Word Games

Pay too much attention to the French Film Festival and you'll miss the great Spring snow.

Hell, I missed even knowing it was coming.

On the other hand, "Le Prenom," a film essentially about a dinner party-long war of words and revelations, was delicious.

But a movie about food requires food so my FFF girlfriend and I made a pit stop at Secco for sandwiches.

I don't know which of us was happier, she with her curried egg salad with crispy onions or me with my house bacon, Gouda, spinach and whole grain mustard.

If nothing else, the aroma of our lunch eaten in the close quarters of the Byrd seats must have had our neighbors drooling.

And then there was the comedy of words we watched.

Is naming a baby Adolf or even Adolphe wrong? Do friends have the right to pass judgment on your children's names? Is a 26-year old age difference between a man and woman understandable when the women is your mother? Is it okay to take credit for killing a dog when you didn't actually do it? Why are French men so charming and thoughtless at the same time?

Afterwards, we stretched our legs before the next movie, the historical drama "Therese Desqueyroux."

But the wait was endless as the French delegation of actors and directors got introduced, followed by the UR and VCU interns who'd helped with the FFF, followed by a reading, followed by endless boredom at being stuck in uncomfortable seats for far too long.

Rather than suffer in silence, we slid out (getting a thumbs-up from a French friend sitting two seats away) for a stop at Amour and some Lucien Albrecht Cremant d'Alsace rose and a trio sampler of a Dutch egg, crispy on the outside and soft-cooked inside, sherried crabmeat and a decadent foie gras.

But the issue of the moment was where had all this snow come from while we were stuck inside?

We had no clue, but a charming and erudite law type from Jamaica joined us at the bar, followed by Carytown's newest restaurant owner and his smiling bartender, so we got a little company to tell about our recent film-watching, among other things.

On the table were such hot topics as children's books, Scrabble and men who remember women's birthdays.

By that time, Carytown was a ghost town, so I left the film-lover to go get a music-lover and find some jazz.

We found it at Commercial Taphouse where the Scott Clark 4-Tet was in full swing.

Honestly, we were just grateful that everyone hadn't closed down for the snowy evening, so getting to hear one of my favorite jazz drummers was icing on the cake.

Taking the only unoccupied table, the one in the back under the big (read: cold) front window, we had a mostly decent view of one of Richmond's best quartets.

Friends came in, musicians all, saying they were going to give the music six minutes and if they didn't like it, go build a snowman on the grounds of the VMFA.

An hour later, they were still there.

Maybe it was because drummer Scott and bassist Cameron (who was also celebrating his birthday come midnight) with occasional horns from Bob and Jason, were playing some of the pieces from the work he wrote based on his reading of "Bury Me at Wounded Knee."

I'd first heard the work back in January at a show he'd done at For Instance Gallery and I recognized the aching, tribal quality of the music as soon as he began playing it.

I don't know how someone couldn't be caught up in such moving music.

And since one of the friends who'd come in was a drummer, I wasn't the least surprised when their six minutes lasted indefinitely.

During the break, Scott came over and we talked about composer John Cage and the tribute to him, the Musicircus, I had attended and he'd played in the other night at UR.

Naturally the weather came up and he admitted that he was only too happy to come out and play on this snowy night.

"What else was I going to do?" he asked rhetorically.

My sentiments exactly.