This is the third and final part of our trip to France in 2019.  Part 1 was to  champagne country , Part 2  Bordeaux , and this Part 3 to Cognac, which is both a town ( 250 miles southwest of Paris ) and the highest form of brandy.  All bottles labeled Cognac are produced from grapes grown in this location.  The population of Cognac is around 19,000, but was as high at 22,000 in 1975. We only stayed two nights in Cognac, at what was then a new  Chais Monnet , one of the very finest hotels we have ever experienced.  Virtually adjacent are the grand four cognac companies, Martel, Hennessey, Courvoisier and Rémy Martin.  I picked this hotel because Rémy Martin is just across the street, where we had made a special appointment to get a private tour.  These four make 93% of all the cognac drunk.   We arrived by train.  Every major train station has a taxi stand, right?  Nope.  We waited for 15 minutes, and finally got some...

I guess you must know that this is Presidents Day.  Congress in 1971 combined Washington's and Lincoln's birthdays into one holiday for all presidents.  Also a day for shopping.  In fact, did you know that  Amazon has a Presidents Day 40% off sale ?  If you scroll down, you will see items you don't need for more than 50% off.  Anyway, good time to focus on the current president and his  5150  president, Elon Musk. The  New York Times  this morning indicated that President Donald Trump's bulldozing the federal bureaucracy makes Democrats almost envious, but of course brings up the matter of a Constitutional Crisis. Democrats may not approve of Trump’s targets — foreign aid and consumer protection agencies — or the   potential constitutional crisis   he initiated when he tried to eliminate them. But some Democrats might envy the speed at which he cut through red tape. After all, liberal lawmakers have for years complained about b...