and a proposal

Today was cloudy, and I'm sick. That pretty much sums it up.

I don't have class until 1:45 on Wednesday, so I had a relaxing morning. I made breakfast then got up to study. I felt kinda scatter brained and couldn't really focus on writing my pop paper. I did, however, manage to finish my work with enough time to get dressed and go to the boulangerie for my baguette.

I didn't realize that the boulangerie near my apartment would be closed so I had to walk to the boulangerie on the corner for my baguette. I came back and ate my bread with herbed cheese. I was going to save part of it for a snack between my exursion and my pop class, but I managed to devour the whole thing without a second thought.

It's getting to be really cold here, so I wanted to be warm but not too warm while we walked around. I picked out jeans, a tank top and pull over, a scarf, and boots and headed out the door. On my way to the train station a guy literally rolled down the window of the parked car he was sitting in to bonjour me. I take back my love of Paris. It's a vile city, and I'm heading back to California on the next plane. It has better weather, and men only hit on you in bars.

My excursion went to the Louvre today so I took the one to Louvre-Rivoli. I got there a few minutes early and sat on a wall outside the Louvre while I waited for our excursion to start. About five minutes before our start time, I saw a group of my classmates with my professor outside the metro stop. I walked over, and we began our tour. You know, Parisians are epic smokers. Our professor must have managed to smoke four cigarettes in the hour and a half we were together. We would be walking for one minute between stops and she would have smoked an entire cigarette! Impossible!

We saw the church that's on the opposite side of the Louvre from the Tuileries, and talked about the different time periods and designs of the church. Then we turned around and talked about the Louvre. I won't bore you with details of the iconography of the Louvre, but it's complicated symbolism that combines an authoritarian state, the monarchy, and Greek gods. That's pretty much the jist of it.

I started to feel extremely faint while we were standing outside of the Louvre. I took off my sweater and scarf, and sat on a post to try to feel better. I would fade in and out of dizzy spells for the rest of the trip.

We then walked across to the artist's bridge that is the next bridge over from Pont Neuf. The bridge is covered in locks, and there was an accordian player. While on the bridge we saw a proposal. It was really cute, if not a little cheesy; I mean seriously, man, a bridge covered in love locks in Paris isn't exactly original.

We talked about the Louvre iconography more, and then moved onto talking about Pei's triangles. I personally hate the triangles. They seem so out of place, but I suppose they fit in with Paris' theme of mixing old and new artistic and decorative styles. After learning their connection with the triangle from the first Bastille Day, and their function, I can appreciate them a bit more. Maybe they're not god awful afterall.

I did appreciate learning about the pink columns that are outside the Louvre and on the Carrousel Arch outside of the Tuileries. The columns on the arch are Napoleon's way of connecting himself to the Louvre and the previous lines of monarchs in France. The pink columns are mined in France and are the most expensive type of marble. Not only are they beautiful, they were meant to make a political statement like everything else in Paris.

Next we saw the medieval moat that runs under the Louvre, the equestrian statue outside of the Louvre,  and a surviving statue from the Tuileries. After class I had to go back to the Accent center for my pop class. At this point I was still feeling pretty ill, and my headache made me not look forward to another hour and a half of lecture.

I hopped back on the metro and got off at Bastille to go to class. Pop was actually pretty interesting today. We talked about the la chanson period of French music that covers such greats as Trenet and Piaf. It's the old timey music that you traditionally associate with French music. Really depressing lyrics that were produced during the interwar period. We also talked about the trinity of la chanson and their singer-songwriter genre. This is already the kind of French music that I listen to so I was happy to learn about it. I was also happy to find out that class is cancelled tomorrow because we're going to the concert on Tuesday.

After class I stopped at Monoprix to buy a bottle of water because my bottle is on its last leg. I then came home and have been bedridden ever since. I've eaten enough potato chips, ice cream, and cookies to kill any lesser woman, and will now be going to bed. 7:30am comes early…