Bicyclists and Christmas - Monday, 20 September

In the Marais, where I’m staying, almost all of the small shops and cafés are closed on Mondays.  They are typically closed on Saturday for the Sabbath, and then mostly open on Sunday with lots of business and browsing (since small shops are pretty much closed elsewhere in town), and then closed again on Monday to rest up!  One exception today: the Christmas Store just a block from the apartment!  OK, it’s not exclusively Christmas stuff - also lots of games, action figures, fantasy hero attire, etc.  But still….

And then something I haven’t seen before!  A bicyclist (a guy probably in his 60s, fairly well-dressed) with a sound system in a specially-outfitted basket of his personal bike pedaled past me on rue de Rivoli.  It wasn’t just a boom box.  Nope.  It was a large decent speaker enclosed in a wooden case.  Not sure if it was connected via Bluetooth to a mobile device music player or if he went old school with a small CD player, but it was cool.  I couldn’t identify the music - it was a soft jazz style, loud enough to be heard by the rest of us, but not blaring.  Sorry that I wasn’t fast enough to snap a photo!  I did appreciate his contribution to the street scene and the aural environment!  

Speaking of bicyclists, there sure are a lot of them around, more than I remember from prior trips.  I remember a taxi driver telling me a few years ago, as we drove past an accident involving a bicyclist and a delivery van, that these accidents between bicyclists (who don’t always obey the rules of the road) and other vehicles were fairly prevalent. I’m not thrilled that a bunch of the main arteries in town have been narrowed to allow for dedicated bicycle lanes, but hopefully the accident rates have fallen.  I can tell you that those lanes are sure being used!