It is not even the fact that bicolor Rolex Oyster Perpetual watches seem to be the timepiece of choice -- for 12-year-olds.
"Next year," says one, "we will improve or polish existing reforms, not begin anything new .The perils of perpetual motionTo watch Mr Sarkozy up close is to observe a machine in perpetual motion.
One houses a magnificent, 17th-century church vestment in lace and silk, a Perpetual Calendar watch by Vacheron Constantin (2007) and a demonstration model by the same firm that is ten times the normal size (2014).
The Blancpain Le Brassus perpetual calendar watch, for example, shows the phases of the moon, even during leap years, has an automatic mechanical movement and a day-of-the-week subdial.
As a in-demand sideman on such interesting recent efforts like Ryan Truesdale's Gil Evans Project Centennial, a valued member of trumpeter Dave Douglas's Quintet and Maria Schneider's Orchestra, or on his own recent impressive efforts as a leader on albums like Recommended Tools, Declaration and Perpetual Motion, watching McCaslin mature is like watching a seedling develop into a mighty oak.
In the 2007 auction, Girard-Perregaux's World Time-Perpetual Calendar-Financial sold for only €17,000, well below the retail price for one of its perpetual chronograph watches, while the Jaeger-LeCoultre Joaillerie 101 Etrier brought in a disappointing €28,000.
The Big Pilot's Watch Perpetual Calendar Spitfire is a variation on its stainless-steel cousin, but with a bronze case, olive green dial and rugged brown calfskin strap, the watch has a vintage military look that would please any RAF pilot.
The company also makes a Perpetual Calendar Repeater, the watch you buy when you make president.
In the Batignolles gardens, where we went often to feed the ducks, he would sit rapt on a low wall overlooking the curving sweep of the 10 or 12 sets of train tracks that ran under the Cardinet bridge, watching the perpetual ballet of trains going into and out of Saint-Lazare station and chat about things going bang, naughty engines, causing as the Fat Controller always said: "confusion and delay".
"And no one wants to watch somebody in a perpetual state of despair".
The following is a long excerpt from my new book, Marie Antoinette's Watch: Adultery, Larceny, & Perpetual Motion that I wanted to share with you here on the site.
