a jersey girl in paris

[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

Happy Fourth of July, folks, from a Jersey girl named Sandy.

(Bruce is singing to me, and me alone, by the bye.
Us down the shore on this warm July, our carnival life forever.)

4th of July Asbury Park (Sandy) - Bruce Springsteen

(The Sounds of Summer)

It might be unhealthy of me to automatically follow anyone who posts a song from The Wild, The Innocent and the E-Street Shuffle, but it hasn’t hurt me yet.

“Sandy” was the last song from WIESS, my favorite album forever and always, that I fell in love with. Immediately it sounds like the epitome of a song that has aged badly, something that can only exist in the end credits of a soapy 70s romance, what with Bruce’s whispers and the acoustic guitar and tunnel-of-love accordion and a girl named Sandy of all things. But then you realize that these lyrics (especially these verses) are the most beautiful lyrics to any song that has ever been written, and I don’t even think I can explain why.

And you know that tilt-a-whirl down by the south beach drag?

I got on it last night and my shirt got caught.

And they kept me spinning, didn’t think I’d ever get off.

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Pilot: Before we start our ascent, an important question: Anyone here from the North Allegheny high school class of ‘68?
-Silence.-
I always ask. I’m hoping at some point I’ll find my old girlfriend.

JetBlue flight
Pittsburgh, PA
(via Overheard Everywhere)

(Photo from LIFE : ROTC cadet Lieutenant William Ackenhauser snuggling in front seat of car with his date Joanne Warren..Kansas City, MO, 1945)

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I once answered an ad looking for a nude model (one of the more audacious things I’ve ever done). The artists’ studio was located near the Place des Vosges, and it was filled with not-half-bad oil paintings, and sketches from the figure drawing class they taught. My interview consisted mostly of wine, cheese, discussions of my new Parisian life, being undressed for a bit, and a mouse that noisily scuttled about in his home underneath the floorboards. We tried to feed him some of the cheese to coax him out and join us, but he didn’t oblige. At the end, I never replied to the messages they left afterward, because I realized I am just not made of that much moxie.

(Photo from LIFE : Painter Fabius Gugel using nude model, partially covered with checked cloth, to sketch figure for center panel of his elevator mural seen in background behind model. Rome, 1950.)

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All he needs is a good stone.

This episode, during which a small part of me died, was a revelation: It was the first time anyone had asked me to prove that I could do the job I was applying for. All the answers and explanations, all the words about what I could do, were irrelevant. It was put up or shut up, and as I packed up my things to leave, Lloyd said the damnedest thing. He was a jeweler, he said. He could recognize a gem even when everyone else saw a stone. All he needs is a good stone, he said, and he could do the rest. An impressive and poignant metaphor, particularly for a man who apparently learned English by watching Dynasty, and it may explain why he never called again.

—Esquire article ‘Help Wanted’ by Richard Dorment,
who applied for 300 jobs & heard back from eight (via thedailywhat.)

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The No Smoking Orchestra at Solidays 2009, Paris.
Violinist is keepin’ his eyes on you, man.

Can you spot me? I’m way in the back there,
to the right of that hulking black-walled structure in the crowd.

photo via their website.

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My coworker scored us free passes to Solidays this past weekend. Solidays is an annual music festival that raises money and awareness for the fight against AIDS. In the program pictured above, it’s described as “une sorte de zone érogène de solidarité.”

The performers we took in :
Saturday — Amadou & Mariam*, Keziah Jones, a bit of Alela Diane, Yodelice, Bénabar*, Anthony Joseph
Sunday — Ayo*, Zabranjeno Pusenje/Emir Kusturica & the No Smoking Orchestra**, La Grande Sophie, Cocoon*, Manu Chao*
*faves

Highlights :

Folks covered in stickers in the style of tobacco package warnings that said things like “L’homophobie peut entraîner une mort lente et douloureuse (Homophobia can result in a slow and painful death)”
The sweet, perpetual smell of miss mary jane (duh)
Ayo bustin out with ‘I Want You Back,’ the MJ tribute I so desperately wanted
Crossing paths with Olivier Besancenot, the mailman/leading political figure of the radical left, looking pretty yummy in a blue&white striped shirt and two little kids in hand (yes, I am that shallow)
The cerulean batty bat costume worn by the No Smoking Orchestra’s lead singer
And their weirdo krik-krak of “Are you agree?(sic)” “Fuck you MTV!” during ‘Upside Down’
Que voy a hacer, je ne sais pas. / Que voy a hacer, je ne sais plus. / Que voy a hacer, je suis perdu / Que horas son, mi corazón.

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On the télé at the moment : Les Demoiselles de Rochefort (1967).

« Ca te dit quelque chose ça, Lola-Lola ? »

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three-piece

I manned the cashbox most of my time at the Strand Annex (which heartbreakingly closed shop last summer). I eventually gathered a wee coin collection, one I displayed on my nametag.

Here are the 3 coins I’ve managed not to lose : a simple indian rupee on the left, a u.s. quarter splashed with a bit of watercolor on the right, and a pipe-smokin’ Abe at center.

pretty penny

This might have been stamped by one of those coin-squashing contraptions found down the Jersey shore, or, (or!!), it was mischievously imprinted&circulated by one most marvelous person (my possible twin soul).

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This morning, standing on the sidewalk and smoking my pre-work cigarette, I saw Roman Polanski and wife Emmanuelle Seigner walking toward my direction. Romek was looking really good for a 75 year old, with luscious white-grey hair, and a spryness in his step. But he appeared rather bitsy flanked by Emmanuelle and another woman, who were both tall (& outrageously gorgeous) dames.
When they walked past me, I did nothing but stand and stare (a reaction identical to that of my previous acclaimed-director sighting). One of these days I’ll learn the art of aloofness.

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I picked this short story up from the library this weekend. Here are the first words:

Le bonheur, c’est comme la santé : quand on l’a, on ne le remarque pas ; du reste, il y a beau temps que les gens d’esprit l’ont dit. Mais voilà, les années passent et vient un jour où l’on s’en souvient ! Oh oui, comme on s’en souvient !

Moi, je me rends compte maintenant que j’ai été heureux durant l’hiver 1917. Année inoubliable, année de neiges et de tempêtes !

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Photograph of my former landlady and her estranged husband,
taken back when they were young and in love (évidemment).

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I am loving this video with all I’ve got.

I saw Camera Obscura at the Point Ephémère two years ago — in the top 5 of my favorite Parisian experiences.

You, with your dietary restriction
Said you loved me with a lot of conviction
I was waiting to be struck by lightning
Waiting for somebody exciting
Like you
Oh, the thing that you do
You make me go, ooooo
With the things that you do (you do, you do)

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We didn’t have money to buy cigarettes, so we’d get us a coffee can and collect the butts thrown off the train,” she said. “Mother would always leave a skillet of cornbread and brown beans outside the house for the hobos coming through. Evidently, they had passed word on to their friends that Mother was a kind lady. She’d never have enough food for us, but she’d always have something for somebody.”
“I said, ‘One of these days I’m going to ride a train to remember Mother and those hobos.’ ”

— Finding the Charm of Cross-Country Rail Travel - NYTimes.com

We didn’t have money to buy cigarettes, so we’d get us a coffee can and collect the butts thrown off the train,” she said. “Mother would always leave a skillet of cornbread and brown beans outside the house for the hobos coming through. Evidently, they had passed word on to their friends that Mother was a kind lady. She’d never have enough food for us, but she’d always have something for somebody.”

“I said, ‘One of these days I’m going to ride a train to remember Mother and those hobos.’ ”

— Finding the Charm of Cross-Country Rail Travel - NYTimes.com

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[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

“You Beat Me to the Punch,” Mary Wells

It’s the whoa-oh-oh-ohs that get me. They get me every time.

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I had a mad impulse to throw you down on the lunar surface and commit interstellar perversion.

-Manhattan, Woody Allen

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