baggage…  We’ve been told we’re crazy; I would argue that we’re crazy-smart…