I’d never managed to make it to the Natural History Museum (palentology), found in the Jardin des Plantes, here in Paris until my grandchildren visited. Children love nothing more than giant skeletons left from animals living now and those dinosaurs. They were so excited. I not only enjoyed seeing them myself being a lover of fossils since my own childhood, but I also enjoyed the old building in which they are housed. It was a great place to visit.

A giraffe.

The vertebra of a whale. Sort of goes on forever.

A closeup of the metal work on the two balconies that overlooked the huge room holding the bones.

A dinosaur seen from up above whose tail has to be supported on another table.

A frontal view of a mamouth showing some of the great room where everything is placed.

Is it just me or did 2009 go by very, very quickly? It certainly doesn’t seem like 12 months since last New Year. I have trouble remembering what all I did. Mostly my memories seem to be of studying for the French driver’s license this summer, from May to October. I managed to pass it much to my amazement and great relief but it seems to have eclipsed all of my other memories to oblivion. I vaguely remember going to Ville Franche to improve my French. I remember visitors to our house in Provence. We did go to New York for several weeks which I enjoyed. The rest is a blur. With each year I age, time passes more quickly. I wonder why that is?

I stopped making New Year Resolutions some time ago. It seemed like an exercise in futility and lead to a little depression wondering why I could never follow through. Then I learned about picking just one word to focus on all year. It really does seem to bring great things into your life. My word for this year? ‘Exciting’. I love that feeling when something fabulous happens. I hoping for some really exciting things (exciting in a good way) this year. I already know one-Maurice and I are traveling to India for three weeks the end of January. It’s hard to get more exciting than that.

I had my son and his family over for a New Year’s Eve dinner and was just barely awake at midnight. I would have loved to have seen the special light show at the Eiffel Tower but when the news said they were expecting 500,000 people to be there I decided to stay warm and safe at home.

I wish for all of you a wonderful new year filled with joy, health and exciting new things. Thanks for joining me here all year in the blog world. How interesting and, yes, exciting it has been for me.