Notes from France:
- French keyboards are absolutely maddening. This is my excuse for any subsequent typos.
- When I first got here, I had to wander through a planeload of French Marines also arriving at the airport. Deeeeeeeeee-licious. What may be delicious is the food, but I’m not sure because I’ve been having terrible indigestion, making it hard for me to eat.
- I am able to read more French than I thought, but I am able to speak much less. This language barrier is especially frustrating when handsome Frenchmen are whispering dirty propositions in your ear, but you are unable to decipher them. Luckily, not all forms or social interaction require much talking.
- This is a very, very cruisy city. Like, out of control. It’s also kinda dirty and graffitti-covered, which is a very welcome surprise. I like seeing signs of life like that.
- As much as I am used to turning corners and seeing surprises in New York City, it’s a very different thing when I turn corners here and see glorious architecture that I’ve studied for years. Even the regular buildings here have beautiful, enviable massing and proportions.
- Versailles is a beautiful obscenity, but it totally lacks passion. It certainly doesn’t lack lavish splendor, though. I would have revolted because of it, too. And I’m a wuss.
- My hotel is a block away from a gaudy neon stretch of strip clubs, peepshow theaters, and faux-scandalous cabarets like the Moulin Rouge. The most glamorous whores I have ever seen wander the side streets and the taxi-dancer bars: They are plump, saggy, made up like paintings, and dressed in cheap cocktail dresses and fur coats. I completely love them. Very Toulouse-Lautrec, even in this day and age.