A day at the shops - Metz

Our friend Jacques once confided that he thought Metz was the nicest city in all of France, except of course for Lagarde where he lives and works. 

We have to admit that we are pretty much in agreement with regard to Metz and although Lagarde is a sort of home for us it shouldn’t count because it has a population about equal to that of a crowded bus.    All of that aside we do have things to do in a week or so in another nice city, things that will require a standard of dress just a little above that to which we have allowed ourselves to become accustomed, and with that in mind we spent at least some of today wandering the almost endless streets of department stores and the shoe shops reflected in them, in search of some footwear that might  contain something that bore at least a resemblance to leather.

In one encounter a pleasant young man wearing a tee shirt imploring us to do unmentionable things to Mick Jagger failed to find a shoe that would fit a pair of apparently somewhat larger than dainty feet. He tried  valiantly to find an alternative offering all manner of options and when finally convinced he had not succeeded, asked us where we were from and inevitably why  we were in Metz.

We have a well practiced response to that question, that apologises for our miserable skills at communicating in his native tongue and wanders off into something lyrical about culture and history and tranquility and the people and the wide variety of shoes for sale.

He was suitably impressed and bade us farewell. promising that on our return that he would have larger sizes in stock.

We left sorry that he could not help but quite happy that neither of us bore the slightest resemblance to Mick Jagger.