I'll admit it: Paris and I have our off days. I don't like her meteorological mood swings, or the way a good portion of her street plans were built on a triangle. But I just can't stay mad at her on sunny days.

I have another admission: I am very much tied to smells. I know a boy who used to reeke of b.o. and cigarettes. It wasn't the most tantalizing of smells, but it was his, and every time I smell that specific melange, shall we say, I think of him. But I digress.

Today as I walked down Faubourg St. Honore on my way to the salon at Les Tuileries, the sun was shining, old women in silver eyeshadow and pink lipstick were passing by, the water rushing in the gutters was sparkling, and everything smelled the way it did the first time I was here when I was 14. Also a lady was walking her yorkshire puppy, which had barrettes in its hair. Put a fork in me, Paris; I'm done.

So it's goodbye Rachel Hunter, hoodie-wearing-loose-leaf-tea-drinking-liberal-arts-student, and salut Rachellllllle hUntehr, errand-girl of the 8th arrondissement. The diamond encrusted Dior bikini for your 18-month-old is no longer on display, but fear not, for Miss Sixty is helping to fill the void. You know, the void you feel when no toddler swimwear is sufficiently sexually suggestive. And Lanvin Homme has replaced their clown mannequins with mannequins that have cardboard boxes for heads. Will someone get me a job at Hermes, already? I was born to be in this business.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go use this press badge of mine to get some free champagne and hang out with some gallery owners.

This photo appears courtesy of the Liz Turner Estate

I left my caaaah keys in my khaaaakis

I spent a good part of this week being distracted/cranky/distracted and cranky, so when 5am Friday morning rolled around, I was very pleased. This is actually a half-truth. I was none too pleased at having to get up at 5am, but I was very pleased to be heading south to PROVENCE.

We took the TGV down to Avignon and then bussed out to Arles where we saw remnants of the Roman theatre and coliseum (stadium? amphitheatre? Are these all synonyms?), which were all quite lovely, especially in the sunshine like that. Though perhaps rendered somewhat less enjoyable by the mysterious Gilles- a man "hired" by Sweet Briar to "accompany" us around Provence. Gilles loves to talk, which is to his detriment because the man is about as interesting as 19th century Guatemalan cabbage farming practices.

After lunch and some aimless wandering around the city we drove out to the Pont du Gard, which is near Nimes, I'm told. Gilles talked. I wandered. And then we rolled up our jeans and settled into the banks of the Gard where we passed the time skipping rocks (or hurling rocks, in some cases).

We spent the night in a hotel on the grounds of a monastery where there were trees to climb and open spaces to explore. And it turns out that in addition to history professor, translator, and art historian, Gilles fancies himself somewhat of a rec. director, too. Is there anything he can't do?

Gilles woke us bright and early the next morning. We ate breakfast, bid farewell to the monastery, and took off for Baux en Provece, which offered no shortage of midieval ruins, quaint houses, cricket motion sensors, lavender sachets, and postcards with kittens in hammocks. Oh and wind. There was a lot of wind.

Our final destination was Avignon, where we visited le Palais des Papes, Gilles talked, and I ate ice cream. I would like to commend France for its embrace of tiramisu ice cream. Well done France. I would also like to commend certain males living in Avignon for acknowledging the fact that I do indeed have une poitrine magnifique.

The train ride home included special guest appearances by Katharine Hepburn and Coco Chanel. Upon our arrival back in Paris we grabbed some gyros at St. Michel and loitered outside the Cluny gardens before disappearing to our respective corners of the city.

Oh Provence, I miss you already. Fortunately for me I'll be living there one day in the not-too-distant future. I picked up this bit of information from the awesome fortune teller known only as M.A.S.H.

Meeting People Is Fun And Easy: VF

While talking to a French girl at a French house-party this weekend, she told me that there's a saying in French, which I now no longer remember word-for-word, but do remember that it translates to something along the lines of "Lose one guy, find ten more." I have to say that this has, in fact, held true for me, but I'm finding that it extends beyond le monde des garcons. At the end of the first semester I lost two very good friends to the U.S.'s gnarled clutches, and while I still miss them quite a bit, I've met four new people who are quickly becoming very close friends. And that's just in the American realm. In the past three weeks or so I've met so many new people; I'm left wondering what happened between this semester and the last that brought such a great change. I don't know, maybe having a French boyfriend for a month gave me the confidence to continue talking to random francophones. I don't know why it's happening, I just know that it is.

On a somewhat related note, in a city of 2 million people, one would think it nearly impossible to see the same person more than once. And for five months this was, more or less, true. The people I recognised were those who played a consistent role in my life: friends and their families, boulangerie and salon de the staff, professors and classmates. And I never saw these people outside of the environments in which we interacted.

It follows, then, that I am supremely weirded out by the number of strange faces hat have appeared over the past week that aren't so strange anymore. I'm seeing people I saw only once before, in line at a crepe stand, or at a large game of cache-cache at Trocadero, or even on the metro for a second time. It makes me wonder who else is going to turn up in the weeks to come. Jacques Chirac in a bear suit? God, I hope so.

Raphael Schweitzer: Luxembourgish Hero

I'll be honest. When I talked to my mom on the phone this evening, I had every intention of telling her what happened over the course of the past week. But I couldn't remember.

I am still on vacation, by the way.

I blame this fact for the way the past seven days have blurred together.

This week was filled with wandering down narrow streets on the left bank and large boulevards on the right.

I learned that when a gallery purchases a piece of art for 50,000 euros or more (an occurance which happens often, apparently) and has the intent to sell it, possibly overseas, it is necessary to register it with the museums bureau to ensure that it is not a national treasure. If it is not a national treasure, the bureau will give the gallery what is essentially a passport for the piece of art in question. It was my duty on Tuesday to go and retrieve three such passports. "You can take Faubourg St. Honore. Look at the boutiques," Anais said as she handed me an envelope. "But not too much," Yannick added. Here's what's new on the Faubourg: Lanvin's got clowns in suits and Christian Dior has designed a triangle bikini for your 18-month-year-old.When it rains in Paris it doesn't seem to last longer than 15 minutes. I find that a good way to make it stop is to get on the metro when it starts raining and ride it for two stops. And when you exit the metro and are above ground, you can silently reflect on this and that makes the sun come out. I swear it works.

Here's a list of people I met this week: DJ People's Champion, an Australian backpacker, a large group of students from Luxembourg, two French girls who condemned all Frenchmen, a Swede, and a woman who wore green mascara and sold me some sausage. It was a good week for meeting people.

I also started reading Harry Potter in French.

Paris has a sort of "First Friday" of its own, but it's a First Sunday, and all that entails is free admission to many museums and monuments. Selene and I took advantage of this today and visited Sainte Chapelle and climbed the towers of Notre Dame. The Paris Roofline is slowly inching its way up the list of My Favorite Things








There's this photo exhibit at Le Bon Marche right now in which actors, models, fashion designers, photographers, and other People Of Note were asked to submit a self-portrait. Cindy Sherman dressed up as Madame Pompadour and screenprinted herself onto a Limoges turine. Afterward Selene and I contemplated the benefits of purchasing matching Paul Ka dresses (and let me tell you, there are a lot of benefits). There was a dress that reminded me of a birthday cake that I liked a lot.


We had a picnic dinner on the steps of a church, during which two men and their dog hid some groceries behind the ballustrade.

Yea, honestly this week wasn't too eventful. The weather's nice again, though. You can rent boats in the Luxembourg and go for a ride in a carriage pulled by ponies. And don't think I won't.