It feels like only days ago that I was sitting in the Paris airport, trying to get my bearings to go meet my parents. I knew my mother would be hyperventilating about her poor baby girl riding the subway alone, and my dad would be laughing at her and thinking about books or ice creams or ladies with pretty legs (he does that).

It feels like a lifetime ago.

It's been a crazy trip. I'm down to my last five euros, just enough to buy a can of coke in this godforsaken airport. At least the wifi is free.

So.

Yesterday morning I woke up to a grey and rainy Amsterdam. I will say the city was crying because I was leaving, and not delve any deeper.

I'm glad I had had such good weather as it was.

What was I going to do? That was a good question. I'd hit all the major museums, and some of the minor ones. I even saw that stupid Bible museum.

So I started to wander without a lot of purpose. Found myself near the Old Church, right as it opened. And hey, the Museumkaart worked there, too! So in I went, if just to get out of the elements.

Rembants wife was buried there. She died when she wasn't much older than I am now.

The church was a bit run down. It hadn't been maintained well for a long time, but they were in the middle of restoring and getting things up to snuff.

But check out this huge and manly organ?

Seriously massive instrument. I was intimidated. It covered the entirety of one wall, almost floor to ceiling, except for a door underneath it.

The church got pretty badly stripped of its decorations and paint during the *muttermuttermuttermuttermutter*.

Okay! I can't remember. It was a religious shift, anyway, that looked upon so much decoration as frivilous and taking away from God's glory, or something. A lot of churches got their interiors painted flat white, and all the carvings pulled down.

I can't remember if this organ survived it, or was built after the crazy relaxed.

I stuck around there as long as I could bear. There was some dude doing really bad paintings in one section of the church. Maybe I just don't have an eye for modern art...I didn't take any pictures. It wasn't worth it.

Then I left. It was only around noon.

I decided, what the heck, I'd check out the New Church!

Unfortunately for all of you they didn't allow pictures, mostly because they had a special exhibition on about the Jewish religion.

I think I had to pay extra to get in, on top of Museumkaart, but it was only something like three euros.

The exhibition was interesting. Very thorough. They even had pieces of one of the Dead Sea Scrolls. For reals! I'm not full of shit! They had four (I think) small shreds, about the size of paperback pages. They were, apparently, pages detailing how the temple would be built.

They were so delicate that they were kept in separate little room that was all hung around with heavy black curtains, and a woman at the entrance who would only let a few people in at a time.

After that, I was at a lost. It was barely past one. What was I to do?

I wandered around for a while. Found a shop that was closing down, and selling all it's clothes off for five euros, assessories for 2.50.

How could I not?

I bought a dress for myself (originally 130.00 euros) and a scarf (20.00 euros), together for 7.50. I like getting deals.

It was very cold out. I finally decided to take a canal tour.

You know those ticket shops, that all proclaim to have the cheapest tickets for all the major attractions?

Yeah, they're all full of shit.

They were all proclaiming a 'deal' of eleven euros, but I went directly to the boats to their little kiosk, and got a ticket for nine.

Go to hell, ticket sharpers!

The tour was nice. The captain was very friendly. He always made sure to slow down and point out good photo ops.

This is apparently the seven (I think) arched bridges. Maybe it was nine.

Doesn't matter much, since you can barely see more than three!

I got to see bits of Amsterdam that I didn't get to before.

The captain told us about the famous business man who opened this restaurant:

First he said: "No smiling. This is a sad story. I don't want to see any of you smiling."

And then he told us the story of this famous Chinese businessman who had a very successful restaurant in China. He either moved the whole building here, or he built a new one. I can't remember.

Anyway, it could seat SEVEN HUNDRED PEOPLE! Which was unheard of at the time.

Everybody was so excited. All sorts of dignitaries were invited. Seven hundred of them, in fact!

They had all sat down to dinner and were starting to eat when...the whole restaurant started to sink!

No smiling! This is a sad story!

They had to evacuate everybody! All the dignitaries in their fine clothing in the sinking restaurant! (Of course we all know Amsterdam is built on top of mushy ground, so lots of wooden poles are driven into the ground before things are built.)

Well, they investigated to find out what had happened. They went to the engineer who had calculated the capacity of the restaurant, and checked over his numbers and discovered what had happened.

When the Chinese engineer had calculated, he had calculated seven hundred CHINESE people.

But of course seven hundred DUTCH people showed up.

Now the restaurant seats five hundred.

HEY, NO SMILING.

Aw shit, I gotta board a plane! I'll see you all in Canada, eh!

I am sitting in the same place for breakfast, in the same chair, even, and just killing time until I have to catch my bus back to Paris, then the plane back to Canada.

I'm already wearing my travelling clothes, even my lucky underpants (those are important).

Forty-eight hours from now I will be in Canada. No canals, no good cheese, no crazy history and beautiful buildings.

Don't get me wrong. I love Canada. But I often feel that the cities are built more for efficiency than love or pride.

I've been thinking over my travels. What makes me proud to be Canadian?

Anything?

The whole mess with the oil pipeline that's going on right now. What are we viewed as? Just another source? Another country sacrificing pride for profit?

What happened to our peace keeping missions? I looked up a list of missions. Between 1990 and 2000, we were involved in approximately sixteen different peace keeping missions.

Since 2000, approximately nine, with two of those continuing on to today.

What happened to Canada as a peace keeping nation?

I have been talking a bit to other folks, and I more often than not get rounds of: "Oh, Canadian! That's just like American!"

Sometimes it's just to get a rise out of me, I know, but it's kind of true.

Someone leaned over to me after one of those encounters and said: "But really. I don't see a lot of difference."

I don't really, either.

I can rail against being called American, but really, is there any difference?

We get shittier winters and a lizard-man for a prime minister, instead of a nubian god. We have a Queen that hardly ever comes to visit, and more land than we know what to do with. We can't very well fill it up with civilization, because let's be honest, who really wants to live in northern Saskatchewan? Seriously.

Amsterdam has a population of a million(ish) people, and about 1.2 million bicycles. I have watched the traffic with great interest. Most people drive bicycles or motorcycles, with only a few driving cars. Nobody wears helmets on bicycles.

I was terrified at first, and I asked my buddy Cipri about it, and he just laughed.

So I watched some more.

People in cars watch out for bicycles. They actually treat them like vehicles on the road (unlike Calgary, where people get really twitchy near bicycles and/or try to nudge them off the road). They also appear to trust each other to be paying attention, and move around the road carefully but with purpose.

I wish drivers/bicyclists in Calgary could see how the traffic moves here. I am downright embarassed at the city's treatment of bicyclists, and I wish Calgary would install about a thousand more miles of bike paths.

Mind, Amsterdam has hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years of development on Calgary, and even Canada. There are houses that were built before Canada officially became a country.

In conclusion, I guess I should point out that I know all countries have their problems. This is really just whining about a first world problem. Some countries have more problems than others, and certainly, Canada is not NEARLY as bad as most.

I just wish it were easier to be proud of my country.

So this morning I woke up, and the internet wouldn't work again, so I left.

And I saw this poster.

I don't know why, but I love this poster.

I think it's fantastic.

There are days that I wish I was Ru Paul.

He's the bomb, as they say.

ANYWAY.

Enough transvestite fantasies.

I found the same breakfast place. Had the same breakfast. It was similarly delicious.

Looked at my guide book. I'd already hit most of the major museums.

Decided to try out the Bible Museum.

Because I'm thinkin': ILLUMINATIONS! BITCHIN'! *fist pump*

I get there and it was a whole lot of...no.

It was...a handful of engravings, a handful of reconstructed rooms (which were interesting), some Egyptian artifacts (including a very creepy mummified cat), and the history of the first bible printed in Dutch (and also kind of the rise of Dutch Reform Christianity).

BOR-ING.

The only illuminated prayer book they had on display was badly degraded and most of the paint had faded, leaving nothing but a little ink and the gold leaf.

So I left.

(Also, there was a big meeting going on in one of the rooms, and the museum people kept chasing me from room to room to get me out of the way of the crowd. Kindly, but still.)

(Also, this was not an objective museum. This was definitely a religious museum. As an agnostic, I found it a little unsettling.)

I will say two things about the Bible Museum: They had some excellent biblical engravings on the first floor. Not just good in the biblical sense, but who ever did them was a seriously good engraver. A really excellent hand with light and shadow and composition. I was impressed. I wish I had the guts to sneak pictures of them, but the room was close to the main desk and I didn't want to incur the wrath of the museum manager.

Also, there was this super wicked staircase.

I wasn't really supposed to take pictures, but seeing as I was the only patron in the museum (LITERALLY; I SAW NOBODY ELSE), I completely ignored the signs. At least, above the first floor I did.

Anyway. Cool staircase.

Amsterdam seems to have a lot of cool staircases.

Except in the Anne Frank house. That staircase was just depressing.

Then I left. Decided to head over to FOAM, the photography museum, under my cousin Miriam's recommendation. It didn't hurt that it was very close.

On the way I stopped by a canal for a little lunch.

Oh, what a hard life I have!

That's cumin cheese, I think. It was hard to tell.

Fresh strawberries.

Radishes.

Sparkling water.

ALL SOAKED IN BEAUTIFUL SUNSHINE.

It just made it more delicious.

Unfortunately, when I had only a handful of radishes left, the stupid wind took it upon itself to blow over the cup and all the rest of my radishes went bobbing down the canal.

*sigh*

Well, some duck is going to have a spicey dinner on my coin.

The strawberries were a little under ripe, but still about a billion times better than the giant, wooden, hollow things we get in Canada (mostly).

At one point a duck came by to see what I was up to (he was a slut; he was going around to all the people sitting on the canal edge), and was all: "Is that food? You should give me food. I want food."

But of course all I had were fruits an vegetables. But I threw him down a little piece of strawberry, at which he merrily dove.

He beaked it for a few seconds, then spat it out and tilted his head at me reproachfully.

Then, I swear to you, he dipped his beak in the water and washed out his mouth.

Cheeky bugger!

No more strawberries for you, ungrateful wretch!

I lounged around for a while, reading my stupid book (it's one of the Temperance Brennan ones, and it's almost as bad as the TV series, though considerably different), then headed over to FOAM.

Hilariously, they did not permit photographs in the photography museum.

There was stupid show a woman did on. I can't tell you much about the show, except it was a lot of the reject pictures left over from previous shows.

The only one I really liked was a picture of a prepubescent girl wearing a lime yellow bikini, staggering out of the ocean, half grinning and half grimacing with the cold. It was an interesting juxtaposition of her fashionable bikini, which was obviously bought for style, and her entirely tense muscles from the cold, the tendons in her neck and arms and thighs all standing out, and the roiling ocean behind her.

If they'd had a poster of it, I would have bought it.

There was also a show on about the New York Times Magazine, and some of their more famous issues. There was a series on the Afghanistan war, and 911, and the Kuwait oil fires. It was pretty intense. The running theme, I think, was recognizing good stories before they happen, putting photographers in dangerous places.

Or something.

The 911 photographs were pretty intense. There weren't many of them. There was also a series of portraits of New York muslims, and interviews with them about peoples reactions to them after the attack, and their feelings.

I thought it was very important. Every single one of them said: "I am Muslim and I am American. This is a terrible thing. It should not have happened." Though not necessarily in those words.

I looked at all the photographs but I couldn't read everything. It was intense.

There was another section about models and celebrities, I think. It was hard to tell. There were a lot of art students there, being, well, y'know, art students.

But the series on celebrity was interesting for two reasons:

It was photographs of actors, largely after they'd done very long days. They were exhausted, empty, drained, in ways that people don't generally see them.

Also:

There were no photographs of technicians.

Perhaps I am sensitive about the point, being a technician myself. I don't know if any of my coworkers would agree, but I often feel we get shoved to the side-line, the first to be downsized, the last to be recognized.

I would very much like to do a similar series about technicians.

Perhaps I shall.

Anyhoo...

There was another show with some other woman that I didn't understand at all, probably because I don't speak Dutch (sorry!) and everything was in Dutch.

In any case, I left the museum after that, and who did I find!

Why, it's Rembrant!

Being 'awesome'!

Hi Rembrant!

Man. Being an artist kind of sucks.

Nobody cares about you until you're dead.

Did you know that nobody is really sure where Rembrant is buried?

They're PRETTY sure he's under a church here in Amsterdam, but not a hundred percent. They put a plaque up, anyway.

Because he died a pauper, after going bankrupt.

(Admittedly, he kind of over spent on his massive and awesome house. But it was a pretty awesome house.)

I lay on the grass for a while and listened to a busking guitarist play.

There's a guy who plays in Dam Square. He has a napkin on his head, and a hand puppet of a rabbit, and he plays a single note on the recorder.

One. Single. Note.

For hours.

I stopped at a market on my way back to the hostel. It was not as good as the one on Monday, but still okay.

I walked through the Red Light district as the sun was going down and listened to a tour guy tell his patrons that the best way to solicit a prostitute was to go to the narrow alleys, as people on the big roads tended to just look.

It had never ocurred to me.

I walked down an alley full of red lights, where most of the women had little signs on their windows proclaiming what they specialized in.

Apparently, I walked down the electrosex alley.

There was a woman dressed in a latex nurse outfit.

Except for the fact that I'm pretty sure I'd get beat up, I would like to rent a window, put up green lights, and dress in, perhaps, a clown suit or a nun's habit.

See what people do.

Anyway, I think I'm going to sleep now.

I have tried several of this country's fine malt and hops beverages and they have left me sleepy.

You can't see it well in this picture, but far off, past the man in the boat, the swans were going CRAZY.

CRAY-CRAY, even.

I don't know what was going on. I was tired and foot-sore and I wanted to lay down and drink beer, like any good Canadian.

So that's what I did.

And now I sleep.

Tomorrow begins the big trek back to Canada.

*le sigh*

See you all soon, my friends.

WHY HALDO THERE.

Yes. Me again. Your old pal, Rosemart.

Today I woke up late and the damned internet Would Not Work.

I dunno about you, but I like to check my emails while I eat breakfast.

So I went to a little breakfast place with free wifi. Same place that had the goat cheese. It was great.

On the way I saw many bits of graffiti.






Pretty sick, eh?

These were all along one wall. They kind of overlapped and ran into each other. I liked them a lot.

Amsterdam graffiti tends to be pretty cool. Paris graffiti was almost entirely tags, and boring, but the stuff here is mostly art or interesting ('interesting') sayings.


Thought provoking. Mmm.

Anyway, I went down to the Rijksmuseum? I think that's how you spell it. It's mostly under reno, but they had a number of their highlights on display, including, as they made very sure to post a sign about, The Night Watch by Rembrant WAS on display, thank you, so please come in and give us your monies.

There was also some Vermeers! Yaaaaay!

The one I liked best of the ones they had was being hogged by this woman.

Seriously. She stood about a foot away from the painting and wouldn't move. It's not like the museum was deserted; there were lots of other people trying to look. I tried to menouver around her to get a good look at the painting, but she'd all but wrapped her legs around the guard rail.

So I took a picture of the back of her head.


ENJOY INTERNET SHAME, LADY.

(I eventually gave up and went to casually gaze upon The Night Watch, by Rembrant. It was okay, I guess...)

Then I double backed, and the stupid lady had moved on. It was a purdy painting. Vermeer painted some nice stuffs, he did.

After the museum (which my mother will be pleased to know I got an audioguide for, and listened to every entry) I decided lunch was in order.

Lunch turned out to be gelato, and lounging around beside the canals.

My life is so hard.

Have I mentioned this is the warmest March they've had in about a million years?

Okay, perhaps I'm exaggerating on the million. Maybe just a couple hundred thousand.

Brilliant. It's been perfect weather.

So I wandered. Got a little lost, but not too much. Found my way to the Anne Frank House.

Man.

As big a jerks people can be to elephants, they apparently can be bigger jerks to each other.

Let's never repeat that particular point in time, shall we?

Everybody?

Good, we agree.

No more of that.

Afterward I kinda dicked around the streets (that's not hard to do in Amsterdam). Did a little shopping. Spent perhaps more money than I ought to have, but it's okay. Come a certain someone's birthday, there's going to be little girl squeals. (I hope.)

Then I went back to the hostel for a little nap, and my buddy Cipri was all: "ROOOOOOOOSIE! COME SEE THE TERRIBLE PLACE WHERE I WORK!"

And I was all: "*SIGH* You are so hard to deal with, Cipri."

But I went. (He also promised to take me around the Red Light District at night, which up to this point I had been too frightened to do.)

So I found the building okay. Got buzzed in. Promptly got lost.

I *did* find the H&M headquarters! Like, I was right in the middle of it because I came out of the wrong stairwell! And there was nobody around!

I was frightened. I look at H&M a bit like Wal-Mart. I'm pretty sure if anybody high up in the company found me I'd be tied to a table and people would be dancing around in goat skins.

So I fled. Found an elevator.

Encountered a bevy of Dutch speaking businessmen, who all very cheerfully chattered at me and laughed and I didn't know what they were saying and so I just smiled and blushed and I think that was what they wanted because they all laughed some more.

I eventually found Cipri's work, which was in the top, top, top of a building right on Dam Square (which is the main square; there's a palace and everything!). He made fun of me for getting lost. (Jerk.)

I don't know what's going on down there, but something's on fire, and everybody looks interested. There are a lot of police and someone looking very official, so I can only imagine it was intentional.

Cipri's work is right at the top of the building, there's pretty much a 360 degree view. It's pretty crazy.

(That building on the left? That's the palace. Cipri says the Queen is rarely ever there, and pretty much only comes round once a year for her birthday party.)

(Apparently the birthday party is kind of insane.)

Anyway...

HOLY CRAP. WHAT DO WE HAVE HERE?

WHY, IT'S CIPRI!

Everybody say hello to Cipri.

(He can speak way more languages than me.)

(Which isn't really saying much, but there you go.)

So we hung out on the roof for a little while and he pointed out good alleys for smuggling ladies into the gentlemen's club (which apparently used to be on one of the lower floors).

Then we went for a walk in the Red Light District!

It was getting dark(er) by then, and all the ladies were out in full force.

I learned a few things on that walk:

Red light means ladies for hire.

Purple light means Dude Looks Like a Lady.

Cipri is colourblind.

HILARITY.

Moving on.

I was famished, FAMISHED, so we popped over to a sushi place.

They had pretty good sushi.

They also had a few pieces that were like: salmon, with melted cheese.

And: shrimp with melted cheese and pesto.

And: tuna with melted cheese.

And I was all: Okay. What?

But I thought: If I'm gonna have weird cheese-based sushi, I might as well have it in a country that had MAGNIFICENT CHEESE.

Right?

So I tried all of them.

My conclusion is.....meh. Not bad, but not great. I don't suggest the melted cheese sushi. (It was basically like a normal piece of sushi with a sliver of cheese on top that's flash melted, so the fish is still raw(ish) and the cheese is melted.)

After that....what did we do?

I think I just went back to the hostel. It was late. We closed out the restaurant.

We ran into Cipri's sister and her boyfriend on the way back and I tried to fulfill all the Canadian stereotypes I could. I also explained encountering bears to Cipri, and how to scare them off or generally not get eaten. (He thought being covered in bells was a pretty hilarious thing. Hilarious and LIFE SAVING!)

And then I tried to stay awake to post this last night, and compeltely and utterly failed. My brain turned off around 1am and refused to be revved up again.

Oh well. Now you get late posts.

HOORAY FOR LATE POSTS!

Here, have some more graffiti pictures:

I'm not gonna post today because I'm tired. And also I forgot until just now. And also I didn't really take any pictures.

Rest assured that I went to a market, saw the Van Gogh museum, at cheese, saw hookers, met my long time internet buddy Cipri, saw more hookers, drank some wine, and now I'm sleepy.

Here, have a picture of a swan:

Also, there was a seagull there. He was watching me a little TOO closely, like he was waiting for me to die so he could eat me corpse, or drop bread crusts.

Van Gogh did some nice paintings. Also some bad ones.

Ain't that the way with artists.

Soon as you cut off your ear and give it to a hooker, everybody wants a piece of you.

Or was that Picasso?

I always get those two mixed up, except Picasso sucks and Van Gogh doesn't.

Anyway. It's sleep time now.

So I got in last night. Saturday night in Amsterdam, just after dark, and things were a little nuts. I was very tired from travelling, and a little bit scared for being in a new place and trying to find my hostel in the dark, and there were all these flashing lights and trams and people and bikes and everything.

Then I hid in my hostel, all overwhelmed, and talked to cute boy(s) on the internets.

Next time: Bring extra blanket. Even a small one would help. This hostel sucks for blankets.

Okay, I gotta say: AMSTERDAM IS AWESOME.

But anyway. Back to my day.

I woke up 7ish, like I have been for the past two weeks. When I'd gone to sleep, none of the other beds were full. When I woke up, all but one were full.

I was the first one awake.

I got dressed as quietly as I could, ignored my rumbling stomach, and headed out into the street.

It was a wasteland. After Saturday night, I didn't expect anything less.

I didn't really know where I was, but it didn't matter. I have a pretty good sense of direction, especially after living in Calgary (I ALWAYS know where north is in Calgary). So I started walking.

For those who aren't aware, I am rather nervous being in a country where I don't speak the dominant language.

Fortunately for me, it turns out the dominant language is English.

Who knew.

I found a cafe where EVERYBODY was speaking English, and ordered myself a magnificent breakfast of tomato bagel with goat cheese, walnuts, honey and thyme on.

It was freakin' brilliant. Expensive, but generous and delicious.

Unfortunately, it also meant I was burping up the taste of goat all day.

Mmmmmm. Terrorizing Amsterdam with my goat breath....

Certainly not the worst it's seen.

Anyway. I decided to head towards the Amsterdam History Museum. I saw some swans! :D

One of them kept eyeing me up like it wanted to break my arm, so I didn't get too close.

I like swans. Except when they attack.

I found the museum I was looking for, and dropped a load (!!!) on a Museum Card (45 euros, or there abouts). I hope I will make it worthwhile.

The museum was good. Not as big as I thought it would be, but good nonetheless.

This is also coming from somebody who just did almost all the major museums in Paris.

Walked around some. Found one of those little walled communities that's only for women. It was very peaceful. I wouldn't have minded living there.

Discovered it was barely noon.

Checked my map. Headed over to the Rambrant House.

It was interesting. The house was all set up like he most likely had it. They had a full inventory of the things he had in his house, because he ended up going bankrupt in the end and dying a pauper.

They even had his studio smell like linseed oil, which I thought was a nice touch.

After I left there I would have horrified my mother. I found some picnic lunch, sat by the canal, and read my book. Probably for about an hour.

Then I just walked and looked at things. I bought some earrings. Took precious few photos. Found a shopping street. I think I will go shopping again tomorrow, maybe, but earlier when there are less people.

I like Amsterdam. It's a pretty cool city, even if after dark kinda freaks me out.

See you tomorrow, folks.

Today my parents left me all alone in the wilds of Europe.

YE GADS.

My mother made me tell her my WHOLE itinerary, and write down the names of the places I would likely be, and talk her through all my comings and goings.

My dad looked me over once and said: "You're an adult. You can take care of yourself. Bye!"

I found the bus with little problem. Got on the bus and then realized I had to pee.

I held it for a loooong time.

I also didn't take any pictures today. Between moving around so much and packing, I didn't want to risk forgetting it somewhere.

Instead I will give you pictures of previous days.

Here is a cheeky bird at the mosque tea house.

I think he was trying to use mind control on me, but all I could decipher was: "CHEEP CHEEP CHEEP. CHEEP CHEEP. CHEEEEEEEEEEP."

The bus ride was long and boring.

I found the countryside to be both more developed than Alberta/BC countryside, and less developed.

That is to say...In Canada is seems that when a place is developed, it's quite dense and clearly developed, and when it's not, it's super wild and filled with badgers and deer and killer moose.

Here it seems to be....kinda halfway. You can tell they've been working the kinks out of things for a long time, but not a lot of distinct villages/downtown areas are visible from the road.

Or perhaps I just wasn't paying attention.

Here is a bit of window from the Sainte-Chapelle.

Bitchin', n'est pas?

Imagine doing that all by hand, including melting and colouring the glass?

In. Sane.

I really liked that church.

I like churches a lot, even though I'm not particularly religious. I also find them pretty hilarious.

I found it interesting to note that while Joan of Arc featured a lot around the city (statues, paintings, what ever) there was no mention of the French being the ones who captured her and turned her over to the English and to her death...

Or was it the other way around?

I always get that mixed up.

Anyway. I'm tired, and Paul's not online anymore so I'm going to go hide under my covers and sulk, because life is so hard.

AAAAAAAMSTERDAM. :D

Today I did very little.

Slept late. Ate late. Left the hotel late.

We went to some stupid museum that was stupidly far away and saw some stupid Monets. We also saw Monet's personal collection of art, which included a great number of illuminated pages (and PIECES of pages, the horror!), none of which I was allowed to take pictures of.

Stupid museum.

ALSO! The stupid museum didn't even have a complete book of the illuminations collection! STUPID! They had A book of their collection, but it included NONE of the Florentine pieces, which where the best pieces of the whole lot, if you ask me!

Stupid museum.

Then we went to a patisserie, and a very nice young man tried very hard to speak English for us, but only managed:

"Good.....uh......er........eh......day?"

He tried very hard, and his pastries were very delicious.

I ate this:

It's a cream puff on top of a cream puff, filled with pistachio bavarian cream.

My life is so hard.

Mom had a berry tart of some sort.

It was also good.

But mine was green and that made it better.

Coincidentilly, this is also the only photo I took today, because it was the only thing that mattered that I was ALLOWED to take a photo of.

(Stupid museum.)

Tomorrow I go to Amsterdam, where my mother is convinced I will be sold into white slavery.

I have already had the Talk on How to Avoid Slavers.

Oddly enough, none of the Talks included rolling and exceptionally high initiative.

That's how I usually avoid slavers.

(Unfortunately, I left my d20 at home. Oh well.)

See you tomorrow, peeps!

I am so damned tired.

My leg isn't hurting much anymore. I don't know if I'm stronger or I'm numb.

Anyway.

This morning I put my proverbial foot down that we were GOING to the Museum of the Middle Ages OR ELSE.

Here is a lovely candle mount from 1480.

I would not be surprised if it were German, judging by the head dress, but I don't know. It didn't say.

The Musee to Moyen Age (for all you French speakers out there) was pretty neat. It was not as...thorough as I was hoping. I was hoping for more things dug up out of dumps and sewers and that sort of thing, and less...chipped apart lumps of rock and secular items.

Still. It was pretty interesting. There were a number of nice tapestries, if you're into that sort of thing.

They had JUST finished a show of illuminated pieces, and I refuse to check the exact date of when it ended because I don't want to know if I could have seen it and missed it.

But they did have a handful of nice illuminated pieces that you could check out very close. Also, they let you take pictures (no flash) so I got a few good shots, I hope.

Check it out. I would say those squares in the background were about an eighth of an inch square, and all the not-gold ones had white work on top.

Pretty nuts. Someday, I'll be that good.

Someday I'll use period pigments, too!

I talked my mother into buying a book on illuminators and scribes from the museum bookshop. I found it pretty amusing that most of the books there that were any good, I already owned. My mother even approached me rather excited at one point with a book in hand, only to discover she'd bought it for me five Christmasses ago (and I use it a lot: The Medieval Tailor's Assistant).

After the Museum of the Middle Ages I decided I was Done Like Dinner. Done. No more museums. We'd done the Museum of the Middle Ages, the Musee d'Orsey, the l'Orangerie, Musee des Arts Decoratif, Musee de la Mode et du Textiles, Musee des Arts et Metiers, the George Pompedou Centre, Saint-Chapelle, Notre Dame, the crypt in Notre Dame, the Catacombs, the Petit Palais, Versailles, and the Lourve THREE TIMES.

And I was done.

So when my mother said we were going to go to the Musee Carnavalet (which was the history of Paris), I said: "No."

"But--"

"No."

"Well....what do you WANT to do?"

"I want to sit in a park and read my book."

"But--"

We walked all the way there and at the door I stopped. My dad stopped too. And that was it. We were like mules who didn't want to go any further.

Mom went in, though. Dad and I sat in a park around the corner, in the sun, and read books and napped, respectively.

And this is where I noticed this fellow:

Oh fine and noble pigeon.

He was the most hopeful pigeon I have ever seen.

He walked up and down that roof top. When he was all alone, sometimes he would sit on that corner and stare forelornly at the street below.

That is...until another pigeon landed on his roof.

Oh, and then! THEN! Our fine feathered friend would strut up behind her and puff up his feathers and do the mating call walk.

And do it and do it and do it until the frustrated female would fly off again (usually within about ten seconds).

And our poor buddy would take up his perch again.

Someday....someday his princess would come...

At the end of the evening we took a totter down to the docks and took a boat ride along the Seine. The sun was setting and the lights on the Eiffel Tower were coming out.

It was all very pretty. I told my dad that a night like this needs a man to down a bottle of wine and profess his undying love.

My father took me gently by the arm, waggled his eyebrows in a lascivious manner and said:

"I think we're too closely related for that."

I gave my father a look that looked something like this: -_-

He just giggled.

Which reminds me, the other day we were walking down the street, just me and him.

All of a sudden he leans over and whispers very loudly: "HOOKERS!"

And I said: "....what?"

"HOOKERS!" he whispers again, and points over his shoulder. "WE JUST PASSED SOME HOOKERS."

I looked. They didn't look like the hookers I'D seen.

"They don't look like the hookers I'VE seen," I said. "They look like they're waiting for some---ooooh."

"VIETNAMESE HOOKERS," my dad whispers. "THEY WERE HERE LAST TIME, WHEN I CAME BY MYSELF."

Again, I was a little: -_-

There were a lot of hookers out that afternoon, if my father's summation was correct...

And on that note, I think I will go to sleep.

See you tomorrow, peeps. Only two days 'til Amsterdam!

My leg doesn't really hurt today!

Perhaps because I appear to be numb from the waist down...

Man, so I love me some painkillers. I will forever travel with my own.

So the Master Plan told us we needed to hit the Museum of the Middle Ages, but they were not open until ten for some reason, and so we went to the Louvre instead.

It was REALLY busy by the time we got there. It was not pleasant.

We braved it, briefly, until I found myself in a WHOLE ROOM full of CRAP.

Some guy named...now what was it....

Rembrant. Or something.

Whatta wanker.

Can't even paint the whole canvas...

BAH.

You know who's AWESOME?

Vermeer.

Just sayin'.

Cringing in abject terror, my dad and I abandoned my dear mother there and headed toward the Musee des Arts et Metiers, which is a fancy way of saying science museum. Or specifically, tools and industry and stuff.

It was pretty neat.

It started with ten dioramas of various workshops, built in the 1700's by a VERY enthousiastic teacher.

To give you an idea of scale, those tables were probably about three fingers high, the way you'd measure liquor with fingers.

There was all sorts of little workshops, from a blacksmith, to a potter, to an alchemist.

I gotta post a second picture of this, because it's so cool.

See those glass bulbs?

They're probably about as big as a quarter (not counting the stem).

SICK. BONER.

They were so finely wrought. I don't know if they were original, since I don't read all that much French, and the English explinations weren't very detailed, but even so. Pretty amazing.

It went through all sorts of nuclear stuff and solar power, which was passingly neat, but I didn't honestly care much.

There were some things in this museum that I think they just had displayed because they were given them and didn't know what else to do with them.

Like this gem!

This is made out of primarily ivory, and is carved as a single piece.

It was only maybe four inches across. It kind of made my brain hurt.

Of the visible levels, there are fourteen spheres inside each other.

In case you missed it earlier, THIS WAS CARVED AS A SINGLE PIECE.

There were a number of pieces like this, largely out of ivory, some pieces out of ebony. But mostly ivory.

It's such a pity that in order to obtain ivory, you have to be a real big dick to a pretty nice animal. I would love to try my hand at carving ivory if it didn't involve so much dickery.

Today, I think, has been the day for weird things and penises. I'll get to the penises later.

But the weird things.

So my dad fell asleep on a couch, and so I continued on by myself.

At which time I found a church full of planes and the Statue of Liberty.

I AM NOT FULL OF SHIT.

I even took pictures to prove I saw it.

I am largely as confused as you are.

There was also a giant pendulum, like there was in the Pantheon.

It wasn't QUITE as big, but this was a smaller church.

There were absolutely no explinations for the planes or the statue of liberty, though. It was not the only planes hanging around, though, not the only statue of liberty.

After the church, I left very confused and went to sit on the grass out front and pretend I was back in the mountains.

That probably would have worked better if a parade didn't come marching by.

It turned out to be about eighty children dressed as princesses, princes and (inexplicably) one Luigi that I did not manage to take a picture of.

They were marching down the middle of the street, accompanied by four very enthousiastic drummers and a full police escort, while they screamed: "PRINTEMPS!" (read: SPRING!) at the top of their lungs.

This also confused me. I particularly enjoyed the children with hats that looked like suns and birds, none of which are, of course, pictured here.

After that my dad came wandering out looking dazed and more awake, and I told him about the lovely parade he'd just missed.

We went back to the Louvre to meet up with my mom, and we happened upon this reclining beauty.

AWWWWW BABY.

Such fine workmanship.

Such pearly marble.

Such pert lady-buttocks...

Such...

Wait...

What?

That, my friends, is a penis.

Also boobs.

Boobs and penis.

BOOBS AND PENIS.

In case you aren't convinced, I made sure to take a closer picture.






See?

Terrifying looking penis, I admit, but a penis nonetheless.

I wonder why it's hollow...

I wonder who tried to break it off...

I am suddenly reminded of the lyric: "Six inches forward, five inches back; I GOT AN ANGRY INCH."





Enough of that noise.

I started to notice penises everywhere, on everything.

Or in the case of this poor fellow, the lack of one.

Here is an added fig leaf.

At some point in history, some stupid politician decided all the penis statuary was unseemly, and decided to get everything covered in fig leaves.

I would punch that politician if I could.

Still, at least it's a nice looking fig leaf.











We also found this unfortunate piece of junk:

By junk I mean penis.

Yes.

That is a penis.

That little twisty thing is a penis.

You know what the most hilarious thing of this is?

The actual statuary that this junk belongs too.

There are four of them, and they're all looking down at their slightly mauled junk.





It enabled me to get this beautiful photo:

I will leave you in silence for a few lines to let you truly appreciate it.


















That, my friends, is motherfuckin' art.

Anyway, I need to go to sleep. I am very sleepy.

I will leave you with a picture of the meat-grinder that is the Mona Lisa room:

And to think: that's not even at the height of the day!

G'night folks!

Paris, AGAIN?!

How SO last week.

Okay, so, yes. Paris again.

We started late-ish. It was nice to lurk.

The Great Master Plan (which had been written out on a paper placemat stolen from the dining room) said we had to go see the Musee d'Orsey.

So that's what we did!

MAN. They were ever strict there. Dad got chased around a bit for taking pictures.

I snuck one or two.

I really liked these hair sticks. I'm not entirely sure what they were made out of.

The flowers were a translucent peach colour. The stalk was brass, and the stem was horn.

Really well done. I was super impressed.

All that art just made me want to go home and make art. I wish I knew more about jewelry making.

Dad and I ditched mom there. She had an audioguide and was SO INTO IT ALL. I saw what I wanted to see, learned of a new artist which I liked but can't remember the name of, and then I was done.

So dad and I left.

I kept seeing this graffiti everywhere. It's all over the city where we are:



For all you plebs who don't know any French, it translates to "Look at the sky". My dad is being very helpful there in the last photo. And by 'being very helpful' I really mean 'being confused by non-specific instructions'.

It makes me think of this song: CLICKY CLACKY CLOCKY

FUN AND RANDOM FACT TIME!

The musical that that song is from is called Urinetown: The Musical. It was inspired by the composer's time spent travelling around Paris on $5/day, and discovering he had enough money to either eat, or use the pay toilet.

COINCIDENCE?!

Probably, actually.

Anyway, I have the lyrics running through my head, more specifically:

Look at the sky!
There's a great big heart there!
There's a heart in the sky,
There just is; don't ask why!
It's the sky!

Hilarious, no?

Yeah, you're right. No.

Anyway, dad and I ditched mom at the Musee d'Orsey and headed down the street to the Jardin du Luxembourg, where we sat and stared vaguely into the distance. I fet a pigeon some, even though I probably wasn't supposed to.

We checked out the old Roman ampitheatre. Boys were playing soccer where gladiators fought once. It was a neat old ruin. There were lots of old men playing bocci there too.


There was also the Judean Popular People's Front.

Splitters.

Or that's my dad.

I always get those two mixed up.

In any case, I think it's time for me to go to bed.

LESSON FOR TODAY: Stinky cheese and oranges taste REALLY REALLY BAD together. In case you were wondering.