summary of 2009

What did I do, feel, think, want and experience this year?

1. What did you do in 2008 that you’d never done before?

Managed money, and people – took authority and responsibility. Sometimes it worked out, sometimes it didn’t, either way I learned that a manager is only as good as their team.

2. Did you keep your New Year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?’

Can’t remember 2009’s. 2010s is to have less stuff.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?

3 coworkers, 1 Tim’s coworkers. Last year it was 1, this year its 4. Time’s acoming my friends.

4. Did anyone close to you die? No. (I am so lucky to say this 2 years in a row!!!!!)

5. What countries did you visit? US (Las Vegas (!!!), Los Angeles, Buffalo, Tampa, Orlando (Disneyland!), other side of the lake), Canada (Oakville sailing club, Frenchmans’s bay), Paris-France (with Karmun!)

6. What would you like to have in 2009 which you lacked in 2008?

Less stress.

That said – last year I said “more windows” and now I live in a crazy bright apartment. But we acquired it somewhat in part to my stress – eg I worked hard – so I dunno if this is a trade off or what.

7. What date from 2009 will remain etched in your memory, and why?

The day I loved sailing. I went sailing a few times before that, but on that occasion, a very superbly awesome coworker (Leo) and his girlfriend (Ella) came along with us on a beautiful after work sunset cruise. The experience was peaceful, magical, and awesome and I fell in love with the water, the light, the view. This year, 2009, was truly the year of the boat.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year? Learning how to sail. Even a bit.

9. What was your biggest failure? Not uploading more of my photographs despite taking them. I have a problem with sharing my work. (Same as 2008). + Not taking more photos. Gugh,

10. Did you suffer illness or injury? I officially cracked my right pinky toe and freaked out my doctor by getting a ridiculously (twice normal bound) count of white cells, which made them call me in and get retested. That seriously freaked me out and gave me a major perspective on work for all of 5 days.

11. What was the best thing you bought? 27 inch iMac, French little black dress, Wii, condo, boat.

Last year (for the memories): I bought: flash for my camera; I got as a present: my Movado gold watch (LOVE), e-book reader (LOVE), and iPod touch (LOVE). Actually I love a crazy amount of things I bought this year. 2 awesome dresses, some wonderful shoes, both will serve me long and faithfully. Awesomely cute elephants in Japan. Cool photo album that I finally put wedding photos into. Our first dining table (tii-iiny).

12. Whose behavior merited celebration? Mine for being so goshdarned adult at 25 years of age. And my team members at work who brought in kick ass results that could not have happened without them.

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed? Sadly I saw a lot of stupidity this year. Maybe managing things does that to you.

14. Where did most of your money go? Good wine; good food; good clothes; but mostly A PLACE WITH WINDOWS.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about? Going sailing; but that took a while.

16. What song will always remind you of 2008? Flo-rida – Get low – because we made up our funny songs about it. Also, Lady Gaga.

17. Compared to this time last year, are you: Happier or sadder? Thinner or fatter? Richer or poorer? Happier, thinner-ish  – this year I ate healthier more, richer. Wow, now it sounds like I’m showing off.

18. What do you wish you’d done more of? Taking pictures.

19. What do you wish you’d done less of? Internet-browsing.

funny both are same from 2008

20. How will you be spending New Year’s? I spent it with Tim, 3 more couples, and my parents, having an awesome dinner, loads of champagne, and a fun evening. It was a blast. And my dad almost got arrested for drinking alcohol outside (even if it wasn’t! :-) ).

21. Who did you spend the most time on the phone with? Mom. I hope to call her more often next year!

22. Did you fall in love in 2008? Same person as before :) Each year brings a new aspect to the relationship. It might not get easier, but it sure gets better

23. How many one night stands in this last year? N/A?

24. What was your favorite TV program? Again, TOUGH. Dexter, How I Met Your Mother, HOUSE is definitely probably first? This hasn’t changed in a year. (!!)

25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year? Nope. No hate, peace brother.

26. What was the best book(s) you read? This year I went on a Sue Grafton kick. That was aweome. And I loved Twilight even if I am ashamed.

27. What was your greatest musical discovery? Lady Gaga.

28. What did you want and get? IMAC AND NEW CHAIRS AHOY. All the presents I got this year were awesome. I am crazy lucky to have such awesome family and friends.

29. What did you want and not get? Did not happen at all.

30. What was your favorite film of this year? Up.

31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old did you turn? Slept in, enterntained a large but awesome selectio of guests at home, had a great dinner I made (lamb roast. mmm.) with Tim, parents, Maha & Tema. Turned 26.

32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying? Having less stress and more free time. Apparently hard work means HARD WORK.

33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2008? More dresses, still with black & grey now with addition of navy and white.

34. What kept you sane? Family. Sleep.

35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most? Robert Downey Jr.

36. What political issue stirred you the most? US Healthcare.

37. Whom did you miss? A lot of people. Netherlands.

38. Who was the best new person you met? I feel like I’ve gotten to know some people far better; that is a good thing.

39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2008. Work hard – the payoff is good. Work hard – be gentle with your marriage – it is hard to balance work and home life without damage to one or the other.

40. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:

Waiting at the station
Feel no hesitation and begin the ride
Still pretty young,but time’s already come and I begin to slide
I’m turning down, down looking down now
I got you dazey little hazey
I get the feeling, just leaves me reeling I begin to cry

Then the rain came down .. teardrops
Then the rain came down .. teardrops
Then the rain came down .. teardrops
Then the rain came down
I hope it doesn’t rain all day

So later on, thought I was on my own and twilight filled the sky
voice drifted through, it sounded just like you and I remember why
I ran away from the celebration, another year by, a fly-by
Out the door, I’ve been here once before, forgot to say good bye

Apparently I listened to this song at least 43 times (out of my 5.6K+ library), right after Runaway by Del Shanon, Let it Rock by Kevin Rudolf, Lady Gaga (Poker Face/Just Dance) or Under the Moon of Love.

But this song twingest a thing in my heart. It’s about moving on, growing up, the crazyiness that is growing up, and the enormous pain that is letting go of you childhood – the freedom, the options, the incredibly underlying sense that anything you want to do is not only possible, but is OK – that whatever it is that you do is available to you. (I can no longer decide to move to France on a whimsy).

It’s tough, but it’s good. It is still tough, and this year brought a lot of moments where I had to turn away from old photographs in order to stop crying over the life that I have lived – not because it was bad, but because it was so good that I don’t know how to handle those feelings and those memories. This paragraph took me 10 times to type.

This was overall a great year. It was the first year that I was truly a professional at work. It was the year we have bought our boat, which is definitely going influence how we live in the future, and also the year of our condo (unbelievably freaking lucky catch of a break condo).

It was the year of the iMac, the couch, the pass of a quarter century.

It was a good year.

But I can’t wait for 2010.

I have a feeling it holds more awesome things.

6 weeks

PS – It’s going to be 6 weeks tomorrow. Not a drag.

But, 3 nightmares (!!!) about having one. I cannot be happier that I quit. I could not be happier that I did it BEFORE the holidays, which would have annihilated any desire to do so. Allen Carr saved my life.

first mac

after loving the shuffle; after becoming entirely attached-at-the-hip to the ipod touch; i have received/gotten the quad core 27 inch imac for my birthday. (Eg instead of paying off mortgage i got myself a fancy toy. This is me being a 26 year old adult. Clearly I’m learning something over the years…!)

I have never owned an apple machine before. I remember the first time I used one – it was when we came to Canada and I went to grade 8. They had the old macs and the new ones – the all in one, brightly colored ones? I don’t think I really had much real exposure after that – in high school the machines were PCs. At home, they were PCs. At university, they were PCs (by large, anyway, I can’t recall otherwise).

But despite the rarity of the Apple I always had a deep dedication, fondness and a hidden desire to own one.

So as we are DINKs (Double Income No Kids) and I have worked my  butt off in form of many late nights, 11pm emails, 7am calls and 8am meetings, I feel (and kinda have) earned myself the ultimate. present. of. all. time. A new, TOP OF THE FSCKING LINE, 27 inch widescreen QUAD FSCKING CORE iMac. I wouldn’t swear but I CANT.

The entire reason for this entry is the overwhelming disbelief and joy that I have went and gotten myself the most top end thing of anything. I’m not whining – its just, I’ve always been very reasonable in my demands. iPod touch – not iPhone. Built PC – not a laptop. Nikon D70 – even if its falling apart quite literally after 5 (5!!!!) years.

But I went and gotten the computer of my dreams.

The funny thing is I didn’t even know how much I’d enjoy using it. My motivations were based in (a) esthetics – we live in a nice place, my computer is highly visible, and I wanted something that would look good – and (b) function – I sure as heck wasn’t going to get a Sony all in one or something silly like that. After the fairly recent announcements of the 21 and 27 inch macs I decided that – fsck yeah! – I’ll treat myself to top of the line.

The smell of new computer is makes me ecstatic. The hugeness of the screen …. is unbelievalbe. But every time that I look down and see THE DASHBOARD. Or everytime that I do ANYTHING AT ALL EVEN SORTING PHOTOS – I am blown away by HOW GOOD IT LOOKS. And I’m not being biased – my crazy dual core 64 bit 2gb ram 500GB raid + dedicated swap PC + 21 inch dell monitor (same manufacturer as one for apple monitors) is right by side. THEY CANNOT BE COMPARED.

2010 is the year I switched. I do not think I will ever, ever switch back. It pains me it took so long. But now – I cannot imagine it.

quitting

it’s been 50 hours since i stubbed out my last one and said i’m done.

it was surprisingly easy. tomorrow evening i’ll hit the 72 hour mark for all nicotine being out of my system, and before my birthday i’ll hit the 2-3 week pass when I hit the next milestone.
[1] [2]

It’s exciting. i’m doing this in the arguably most stressful and busy period of the entire year – i have 3 projects reaching major milestons and completion in the next 3 weeks; plus christmas, plus volunteering, plus a number of other initiatives at work that i’m working on; plus you know, regular life/cleaning/friends/family.

the first 2 days were very, very, easy. i’m finding tonight slightly harder than before, but evenings are usually more hard. once i get a final update on this project i can go to sleep… and that has become FAR better!

speaking of work – that has been a blast. though very, very busy i am loving the never-a-boring-moment, and working with people, and trying to find my way out of very complicated situations where i have to deal with people – not computers. this is why i like this job.

condo is going well. the couch is all i dreamed about and more. the next big project is the kitchen.

while tim was away i repainted the bathroom and hung up a new light fixture. mm, good light.

we now live in a condo

well, we finally moved out of the bunker. it is a good move – our new place is

a) 1 minute from subway

b) larger

c) has windows

d) has nicer floors

e) is nicely layed out

d) allowed us to ditch a lot of baggage and stuff and start very fresh.

as in, pretty much no furniture fresh. so right now, we still have no sofa, no bed (a futon substitutes temporarily), and only 4 chairs (gasp! :P ). surface wise we have the bed tables, a coffee table, and a small side table. its pretty dang awkward, but certainly means we have lots of space.

today was monday, which i got off to do move-in stuff. boy, was that a great idea… i got up at 8, and only stopped working and doing stuff at 10pm.

the move

the move went incredibly well thanks to the help of all our friends. scarf showed up first, and saved our entire schedule by leaving right away with tim to get the van. while they were gone, i continued to pack the things we didn’t pack the night before – we stayed up until 2 am packing things, and towards the end just ran out of energy. (6 hours packing!)

wait i’m jumping too much forward.

friday

somehow it all came together fairly well. tim picked up the keys; i left work 3-4, and then came back and left again at 5. meanwhile, my mom painted most of the living room, while tim (and maybe mom?) moved up all the laminate that had to adjust to the conditions of the room. just typing this makes me tired. we started off with an empty, dirty-ish, apartment, with carpet in the bedroom and yellow and blue walls. towards the end, it became magnificent.

mom and i finished laying the first coat of paint in the LR  and BR (Bedroom), and we all went off to our place and had a quick dinner. parents left, and we went off packing.

okay, then…

saturday

the move day! this is where scarf comes in, and then dad, and then maha and tema and kisa and stalker and everyone just MOVING boxes non stop while i was trying to keep the conveyor line going. towards 1-2pm i started falling apart at the bunker from sheer exhaustion, and tema/scarf/stalker/dad helped me do the last push and wrap it up.

i’ll miss the apartment lots. it was a really fun, interesting, different period of my life, one that is as significant as europe to the person that i am. tim and i met while he lived there, i found my love for interio design while living there, and i found my LOVE for awkward spaces and making them work. we had our first fights, first making ups, first “i love you”, first jobs and graduations (and 2nd graduations for some). we had our Big Talks about life, and lots of silly nights watching tv or sharing funny stuff online. we got our cat/s. tim grew out his hair and cut it; i dropped a table on my toe and completely destroyed (a now regrown) nail there (biggest injury ever i ever had, i think). i left for australia while he lived there; and i moved in after we returned together.

so many happy, drunken, talking evenings with friends. a new year, several birthdays, impromptu get togethers, poker nights, (few) dinner parties, more drinking and talking, and staying up waa-ay too late and shooting the philosophical bullshit. that place lent itself so well to that kind of life – easy, student, chilled out.

i biked to school during wither; i walked to exams over harbord freaking out about databases and philosophy questions. our marriage planning, our budget planning, our life planning, our future planning, all took roots in this place.

i won’t miss the small windows. or the smallness. i forgot how much difference an extra foot ceiling height makes; and windows! are! awesome!

anyway. that place was great. i’m glad its staying in the “family” (stalker has it now, good for him. i hope he makes as many awesome memories there as we did.)

saturday continued

as people were moving boxes, mom was painting and maha cleaned the kitchen. their hard work paid off; kitchen feels CLEAN and rooms look BEAUTIFUL with the coat of “toasted marshmellow” that i really love.

eventually, around 4pm (specifically 3:20pm, 40 minutes ahead of my schedule, how good of a PM am i? :-) that’s SPI of 1.11 for those of you following. ) the move wrapped up by eating some food graciously brought by parents and drinking beer graciously bought by tim and scarf. eventually everyone left, and we went down for a quick nap. the place was a mess; chaos; boxes piled everywhere, bedroom unusable due to no floor; complete insanity.

though, but the end of the day, we went to canadian tire (7 minute walk including getting a fresh mango bubble tea), i cleaned the bathroom and it instantly felt so much better, and thus we gained 2 rooms that became nice. (kitchen and bath).

the highlight of the day, if i am allowed to pick it, was the moment tim kicked me out of the LR (i went to clean the bath) and put together my lovely, beautiful, eames lounge. it is beautiful. it became the centerpiece of elegance among a PILE of boxes; and though that may have been crazy that chair motivated me each moment to KEEP ON CLEANING so that it looks even better.

sunday

an early start by tim at 7am and laterish by me, 9am, as we rose with the city and the sun. my uncle and dad came over and tim joined them in laying down laminate. the guys did a great job, and our bedroom is probably the coolest looking room in the house. while they were doing that, i went off to ikea, with stalker, which took a while but was fairly productive.

later that day we also went to structube, and got 2 more chairs and a desk table (to be delivered) and i stopped by the apartment and got more stuff i forgot. what a stress-less move. so nice to have a friend living in the old place.

monday

and so that brings us to today. after an early start, i tried to

– return laminate (fail)

– return underfloor (win)

– return ikea tv stand thats too big but missing packaging (win)

– return other misc ikea stuff  that was sealed (easy win)

– purchase a new shelf (major win; found a great one in as-is in a style that i wanted and that was sold out. and it fit in the car EASY.)

– purchase 2 office chairs in MOST! (win; and possibly found a sofa for mom – she came along for this store)

– clean up clothes (win! did all the laundry (mmmm own laundry rocks), and hung almost everything up. some minor stuff left, extra towels and stuff, but nothing critical.)

– clean up living room (win! more stuff went away as i cleaned up clothing; more stuff went away as i cleaned up and unpacked hallway and misc kitchen stuff; and even MORE stuff got unboxed as it went into the new shelves).

and thus i am at 11pm, having blogged way too much.

summary

we are exhilarated, terrifically happy, and REALLY look forward to next week – when like 90% of our furniture gets delivered.

this wednesday: office chairs

next wednesday: mattress

next week (wed?): sofa, bed, 2 easy chairs, tim’s desk

aaah, i cannot wait.

day 6 – notre dame, market, louvre, pompidou, dinner, gardens, night on the sienne

as you can probably tell by the title of this post this has been quite a long day with a lot of things happening. this is what happens when it only gets dark by 11pm and it gets light at 6am… your days seem unbelievably long. and of course being on vacation doesn’t hurt either.

i woke up first and not as early as i’d have liked – i was supposed to wake up at 8 in order to get to notre dame before the line ups; alas the 2am falling asleep ensured that i really didn’t get out of bed until 8:40, thus getting out of the house by 9:10. k was still asleep when i left.

i tried to hit up the local market on my way out of our area but nothing seemed to be there, and i thought i had the wrong square. on my walk to the subway found another bakery, where the croissants were FAR more delicious – thus ensuring i have a quick snack later on in my line up for notre dame.

going to notre dame alone really reminded me how much more paranoid i am when i travel by myself. though i enjoy the lack of accountability (stop and go as i wish) it is more unnerving to be by yourself. i played the parisian role by reading on the metro while huddling in the corner. karmun wisely slept in and left me to stand the line up (yes, line up 30 mins prior to opening – insane!) and climb the stairs (400 something of those) by myself. i don’t blame her – i wouldn’t and haven’t cared to go up last few times in paris either, but i really wanted those gargoyle photos.

notre dame itself, outside of the stair climb, was pretty much as expected. i had a cute chat with the security guard about the ebook – not because he thought its a problem, but just because he saw me reading it and got curious. that thing provokes friends like no other – everyone wants to look at it and touch it. its awesome!

the climb reminded me that after paris i’m probably going to have mad toned legs, because of all the climbing up and down from the subways, into the subways, from our apartment, into our apartment, from views and sights, into views and sights, from museums, into museums, from stores, into stores, etcetcetc – these people don’t like their gyms but love their stairs.

the views up top were as spectacular as promised; photos – eh, we’ll see – i definitely loved the gargoyles. if i ever have a balcony i’m definitely getting a few gargoyles – they are actually really cute. i even saw one that looked like an elephaunt – how awesome is that?

quickly getting home after picking up a few small bottles of wine for tonight put me home at 12:15 – pretty early for having checked off a landmark of the day’s list of activities. k slept in and so we went to have a very Nice lunch in the nearby square – it was somewhat pricey, but very good. it was the nicest meal we’ve had so far; to be honest though i enjoyed the cheaper food in other restaurants a bit more. i like the classic french bistro fare. before we sat down for lunch we noticed the market that i was looking for earlier in the morning  – it was now open, so we walked around.

markets seem to be very similar between all cities in europe. though they change depending on the size of the city  and the language, the essentials are always there. fish, cheese, meat, veggies, fruit, cheapo clothes.

clothes – nah, nada

fruits – cherries

veggies – nah, nada

cheese – yes, a bit, 50g

meat – procuitto, yes, a bit, 100g

c’est tout. quick and efficient.

we dropped off the produce at home after lunch and went on to louvre. louvre was the same as usual – though we got a lot of awesome photos of horribly freaky painted babies (painted as in, on the paintings), i got really stressed out and overwhelemed in my usual fashion, so  we wrapped it up pretty quick and got out of there. all told for louvre it was 2 hrs – i guess i’ll keep that limit in mind next time i come!

we headed to pompidou area, and prior to going to the museum took a long, relaxed coffee & coke at a nearby area. it certainly helped restore our spirits and renergize us for another museum.

pompidou was fun – i liked a few exhibits:

  • a lot of picasso – nice to see.
  • fauvres – like old friends, happy to see again
  • duchamp’s ready mades
  • some very modern art where the artist cut a hole in the ceiling in a very geometric shape and then placed either the ceiling or white cubist/triangular pieces shaped like it on the floor. basically a great piece of installation art.
  • a video of a woman violently combing herself and repeating “art must be beautiful. artist must be beautiful.” it actually made quite an impression on me.
  • some modern furniture/industrial design, but not enough. i should hit up some industrial design museums next time or maybe even find some in toronto.

after pompidou we walked around the area, which turned out to be super sketchy. we got hungry and picked the restaurant too quickly and got our first major major rip off of the trip – not TOO Bad of a rip off, but still. the food was HORRENDOUS, like, unbelievably bad. so bad we actually shook our heads at some tourists that came up behind us and thus disuaded them from sitting down. a table near us sent their food back. we sure were happy to have the market meats back home at this point. though the atrocious dinner provided us some energy to get home, ugh, NEVER AGAIN a place with an english menu.

it really was so bad it became funny. even the wine was watered down. terrible.

anyway. after the terrible, terrible place, from which we ran as fast as we could – we got home, picked up our snacks, and finished them in front of the tuileries garden fountain. towards the end of our meal a very nice, friendly, normal guy near us chatted us up – and i mean, very normally. (we tried to grab a few chairs and they were sniped, so he commented how chairs are expensive around here).

after he tried to open my wine and failed, we got kicked out of the gardens because they were closing, so we ended up finish our meal and my wine on a nearby pedestrian bridge – which was really, really fun! it was great to meet a non creepy local, and he genuinely was very nice. we all chatted amicably for about an hour and then he left home and i realized my wallet was missing, so we rushed back to the apartment.

before ya’ll freak out:

1) i mentioned i’m married as soon as it seemed that he’s not a creepster that we’re trying to get rid of

2) wallet was left at home

3) we’re being smart and not stupid

anyway, so all was good; we came home, i copied photos, i blogged, and now to read and then sleep in slightly.

plan for the last day is somewhat vague right now. i want to sleep in until 10am, because i plan to stay up until our flight – our flight is at 9:40 so we should be in the cab by 7am at least, and given how its 1:20 as i’m blogging this i think i’ll be ok if i have a cup of coffee around 10-11pm. this way i should pass out on the flight and arrive nice and switched back.

we want to visit place dus vosges/marais; see dept. store bon marche; go for drinks in the montparnasse; get a sunset photo of eiffel tower over river (i’m the driving force behind THAT one… its a pain because i know what photo i want but dont know where i can get it from); and generally have a good time on our last day. hopefully we’ll fit it all in.

the only thing i know, is that the food in that place SUCKED MAJORLY. ugh. at least our tourist karma has been fulfilled.

day 5 – c&a, orsay, eiffel, inspiration strikes

    day 5 started pretty freaking late, given the 2am bed time. we got up at 9 am (karmun) and 10 am (me), feeling pretty groggy. dragged ourselves back into the shopping area and ended up in the same breakfast places as the one the day before – but too late for breakfast, but that point it became almost lunch time. i had a delicious salad with procuitto, melon, soft cheese and tomatoes; karmun had a chicken club as to keep her delicate system healthy. the food was good, and after lunch we split up for our respective goals.

    one positive thing about today, though i am still ugly coughing and we’re both somewhat “off”, karmun is back to feeling much better. me? eeh, i’m hanging in there.

    our respective goals were – c&a for me; lafayette for karmun. 1-2:30pm we hunted and hunted. i went through 4 levels of that store; found nothing for mom; found 1 jacket for me (woo), and a shirt when i was waiting for k back at our meeting place.

    zara was unsucessful.

    i still feel dissatisfied about lack of shoe success; that said after talking about fashion and shopping with karmun tonight i realize that a lot of it stems from my lack of looking. an 80 eu pair of shoes is 130 cad. i never buy shoes that expensive in canada; if i did i would likely – and often surely could – find the type of thing that i am looking for (cute, high quality, stylish flat, etc.). the goal was to find the same thing cheaper – and that was not THAT successful. i did get lucky with my zara high heeled pair.

    after shopping we regrouped and headed home for a quick breather (that’s when i blogged day 4). after the breather we went off to orsay.

    aah, orsay. my favourite museum; the impressionists will always sit dear in my heart. we lolled around there until they closed and kicked everyone out. k enjoyed the impressionists and wasn’t too obviously bothered (well, truth be told she wasn’t bothered at all – very patient girl) with my insestant chattering about “they did this because of…” and “look at the way that he painted the light here it is so hard because…” and “oh my god look at how claustraphobic this feels!” and “LOOK AT MY GOOSEBUMPS” (which i seriously said at least 3 times). apparently i’m the type of person who gets goosebumps around great art.

    maybe it was the AC.

    i really think it was the art, though.

    the lillies weren’t on show this time, but k fell in love with “Woman with a Parasol”, both of them (1, 2) – i think she liked 1 more.

    after we got kicked out, we subwayed it in another crazy hot subway car to the eiffel tower. walked around, took photos, had coke and a crepe, and headed back home.

    sunset went into full swing by this point. after eiffel we went onto this huge ferris wheel, and this is when my inspiration woke up and i got a lot of excellent photos. as we came down, renewed and somehow inspired i actually got some excellent photos as we crossed the louvre, the river, slowly making our way to the restaurant for a quick bite to eat.

    the dinner was excellent; i had meat of the day (blood sausage in wine reduction with apples and mashed potatoes) and k had fish of the day (no idea). we wrapped up at 11, headed back and got stuck again on the bridge because it was too freaking beautiful.

    day 5 was the most productive day photography wise. and probably least successful sleep wise.

    you must understand, its light here until 10pm, how in the world are we supposed to go back home before 11? ofcourse now its almost 1am and k still has to blog, so i sign off.

    day 4 – galeries lafayette and montmartre

    day 4 started off pretty poorly. i woke up with a headache, grumpy as all, feeling sick and tired. this despite going to bed very early – i got 10 hours of sleep, but the sleep was very “low quality” – i kept tossing and turning and waking up every time i do so.

    i got up first, blogged, woke up, showered, karmun got up around 9am and we again fairly quickly and efficiently got our butts out the door by 9:30.

    walking away from the touristy area where we’re staying we headed towards paris’ largest department store – galeries lafayette. a huge department store, full of fancy, designer, unique and other clothes, shoes, bags and anything you can dream of. their shoe floor was mindblowing on several levels. it was really quite insane.

    but i’m getting ahead of myself! each morning i wake up grumpy until i have my coffee, and in general because we dive into high energy action quickly after eating we must have breakfast. we found a cute little place near the store where the breakfast for the 2 of us was not only 5 eu cheaper, but also much, much better. compare and contrast:

    • louvre area 10eu gets you: a coffee, a croissant OR toast (and they were out of croissants and the toast was very very lame), a little plastic “airplane style” box of jam, orange juice, butter.
    • more french oriented dept. store area 7.50eu gets you: a coffee, a croissant, a great baguette toast, a small glass jar of jam, orange juice, butter.

    the cafe was very cute otherwise as well. a funny highlight – as we sat and ate i saw a little boy with a russian grandma? (mom? looked too old to be his mom, boy was 7-8 yrs old…) walk in. she perched on the edge of the outer seating area, and instructed him in a classically Russian way to take a photo. then, she actually walked in deeper and posed against the curtains that framed the entrance to the cafe, and he took another photo. and then they ran away. they didn’t even have anything to drink in the stupid cafe, and trust me, the cafe was not even that remarkable!!! ah, hilarious.

    in all ways it was a lovely breakfast. and karmun was feeling better; i felt better too upon taking advil cold & sinus. after munching away and waking up we ran through the galeries for women, galeries for men, c&a, another dept store (name forgotten, next to the galeries), galeries for the house, all in about 3 hours.

    while most things were madly out of my price range the memorable highlight was indeed the shoe floor. the galeries for maison (for the home) was surprisingly good – though a lot of stuff, or most of it, is available in canada, it was great to see a lot of the familiar brands close and side by side. i can tell you guys, we’re damn lucky – the mid century classic remakes that are produced in europe are about 3 times more expensive.

    i also saw my favourite elephaunt – http://www.dwr.com/product/designers/d-g/charles-ray-eames/eames-elephant.do?sortby=ourPicks – very very cute and costs .. 300 eu. at the exchange rate, that’s insane compared to the above, especially given how both are manufactured by licensed authentic makers.

    after speeding through the dept stores we decided we’ll split up and return tomorrow – me, to cover the cheaper and more “old lady” c&a, and karmun to cover in detail the dept store which is not in my reality for most clothes. next on our list was to hit up the area where we had the nice authentic dinner 2 days ago.

    on the way to our dinner we passed by a few shoe and clothing stores where i noticed some stuff that i really liked – a pair of cream flats for 30eu and a black dress for 35eu. the general area was close to a bunch of japanese eateries. by guess and intution we managed to cross from the dept stores into that area and actually find all the stores we saw before.

    side note. paris is really hard to navigate because nothing is paralelle. it is very web like; all streets are diagonal; and for my intuition, when i think i’m going in the right direction in reality, like a man lost in the desert, i’m slowly veering off course without knowing it. i.e. i’ll think i’m going towards point A and i’ll arrive at point B 15 minutes walk from A – but on the same X axis. its pretty frustrating because usually i feel comfortable orienting myself by memory. well, finally this border was broken – i think i’m getting the hang of it!

    as we were “crossing” into the other area we found some burger/meat place that was (a) right there when we (really, i am the driving force for “exhausted-can’t-stand-up-anymore”, so i should say “i” instead of “we”) needed it, and (b) seemed reasonably cheap. i ate a burger which was nice – i needed some beef to get me standing – and i had a glass of white (which always helps, don’t you know), karmun had some beef sticks and the usual coke. it came at a great (reasonable) cost and was a good break in the day.

    after lunch we successfully got into the area and very quickly found the right stores. i tried on the shoes, liked them, bought them, and the dress, liked it, bought it. by this point it was getting close to 5-6pm, so we headed back to drop off groceries and take a quick breather.

    after the fast -superfast- breather, off we went for karmun’s gucci store on rue Saint Honore. it was actually quite funny inside the store, because i was dress “ghetto” – white skirt, some fairly rumpled top, cheapo flats, and karmun actually put on the high heels to test them out so she look fabulous. i’m pretty sure the gucci guy thought either i’m the sugar moma, or the assistant to some chinese soap opera star.

    on the way there we stopped in some boutique little place and karmun bought a pair of really gorgeous, unique, french, beautiful, and possibly slightly overpriced shoes. (she doesn’t care what i say. she knows!)

    dropping her purchases off, we headed out to montemarte – karmun for the first time, and me for the 3rd. subway was inbelievably, insanely hot – no air movement, tonnes of people. i broke into an itchy sweat within 10 seconds of standing inside that cab, it was absolutely unbelievable. the weather has generally been sunny and hot – i’m not sure if we’re picking up color, but definitely not losing it.

    at the abessess subway station we ended up being the complete noobs by taking the stairs. no wonder there was an insane lineup for the elevator – the freaking stairs had 10345425098427 flights on them. we had to stop twice. and this is AFTER we’ve gained stamina from our 4th floor walk up!!! looking online, looks like we’re the noobs. ah well. excersize :-) turns out its the deepest subway station in paris. the name should’ve hinted…

    montemarte was lovely as usual. i drank my tiny (375ml) bottle of riesling; we ate croissants and cherry tomatoes; listened to the guitarists and tried to spy the pickpocketers. we even bargained down a caricature/artist guy to a very cheap price to paint the two of us :-) we promised not to tell how much so that he can try to get the full price from others. funny!

    the caricature is adorable and shall be uploaded.

    he (the painter) was a very enterntaining and animated guy, chatting to us about pickpocketers, watches, languages, other travellers (supposedly some insane russian couple paid him 150eu for the drawing of the 2 of them. i find it REALLY hard to believe!).

    when the sun got low enough we walked over to the moulin rouge – first time for both of us – and yes, very creepy area. no wonder i hadn’t been there before :-) but near the moulin rouge, 2 police cars, metro 30 seconds away, and lots of tourists who looked far more hapless than us (we are always clutching at our bags like mad). after hanging out there we went home, and high on good weather, good mood, and good health stayed up until 1am drinking tea and wine at the local corner bar (until they basically kicked us out).

    sleep came at 2:30am. my poor, jetlagged head probably can’t figure out what the hell am i trying to do with the shifting sleep times by 6 hrs each night.