Things you might see on the Metro

Miss K spent a couple of years as a platinum blonde and let me tell you - bleaching your roots can be a bit on the painful side, so I give full credit to this gentleman for his commitment to the rather stylish stars he has bleached into his skull stubble. I can't even imagine the hassle of the upkeep on this hairdo, but sir, I salute you!

Things you might see on the Metro

Man, you just have to love dogs - they really just make the best of any situation, don't they?  This little dude had to squish himself into the most uncomfortable-looking position of all time in order to lie down out of the way (I got this shot at a stop when hordes of people got off the train, just before the next hordes piled into the train), but there he is, perfectly happy.  I'm sure there's an inspirational thought in that somewhere, so if anyone turns this photo into one of those affirmation-of-the-day posters, don't forget to send Miss K a royalty cheque, okay?   

Things you might see on the Metro

Guys, it's nice that you went to the souvenir store and those shirts (and the satchel) will be fun for you to smugly wear when you're back home.  But you don't have to wear them when you are still in Paris.  Because, trust me, the Parisians already know you're tourists and they don't care what you think of Paris or anything else.   Just a little tip from me to you...

Things you might see on the Metro

Really?  Lingerie Street?  How have I lived in Paris for a year and a half and never seen this before???

So the question is this...

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

Totally crap outfit of the week

Okay, just because I am horribly disfigured at the moment, did you really think I would let you down by not keeping track of the fashion crimes on the streets of Paris?   Admittedly, I have been shunning human contact as much as possible; I had to go to the office on Monday, but other than there, my sunglasses have been firmly in place anytime I have gone out this week - from riding the Metro to buying groceries, my shades have not left my face when I've been out in public.   Yes, that's right, I'm that idiot - Indoor Sunglasses Wearer.  Gah!!  Well, at least that's better than subjecting the good citizens of Paris to Ol' Eye-bald...

Anyway, the point is that I've been hiding at home for most of this week, which is a damn shame because the weather has been beautiful.  Fortunately, my apartment has a teeny-tiny balcony (so I've been able to enjoy the sunshine) and my camera has a long lens (so I've been able to enjoy people-watching).  And even though I was way up on the 5th floor, I could hardly miss this fashion monstrosity.  Hell, this little ensemble is probably visible from space.  In fact, aliens might have been on their way to Earth, seen this from a billion light years away, and turned right back around and gone home again. Because going by this outfit, there's clearly no intelligent life on this planet...

Tales from Toronto (Part 2)

Toronto is an awesome place to live.   The weather is great in the spring, summer and autumn (okay - admittedly, winter can be a little rough), we have a lake so big you could fit a hefty chunk of Europe into it, and we have world-class theatre, opera, ballet, restaurants, bars, music, wine, sports teams (okay - admittedly that one is stretching it a bit) and so forth.  But no matter how sophisticated and cosmopolitan Toronto can be, it's still a place where someone can get on the subway with a circular saw tied to his belt and no one will give him a second look.  You don't get that on the Paris Metro...

Totally crap outfit of the week

Okay, so this is actually from last week before I left Paris, but hey, I've been a little busy.  Anyway, let's see what we have here, shall we?  

Now, I know that as one gets older, one can indulge in little eccentricities, and why not?  I fully approve of aging disgracefully.  Too many martinis at lunch?  Hell, yes.  Having a fling with a hot pool boy called Pedro?  Go for it.  However, I don't approve of using curtains as clothing - Scarlett O'Hara could barely pull it off, and madam, you are no Scarlett O'Hara.  This fabric was ugly hanging in the window of whatever cheap, nasty motel you swiped it from and it's still eye-wateringly ugly now...

Quote of the day

After Wednesday's epic snow in Paris, I was more than a little concerned about catching my flight out of town on Thursday.  I had planned to walk to Opera and get the bus to the airport (thereby avoiding the hassles - which are many - of taking the Metro with a large suitcase), but since the roads were in complete chaos, I had to take the Metro/RER combo to get out to the airport.  The Metro was working fine, and the RER was delayed, slow, very crowded and fairly miserable, but it was worse when we got to the airport with crowds trying to get through the gates into the building.  There was a lot of very rude pushing and shoving, and from somewhere to my left, I hear this:

"The next person who pushes me, I'm gonna hit 'em with my cane!"  I look over there and see a rather large, extremely sassy, middle-aged African-American lady, who was, indeed, brandishing a cane.  I, of course, thought this was completely excellent, but she wasn't done:  "I don't want to get all American on y'all, but if I have to, I will!"  

I'm not sure words can describe my love for her at that exact moment.  Hee!  Thinking about that made me giggle my way through a 2.5 hour delay on my flight and it's still cracking me up to write about it...

Nuit Blanche report

As promised, I am reporting back on last night's Nuit Blanche in Paris. 

 Miss K is currently suffering from a very painful bad back, but I nonetheless dragged myself out to one of the primary art events on the Parisian calendar, just so that I could tell you about it (needless to say, I had to have a couple of glasses of red wine during the course of the evening, but in this case they were strictly medicinal!) - do you appreciate my efforts?  Well, we'll see...

We started off at Notre Dame, which was amazing - the artist was Thierry Dreyfus and he had the outside darkened and the inside lit, so that the colours of the magnificent stained-glass rose windows were visible at night.

Upon entering the church, there was dramatic lighting accompanied by ethereal singing - really magical...

The next stop was at the Hotel-Dieu, which was okay, but certainly not worth the hour spent waiting in line to get in.   There were several other venues we tried to check out but the line-ups were far too long, so we saw some of the general projects on the street but probably the coolest thing was at St Martin, a ghost station which has been unused since WWII - the only way to view the project was to take Metro line 9 from Republique to Strasbourg St Denis.  I am attempting to link a video here that I shot of it (accompanied by the oohs and aahs of the other Metro passengers - hee!) but bear with me as I haven't tried video on here before.  If it works, I hope you like it...

Things you might see on the Metro

Ahhh, Paris.  Where even the graffiti on the Metro is philosophical...

Normal life

Well, here I am, back to normal life in Paris - or rather, what passes for normal in a place as quirky as Paris.  Anyway, I don't really have much to report - just wanted to let you know that tomorrow is Miss K's birthday and Miss K is planning to party, so I am afraid that I will be neglecting you then as I won't have time to post while I get everything ready.  I may also be neglecting you on Thursday as well, depending on how many brain cells I have left by then - I am hoping that I will act my age and be somewhat sensible, but seeing as how my last party carried on until after 5am (you know your party has been a success when people can catch the metro in the morning), I have my doubts about that!

But since I am going to neglect you, I thought I would leave you with a nice colourful little shot of Mediterranean awesomeness.  Enjoy, and try not to miss me too much!

Spontaneity

Damn, I was going to post every day this week, wasn't I?  Sorry about missing yesterday, but one of the truly wonderful things about living in Paris is that it's such a spontaneous place - I really found in London that people plan things waaaaay in advance and it's only occasionally that you meet up with friends on the spur of the moment.  It's partly due to the geography as well - London is so huge and sprawling that it can take forever to get to and from your social engagements, whereas you can get pretty much anywhere in Paris in less than 20 minutes on the Metro. 

So, yesterday afternoon when Miss M and Miss J called me up to see if I wanted to meet them for cocktails, pizza and wine?  Hell yeah!  So we had a delightful evening at Miss M's place - oh, the fun that girls can get up to with too much wine, a camera and playing dress-up (No, not like that!  God, you people are perverts - but that's why I like you...).  I'm not saying there were Charlie's Angels poses, but I'm not necessarily denying it, either - and no, before you ask, I will not be posting a photo!  Spontaneous fun on a random Wednesday night - that's what I'm talking about...

Quote of the day

I was on the Metro last week with my friend Miss RA, who is sweet and ladylike and from South Carolina, hence still has a bit of a southern accent (all of which is important for you to know before reading this quote in order for you to picture it correctly).  

Anyway, it was about 29 degrees Celcius in Paris that day and it was very hot and unpleasant on the train.  And out of the blue, my sweet, ladylike friend turns to me and drawls: "You know what I hate about the Metro?  Every so often, you just get a whiff of ass."   Hee!  I don't believe I've ever heard it put it like that (especially with the southern accent, which just makes it more awesome), but she's not wrong, unfortunately, the Metro can be a rather smelly place...

Something you don't see every day

Okay, I normally hide people's faces if I post their photos online, but really, in this case?  When you bring your own antique furniture for riding the Metro, I think the term "attention seeker" can be safely used...