Oh dear. I think I'm starting to lose it.
I am now unable to walk down a normal Parisian street without stretching my neck and twitching my head like a turkey training for Christmas or even just one of our common or city pigeons who are accompanying me along my Paris idyll.
What can this mean? Early onset madness? Creeping insanity? Or just a heightened awareness of things? In any case it's worrying... me and my friends!
Because of this illness I'm currently incapable of strolling the sidewalks of the capital (or the middle of the road, more often than not) without looking to right and left, up and down, in the not so unlikely hope of seeing something interesting. Sometimes intriguing. Often historic. Occasionally weird. And from time to time startling, shocking or smile-inducing.
All of this for the price of a few pairs of shoes and a neck massage, which, by the way, you can get for free (don't forget the tip says the sign... err, what?) in the down town Marais on any given Sunday. Haven't tried it yet. Too busy taking pictures of things like this.
Like, err, what, exactly, Mr. Sab, one of my student's might be tempted to ask.
Ah hah, well now, you see, this is payment for all this head twitching and neck stretching, you see...
What we're looking at here is in the interior of a little turning, up under an arch, so it just goes to show, us twitchers do sometimes unearth things which might pass the average wanderer by.
And what's so amazing about a street sign, you might ask? Well it is interesting, honestly, because I only know of two examples of this type in Paris, and it's history crying out to us from the very walls we wander by.
This in in the Marais, and indicates a change of French mentality. A famous French writer or poet, ohh, who was it - I'll get back to you on this one - probably Hugo or Voltaire, objected to calling a dead-end street a 'cul-de-sac', which is French for 'bottom of a bag', or something from which there in no way through. 'Cul' is also French slang for ass or arse, and the poet remarked that these little dead-end streets look neither like bags nor arses, and so shouldn't be labelled so.
He considered 'impasse' far more elegant and correct, and so it came to pass. Luckily for us, however, a couple of the original names are still holding on grimly to existence, and you can see one of them here.
The original name, 'Argenson', referring to a Seigneur who held land and a mansion in these parts around 400 years ago. So there you go. Who know where the other one is..?! Or any which I don't know about for that matter, do share, and I will too. Use it or lose it is what I say. Although, as I said earlier, it may be way too late for me ;~Sab
Thursday, 7 July 2011
Wednesday, 6 July 2011
Paris and I ~ 'Why Are Girls So Stupid?'
iPhone Photo Chronicles ~ Why Are Girls So Stupid? ~ |
It was the two ripped up 'My girl is stupid' stickers that made the image worth shooting, of course. Without them it would just have been a picture of someone else's picture, even if I did add a few special effects, and that's not street photography in my book.
I also can't remember what the 'My girl is stupid' stickers are about either. A Google search doesn't help much, but it does cause an eyebrow to cock, I must say.
Typing 'my girl is stupid' leads, logically enough I suppose, to a whole load of discussion forums and Q & A pages dealing with, well, can you guess? Stupid girlfriends!
It seems that there's an inordinate and rather depressingly large number of guys out there in this pitiful predicament. I feel for them, I really do. Here's a sample, called 'My girlfriend is stupid?':
well lets just get to it, ive been dating this girl for 8 months and she dyes her hair constantly and it annoys the piss outa me, about 2 months ago i confessed to her how much i hate having to adjust to a new hair color every couple of damn weeks. i said this cause she wouldn't let me cut my hair and she wanted it to grow out...i absolutely did not but w/e i let it grow (now its long as **** -.-)
It's riveting stuff, I know, and you can read the whole sorry story here.
Here's another example, entitled 'Is my girlfriend that stupid?':
Okay, you know those stupid little fights that couples get in? Well I was talking to my girlfriend just now, and she was telling me how she really missed living in New York City.
Well, the thing is, she's from a suburb of NYC called "Farmingdale".
So, I politely corrected her and said "you didn't live in NYC, you lived in Farmingdale." This turned into an hour long argument, about her telling me how she's from New York City and I'm wrong. I'm sorry, but if you look at that map, it shows that she is almost 1 hour away from Manhattan...
More excitement here.
I'll spare you 'I called my girlfriend a stupid B - and it's her birthday today', and leave you with the genuinely perplexing 'Is my girlfriend a stupid fucking whore?':
long story short, i am hanging out with my GF and 2 of her friends(also girls) one ive dated before and the other i almost dated and fooled around with several times. my GF knows i find both of them attractive. well they were watching porn, and being slightly suggestive, then my GF got/gets mad every time i even slightly suggest that they do "something" (they are all bi)
am i missing something or is my GF just a stupid bitch?
The answers are just as revelatory, and occasionally poignant too.
Thank goodness guys don't suffer this terrible affliction. Phew! ;~S
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© 2011 Sab Will / Paris Set Me Free - Contact me directly for photo tours, interviews, exhibitions, etc.
© 2011 Sab Will / Paris Set Me Free - Contact me directly for photo tours, interviews, exhibitions, etc.
Tuesday, 5 July 2011
Paris and I ~ 'You Lookin' At ME, Punk?'
iPhone Photo Chronicles ~ You Lookin' At ME, Punk? ~ |
I've also heard it claimed that faith itself, the irrational belief in stuff you have no evidence for, is a little like a rhino: it will do nothing in the way of real work for you, and yet up close and personal it makes spectacular demands on your attention.
Why on earth am I talking about rhinoceroses and faith? Well it's simple really; I'm reading a fascinating book called 'The End of Faith' and they mention the rhino metaphor in it, and, in the true spirit of Paris, I just had to go, seek and shoot one for myself in my capital of predilection, didn't I? You know me. Handy with a lens hood and a dab hand at liturgical heresy. I couldn't resist. For more irreverence, go here. For less irreverence, don't.
Nearby you'll find an irate nelly, a posing stallion and a whole bunch of other statues - have you guessed where it is yet? In front of the Musée d'Orsay, parbleu!
What can't you find in Paris? That, is the question.
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© 2011 Sab Will / Paris Set Me Free - Contact me directly for photo tours, interviews, exhibitions, etc.
© 2011 Sab Will / Paris Set Me Free - Contact me directly for photo tours, interviews, exhibitions, etc.
Monday, 4 July 2011
Paris and I ~ 'Rainbow Rising'
iPhone Photo Chronicles ~ Rainbow Rising ~ |
Theoretically this shouldn't be an unpleasant experience, and to be honest it's bearable, but still funny to see boring businessmen bustling for space with rucksack bearing bums from who knows where, but not around here, jealously speaking you understand.
I'll have my revenge soon, though, because I'll be off to Barcelona, the party capital of Europe, in a couple of weeks, and you can be sure that amongst all the beach paraphernalia and wotnot there will be a perfectly demure business suit-clad Brit, looking ever-so slightly down his snooty nose at all these ridiculous young things pretending they're having a good time, when really he knows they're just making up for not being down at Paris Plage right now.
Think I'll rile 'em? No creo.
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© 2011 Sab Will / Paris Set Me Free - Contact me directly for photo tours, interviews, exhibitions, etc.
© 2011 Sab Will / Paris Set Me Free - Contact me directly for photo tours, interviews, exhibitions, etc.
Sunday, 3 July 2011
Paris and I ~ 'Back To The Plantation'
iPhone Photo Chronicles ~ Back To The Plantation ~ |
Harking back to a colonial past, we see a 'black-skinned man' serving (or offering?) a drink to another man, this one pale-skinned and clothed in white.
I won't go into all the ethical issues raised by this image in modern day Paris, as I've already gone on about it at length when I posted the 'Nègre Joyeux' picture on this blog.
Suffice it to say that it's yet another highly striking reminder of the Paris of yesteryear, which one way or another we haven't quite forgotten. I saw a comment by someone who reacting to another person who called this a 'beautiful old picture' or words to that effect. The reaction was: would it be ok, then, to have swastikas and other Nazi insignia around the place, which we would also refer to as 'beautiful old...'? A good point, and one I won't expand on here. I will say, though, that I'm glad it's still there. If I have to defend that position I can try.
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© 2011 Sab Will / Paris Set Me Free - Contact me directly for photo tours, interviews, exhibitions, etc.
© 2011 Sab Will / Paris Set Me Free - Contact me directly for photo tours, interviews, exhibitions, etc.
Saturday, 2 July 2011
Paris and I ~ 'Wobbles Of My Mind'
iPhone Photo Chronicles ~ Wobbles Of My Mind ~ |
Of course, it's probably nothing. It's probably just a bit of pre-holiday, July madness setting in. But still. Things are still looking a bit wonky from where I'm typing.
Oh, should probably report that, despite lack of pics (I was rowing, you see), I took part in a boat race on the Lac Daumesnil in the Bois de Vincennes, which is a highly pleasant thing to do, if you ever get the chance.
Come to think of it, my rowing was pretty lop-sided too. Maybe that's where it all started.
And then there's people to be running around and dropping off and getting ready and fending off and calming down and sorting out and all in all the week's shaping up to be less than boring.
Which is probably a good thing in the end. Have a wobbly one.
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© 2011 Sab Will / Paris Set Me Free - Contact me directly for photo tours, interviews, exhibitions, etc.
© 2011 Sab Will / Paris Set Me Free - Contact me directly for photo tours, interviews, exhibitions, etc.
Friday, 1 July 2011
Paris and I ~ 'Thank Apple It's Friday'
iPhone Photo Chronicles ~ Thank Apple It's Friday ~ |
In the end I thought it would just be too much (even the French say 'too much', in English) so I just kept mine hidden, as Morrissey once sang.
I've been chugging along with my iPhone 3SG, sorry, 3GS, for over a year now, including having to swallow the envy-inducing release of the version 4 with its much better screen and higher res camera.
However, I'm about to have the last (or at least the latest) laugh, as the iPhone 5 is about to come out with EVEN better, well, y'know, stuff.
If I can afford it. Which right now I can't.
And then there's the competition, which shouldn't be sniffed at, even if you are an Apple freak, which I'm not. I'm just an iPhone freak, but then I came to it from the crappiest little replacement piece of crap you could possibly imagine and it was like being on another planet. And I should know.
Anyway, I've been getting a bit nervous at sticking with the pretty awful resolution for all these amazing Paris shots I'm publishing every day when the original versions could be much higher quality, so I reckon I'm about ready to change. Lo-Fi is ok, and Grunge is Good, but when the pixels start getting in the way once you've put it through a few post-processing palavers you know it's time to change.
Have a great weekend, and may the Apple be with you. (Other brands of smart phone are available ;~S )
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© 2011 Sab Will / Paris Set Me Free - Contact me directly for photo tours, interviews, exhibitions, etc.
© 2011 Sab Will / Paris Set Me Free - Contact me directly for photo tours, interviews, exhibitions, etc.
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