---

Darn you, Verbal Remedy, just darn you to heck! I ALMOST had her under control.  Oh, sorry, by "her" I'm referring to my inner Republican Heiress. Not only do I have an evil twin, it turns out she's a cross between Martha Stewart in home decor taste and Paris Hilton in her spending capacity.  Maybe I'll call her Partha. The bitch wants everything, and I ain't talking generic  brands of everything, either.

       I've been good, this summer.  I haven't bought much of anything but necessities,  and haven't even gone to the bookstore often, or to many theater movies.  My inner Republican Heiress finds this  a deadly bore. (Well, I do too, sometimes, but she's a world champion whiner.)  But by holding the purse strings in a death grip, I've finally convinced Partha we're officially living in hard times. 

       With much grumbling, she looks through all the luscious catalogs and gives me mean looks muttering about what a  "mean skinflint  I am who won't let her have anything"  under her breath, but she can't do much damage without credit cards.

But then  you had to give us this virtual ten thousand dollar shopping challenge to counter Recessional dreariness, and Partha was off and running.  She even absconded with my virtual  tropical vacation budget, too.  She can't resist the siren call of crisp currency.

 I finally  caught up to her in Paris, outside  E. Dehilllerin, a famous cooking supply store.  Clearly, the rotten apple doesn't fall very far from the tree.

 

 

I didn't get there in time.  She was already inside surveying all  the copper outils du chef.  With all that beautiful copper in front of me, what chance did I have? It was the batterie de cuisine of my dreams!

 

 

The purchase price was bad enough after converting dollars to Euros, but the shipping costs to get it all back home....ouch. This is why I won't be coming to the tropics, folks.  But there's a bright side to that... I get bad sunburns like you wouldn't believe.

Partha gave me the slip again the next day.  When I finally caught up to her in an antique shop, I had to talk her out of the striped Louis Quinze sofa:

Provencal linens and Italian Pottery dishes

"Aw, Come on," Partha coaxed.  "Are you going to cook fantastic gourmet meals with all those copper pans, set the table with those beautiful table cloths and then serve everyone on a bunch of  lousy paper plates? You know you love this stuff, and it's very reasonably priced if you buy it here."

 I have to admit, she had a point, both as to my loving the Italian  pottery and the reasonable price while in Italy.(It's the shipping costs that kill ya.)   I just don't know how I'm going to control her spending again once we get  home. Now she's like a shark that's tasted blood in the water! 

Stay tuned this afternoon as I honor Julia Child when a semi-live supper cooking blog out of Mastering the Art of French Cooking. =o) Although alas, the "Julia Child Love- in and Bake-off" will occur sans the lovely but still virtual copper pans.