Yesterdays photos.....TODAY!

Out of order...  But we are lucky they are up at all!!!

This was the sky after we left the Louvre... Look how thick the atmosphere is here....

The lights of the Eiffel tower over Paris...
Courtney outside the Pompidou with the famous LIPS fountain
The wicker airplane with scissors....
Picasso      Delecroix    - 

The Louvre at night.. Looks awesome all lit up... It's hard to believe that it was, at one point, someones house..
Courtney in modern art .....
Now just try to visualize these photos, in the right order, in yesterdays post.

Masterpiece...

Or, maybe....  The photos the day after was on purpose in order to create the feel of need and desire in the blog reader, symbolizing the contrived needs of modern societies dependence on instant gratification..... hence, the post is now MODERN art.

Ug.. It hurts being this artistically gifted.

We have seen a lot of art, that we cant show you...

We had 2 big museum days...

The Pompidou center on Sunday, and the Louvre today (Monday)

The pompidou center is Paris' largest modern art museum. It is HUGE... 5 stories.... With a gigantic permanent collection. 

The Louvre is, the louvre....  It has everything...

We have some good photos.. but blogger wont let me upload them.. So that will have to wait...

sorry!

Pompidou was a fun museum.. For one, it was open Sunday.. For two, it was free... After being here for 2 months, you come to value those two attributes.

There was a lot of art that I consider on the "not good" side... But a lot was really interesting..

Every time I walk into one of these places though, and look at the canvas that looks like someone threw a paint covered cat at, I seriously ask myself. "Now really.. Did this person actually think this is art? Or did he just know that, because he was famous, he just had to make any mess on canvas, and sell it for thousands of dollars."  Most of these artworks weighed heavily on the latter. 

Some though were actually pretty cool.. Like the 30 foot long wicker airplane hanging from the ceiling, full of scissors and nail files. I know.. Already sounds bad ass...  But the message was actually good...  The work was called "30,000 treasures from Airport security" (something like that... I was too busy checking out 5 tons of levitating wicker to really read the plaque...) anyhow.. It was a message about how we have created a world paranoia about weapons on planes, and what constitutes as a weapon these days..  things like nail scissors, bottle openers, etc...

I have a picture of this.. that you cant see.

There was also a big squiggly line room that you could stand in.. Like being IN art...  I also have a picture of C in this room. 

The louvre today was a different kind of art. First, we did a 1 1/2 hour tour of the basics..  The stuff that the louvre is known for. Venus di Milo, The winged Victory, Mona Lisa, The French liberation painting I refer to in my delecroix post, etc...  There was also a cool temporary exhibit that was part of the Picasso and the Masters series that is running in 3 museums here.. 

This was his tribute to delecroix, and how he took one of Delecroix paintings, and painted 12 different versions of it... 

There was also a Mantenga exhibit that is only there for a few months. Mantenga was sort of the father of perspective in painting. He was a master of his time, but in the end was seconded by the work of DaVinci and Bellini.  It was fun learning of an important artist that I had never heard of before!

Well... I hate to cut this short with no pictures, but the blog site is acting up, the internet signal is weak, and the laptop battery is dying!

OH.. before I go.. Tonight C and I "philosophized" at Le Deux Maggot cafe! We people watched and talked about projects we want to do, etc. We kept asking ourselves why we dont do that more!!

After that, we played French Monopoly..  Only in france can you get a community chest that says "Fine for drunken misconduct, 5000 francs"

I got that one.

Reading....

As I was sitting here before dinner, realized that I have read a ton of books on this trip!

I'm typically not a big reader..  I always wanted to be more of one... Just never happened...

In the past two months I have read:

Hell House - Richard Mattheson

Button Button and Other Short Stories - Richard Mattheson

Midnight Tales - Bram Stoker

The Hound of the Baskervilles - Arthur Conan Doyle

Lair of the White Work - Bram Stoker

Currently reading: The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle

That is more books than I (embarrassingly) typically read in an entire year! 

Something about no TV I guess!!

Sorry for the silence!

Hi All!

Sorry for the little stretch of silence..  It's not that we havent been doing anything, It's just that we havent been doing as MUCH. Not to mention that for some reason, al the stuff we have seen this week, didnt allow photos...

Paris has gotten cold. Very cold. Sometimes we walk outside because it looks nice, and then 30 mins later, its grey and cold again.  It comes fast and hard.  It also makes it a little harder to just get out and walk around, because it has been raining off and on for the past week. 

We have hit 2 exhibits since the last post. The first was at Foundation Cartier. This exhibit was 4 video installations dealing with global migration of people. The first video was interviewing small tribes of people, who were happy in their small native lands. The Second was a video just showing people in cities living their lives. The third and fourth were about people forced to leave their native land as refugees or due to natural disaster. It was actually very interesting.. Court and I were skeptical when we first heard the premise, but both came put really being glad we went.

The second exhibit we went to was actually a small museum.. the Delecroix museum. This is literally a 5 minute walk out the front door, and for whatever reason we had never gone. It was Delecroix's studio and apartment in Paris, converted into a small museum. Delecroix is most famous for this painting:

That painting wasnt at the museum...  But a lot of his sketches were. He used photography to take pictures of his models to practice body composition, and they had a bunch of the photos and coinciding sketches together for the exhibit. It was actually very cool and inspiring. I bought a book that reprints all of them while I was there.  In the museum, it talks about the love he had for painting "his chapel,"  which is inside the church st. Sulpice. He painted 3 large paintings on the walls of the church.. And since St. Sulpice is also only 5 mins away from our place, we decided to walk there and check them out as well!

Today we just walked around a bit. We are a bit museumed out! Paris feels like it has twice as many people in it today than it has since we have been here! The streets are jammed!!

Next week is our last week.. I cant believe it has already been 2 months..  We have done so much, and to us it doesnt feel like we have done enough!  4 countries, and 10 cities by my count.. not to mention countless museums and exhibits!! I think though, that we are also both looking forward to seeing our friends and families again!

Finished Product

Lost in Translation

It was blue skies today in Paris, right to the right of Ty you can see the Eifle Tower, its small from here! We haven't seen the sun in a few weeks, it feels like, in Paris so we were pumped! 

First stop, Sonia Rykiel exhibit at the Les Arts Decoratifs museum in the Louvre.  This was awesome!  It was huge with tons of clothes from her collections, videos of runway shows, photographs of shoots in huge black and whites and a special anniversary collection that other noteworthy designers did especially for her. My favorite was a Roberto Cavalli number that was meant to be twirled. Ty's was, (I made him pick one) a Super Man dress with a cape that said Sonia on the back, it was cute. Forgot who did that one though. He was a champ going to this with me and faking his interest in woman's fashion. Although he loved the concept art. Donna Karan appears to do hers in water colors, gorgeous! Wish we could take pics there but it was prohibited. I did snap 1 pic but it doesn't do the show justice so we'll just use our imagination. We did stop off at her flagship store which is around the corner from the apartment on our way home to come full circle. I am a new fan and I love this season's handbag collection and accessories. Its really fun and has tons of rhinestones on them, bringin it back. The best was seeing this older man taking a nap in one of the chairs near the dressing room and his wife, all snazzed up with her multiple shopping bags, coming over to say, "Irving, I am done, Irving!!! We are leaving!!!!!" Her friend was right behind her and said, "Is he dead?"

Ty was cracking up.

But before we made it home, we ventured back to a favorite restaurant, mainly because the view is so gorgeous and you can sit outside and stare at the Louvre behind big glass pane windows that block any wind. Here we are waiting for our food.

This is the view from our table.

We both ordered the Tuna which we had last year but it was more of a tartare then with avocado. This was fantastic although not the same, raw, and with a ginger ponzu sauce I think. We savoured every bite. It was a no carb kind of a day. Gotta love it!

Unless you count sugar as carbs...  The weather took a quick turn for the worse so we decided to come home and finally make toffee! This is a tradition in my family and always makes if feel like Christmas. Its a huge hit but really a challenge to make. So many batches I have thrown away in my lifetime, candy making is tricky.  But when you nail it, its worth it!  Here I am at step one, melting the butter.

Skipping ahead a few steps, Ty helping me stir, my hand felt like it was going to fall off after 20 minutes of solid stirring.

Pouring it out on a greased cookie sheet... crucial.

Melted chocolate. Check.. About to drizzle toasted chopped almonds. 

I am letting it sit overnight before I do the other side with chocolate and almonds. I will post the finished product although Ty and I came home tonight and tasted a corner. Its definitely my best batch YET!! I am not sure whether its the european butter or what, but its perfect! My Mom would be proud as its her special recipe.

Oh, after the toffee was done, we headed back to the American bookstore. I have 2 funny stories about that.

1. The first night we went to hear David Sedaris, we were smushed in the back with a bunch of people. This one girl was there and was about our age and started to have a panic attack, then she fainted. I am not sure if she was star struck or what but she was out cold and then came too, right in time for his readings. She was kind of a spaz before that and we were doing our best to ignore her.

We were in line with her when he signed our book and she told him, "I am one of those people you write about, where I think my dog is my child, I call her my daughter" He looked at her slightly amused and nodding out of courtesy. 

So anyways, we went back to the store yesterday to get Ty a new book and she was there, with her "Daughter". She has a Tri-colored King Charles Spaniel which is the same breed as Ty's parents 2 dogs, Tucker and Morgan. Tyler got excited to see the dog and went over to pet it and noticed she was attached to the fainter. He starts talking to her and shows her a picture of T and M. She starts off on a ramble, "Oh, they are so cute.. are they males? I keep looking for her for a husband. Everywhere I look, I see a dog and I want to breed her but the vet said it would be very irresponsible as she is too old, but I keep looking anyways, she needs to find a husband. Oh, you live in Marin, how is San Francisco? Like, can I take her shopping with me? I have a bigger bag that I take her in that no one knows she's in there, its black. (The one she is carrying now is sparkly gold, all bling'd out) I might move there to study animal rights law but I am worried about her, (pointing to her daughter) are they very dog friendly? Because we have a very good life here, everyone loves her in the 6th, all of the restaurants call her the princess of the 6th, I think I am going to write a book about it."

Um... Ya. That is seriously how that went. I meanwhile, was flipping through cookbooks wondering how Ty was going to get to walk away from this one but he did, like a gentlemen, say nice to see you again and bee-lined it for the horror section. Incredible.

2.  While we were there last night we read about another author reading going on tonight so headed over early to get seats closer to the front. Mission accomplished, we were an hour early and snagged front row seats, this was not the David Sedaris smash hit however. This book was called, The Journal of Helen Barr, a diary about a jewish girl in Paris during the Nazi occupation.  We both thought it sounded really interesting and it did once we heard some of it, the niece of the author was there to read and tell a little background about the book, she was the one who got it published last year and it has since been a best seller in Paris and is being printed in 21 more languages currently. 

So... the room fills up, and the reader speaks the ENTIRE time in French. There was an english speaker who read aloud the parts from the book that the niece did, but not any explanations, nothing. It was 2 hours long and then there were questions. Ty and I fortunately were in the front row, eyeing each other like we wanted OUT! I wish we had discussed a signal, never in my life had I wished we had a secret code tug on ear or something. But the room was tiny and we were in the dead front so we had to stick it out. Finally, after questions were going for what seemed like hours and my stomach was growling, I bailed. I couldn't take it and my manners were out the window. Oops.

It was a bit torturous not understanding anything and I said once we were outside, "See, that is why I never sat in the front row? You never know when something might suck and you gotta bail"

Whew!  We were laughing that it was at the American bookstore and we should have known at the very beginning that the host said, "I am sure all of you speak French enough so we can do this in French." 

Ya, that's why we are buying books at the AMERICAN BOOKSTORE!!!

hahaha  

Ripped off and Souf'ed up!

Mondays are a tough day in Paris. Sunday, you generally know that everything is closed. Monday however, is always hit and miss..  SOME museums are open, SOME are closed... Court and I decided that, since we are staying in Paris for the remainder of our trip, we should go see some of the modern art exhibits that people we have run into keep raving about. 

Let me start by saying that I HATE modern art. I dont hate all modern art, just modern art that is considered "Modern Art." However, with the new theme of our remaining days in Paris being 'exhibit exploration' I decided to open my mind up to the concept a bit more...

Today we went to the Luxembourg museum to the exhibit called "Miro to Warhol" ..  It is 80 modern art pieces from the private collection that they repeatedly remind you is the "Most important collection in Portugal."  

If this is the important stuff, I would hate to see the unimportant.

For starters, the ticket price was 11 euro each, and after the audio guide at 4.50, we were into this thing for 26.50. Thats EURO remember...  so it's a hair over 30 dollars American...  That is SIX double-Doubles at In-N-Out....  But I digress...

So we get in and find that the audio guide is only good for like 6 paintings in the museum.  Also, when you listened, it just talked about the artist and some of his OTHER works...  Not really the piece at hand...  Kind of like when we were at the Royal museum in London, and the lady kept telling us about all the beautiful colorful frescos...  that are at the Louvre.

Anyhow.. The art was literally awful. I have seen better collections of art in my garbage can. Plus, for having the name WARHOL slapped proudly across the banner out front, you would thing they would have more than TWO prints... ONE of which being.. you guessed it.. a can of Campbells Soup. 

The museum took 30 mins to get through..  and when we left, C and I sort of looked at each other and said "Wow.. THAT was a waste." Oh well.. they can't all be winners.... 

Anyhow.... Since C and I live for contrast, we ended up having dinner at a place that really WAS a winner... 

My mom has been raving about this place for years...  It is kind of around the corner from us. and specializes in soufflé! Neither Courtney or I had ever had a souffle before (as far as we could remember) so we were pretty excited to try something new!

They were delicious! C got Truffle and I got 'Fromage' which was some kind of really good cheese! For desert, we shared a 'caramel and sea salt' souffle as well!

So, even though the day started rough, it ended with a great dinner! Thanks for the recommendation mom!