I asked her if she wanted to keep the book and take it home with her. She looked at me, smiled, and said yes. She graciously offered me money back. Of course I couldn't take it. Just watching her face while she saw her mother's writing was a gift to me and I told her so.

One of the books I bought had an 40-year-old inscription from a mother to her daughter. I opened the book to the signed page and asked the English lady if it had been inscribed to her. She looked at it for a long while, with such subtle emotion crossing her face, and said yes in a small voice.

I complimented her on her library, and told her I'd been a bookseller for years. All attention suddenly turned to me. I'm still astonished at how revered my old profession is here. Someone asked me how many books do I own, where my bookshop in Paris had been, and how I came to live in the southwest.

I found some Penguin pocketbooks that I wanted, and handed them to the English lady so she could price them. Her face lit up while she handled the books. She complimented me on my choices, as I'd done hundreds of times to other people in my old bookshop.

With George Platt Lynes no less. Holy smoke.

I'd head downtown to the Public Theater for this publictheater.org/performances...

My affection for them stems from the physical form. I have a bum left hand, and the LoA series are bound in a way that I don't need to use a book weight to read them.

M. F. K. Fisher. I heard there was a volume in the works, so there's hope.

The little grey one is, but the others are total love bugs. I set up beds for them next to the house, and they greet me at the door every morning. My cat loves to go out and play with them. It does feel like I'm running a restaurant for French cats, but I don't mind.

The same thing happened to me about a year ago. But the red truck in my scenario was their feral mom. They're still around, all fixed and all chunky.

Beautiful pic, and welcome to France.

I'm re-reading my dad's letters home from the war. Here he is somewhere in Germany, April 1945. He was not impressed by the dissembling Nazi losers he saw on his way to Berlin.

I'd only lived in the countryside for a few months when I witnessed a cat scare the hind part off a lizard. The tail kept wagging like so. This city slicker had never even seen a lizard before let alone whatever this was. I thought I was tripping.

Please pardon the unsolicited advice, but I'd like to pass on the wisdom of a friend's grandma. When she saw me suffering over some onions, she told me to fill my mouth with water while cutting. I'm not sure why it works, but I've not shed a tear over an onion since that day.

I discovered it recently and my first thought was the BBC was having a stroke.

That is such a good idea. I just re-read FGT, and was so charmed that I ordered her cookbook and her new collection of stories. There will be some serious cooking going on while I read her stories.

I've just learned that Fannie Flagg published a new book last month, so am looking forward to some supremely cosy reading.