God damn it!
I have to poop really, really bad.
I have been in France for 10 days and for the most part the bathrooms were stinky and gross or there was someone in there who wanted me to give them money. I don’t like public restrooms in the best of times, and in France it was the worst of times, in the bathrooms. I mostly did not go, mostly. Now I am full of shit and I am locked out of my house.
As I stand in my backyard trying to figure out what to do I can’t help but relive the last day.
I just landed in Seattle after 10 and a half hours on a flight where I paid through the nose for first class only to find that my video screen did not work so there was no TV, no movies, no music, for 10 and half hours. And the reading light would not turn off so I was unable to sleep.
Then while standing in customs at Sea-Tac waiting for my luggage I dropped my carry on bag shattering a bottle of olive oil and a bottle of wine.
Then I learned that Air France lost my luggage.
Then I got home and learned that my parents had changed the locks on my house while I was gone.
No I am not kidding.
Aside from being filled with shit I am now also filled with bitterness and hate.
God damn it!
This is so not how I wanted to finish up my 10 day vacation to France.
OK, OK, I’ll calm down.
Let’s start at the beginning...
I am flying over Greenland in the dark. Everyone else on this airplane is asleep. I don’t sleep. I did just watch the Sex and the City movie again. Miranda is such a bitch. I am so Miranda. Everyone thinks they really are Carrie, but that they have that wild eyed optimism of Charlotte, and that they’d really like to be Samantha but are too chicken. I know who I am. I am Miranda. I am a bitch.
So far this flight has been fine. I was just going to drink wine on the flight but when they came through for the first round of drinks they had bottles of both Grey Goose and Bombay Sapphire. The pinkies on both my right hand and my left hand went up of their own accord.
How can a boy be forced to make a choice like that? I went with the Grey Goose. It’s French.
For dinner I had duck terrine, then lamb stew, then a selection of cheeses, then some Pastis. First Class. It does not suck.
I change channels on the TV for a while then I look up and see we are nearing Scotland. The UcK.
It’s light out now and people are waking up. We are over stupid London then the English Channel. I see France and think of that underpants joke.
I have the most amazing view of Paris coming in. There is fog surrounding the city and the sun is filtering through giving Paris this supernatural glow. I have a completely unobstructed view of the Eiffel Tower, Sacré Coeur, La Defense, and the rings and rings of commy apartment blocks that make up the suburbs. This city is really huge.
Maneuvering through the airport is not too bad but getting the luggage takes a while. We hired this car to pick us up and take us to the Gare De Lyon train station so that we can catch the bullet train down to Marseille. Driving into Paris I am even more amazed by how huge and intense this city is. While I know London proper is bigger than the city of Paris, and that metropolitan London is also bigger than metropolitan Paris, that just does not seem possible based off what I am seeing. The only place I have seen that comes close to this is New York. I am loving this.
The minute I get out of the car at Gare Lyon a bird poops on my new bag. Merde! We have a long wait for the train. I just sit on a bench and look at people. They are all dressed way better than I am. There is a little big of autumn in the air here, unlike in Seattle. The light is different too, maybe because it’s farther north. French military boys walk around the train station with machine guns just like in Mexico. That is weird. Also, and even weirder, there is this creepy sound that keeps coming over the loudspeaker in the train station. First there are these music tones, "doo dooo doo", then this female voice that reminds me of Rosemary's Baby says "la la la". It's freaking me out.
I am getting really sleepy now. Finally its time to get on the train.
So now I am on the famous TGV Bullet train. We’ll make the 400 mile trip from Paris to Marseille in about 3 hours.
The train car is comfortable and we have a great view out the window. I am so tired though that my head keeps bobbing up and down like an oil well. These stupid Euro Trash boys across the aisle from us will not shut up. At some point I fall asleep though and then I wake up and see we are in Provence. Avignon is out the window. Provence is drier than Tuscany but still green. We go through a tunnel and then we are in another huge city -- skyscrapers, cruise ships, an old golden church on a hill. Marseille.
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So here we are in Marseille, the second city of France. It seems big, dense, very beautiful, and a little scary. The train station has the same creepy Rosemary's Baby voice woman over the loud speaker. "Doo dooo doo. La La La."
The woman at the Hertz counter at the train station laughs at me when I walk in. She immediately starts speaking English before I even open my mouth. Over the next 10 days I will learn that all French people immediately recognize Americans because we are fat and dress badly. Anyway, I hand her my International Drivers permit that I took a day off work to go get 2 weeks ago. “We don’t need those here, where do you think you are, Italy?” Great.
My car is called an Opal Splarf. I hate the Splarf. It’s a stick of course as they do not have real cars in Europe. It runs on Gasoil. I have no idea what that means, so I will just avoid filling it up which will in fact come back to haunt me later. The Splarf has the R for Reverse where the 1 for First should be. Every time I have to stop I accidently put the car into reverse. This just adds to the building drama. We leave the train station area and soon are lost in a warren of ancient one way streets filled with non French speaking people from northern African places like Tunisia and Libya (not that there is anything wrong with that). We find an elevated freeway near the waterfront that seems to go north, like we want to go, but there are no on ramps on off ramps to this freeway. After about 3 hours of this, as well as the car dying many times and lots of accidental shifts into reverse, there is much anger, tension, and murderous rage in the Splarf. Lynnette finally gets out of the car, while we are moving, and goes over to a crowd of Arab men who are standing outside smoking, apparently to ask for directions. We are in traffic so I have to keep moving. I confirm with Mark that he does have her power of attorney and we move on. After a while we find the way back to her. She seems OK but she is wearing a black head scarf now. It turns out the men gave her a recipe for making a chicken tagine instead of directions. More driving, more screaming, then finally we see a sign that says Barcelona 200 km. We take that as it is the first road sign we have seen. Finally we are on a freeway and we head out of Marseille...towards Barcelona, Spain.
No, not really, we are going the right way.
Marseille is kind of this island of urbanity that is very separate from its surrounding region much like New Orleans is. The freeway takes us through a tunnel in a big hill and then we come out back in Provence. Its green, we can see the white sandstone mountains in the distance, there are olive trees and little hills towns all around. After about 45 minutes we arrive at the villa, Mas La Monaque. In the ancient Provencal dialect Mas La Monaque means "Lair of the Black Worm."
Of course the house is amazing. It’s all thick stone walls, part built in the 1600s, more in the 1700s. Five bedrooms, six bathrooms, great kitchen with a gas stove, a pool, wi-fi, satellite tv. There are olive trees all over the grounds and fresh herbs. And sandworms. If you have read my blog for any length of time you know I am not a big fan of the sandworms. To be fair, they are on the smallish side, about the size of a tire on an Opal Splarf. They come out at night, mostly, but they are everywhere. The lovely woman who takes care of the house, Maureen, says they are called 1000 Toed Millipedes. I think this is rather redundant. They curl up into a ball and emit acid from holes in their sides when threatened.
I am against them.
We are very jet lagged. We have some wine and cheese. We do not wait 20 minutes before entering the pool. Yes, there is swimming. Sandworms surround the pool and stare at us.
Later I throw together this crappy pasta dinner and then we crash.
I am wide awake at 4am because it’s really only 7pm. I make coffee and watch Sit Up Britain on British TV. The global economy is crashing and it is the end of the world. This seems appropriate because today we are going to St. Remy, the birthplace of Nostradamus.
After about four hours later people start to get up. I make this breakfast of fried potatoes with rosemary and onions, and this great egg thing that I invented on the spot and christened Eggs Provencal. You put 24 un-scrambled eggs into a baking dish with some butter and olive oil. Toss in some fresh thyme, salt, and pepper. Cook this until you think it is done. It tastes great and everyone will think you know what you are doing even if you just made this up.
Off to our first little French village, St. Remy.
We have to cross this little mountain range made of white sandstone. This is perfect Provençal scenery.
There is a little ancient hill town on the way called Les Baux. We can’t stop here as Marie won’t be able to handle the steep hills, but we will come back. As we come down out of the mountains there are Roman ruins on the side of the road.
St. Remy itself is not really a village, it’s bigger than that. Lots of shops, restaurants, galleries, etc. all on a main street that is a big circle. Within the circle are lots of little alleys filled with ancient stone houses.
There are dogs here, but no cats. This is important. Remember this point, the lack of cats.
You may be aware that I am fond of rosé wine. Fond is probably not the right word. I love rosé wine. Every summer when the first rosé wines from Provence appear I sacrifice a lamb and burn sage leaves. Golly, I wonder if the fact that Provence is the birthplace of rosé wine at had anything to do with us coming here?
Mark and I find a wine store and shockingly decide to buy some wine. We pick out a couple of bottles and go up to the counter. The wines are just the lightest shades of pink and orange. They are drop dead gorgeous. My hands are shaking as if I was holding some kind of religious relict. There is a cute little French mo working there. This is our first stab at speaking French to a real French person. The nice wine mo does what everyone is France does: he says he does not speak English very well, but as soon as he hears my Yakima inflected French accent he immediately switches to perfect BBC English. Everyone is France speaks perfect BBC English, you just have to play this game of trying to speak French with them first. Once they hear your terrible accent they laugh and switch to English. I ask him about the rosés and he says that what we picked out is really good but that we can buy the same wines by the box to get more wine for less money. This meets my needs. I am pleasantly surprised that the French have embraced boxed wine. We buy the boxes so we have lots of wine but we also buy the bottles so we can look at how pretty they are.
We wander around for a while then find a place for lunch. We order some rosé wine. I get this fish soup to start. It is a thick orange-red broth that is spicy and fishy. This is not Bouillabaisse, the famous fish soup from Marseille. This is think and rich and yummy but it does not have chucks of fish in it. It is served with toast, aioli, and cheese on the side like Bouillabaisse though. It’s fantastic. Mark has fois gras and Lynnette has Salad Nicoise. It’s all great.
My main dish comes out.
It is duck with peas and this little glass dish of something orangey beige colored. There are little sparks of pink lightening coming out and what appear to be smallish fireworks. I ask the waiter what this is and he says “pommes de terre magiques”. I close my eyes. I taste. Creamy, rich, hints of nutmeg….I…wow...I….wow....I….wow. Fuck, this is good. Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Suddenly I am astrally projecting over my body. I see light blue glowing bubbles around us (how odd!). I don't know what they are but before I can check them out I am moving up higher over France, then back over the Atlantic, over North America, over the Pacific. There are islands below me. I start to descend to the second largest one. I am hovering over a pineapple field. There is an old store that is now a restaurant. Inside a largish orange middle aged man is eating what appears to be a pizza covered in crab dip. Hey that’s me! I see my spirit start to leave my body and float upward towards...me. The other me is floating up fast. Too fast. I crash into myself as both of me are floating over the Hali'imaile General Store in upcounty Maui. I feel this strong electric shock and then I open my eyes and I am back at lunch in St. Remy. I look around to see if anyone else has notice this shift in the space / time continuum. Everyone seems normal and apparently they don't know that I just left my body. Wow. These really are magic potatoes.
Driving back from St. Remy we stop at this Santon museum. Satons are these really annoying little statues that you might put in your nativity scene. If you had a nativity scene. I do not have a nativity scene.
The woman who works here is mean. She and Lynnette get into a bit of a pissing match so I step outside. They have these creepy statues of cicadas that make a noise when you get close. There is cicada art all over here. If fact there are Santons of cicadas that you can put into your nativity scene. If you have a nativity scene. There are no Santons of cats.
We are having dinner tonight at a restaurant in the next town over. It’s called La Place. They have cicada art on the walls here too. What is up with the bug worship?
La Place is OK, but it does not disrupt the space / time continuum. The wine was nice.
We take our picture:
Then we take a picture of the waiter and the chef.
We are all drunk when we get home. We drink more and go for a swim. Michelle demands disco music at the pool. I put on the Ting Tings, best band in the universe at this time. Michelle has just arrived from Portugal and has bug bites all over her face. As she dances she can’t stop talking about this beer she had in Portugal called Supercock. Bill and Carola are more drunk than I have ever seen them. They cannot talk at this point, only grunt and point. Jana is freaking out that bats are in the tress. I don't have the heart to tell her they are pine cones. Omar and Matt are frolicking in the pool. From the splashing I hear, “Hey, that is not my nipple!” I decided it would be best if I just go to bed. It's just going to be nipples, Supercock, grunting, pointing, and bat sightings for the rest of the night.
Walking back to the house, being careful not to step on sandworms, I hear the cicadas.
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Today we are off to the nearby tourist city of Arles. Arles is an old Roman town with a big, intact Roman coliseum thing here. It’s just like the one in Rome, but in much better shape. They use it for bull fights today.
Remember earlier when I said we were only 200km away from Barcelona? Bull fighting is big in this town. There are lots of posters and stuff that reference bulls.
Aside from the coliseum Arles is also famous for being the place where Van Gogh painted this picture:
We do encounter this one hate crime. We walk up to a restaurant and the
waiter slams the door in our faces saying "Complete!" We didn't even
have time to open our big American mouths. Do not eat at this restaurant.
There is a lot of that creepy cicada bug art here too. As we are walking around we see a cat. Our first cat in France. He's kind of a grey tabby cat. He is looking out a ground floor window. He seems scared. Yes, a scaredy cat. He looks at me and Mark, jumps out the window and starts to run over to us. Suddenly we hear this loud noise. It's like a thousand cicadas all making a screaming chirping sound at the same time. The cat runs back into the house. The noise stops. The cat is now looking out the window again even more afraid.
We then notice that there are cicadas all over the place. They are the color of the stone walls so they are hard to see. There is some connection between the cicadas and this cat.....the cicadas hate cats! People here worship the cicadas. That is why there are no cats here!!! This is all starting to make sense now. This is way too creepy so we decide to head back to the house.
On the way home we in our little town of Maussane to pick up food for dinner. I speak a whole sentence of French to the butcher:"I would like that piece of lamb, and that piece of lamb, and all those pieces of lamb over there also please." I am feeling pretty full of myself. Leaving the store I see several angry looking cicadas staring at me from the stone walls.
Tonight we are going to grill some lamb and vegetables outside. We are also going to play boule. Boule is a French ball game, kind of like big marbles...big metal marbles. About two minutes into the game someone starts cheating. We learned from Mark the night before that this someone's sister is notorious for cheating at Monopoly. It makes perfect sense that this someone would suddently become an evil sociopath and start making up points for his team. "If the third person who goes on my team throws their boule and does not hit anything we get 10 points." Even Roxanne, who is on this someone's team is appalled at this level of depravity. I decide to just give up so I start rubbing my boules together in a nasty way. The cheating continues so I throwing my boule the other direction so that I have an excuse to go back to the house to get more wine.
I make dinner again tonight. Its pretty, but not very good.
There is more late night swimming tonight. The less said about this the better.
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Next day. I try to make my Eggs Provençal thing again. This time I put some French ham and some cheese on top. This is good too. I am tempted to name this Eggs Provencal Croque Monsier, but since there is no Croque going on here we will call this Eggs Provençal Crock Monster.
We are off to St Remy to go to the weekly market. The market is packed. I buy soap and herbs. I eat cheese, meat, and olives.
I take a couple of pictures of things at the market:
Olives
Soap
Herbs
Boys
Meat
Flowers
Boules
Cheese:
We find a restaurant that will seat 10 of us. This French guy in tight leather pants in playing the accordion out front. We are tourists being lead in like fools. It’s OK. Lunch is OK too. We are eating and chatting when suddenly the most beautiful man in the world comes in and sits down.
I feel myself start to astrally project again then Michelle kicks me under the table.
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We were supposed to have Provencal cooking lessons today but our cook, Nanook du Nord, cancelled at the last minute because her kids have food poisoning. Our cook’s kids have food poisoning. Fraught. Instead we are able to get reservations at Le Bistro du Paradou, which is a famous restaurant and is actually recommended by Patricia Wells, the food writer.
Marie bails on us because she is still full from a meal she had 3 days ago. I am kind of mean to her about this because: 1) I am a bitch, and 2) I am worried that they already went out and sacrificed a little lamb or a bunny for us for tonight. Marie gives me the finger and goes back to her book.
We drive the 2 miles over to the restaurant. It's kind of rustic looking. I am glad we did not dress up because we would have looked silly. There are three really good bottles of red sitting at the table waiting for us. I frown. The owner comes by and I say, "Je suis désolé mais je voudrais une bouteille de vin blanc." I am getting good at this. He comes back with a bottle of white burgundy that, well, makes me fall down and wet my pants. I immediately order three more.
There is no menu here. They just bring stuff out and you pay for it later.
We start off with a choice between this red snapper like fish with a tapenade or escargot.
More than a few lifetimes ago when I worked at Dominique’s Place I ate snails all the time. I did my snail time. I learned my lesson. I have paid my dues. No more snails for me. The fish is fantastic.
Under duress I try one of Mark’s snails. It’s in pistou.
No, it does not taste like pistou. It tastes like a slimey mud ball covered in pistou. Vile.
Next is some chicken with some vegetables.
This is more than just good, it’s quite amazing. Mark and I both recall 10 years ago when we went to Chez Panisse in Berkeley. One of the most stupid dining experiences of my life by the way, but I won’t go into that here. The only good thing was the chicken. At the time Mark said, “This is the essence of chicken. It’s the most chickeniest chicken I ever tasted.” That is about right here. It’s really good.
But then, then, then two big dishes of potatoes come out.
I see purple lightning coming out. No one else seems to notice this. I close my eyes. Cream, garlic, nutmeg. Oh fuck. Oh fuck. Oh fuck. Different potatoes. Same magic. Here we go again. The lights dim. I am above my body, in the restaurant. I see these weird blue bubbles floating around again.
Then I am up, over the restaurant, heading north. But not far. I am over London. Two years ago. Another me is sitting in a Lebanese restaurant about to eat a piece of fried Halloumi. It’s creamy and soft, but with nice sexy grill marks. Magic, magic cheese! The younger me floats up, heading towards Maui, but I jump and catch me so I can tell me about these potatoes. But there is that electric shock again and I am back Le Bistro du Paradou.
The potatoes are gone...
We had more to eat..... .....a salad maybe, cheese, dessert I guess. I don’t know. I don’t care.
Magic potatoes. Magic potatoes. Magic potatoes. Later I learn these are called Gratin Dauphinois. Someone drives home. I am walking around bumping into walls for a while then I go to bed.
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I am standing on top of a castle in the south of France. I have this perfect unobstructed view of miles and miles of olive trees, vineyards, dramatic mountains....
....and the tiny stone hill town built around the base of this place.
This was built in the eleventh century or sometime dark like that. For many people this would be their quintessential European travel moment. I just want to jump off the top of this crumbling stone building and kill myself.
I always used to think that getting a paper cut on your eyeball would be the worst thing that could happen to a person. No. Spending time outside hiking is the worst thing that can happen to a person.
I wake first today, so I make coffee and spend a little time listening to NPR on my laptop. The global economy is collapsing. McCain is up in the polls. It’s the end of the world. Linda Wertheimer is in as the replacement host today. As she begins her withering questions of some slime ball from the McCain campaign I can actually hear the flesh being shred from his bones. God bless Linda Wertheimer (in a non-religious kind of way).
When everyone is up we decide to split into a couple of groups. Those who got to Europe early and had time to work through their jet lag have already gone to the little nearby hill town of Les Beaux. They are going to Aix-en-Provence. We are going to Les Beaux. Les Beaux is close, maybe two miles away. We drive over and park. I am expecting a cute little hill town like Cortona in Italy with, shops, restaurants, cats. No. No one live here. This is a just a tourist trap with a few sad restaurants and a crumbling castle on top. I am done with this place in the first 10 minutes. There is nothing interesting here, nothing to see.
But we climb, and climb, and climb. This goes on for hours.
Right when we get to the top someone is shooting off a cannon ball from an old catapult. It flies off the side of the mountain. I wish that I was hit by the cannon ball so that I do not have to be here any more. I could have been in Aix and had lunch and took pictures of gorgeous people.
Later I learned that this place was the inspiration for Dante's Inferno.
Finally, finally we leave Les Beaux. On the way back to the house we stop in Maussane to see their weekly market. It’s much smaller than the St. Remis market. These gypsy women have cute little animals locked up in cages. They walk up to us and try to get us to buy Chicklets Gum. I am having trouble understanding them but I believe they are trying to say: “Buy my gum or the cute little lamb gets it.”
I turn to look at a little stand that sells cheese. I am suddenly blinded. It’s not that I cannot see. No, I am blinded by beauty. This man who is selling cheese is quite gorgeous.
I look around to see if I can take picures of him without Mark catching me when I notice that Mark is already is in full camera stocker mode and has snapped multiple pictures of Cheese Boy. I think I mentioned that our main music for this trip was the Ting Tings. They have this fun song that goes:
“Ker-ching, Ker-ching boy! Ker-ching, Ker-ching boy!”
As I walk up Mark is singing “Che- che cheese boy! Che- che cheese boy!”
Here he is is all his milky glory:
Tonight we decide just to have meat, fois gras, cheese, and bread for dinner. With rosé wine of course.
I take pictures through the wine glass.
I also take pictures of olives and acorns. I like this one a lot.
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We are going to the Mediterranean today but there is some conflict about where we are going specifically, Nice vs. Marseille. I am lobbying hard for Marseille. I really want to go to the big North African market and eat Socca, have real bouillabaisse, and drink pastis at some outdoor cafe. I am nearly universally vetoed on Marseille. I think there is some kind of anti-Arab bias going on here but I do not say anything. I do not want to go to Nice so I tell everyone that it is 300 kilometers away and will take all day to drive to. The fact that I have already stated that Barcelona is 200 kilometers to the southwest and the Milan is 200 kilometers to the east goes unnoticed.
We settle on the town of Cassis. Cassis is a picturesque little seaside town. It’s pretty much postcard perfect:
Here is the Mediterranean.
Here is the harbor.
Here is the castle.
We walk around for a bit and then find this restaurant to have lunch in. We all have a nice view of the boats, the water, and the crowds of people walking around.
I order some local wine....
....and soup.
Everyone is having a good time. This is so much fun. But then some of the people in our group decide that they are going to do separate checks instead of paying for this as a group like we have been. They start throwing cash around but none of it comes to me so basically I get to pay for all of their lunches. This makes me really mad. This is so rude! The sad part here is that I was actually going to pay for everyone’s lunch today just because I was in such a good mood. The good mood is now gone. I am trying to decide if I should light these cheap rude people on fire right now or just poison their dinner tonight.
Before I have time to map out this mass murder I am pushed onto this little boat that is going out to sea. We are going to these nearby little inlets and coves called Les Callanques.
There are naked people lying on the rocks sunning themselves. Old fat Germans sleeping in the sun on their yacht.
Taking this picture is mean so that kind of makes me happy. I have to struggle to stay mad but somehow I manage to keep my fury intact. After the boat ride we stop for coffee. I have to sit with these people now. I just sulk and wonder if they will ask for separate checks for the coffee lest someone overpay by one euro. They do.
My dark cloud of murderous rage must be obvious because as we are walking back to the car I am punked by a large French clown. Apparently he was walking behind my and stomping his feet and pouting just like I was. I turn around and he screams “Papa!” and jumps up on me. I am holding him like a baby. Everyone is laughing. Not just the cheap rude people that I have traveled here with, no, but all the people on the sidewalk and all the people in the nearby restaurant. They are all looking at me and laughing. The clown continues to scream “Papa!”
Suffice to say I do not see the humor in any of this so I whisper in the clown's big red ear, “Get off me right now or I will rip your penis out and stuff it in your mouth.”
This gets his attention. His eyes get wide, he jumps off me, and runs away. Wow. I feel just like Dexter.
As we walk back to the car I decide that since I have already bought everyone’s lunch today I will pick up their dinner too. Why not? We stop in a little store. I send people off to buy vegetables and wine. At the meat counter I pick up 11 perfectly sized steaks made of horse meat. Later I marinate them in olive oil, rosemary, and garlic. As the 12 of us sit down to eat dinner I explain that I am still kind of full from lunch. Everyone compliments me on how good my “chicken” is tonight. I just smile and ask them to pass the vegetables.
Never piss off the cook.
I sleep better tonight than I have any night since I got here.
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The next day we have to get up early to head back up to Paris. This snail comes out to greet us right when we are leaving.
I wave goodbye to the snail and we are off. We are driving down to Marseille now so we can catch the bullet train back up to Paris. I am still kind of asleep so I forget that other people were going to follow me down. I just zoom off into the sunrise. Oops.
I have made other people drive the last several days because I hate the Opal Splarf so much. As we get on the freeway I see we have a quarter tank of gas…or whatever the hell this car runs on….gasoil…? About 10 minutes into the 45 minute drive I see the gas tank light come on the little display. I look down and see that we have about half of a quarter of a tank left. Boy, that went fast. I am starting to get a little nervous. Lynnette and Marie are zonked out in the back and unaware of this pending drama.
As we get closer to Marseille there are more lanes on the freeway and more traffic. Now the little gas tank icon is blinking on and off and shaking from side to side as if to get my attention. It has my attention. We have less than a 10th of a tank now. I am officially freaking. What if we run out of gas on the freeway? Is there AAA in France?! We’ll miss our train! Will we be picked up by some wrecking truck that will take us to Libya? Drama! Drama!
I see Bill and Carola have caught up to us and are behind us now. They do not know where the train station is so they have to follow us. As we pull off the freeway into downtown Marseille the car is sputtering. I am weaving from side to side to get the gas fumes to waft up. I see a stop light turning yellow. I know if I stop we will never make it. I gun the car and run the light. Bill and Carola are left behind us in my fumes. I do not feel good about this but it is kind of a Sophie’s Choice deal.
I hear someone shouting “Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!” I realize that someone is me. Lynnette and Marie are awoken by my fuck storm. They don’t know what the big deal is but I have managed to get Mark all freaked out now. Beads of sweat are running off his head and he has his hands over his ears. Now I suppose I could have been all zen about this and just said “It is what it is and we will just deal with this.” Yeah, right. Bill and Carola are nowhere to be seen. I start another fuck storm.
Somehow we manage to stutter and shake into the BP station near the train station. Right when we pull in the car dies. Another fuck storm. Marie and Lynnette are hiding under their luggage now.
Mark goes in to pay. There is drama about if we pre-pay or pay later or make payments or what but at some point he comes out and we fill up the car. Right as we are finishing I remember reading that many Americans make the mistake of putting gas into a diesel engine and end up wrecking their rental car. We filled this car up with diesel. The car takes “gasoil”. What is gasoil?! Fuck storm.
I try to start the car. It starts. This is good. We drive the two blocks to the train station. I keep thinking the car is going to explode at any moment. We make it to the rental car return place and I turn off the Opal Splarf. We grab our bags, get away fast, and don’t look back. I hate this car, the Splarf. I hope I killed it.
Everyone else is at the train station except for Bill and Carola. I am sure they are lost in a warren of tagine recipes. We sit around and drink coffee and wait, and wait. Finally Bill and Carola show up at the last possible minute. I have never seen Carola so angry before. She will not look at me but I can tell she had a fuck storm of her own. I try to explain to Bill what was going on, but Carola walks away, clearly thinking about serving me horse meat in the near future.
“Doo doo doo. La la la.” Creepy Rosemary’s Baby voice woman is on the loudspeaker in the train station just like in Paris. We get on the train. I close my eyes. I try to relax. Stupid Splarf. I pass out for a little while obviously due to emotional exhaustion.
When I wake up we are about an hour outside of Paris. It’s bright and sunny. Little farms and towns roll by. It’s difficult to tell just how fast we are going unless another bullet train passes going the other way. It takes about 1 second for the trains to pass.
We arrive at Gare de Lyon train station. Unlike the taxi catastrophe in Florence last year, we now know we need to find a taxi stand. We find one and head off.
Nous sommes à Paris!
We cross the river and I get a glimpse of Notre Dame and The Eiffel Tower for just a second. I gasp and my eyes tear up. Wow. Here I am, an American Clove Head in Paris. Without being too much of a freak here, I have been waiting for this since the 7th grade and my first French class with Mrs. Boatwright. I had Mrs. Boatwright for French class in the 7th grade, the 8th grade, the 9th grade, the 10th grade, the 11th grade, and the 12th grade. I dropped French after my first quarter in college. It was not the same without Mrs. Boatwright. Plus there were way too may verb tenses in college French.
We are staying at the Hotel Michelet Odéon which is on the Left Bank in the 6th Arrondissement.
My room is tres, tres petit, but it is a corner unit with good light. I have this kind of classic Paris view out the windows, lots of six story buildings. In one apartment I see a woman tying a giant bow on her dress. In another I see a guy hanging a chandelier. In another a couple is kissing. Really. You can't make this stuff up!
I have stayed in little hotel rooms before in San Francisco, New York, and especially London. This is among the smallest, but it's fine.
I unpack and decide to take a nap but then my horse-eating companions are knocking on my door. Soon I am out on the street, a free man in Paris. Within a block of the hotel there are dozens of restaurants and shops. Bread shops, meat shops, cheese shops, fish shops, and lots and lots of book shops. There are people out everywhere. This city is just absolutely alive. It's a blur.
We end up in, shockingly, a restaurant as it's late afternoon and we really have not eaten today. I think everyone orders steak frites. This seems kind of touristy and stupid, but we are touristy and stupid. My steak is blood rare, just like I like it. The sauce is some kind of peppery wine reduction with butter in it. It's not bad.
The fries are...just like French fries at home. I guess I thought French French Fries would be different...more French somehow. Whatever, they are fine.
After, we wander down to the river. There is Notre Dame! We have so lucked out. The afternoon light is just amazing. I take over 1000 pictures. Here they are:
OK, you don't have to look at all 1000 pictures.
I just cannot believe how amazing this city is. There are just thousands of people out all over the place and most of them are just regular Parisians out living their lives. Bonjour Guy, ca va? There is a reason this is most people’s favorite city in the whole world. It’s truly alive in a way that I can't describe. Wait, yes I can. There are no cats and there is dog poop all over.
It's cooler here in Paris and I know that I should have brought a jacket. I decide to buy one while we are out walking around. I wander into a store called Marlborough Man, because that is so French. I try on this coat made for middle aged overweight American men trying to look like cowboys. This coat costs more than my car did. Everyone tells me I look great in it but I know that this is only because they want to experience the shadenfreude of me buying this ridiculous looking and ridiculously expensive piece of clothing. To be honest I really had been looking for a good cloth coat so that I could start making Pat Nixon jokes*. This is a really good cloth coat. I buy it. I buy a cloth cowboy coat at a store in Paris called Marlborough Man.
I also buy a wool scarf because everyone here seems to wear scarves and I just don’t think silk is a good look for me. As I sign the credit card slip I already know this is one of the dumbest things I have ever done.
*I stole the Pat Nixon good cloth coat joke from Sandra Bernhard, but I love that joke so much I really was going to buy a good cloth coat.
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After a couple hours of wandering we head back to the hotel. I want to take a shower and change before we head out for the night. En route I see this ancient woman, clearly in her eighties, with bleached blond hair. She is wearing this coral colored suit and pink high healed shoes:
So French.
This is the fifth time I have been to Europe. You would think by now I would start to remember things. Hotels here never have alarm clocks or irons & ironing boards. All my clothes are wrinkled. I could have ironed things at the house in Provence, but of course I did not do that.
The guy at the front desk says they had an iron once … but someone took it and they never replaced it. I stare at him and we both here cicadas chirping. For just a moment I think about becoming the ugly American, but I resist. He probably already eats horse meat anyway.
I would prefer not to go out tonight as a giant wrinkled American mess so I try to steam my clothes in the shower. With a combination of shower steam and heat from a hair dryer I manage to make them look even worse. Even though it’s not cold out I have no choice now but to wear the new cloth coat to hide my wrinkled clothes. Wanting to be stylish I wrap the wool scarf around my neck with a poofy flourish. Within two blocks of the hotel I am sweating profusely. We meet up with the people that Michelle had been traveling with in Portugal including her super fabulous friend Chris who reads my blog.
Try to find a restaurant that will seat 16 walk-ins at 9pm on a Saturday night in Paris. Just try. We walk, I sweat. We walk. I sweat. Finally we find this restaurant that can seat us upstairs at two different tables. It is insanely hot upstairs and I sweat more. I am just a big dripping Yankee mess at this point.
This place seems to be a regular Parisian bistro. We start of with some champagne then a salad of haricot vert, duck, and raw mushrooms. The raw mushrooms are a strange idea. Strange and off putting. I get some lamb with purred carrots and a jug of white wine. Everyone is yelling and talking and sweating and having a great time -- including the waitresses. I don't think I have ever seen restaurant people who seem to love their jobs so much. This is all very fun, and I know that is the point -- just being is Paris and being out with my friends, but this food is just so…forgettable. I am sorry. I know that sounds terrible, here I am having dinner in Paris and I am whining about the food. Nothing is bad really, besides the raw mushrooms, but it’s all just so ordinary. I will have to ponder this more.
Eventually we wander back to the hotel. The front desk man is asleep but the door in unlocked and we just walk in. After I get into bed there is some street noise. For a little while I think this is romantic and cool, street noise in Paris! I get over that soon and put in ear plugs.
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Morning. The shower in my tiny bathroom is bigger than my last shower in London. This pleases me.
Today is a museum day. We are off the The Cluney. But first we find a little café for breakfast. I have café avec crème and an omelet. At some point my arms moves of it's own accord and I manage to knock most of the dishes off the tiny table. Everyone in the restaurant stops to look around so see if there is a French clown involved, but it’s just me. I hear the cicadas chirping.
We make a quick escape and walk over to The Cluny museum. This is an old building with a lot of medieval artifacts in it. I usually hate stuff like this but there are real swords with bloody dents in them, chain mail, lots a cool old stuff. The main event though are the tapestries. I keep calling them rugs and getting yelled at. “The Lady with the Unicorn” (Dame a la Licorne) is the most famous and the most amazing. Remember how when I was in Florence standing in front of David and I said that there are reasons some pieces of art of know all around the world? This is one of those pieces of art. We are in a dark circular room. The tapestries are on the walls and a lit with special light – or maybe they are just glowing magically on their own from within, but the light is eerie. There are 6 rugs, but the one with the Lady and the Unicorn is the most amazing. Not the lady, not the unicorn, but rather her handmaids dress. I don’t know how to really do this justice, but the fabric seems to be alive, like its moving. How someone was able to capture this in a rug they were weaving in the 1400’s is quite amazing and actually kind of supernatural. This was soon cool. I am really glad I got to see this.
We are now off to the Musee D’orsee. While we are walking around the streets of the Latin Quarter we stop for crepes. This is my first crepe in Paris. Cheese and ham. It’s bad. Just bad. Not even OK. Bleck.
The Musée d'Orsay is a really gorgeous building and has great art.
I can’t help but think of that newish modern art museum in London – the Tate Modern, which is not a gorgeous building and does not have great art. Stupid London.
Later we take a taxi back to the hotel. I speak a full sentence of French to the cab driver. “Hello, we would like to go to the Odeon Theatre. Thank you.” Taxis in Paris are very clean and they either play classical music or jazz. Taxis in London are great too. Although I haven’t been there in a while I have to say that taxis in post-Giuliani New York were great too. All of which makes me think of the horror of riding in a taxi in Seattle. Have you ever had to do this? It’s terrible. The drivers talk non-stop on their cells phones, they weave all over the freeway at 90 mph, and they are mean. The thought of having an inherently evil and immoral rat fucker like Rudy Giuliani doing anything in Seattle is terrifying, but it would be nice if someone would do something about taxis at home.
Tonight everyone is going to meet up at the Eiffel Tower. We take the Metro over. Matt is in charge of this. He seems to know what he is doing so this entitles him to sing “Riding on the Metro oh oh” out loud, over, and over, and over. Fortunately everyone but me gets on the train through a different door so I am not implicated with the singing as I am 10 feet away. You can just tell these poor French people are thinking, “Oh good, another American signing Riding on the Metro.” I have my own drama going on. I am wedged between Margaret Cho’s parents. These two elderly Koreans are mad at each other and they are fighting. I am standing right between them. As they scream and lash out at each other I enjoy the wafts of their kimchi scented breaths. Fortunately we have to change trains so I escape before they come to physical blows.
As we walk up to the Eiffel Tower the sun is just setting.
It’s kind of orange out and the tower is just starting to show this blue glow.
It’s being lit blue for some holiday or something bluish. As we get closer it gets darker outside and the blue light on the tower gets more intense.
I feel myself start to leave my body a little bit. I cannot believe I am really here. I am standing in front of the Eiffel Tower. I keep trying to pinch myself but it doesn’t work and then suddenly I am floating around outside my body. I see me looking at the tower and everyone else doing the same. I also see those same weird blue bubbles that I saw in Provence during the potato induced astral projections. What are these weird blue bubbles? Why is it I can only see them when I am outside my body? I float over to one. As I get close there is a flicker of bright white light. It’s going on and off really fast. At the light flashes I see a blue bubble, then a cicada, then a blue bubble, then a cicada. I think I have this figured out! But suddenly I go slamming back into my body. The bright flashing lights are coming from the tower! It’s 8pm and the whole tower is lit up with the most amazing flashing white lights.
Everyone in the park goes “Oooh!” all at the same time. This is an absolutely amazing experience. These are not just your average Joe Christmas lights strung up on the tower -- no, these are some kind of high tech fiber optic hooey gooey super flashy lights that seems to move around. They never flash in the same place.
There is a big search light on top of the tower that moves around in a circle. The combination of the blue light, the flashy white lights, and the search light on top is just incredible. I am caught up in the moment and trying to take pictures so I almost forget that I just discovered that all of France has been invaded by cat hating aliens. I do not forget however because my camera sees the aliens too. Just like I see when I am out of my body, my camera is able to document the weird blue bubbles floating around.
I blink my eyes and notice there are cicadas flitting around all over the place. Cicadas through my eyes, blue bubbles through my camera.
This is so obvious now I can’t believe it took me this long to figure it out. France has been invaded by these aliens. Cats are able to see these creatures for what they are and that is why there are no cats in the bug worshipping south. Obviously the amount of dog poop all over the streets of Paris is an attempt to limit feline influence in the capital. Who are these aliens? Why are they here?
I try to explain to my friends that I was just outside of my body and I have discovered that aliens have invaded France and that is why there is dog poop everywhere but people just roll their eyes and turn away like I am a crazy person.
Rude!
We walk around and try to find a place for dinner. We end up in this kind of touristy bistro. The waiter is funny but once again the food is pretty crappy.
It’s late now and there is only one more Metro run before they shut down for the night. It’s weird that the trains shut down so early. They do in London too. Do trains shut down in New York?
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Its Louvre day. I know before I get there that there will be way too much art to even make a dent in the place in one day. I also know it will be crowded.
I really want to see where Jesus’ wife is buried. Now I am sure you are saying, “Golly Troy, aren’t you a big old atheist?” Why yes, yes I am.
Here are the rules:
- God is a made person like Santa or the Easter Bunny.
- Jesus was in fact an actual person, but he was a crazy homeless guy that wandered around the desert talking to himself. I believe he could see that cicadas are aliens. Oh and as Dan Brown tells us, Jesus was married to this woman named Mary. She is buried under the little upside down glass pyramid at the Louvre.
Got it?
Mark and I just walk over to the Louvre buy tickets and walk in.
There is no line. Everyone made it sound like we’d have to wait in line for 4 hours.
The first thing we see is the Winged Victory. There are cicadas all over.
We see Mona Lisa but there are so many people in the room we cannot get close.
We see a lot of famous art:
A lot of Egyptian stuff:
Napoleons’ apartment:
It’s all pretty overwhelming.
We have lunch at an outdoor restaurant overlooking the big main plaza.
After several hours we want to go to the gift shop and then go see the little pyramid that Mary Magdalene is buried under.
Well, there is no gift shop. There is a mall. There is a huge mall under the Louvre. Mary Magdalene is buried in a mall.
Tonight we are off to a “real restaurant”. It’s near the hotel and done up in 1920’s décor. It’s pretty but the menus are in French and English. Not a good sign. While this is a step up from the other food we’ve had in Paris it all still pretty forgettable. A piece of protein, carrots done some way, something green. Sauce.
I close my eyes and think of Italy.
Morning. This is it. Time to go home. We are up very early. Mark has hired a car to take us to the airport. I am so tired I nod off in the car. My eyes pop open right when we are driving around the Arc De Triumph. That wakes me up. This has all been surreal. I cannot believe I have just been to Paris.
While we are in the security line at Charles De Gaulle Airport this alarm goes off. All the workers step aside. Their eyes roll up into their heads. They start to nod. Obviously they are receiving new instructions from their alien cicada masters. I close my eyes and force myself to think of dogs, dog poop, dog slobber. I do not make eye contact as I go through security. I am sweating like an American tourist in a good cloth coat. I feel Jason Bourne!
Mark and I slip into the first class lounge to discuss what just happened. Have the cicada aliens finally figured out that we are cat people? Are they trying to keep us in France? Are they trying to get us out of France?
I am done with France and its cat hating aliens. I slam a Camapri and soda and think of cat loving Italy some more.
We get on the plane to only to learn that of all the seats in first class only our two do not have working TVs and that we cannot turn off the reading lights. This is going to be a long flight.
Soon we are up, back over the UcK. Then Iceland. With no book, no TV, no magazines, all I can do is listen to my iPod and look out the window. While I know there is probably an 80 degree temperature difference, but Iceland really looks like Hawai’i from the air. Very volcanic. I see this brown cloud over Iceland. It seems to be moving west, against the wind. The plane banks towards the cloud and my TV screen flickers for a moment. Suddenly there is a picture of a cicada on the screen. It seems to be laughing. The plane banks back to the left and the screen goes black again. I realize that cloud is not a cloud at all. I pop a valium and wake up in Seattle.
Then Air France loses my luggage.
Then I drop my carry on and break a bottle of wine and olive oil.
Then I get home and find I am locked out of my house.
And I have to poop. Bad.
God damn it!
I calm down after a little while. My cats are here. They are safe. They are en guard against the impending invasion. I figure New York has 28 days. We probably have 28 weeks. Whatever. I will be on the Big Island when the bugs get to Seattle in March.
Sigh. France was not Italy. I really did have a great time and I am still pretty much in shock that I actually was there, but what is up with the food?
Magic potatoes Troy. Focus on the magic potatoes.
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