There are two restaurants I'm dying to try on Taschereau near Boulevard Rome--both DEJEUNERS places. One closes at 3:00, and the other isn't open much later. I saw a girl in one of them, studying, so I'm guessing they won't mind if I sit there for a couple of hours. That's always a problem when you don't know the culture or speak the language--figuring out where they'll let you sit and write.

I also saw a sign that said BRASSERIE on my way back from my errands today (buying stuff I either forgot or didn't have room for in my panniers), so I'll have to go look and see what that's about. It was hung with rope, high on the side of a building that was mostly blocked by another building, so I don't have any certainty of what I'll find there--just the word BRASSERIE and some warm associations and memories of good coffee from my Paris trip for THE NIGHT MEN.

I seem to recall hearing that they're not the same in Canada as they are in France. In France, I could sit in a brasserie all day and not feel bothered. In Brossard, I'm not sure about that. So I went to the Starbucks website and found the nearest four. It's now dark and rainy outside, and I'm just about to roll out the door with script, pen, and notepad.

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It's a little after midnight, and I'm back in my room. Usually these maybe-there's-coffee-somewhere adventures end tragically, but my apparently random steering was made true by the hand of Fate; there's a 24-hour Second Cup coffeehouse on Ste. Catherine in the Vieux-Port! It's got a counter along the big window facing the street, so I could glance up and make sure nobody was molesting my bike. The guy next to me was maybe 45, with a ponytail, and he was working on some kind of writing too, only he seemed to be more interested in being seen writing than in writing. Lots of glancing around instead of focusing on his work.

Or maybe he was making sure nobody stole his bike, either. But I don't think so.