Posts Tagged: paris

Façades III

Off to London tomorrow!

Façades II

Façades I

Paris façades are fascinating.

Salut de Paris!

The first photo is from the airport, the second the view from my room … not much else to report yet, as I only just got here… .

Happy Birthday, G&G!

So, Gethe-and-Goth turns 1 year old today, and if that does not call for a little omphaloskepsis, I don’t know what does. (And it is, possibly, maybe, an excuse to take a break from this paper I am trying to finish writing, which is being unwieldy right now and will profit from some time spent away from it. Shh! It will!)

The advertent reader will of course notice that there are postings on here dated days, months, and indeed, years before April 10th, 2011, but all of them are backdated imports I made a year ago, so that this blog here would not start out completely empty. So they existed elsewhere on the net, but not on here – and not for public consumption, but rather logged for a specific circle of people only, all of whom had to be allowed to see them, and pretty much all of whom I knew/know ‘in real life’ (how is this here not real life? It’s real life, too!) as well. Indeed, for everyones’ convenience, this blog still cross-posts there (to LJ), and LJ is indeed where most of the commenting activity happens, as most people simly know and read me on there, and its easier to keep track of a great many people all in one place on there.

If you look at the mission statement on the right here, you can see that I thought I’d do different things with this blog than I actually ended up doing – post more about academia and academic articles I came across, and possibly not so much about everyday life. Indeed, photos (which turned out to be a major pillar of my updates) are hardly mentioned at all. (Time to revise that mission statement, maybe…after y’all have had a chance to read it the way it is right now, if you want to).

It’s been a really good experience, though – sometimes a bit boggling when looking at the search terms people find this page with (the top 4 for April so far are “underwater statue in key west florida” – “sibylle machat” – “red sand” and “horses ears”. I have nothing on underwater statues in key west (though I read there are some in the waters off of Key Largo, which I had no time to go and snorkle), but the rest actually make sense for once, even though they might not yield what people are seeking).

But I know I had some discussions (with some of you!) last year about the pros and cons of public content on the internet vs. the profession one is in and general privacy etc, and for me, so far, it’s working out – it’s like everything else, practice advertency and ponder what you want to share and what not, and then only put on here the things you would not mind everyone seeing. And it’s been fun to get comments from people I only know via this website, or to keep in touch with people one has met but once or twice. I also still really like that its hosted on my ‘own’ server/webspace, and not elsewhere on the net.

The name … I still love the name, but I admit that yes it does indeed make people think I’m a Goth, which I am really not. :-) So maybe I ought to do more with the multiperspectivity/ineluctable modality of the visible and everything else that the name really stems from. Or possibly write some stuff about Goethe after all, because that’s the other thing people ask me about, and I mostly say “yeah, read his travel writings from Italy. He writes some lovely things about ruins!” (Yep, my PhD blinders, let me show you them!) Or, hmm, ask me what a ‘Gethe’ is. So, the most easily deductive name, it is not. Oops.

Also: 23’077 people in 366 days. Eek. That’s more than 60 per day – not taking into account people reading on RSS feeds or on LJ. Thank you all for visiting, and I hope you find what you seek and have a good time looking around! (The pageviews are even more mindboggling – on April 4th alone this blog had 1’372, not counting spiders.)

I’d say “let’s do another challenge for the anniversary!” but seeing as I’ve not complete the 5-month-thing yet … I’ll just say: if you want to add a photo challenge to that one, go for it! I’ll get around to them all again one day soon-ish, I hope. (Once this paper is finished. And that one. And possibly that other one. And … ;-) ).

Also: if there’s anything you want to see me blog about (more), speak up!

Un fois de plus: la tour Eiffel

Nope, we’re not quite done with la Tour yet – but I’ll spare you the obligatory silly photos where people pretend to be holding the tower up or to push it over or … and yes, I did buy one of those shiny little Eiffel Towers. Eiffel Towers and outstanding pastries and overpriced below average food eaten in locations with advantageous views. And églises and bridges and le Métro and boulevards and tourists and beaches on streets and … that’s (my experience of) Paris.

Other than that, I’m writing and reading, excited about the books my students are picking for their projects (and hoping they are having a good time reading) and why is there no summer? Also, yes, behind with emails. Tomorrow. Also, tomorrow I’m going to the local government office to get a certificate of good conduct. (Yes, yes, also more prosaically a Police Clearance Certificate, but the certificate of good conduct sounds much more mysterious and bizarre, no? I mean, what did I conduct well? I’m no conductor!).

L’après-midi, Place de la Concorde, Paris

And then there were Eiffel towers … .

Et voilà: la tour Eiffel

La Pâtisserie Ladurée / Salut de Paris!

I had to take these pictures while shooting from the hip, because the staff of Ladurée, Fabricant de Douceurs & Gourmandises à Paris were quite insistent that no photography was allowed inside their shop, as it slowed customers down. Well, true that. I take it that the ‘slowing people down’ part is the important one (I hope) and so I took photos without slowing anyone down, and without aiming and focusing properly, resting the camera on the counter and moving along at the pace of everyone else and guessing as best I might as to the angle and composition. I like them well enough for that – though I would have loved to take a properly composed careful photo of all their wonderful pâtisseries and macarons. Oh well.

Photos of églises, la tour Eiffel, les Champs-Élysées,  l’obélisque égyptien &c to follow … eventually. For now:  Salut de Paris!