Part IV- the Wasteland...

...where your humble knight finds herself swept on an evening quest, with faeries and hobglobins lurking in the fabulous Milanese woodwork, Bulgarian storm raiders flying strongly at side, and finally expulsed from the floating pirate ship by a bloated pig-curr
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I'm finally sick. Like real sick. Not the wiggly toe, toasty in bed, day off sick.

ugh.

Last night was a killer... I think I left the house at 4pm, to meet Voin at the Pompidou and stray around like heart-broken love-birds. Born 4 years, 7 days apart, but might as well have been the same day because the same emotional whirlpools seem to show up at the same time for both of us.

Eventually, we pop over by Yvonne Lambert, and my favourite gallery attendant, the scrumptious little muffin who had the knitted tie last time, is working. Voin and he have a work appointment, and the third musketeer in their project is an extremely yummy blond boy, apparently Nan Goldin's assistant, who is straight! A straight gorgeous hunky(but like off the Gap Ads gorgeous) art boy? Where does that happen. But, said assistant, after some minutes of talking, is obviously ambitious and not a master-fuckup, thus ruling him officially out of my books, unfortunately. (I know myself too well and trouble finds trouble, whereas successful winners find successful winners).

So, we get invited to the back, which is all hush and art-serious, the way the posh ones are, and sit on the lovely dutch designerish grey couches. They proceed to talk, while I fiddle with my bag and an invitation, occasionally tossing jokes and sly sassy questions to my muffin. The muffin, who for the record is quite gay and practically married to a very sweet and lovely puffin, answers in his typical weighted fashion, underneath of which I can feel the laughing and the thigh-slapping.

At the end, they ask me what I do...
-Well, I'm an artist, a contemporary artist. Isn't everyone these days?

Which is really, think about it, really the best exit line you can have with cute posh art-fancy boys.

Then I head over to the bloggers meeting, which, for obvious reasons, I am NOT going to spill the beans on except that there were soooo many women, and it was a thorough pleasure to meet Vivi, Petite, Auntie M, Chocolate & Zucchini, Antipo, and Coquette... I mention those names because those are the blogs I caught onto before, and could thus place more of a person behind the name. Oh, and also a new person, someone whose blog I didn't read before but who I was quite charmed by: Bienvenue à mon monde by Sarah Wooden.

Eventually parted, where made food pit stop at the Bulgarian Palace, watching the little Pepe looked all folded and cute on the couch. I didn't blog about Wednesday night, when I went out dancing and met this other Bulgarian, the Pepe, teenage friend of Voin's, who is now a fashion designer in Vienna. He's really cute, in a floppy blond hair skinny tall eastern european way, and wears his clothes so finely over his tallish wide-boned rack. Not hunky, more just impressive... like a young count in his salad days. The whole time, we were listening to Bulgarian pop songs from the 60s, and I was eating a hamburger. The new 60s for the 2000s...

Jump in the car and run off to party at PointFMR, which has a ridiculous lineup. Peaking through the windows, it's obvious the place isn't packed yet so why are we waiting at all. Pepe disdains waiting of all kind, and Voin, really eager to get in, tries his best Mafioso way to squeeze in... but none of us are really that keen, since there was another plan already in place before.

Then, we head off to the other plan... with the cavernous space, hanging island bedroom loft, old-school eighties rare vinyl, and our two hosts, a man and his fashion designer wife. Talking, drinking, smoking, and other stuff (which is not sex), ensue. Two hours later, we saunter out of there...

to got to some mad party hosted by a man dressed up as a 18th century lute-player, minus the wig, which is really the best part, who yells, he and all his other bushy haired friends, the moment we get through the door. Everyone is looking slinky... it's another fashion party... this is turning into fashion night. But, sick... 5 minutes after getting through the door, the guy starts yelling about how if we have 5 euros we can get some cocaine... the price of course slipping between 5 and 20 euros then back to 7 euros in the space of seconds as he gets confused and then freakish when his dealer doesn't pick up the phone. This city is full of white dust and it's mad to see it up close.

Crawl onto a couch with Pepe and chat. We giggle about technology, stuff, people... I like his diffidence, his idea that work is more important than partying, his valor and his uprightness without the ensuing preachy conservatism. A man of his own words, and own fashion label!

Quickly the party dissipates, with the white stuff being of short supply. We pack up and accompany Pepe to the street, where he gets a cab and goes back to the apartment. The poor boy is exhausted from 4 days of looking at fabric. And so...

...Voin and I head over to David and Marly's. I know I dissed Marly in an earlier toss, but, well, just at home, with her feet in the air, and a nice glass of wine, she's cool. I like her then. David, who I have seen always and forever in all those art/fashion parties, is a rather eccentric looking man, with great glasses, an orangey moustache, skinny, rocky, tough and funny. He reminds me a bit of young Jean Rochefort, if Jean Rochefort ever wore jeans, and was gay. We all start drinking, dancing, listening to all our favourite freshly downloaded tunes, and talking about a shitstorm....

David, who has an impeccable english accent, is really actually french. A fact he didn't cease to emphasize the whole night. And then, in a rare moment of Gallic honesty, he said: "We like you non-French, in Paris. We like it that you're here and we're very nice to you. But we will crush you. I am from Paris, I am French... we may like you, but as we are french, and you are not french, we will do everything in our power to stop you... from becoming more successful, than us." I start laughing madly, and tell him that he's a ripe ole goon because in fact, what he's saying comes as no surprise. What actually is the surprise, I tell him, is that China is coming over to kick his sorry ass, and me, being 75% Chinese, will eventually one day be his warlord. In fact, I would be willing to save his ass by lying about his asiatic origins, if he agreed to be my serf right now.

But, we are taking the piss out of each other... I like David, and he likes me. Thank god I'm not in graphic design, where I can see him waiting round some Dutch corner, with a machete ready for my back.

Finally, after extreme messiness, we get around to heading for the Batofar, for the last stretch of the night. As usual, Voin is on the list, but under a different name. Something strange happens at the door... David was messy drunk, and something gets passed between himself and the security man. They yell and push and we try to change outfits to sneak in again, but it doesn't work. All the security hates our guts, all because of something, probably a nothing, that David said. What's with all the Davids I know and their sharp biting tongue that almost always lands them in hot water.

After 10 minutes of squabbling and pushing, we head back to the car.

The sun is risen over the grey city. Paris looks terrible and awful, in her aging steel armour. I love this city. I hate this city.

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epilogue:
This afternoon, just waking up, I was finally outrun by the flu bug that has been chasing me. The pain is deep in my throat and sinuses. A fine reward for an epic journey. Dish rag slumped and head like a thunderbearing cloud. This girl is on official party hiatus.. that is.. hiatus from going out.

Which is all fine because I think I need to start seriously working... too much running around and Pepe sets the good example for us all.

Finally... a happy ending: The gloves, those glorious gloves, are in the possession of a crazy lesbian couple, that left a wonderful and warm message on my phone. The gloves always find their way home.