It was a busy day. First of all, I’ve done something horrible to my right leg and it really hurts. Can’t quite figure out what, but it’s like a knot in my leg muscle that actually has me limping around like a senior citizen. So, send a prayer up for me, would ya?
Paris… Paris. Well, were this a beauty contest, Paris would take the cake. Not that she’d eat it, necessarily, but she’d definitely take it. Speaking of eating, Paris seems the bounty of gastronomical delights that I’d heard. The last time I had creme brûlée two nights in a row was never. Tonight (as I did last night) I randomly selected a restaurant in the neighborhood and was very, very pleased. This evening I found myself in a little cafe called “Rouge” on Rue de Longchamps. It was an odd scene – in a good way – and I sorta felt like I was in one of those old videogame scenes. Say, Leisure Suit Larry or Space Quest.
The bar was lit with trippy red lights (whoda thunk?) and there was a woman at the bar with her dog underfoot. The dog would be really quiet for a while then just start barking. He really disliked one of the waiters.
A man who was talking to dog-lady looked a lot like Columbo, and when a flower vendor entered the restaurant selling roses, Columbo bought the whole bunch and started handing them out to patrons. He gave me a white one and a red one. He gave a pair to two girls sitting two tables away from me and they were coldly dismissive, took the roses, and set them off to the side. There was a Mischa Barton lookalike (yum) one table beyond them, and she smoked a few cigarettes while her boyfriend ate dinner. For some reason, Columbo didn’t give them any roses.
I had a mushroom risotto that was excellent, a cosmopolitan cocktail with a glow-stirrer in it, and (as mentioned) creme brûlée for dessert. Fantabulous, all of it.
I did a great deal of walking around today. Jardins du Trocadero, Eiffel Tower, walked along the Seine for a while, spent a good chunk of the afternoon exploring the Louvre, then walked through the Jardin des Tuileries and back up the Champs-Élysées to the Arc de Triomphe.