Day 41: Mindy

I know, right? Mindy fucking Cher? I couldn't believe it either. But apparently she's here, so hells yes we're going to hang out.

Specifically, we're going to go to Au Trappiste on Rue St. Denis. I'll admit, I got nervous when Mindy invited me out for mussels and fries at a Belgian restaurant in the heart of Paris-touristique. I thought she was talking about Léon de Bruxelles, a chain restaurant best approximated by taking a TGI Friday's, adding a French accent and removing the health code. I thought back to a particular subway poster making perhaps the least tempting offer known to man: buy one plate of inedible, cheese-soaked mussels, suffer through a free second plate of inedible, cheese-soaked mussels, absolutely free.

Do not want.

But everything turned out better than expected. Au Trappiste not only offers tasty, well cooked mussels with plenty of crusty bread and soakable broth, but also (well fuck me French-ways) a beer menu. A whole menu just for beer. Not only multiple beers but multiple good beers. My choice, a Belgian import called Rochefort 10, remains the only good beer I was able to find in Paris. Although I have to voice a tiny bitching here: Where is my delicious, triple-hopped, West Coast beer? I miss that muddy bitterness, that where-has-this-taste-been-all-my-life intensity that slaps me in the face with my own tongue (in a good way).

Above: The bar

After dinner we headed out for a long walk down to the Pont des Arts, which like so many other things in Paris I'd been meaning to do basically since day one but just hadn't had the time. In case the name sounds familiar it's probably because you've been, as I don't doubt that next to the Eiffel Tower and the Louvre it's the most visited spot in Paris. It's the wooden bridge right near the Louvre where couples go to write romantically their initials on a padlock and then throw romantically the key into the Seine. Man that sentence was hard to write. Was it hard to read? Good thing this is a first-draft-only blog.

Anyway trying to find the Pont des Arts took us right down by the Seine, which in the summertime is without a doubt the place to be if you like things like drinking and eating snacks with your friends, and in general being happier than most people have any right to be. In fact, many people felt so contented and so friendly that they decided to call out to us as we walked by. Actually, I noticed that they seemed especially eager to greet Mindy's sister, for reasons that to this day remain a mystery. I'd say it had something to do with her quite revealing dress, but that doesn't make any sense. French people are notoriously shy and restrained when it comes to relationships between men and women.

The Quai, looking extra stylish. No Instagram filter required

An iPhone photo that doesn't suck!

Of course, while we were sitting down by the river, drinking wine and talking about the problems specific to people of our age group and financial status (what's a synonym for "imaginary" or "not extant"?) two French people had to go totally off their shit and start attacking each other. I think I mentioned a few posts ago that while I can carry on a passable conversation in French on academic subjects like music or politics, I am completely unable to talk to the acid trip au chocolat that is the French child. As it turns out there is another slice of French society with whom I absolutely do not share a language: angry drunks. I overhead a couple "suce ma bite" (suck my dick), but beyond that I can only assume the remainder boiled down to philosophical contention and disagreements over the best translation of Bourdieu. Also no, I have no idea why the French slang word for penis is feminine. I have no idea why the French not-slang word for penis is feminine. In fact, I can't think of a French word for penis that isn't feminine. Weird choice, France.


Fleeing from the altercation, we made our way back across the Pont for a quick coffee and some closing remarks. Yes, in hindsight I do realize that this was a mistake. Unsurprisingly, getting a late night drink at a popular tourist cafe with outdoor seating and waitstaff and a view of the Seine was extremely expensive. In fact I'd say that of my entire trip to Paris this was the high water mark of money wasted. It turns out it is possible to spend six euro on a glass of fizz water, putting a spit take just above the international poverty threshold.

I want to add something quickly, Stephan: Mindy deserves from you just a sliver more respect. Granted, she can't compete with you intellectually on any of those topics in which you claim expertise, but try asking her sometime about something she cares about. That something might end up being 50 Shades of Gray, but she can express a lot more than vapid enthusiasm for a shitty book. Mindy is perfectly capable of sound reasoning. What's more she demonstrates remarkable sensitivity to cultural trends, not merely as a consumer but also as an analyst and thinker. All I'm trying to say is, be nice.

Water the price of liquid rubies consumed, it came time for us to part ways. Mindy and sister took a cab back to their hotel (it was maybe 100 meters away), for me getting home would mean a long trip on a Paris bus. Actually, the bus ride ended up not being to bad. Notwithstanding the fact that there were 56 (my initial reaction: fucking what) stops between Hôtel de Ville and Mairie de Montreuil, I made it home in a highly reasonable 45 minutes. I also managed to take maybe a billion long exposure photos in an effort to be artistic, of which exactly one doesn't look like a dog turd convolved with a screen door.

I didn't say it looked good...

Au revoir, Mindy, probably someplace in New York. I'm looking forward to seeing you, but it will be sad when your sister can understand what people are shouting at her.