Friends, Fiends, and Countrymen

as packed with Russians and the gamblers playing 21 looked like losers. 1000 Euros would vanish fast in a bad crowd. We retreated to the Hotel de Paris and I drank a gin-tonic. Alex Cohort opted for an Armagnac. It had been bottled well back in the last century. Charles glowed with the osmosic influx of our joy. Neither Alex nor I had ever dreamed of sitting in such an elegant setting back in Brooklyn. We were like kids in a firework factory, but both of us were married and the working girls assessed our value to be not worth the trouble of any gesture more than a smile. Definitely not my style. I wished them well upon retiring to the Hotel Hermitage. Alex and I were in the same bedroom. We insisted on separate beds, although by the fourth night we were too blasted to worry about what the hotel maids thought about two men in their 50s sharing a room. Luckily our snoring didn't break the sound barrier. I didn't write a single word during those days and I told Charles and Alex that I would get to work in Luxembourg, except the internet in the Residence is useless. My apologies once more. Tomorrow I shall put the seast of my trousers to the seat of the chair in the embassy. Back to work. Thanks for your patience. PNS