We’ve been to Bonjour Paris gatherings in Washington DC, New York, and Paris…guess which one we like the most? No contest, right? Like any good Francophile, it’s got to be Paris!

Today when I was eating lunch at a restaurant where everyone was 100% French (How do I know that?  Easy, no one was fat) and a neighboring couple asked if I’d watch their valuable C&A coats and H&M purses and sleezy newspapers, I realized they thought I was French  -- until I spoke. At which point they gave up hope that I wouldn’t stop eating mid-bite and run off with their stuff to Canal Street, but I assured them I'd guard their valuables.

The third Monday in January—I’ve just read this in an English newspaper, so it just might be true—is now regarded as the most depressing day of the year. Blue Monday, they call it. Everything feels futile. Best to go back to bed.

Jean-Claude Baldassari fell in love in Paris last year with a visiting Chicago finance expert named Jane. He fell so fast and so hard (a “coup de foudre” is what he told me yesterday, his eyes sparkling as he held up the wedding photo that is his response to “why did you move here from Paris?”) that he quit his job at a Marais pub and followed his Jane to Chicago. He just opened Paris in Chicago on north Halsted, a café-style restaurant where he personally serves warm croissants and espresso at 7:00 a.m.

I was out for drinks with friends the other night. Paolo, who is Venetian, was talking about the feast his grandmother had made for the holidays... radicchio lasagne for starters. Now mind you, his grandmother is 89 years old, and she was up and off to the marketplace at daybreak, her husband, also 89, pulling their shopping trolley behind them up and over bridges and passerelles. Cooking is her passion, the sap of her existence.

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I wonder about people who have wine collections. Do they hang them on the walls? Hire curators and conservators? Bequeath them to the nation when they die? How do you collect something perishable—and drinkable? The collector talks of producers and vintages the way art dealers talk about craquelures and provenance. Still, you’d wonder, since he has spent so much time learning pedigrees and lineages of wine, if he’s ever had the time to drink any—but then you wouldn’t drink your Rembrandt or Gutenberg Bible, either.

Paris is one of the world’s most popular tourist destinations. But like all large, cosmopolitan cities (think New York, London), Paris has a reputation for being expensive. And rightly so. But there are ways you can afford luxury in Paris, for less than you’d spend on a budget trip at home. If you don't believe me....

Years ago, when readying for an exchange program in France, my professors cautioned about the unlikely chances of hob-nobbing with the French. “They stick to themselves,” I was told, “so forget being invited to dine ‘chez eux’.”

People mean well, but if one more person asks me how I’m spending my time in Paris, I’m going to scream. It’s wonderful to be home. But it catapults me into a different reality zone. I am not complaining; it’s a statement of fact. For many, Paris signifies a vacation. But when I'm here, I'm working. And guess what, it's not all bad!

The recent Parisian dispute over noise pollution, pitting sleep-deprived residents against clubbers, has been rife with ironies of the best-laid-plans variety. Not everyone is d'accord about what's happening in the City of Light. Yes, people want to go "green." But at what cost?

If you've driven or are driving in France, you won't be shocked. A just-published study commissioned by the French insurance company AXA ranked the French among the worst drivers in Europe—or at least the most disrespectful of traffic regulations. Ah, the charms of France and taking to the road.

I was telling a food-writer friend about my meal at the Jardin d’Ampere recently and gave him the price I had paid in Euros (52 E). His response was it cost too much, translating the price into dollars ($75). Now he’s only been in France four years so I can forgive him for thinking things look pricy.

Alain Ducasse introduces his signature Cookpot. A lunchtime visit with Franck Paget at Chez Catherine. Pierre Hermé opens a dream emporium in Passy, with plans for Selfridge's London on February 5, Knightsbridge in spring.

In these hard economic times, we all look for ways to make our dollars go farther. For wine lovers, a good plan is to take in a wine dinner from time to time. They tend to be somewhat pricey, but much less so than in better times, and since the wines are offered by the winemaker or retailer on a promotional basis for the dinner, you end up paying far less than individual bottles of wine would cost. Plus, there is the interest of the speaker, the chance to taste a series of often exceptional wines, and the enjoyment of a good dinner.

There are so many wonderful places to live. In reality, I could move anywhere and have considered many options. I had been thinking about Buenos Aires. Bonjour Paris readers might find this surprising. But, I had my reasons. After my visit, I concluded Buenos Aires may be the Paris of South America but it's not Paris.

Recently a great friend whom I thought I knew and could “read,” wrote me that he wasn’t “much for 'new' cuisine and didn't do well in those kinds of places—I'm just not adventurous.” Knocked me over.

Why would you move to France when life is good in Washington? The reasons would vary according to circumstances, but for Anne-Marie Simons the short answer is "Quality of Life.” The world is a big place, but when you are looking to settle down somewhere, you tend to quickly eliminate certain countries because they are too remote or too cold or too unstable or too foreign from your own culture. Pretty soon you realize that the world is not so big after all.

And Bardot created sex, not to mention a lot of other things!  If you can, run and don't walk to an exhibit that closes on January 31, 2010, at the Espace Landowski of the Musée des Années 30 in Boulogne-Billancourt. It traces Brigitte Bardot's extraordinary and controversial career.