Strange cities

One night, back when I lived in London, I was walking past a homeless man sleeping on a street corner.  Suddenly, a mobile phone rang.   Was it mine?  Nope, it was his.  I was reminded of this moment the other day here in Paris, when I passed a homeless man sitting in a doorway, drinking champagne.  This is not mockery or social commentary of any kind, it's just an observation.  And I must also add that both the phone and the champagne were far nicer than anything I could afford then or now.

Awesome outfit of the week

Okay, at first glance you might think this outfit is a little on the boring side - classic white shirt and classic black blazer with jeans, but scroll on down and check out the feet: he's wearing leopard shoes.  O.M.G!!!  So fantastic...

Randomness

I had a particularly Parisian evening tonight.   I went to a French/English language exchange event in a bar (which I had been told about by a new Australian friend whom I met yesterday at an Anzac Day event), and as I was leaving, I got chatting to a lovely couple who weren't even at the event, they were just there having drinks - he's French/Moroccan and she's Colombian, but they're both from Los Angeles and now live in Paris.  So they invited me to join them for a drink and we ended up chatting for a couple of hours.

So, to recap - I found out about this event through an Australian, then met a French/Moroccan-American and a Colombian-American.  You might not think that's very Parisian, but trust me, when you're living as an expat in Paris, this is exactly how you end up meeting people...

So the question is this...

...going by this outfit, is he gay?  Or just European?

Things you might see in a shop

Well, if you are in the market for a Bauhaus or Iron Maiden t-shirt, you might find yourself in a Parisian shop which features a whole flock of stuffed crows (or ravens?  I'm afraid my expertise on taxidermied avian critters is somewhat limited) lurking on the wall above you... 

 

Totally crap outfit of the week

Okay, wearing a coat that looks like hideous motel wallpaper from the 1970s is bad enough, but combining it with that scruffy little backpack?  This lady has reached a certain age - an age when one should not only own a nice handbag, but one should use such a handbag, rather than carting around a backpack that even a penniless student would be embarrassed about. Not to mention the white boots - I mean, really:  white boots?  Madame, the last person I saw wearing such a thing was a hooker on the rue St Denis, and her boots were a lot cuter than yours.

Cars

Okay, Parisians, since you keep putting them right in front of me, I'll ask: what is up with these cars?  First there was this: Burns night, then there was this one: Things you might see on the street - Nov 2010, and who could forget this little classic:  Things you might see on the street - Feb 2011.  Not to mention the Barbiemobile: Things you might see on the street - Mar 2011, which I actually had forgotten  (big thank you to attentive reader Ruth for reminding me to include it).  And finally, the latest one (below).  So, I give up - what in the hell is going on with these cars???

Get some bleach for my eyes, please

Yesterday I took a stroll over to the Ile St-Louis and wandered around in the sunshine on the quai next to the Seine.  It was all perfectly delightful until I got to the western tip of the island and happened across a 60ish man sunbathing in only a g-string - eek!  I told this story to a couple of my friends here, and the first thing they asked was whether I had taken a photo.  Well, I hope this doesn't disappoint y'all too much, but no.   Clearly the gentleman isn't overly burdened with modesty and I'm not sure one has much of an expectation of privacy when one lolls around nearly naked in public in a major metropolis, but those considerations aside, that's not why I didn't take a photo.  It's because I was nearly blinded by the glare of the sunshine reflecting off his frighteningly shiny, oiled-up buttocks (gah!), and I'm not sure a photo would have turned out very well...

Things you might see from your window

This morning at about 10am, I glanced out my window and saw one of my neighbours across the street starting off the day with a cigarette in one hand and a bottle of wine in the other.  Yep, just another day in Paris...

Favourite Paris photos - 23

Totally crap outfit of the week

Do you ever get the feeling that someone has their eye on you? 

Things you might see in a shop

Yes, you might see a little dog being carried around in a basket.  To be clear, this lady was carrying two baskets - one for the groceries she was buying, and a matching one for le chien.  Well, naturellement...

Things you might see at the Louvre

What?  You were maybe expecting the Mona Lisa?  Come on now, I would never be that predictable...

Anyway, if you are walking across one of the courtyards in the Louvre on a random Thursday, you might see a woman dressed as a bride, wearing silver sequin high-top sneakers.  Miss K has no particular opinion on the dress, but would very much like to know where she got those sneakers, because they are awesome...

Picnics in Paris

The whole concept of springtime in Paris is a bit overrated, for the very good reason that it doesn't really exist.  Seriously, one day it's winter, and the next thing you know we've skipped right on through to summer.  Well, whatever - the important thing to know is that as soon as it's warm enough, it's picnic season!  My friend Southern Belle was in town a couple of weeks ago and we made an attempt at the first picnic of the year - it wasn't particularly amazing food-wise (see photo below), but since it was the 16th of March and we were still wearing coats, it wasn't a bad attempt!

However, today it was sunny and 24 Celcius and I met up with English Rose to kick off the picnic season properly.  She has the same kind of part-time work hours as I do, and we agreed that the only real benefit to being so poor and under-employed is the freedom to spend random weekday afternoons in the park (beside the Louvre, I might add), enjoying the sunshine while more gainfully employed people are stuck in the office.  Of course, this is the only kind of dining out that we can actually afford to do in Paris, so just let us have our little moment of smugness, okay?

Picnic #1 - bottle of wine and bag of chips. Not quite gourmet, but still delicious!

Picnic #2 - much more respectable, and even a few healthy items.  No wine, but that was only because of our hangovers from the day before...

Microsoft and ducklings

I had to attend a computer training session this afternoon because my office is upgrading to Windows 2010.  I mean, come on - isn't the whole point of an upgrade to make things easier to use?  Can't I just figure it out as I go?  Gahhh! Apparently not.  

So, not only was it the nicest day of the year thus far, but there I was, sitting in the hottest, stuffiest classroom on the face of the planet, looking like a total slack-jawed moron while listening to the instructor spewing technical computer vocabulary in French at the speed of sound.  Now, my spoken French is still prize-winningly crappy, but my comprehension is pretty good unless you are talking about a subject totally foreign to me, like, say...Excel, a program I never use.  However, to the credit of Bill Gates and everyone else involved in Windows 2010, even after having it explained to me in a language I don't really speak or understand properly, I am pretty sure this version of Excel is so idiot-proof that even I can use it.  So, kudos to you, Microsoft chaps!

Anyway, long story short, I convinced the instructor that I could figure out the new features on Word and PowerPoint all by myself, and escaped early to meet Tiny Dancer and English Rose for drinks beside the Canal St Martin.   And if you have suffered through this very boring post about my day, I now reward you with photos of adorable baby ducks on the canal.  All together now:  awwwwww!!!!

Things you might see on the street

And again, I find myself in a position where the only thing I can really say is: ummm, oooooookay...

Awesome outfit of the week

Oooh, it's been a while since I did one of these - shall we guess why?

A)  because it's been winter and it's hard to judge what people are wearing when they're all bundled up in big coats; or

B)  because I'm a horribly mean person and it's way more fun for me to write about the totally crap outfits.

Really, not one of you chose A)?  Are you sure?  You wouldn't like to, oh, I don't know,  maybe mull it over for a while before deciding?  No?  Dudes, where's the love?  Oh, fine, you're absolutely right. How well you know me, gentle readers - hee!  But, to give credit where it's due, I am totally loving this outfit.  Classic black skirt and fitted denim jacket, livened up with fun shoes, a vintage bag, a fabulous leopard scarf and very cool red sunglasses.  And, to really give credit where it's due, this is actually my lovely and talented friend Tiny Dancer - when I met up with her, I decided her outfit was so great that it deserved to be in this category, so I sneaked a photo when she wasn't looking.   See, I'm not always horribly mean...

Sunshine and merde

Gentle readers, it is springtime in Paris once again - the flowers are blooming, the leaves are sprouting, and I think it's entirely possible that my eyelashes have started to grow back after the whole black eye debacle (The eyes have it. Well, they used to...).  Oh, all right - I might just be imagining the whole eyelash-growth thing, but springtime is definitely here.  Yesterday it was sunny and about 23 Celcius, and it's predicted to be like that most of this week.

So, will Miss K be gallivanting around the city like a frisky little spring lamb?  Sadly, no - I just found out that I will have to leave my lovely apartment in a couple of months and find a new place to live,  which will doubtless be an arduous and time-consuming process.  Merde!  On the bright side, if I have to go live in a cardboard box under the Pont Neuf, the weather will be much nicer, but let's hope for better, shall we?  So if any of y'all know of a rat-infested broom closet that might be available for rent somewhere in Paris around the 1st of June, do let me know...

Favourite Paris photos - 22