PARIS ’99: day 3: Happiness is a warm internet connection

Slogged out of bed (still sick) to nice offering of pain au chocolat and Carte Noire coffee on the thick side (mmm…motor oil.) and thank you bugboy!
Prepared myself to do battle with the three headed beastie of tourism and sallied forth into the wilds of Paris.
Deb spent her day toute seule [all by herself] as was her prerogative…and bugboy and I went to the 6th arrondissement.

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Took the Metro to Mabillion and walked along the backside of St. Sulpice. I think that the back parts of cathedrals are so much more interesting than the front parts, so this wasn’t a bad thing at all.

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It also was the direction rumored to hold an internet cafe.
I had done a search on the web of listed cafes and it worked completely miserably for London, so I didn’t have a lot of faith in it.
Stopped in a La Poste to get some stamps for my cartes postales for the fredlet fans at home and ended up with prepaid envelopes… not exactly what I had in mind, but the guy was so earnest about saving me money (not to mention that he was really nice and didn’t just switch into English because he knew I am american…which is a habit shared by MOST of the french people I know.) I love the look of the post cards with foreign stamps and postmarks and any abuse that it goes through in the journey home…à la Griffin and Sabine.
Followed the street around the back of Le Sénat down the Rue de Medecis and SUCCESS!
Cafe Orbital (complete with webcam..however, it doesn’t seem to be up at the time of this writing…so try occasionally and see if it works…) saved my life from a lethal case of DT’s from lack of email. Mailed all the people I had been craving and got my email from various and sundry webbies, surfed for a few minutes then my allotted time was up.
Cafe Orbital is right across the street from the Jardins de Luxembourg, so we walked over there long enough to get rocks in my socks then headed for the Boule Miche [Boulevard St. Michel]. I took bugboy into the McDonald’s for un coca [a coke] where I used to fuel my nights of drunken revelry back in 1990 (No really dad, you didn’t waste any money sending me to Paris for school…really). Say whatever you want, but its cheaper than eating just about anywhere in Paris…and when you are having withdrawals from coca cola, its dirt cheap.

Bugboy immediately cottoned on to the fact that it is indeed a “Royal Cheese” rather than a “Royal with Cheese” as was previously mentioned in Pulp Fiction.
Next door the the restaurant du diable [the devil’s eatery] was a cheesy postcard, bought a few more since I had previously exhausted my supply. Waved briefly up the Rue Soufflot to the Pantheon and we were off again.
Guibert Jaune lie in wait at the end of the Boule Miche. I ferreted out the papeterie [paper shop] au sous sol [in the basement]. Triumphant price on a wooden artists model (52FF=about $10, where in the states they are about $90!) nabbed a few more cadeaux [presents] drooled a bit more at all the art supplies and rounded off the fetishistic shopping trip with another notebook.

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Notre Dame,

 

Notre Dame was trussed up like a pig in scaffolding, so the view was pretty dismal. We walked around back to the better view (IMHO) anyway. Flowers were magnificent in the sunlight and this really cute little girl with this funky camera was taking her mother’s picture.

La Petite Photographeuse

La Petite Photographeuse,

Moved along to the book sellers along the river in the 6th and perused their wares all the while viewing the fabulous view of Notre Dame de Paris in springtime. On whim, we decided to go to Pére Lachaise cemetery to visit Jim Morrison. After 10 years of visiting Paris, I had never made it over there…and it was high time I made the pilgrimage.
The 20th is a very calm place. I’m sure they get sick of the groupies hanging out in front of J.M.’s grave all the time. Lots of funky carvings and gorgeous graves. I took and entire roll of just funky looking things while I was there, and I’ll scan a few when I get them developed.
Cobblestones will kick your butt everytime though. After about 20 minutes, I was dying. (Mind you, I had made the 9 mile trek with no adverse effects the previous day…so it was the cobblestones.)
J.M.’s grave was quite sedate compared to the tales that my cousin had told me when she went there. I remembered her pics and her saying that there was a giant crowd, candles and a wake-like attitude..but it seemed to me to be more of a bunch of tourists with a macabre sense of curiosity. Oh well.
I decided it was time to test bugboy’s learning on how to ride the métro…so I made him lead me home. I was just going to follow him regardless of whether he made any mistakes…so if we ended up in London it was his problem. He did rather well and we made it home around 5:30 ish.
Deb was already back and we had dinner then went out for dessert. Late night pillage for essentials at the Monoprix across the street (Nutella, Carte Noire, cookies, etc…) and then home to bed. Am pooped.

total miles walked:approximately 6