Une Personne

To celebrate my last Sunday night in Paris alone, I am taking myself out for le plat du jour at Le Petit Cler.  This morning I made an 8 pm reservation for "une personne, à l’exteriéur" and I am going to put on a little black dress, paint my lips MAC Lustre and enjoy dinner in my Paris living room.  

It's been a glorious summer day in Paris perfect for crisscrossing the city through some of my favourite arrondissements.  I don't think I will ever find anything that brings me more pleasure than walking through the streets of Paris.  I half-expected at this point that I would be bored of the same streets and the same sights but the familiarity only brings me closer to Paris and more excited about a life here.  I will never tire of catching the Eiffel Tower from different angles, how it disappears from certain vantage points and then suddenly reappears in all of its iron beauty ; I will never tire of walking through Place des Vosges and feeling like I have been transported back to the seventeenth century; and I will never tire of walking beneath the sculpted tree alleys in Palais Royal that compel me to slow my pace and imagine I am wearing a bustled dress and off to meet my amoureux for an afternoon liaison.

Place des Vosges

One of those sudden Eiffel Tower views off Avenue Bosquet

Tree alley in Petit Palais

 Yesterday a mobile petting zoo unloaded at the top of rue Cler. The animals traveled in what looked like a converted brown ice cream truck with chicken mesh covering the multiple windows.  There was a large, sway-backed donkey, several exotic looking chickens, one speedy piglet, a lamb and several goats of different sizes and colours.  The animals were penned in an enclosure about half the size of the average North American's master bedroom with some straw thrown down to make it look life a farm.  The donkey, star of the show, had his own section with a beach umbrella for shade.  You couldn't smell the animals for all of the yummy mummy's wafting Guerlain as they helped their very clean, well mannered children feed the animals stale baguette chunks.   

One of the resident clochards stumbled over shirtless in bright yellow overalls and wraparound sunglasses clutching an open bottle of red in a plastic bag to shout endearments at the donkey.  The children, being petit Parisians, were far more afraid of the donkey than the clochard.  Senior Parisian women stood near the front hunched over in their bedroom slippers and head scarves trying to pat the hopping goats and clucking at them soothingly.  A few dogs strained at their leashes, their bellies pressed flat against the cobblestones, thrilled at the possibility of chasing something not motorized.  It was unlike any petting zoo I have ever seen but not entirely unexpected in the centre of Paris.     

Frenchman du jour...

Jogging down the middle of rue Cler in a baby blue cashmere turtleneck, slim fitting navy blue pants and suede navy blue driving slippers holding a baguette with the end bitten off.  His jaw was moving furiously trying to chew the considerable end piece.  

Strangest thing I ever seen in a Paris market...

A New York Jets football player posing for pictures with the entire fish monger's staff and yelling, "Me and my family LOVE Paris!"  

Best logo on a canvas shopping tote...

I LOVE NUTELLA

Things tourists say...

While passing in front of the organic produce stand on rue Cler, "Where's Trader Joe's?"  

Crossing over from Le Marais to Notre Dame