Day 10: Oddities

As I think I've probably mentioned before, sometimes this city is weird. No but really.

This is a little shop called Picard. They sell exactly one thing, and that's frozen food. The reason the shop is called Picard is because reason not found. The reason someone thought such a thing was necessary was reason not found. All that notwithstanding, Picard's claim to fame is that they can freeze dry anything, and that when it comes out thawed on the other side it will still be palatable. For example, I found:

Hamburger

Bagel, both vegetable and salmon, with cheese

Croque monsieur

I shit you not motherfucking sushi

In addition to weird frozen food places, the 4eme is also clogged with absurdly overpriced clothing stores. If your head is currently unexploded and you'd like to keep it that way, I suggest you steer clear of the 4eme. Although, there is some relatively clever stuff here. One shop was selling designer impersonator "kits", sets of stuff you could buy if you wanted to instantly be mistaken for a member of a certain social class. Two of my favorites, the German and American graphic designer kits:

German, obviously

American. "Verres Inclus" means "You like Atari and fonts"

These next two are from CDG airport. See, the French get international airport design. The goal--and I'm explaining this for your benefit, Newark Airport--is to impress. Foreigners should arrive at your airport and think "Wow, these people have their shit together," not "That's funny, all the rooms smell like the men's room." That's why CDG is just a massive glass column built around a five story open air courtyard. Well, open if you don't count the glass ceiling space escalators.

One final oddity, this one form the basement of IRCAM, and I can't really promise that this will be exciting for any of you as it is for me: A compendium of public domain Max patches, sitting next to a bottle of Eau de Vie.

IRCAM: We take your taxes, we make noise, we buy booze.