The Loudshoes in Europe, Part 4: Paris

You know how you've always heard that Paris is spectacular and wonderful and the be-all and end-all in vacation experiences? Well, it's all true. It's fabulous.
We flew to Paris from Ireland and had to get ourselves from the airport to our hotel on the train and the metro; luckily, the Mister and I have enough French to be able to read signs and get ourselves on the right train and not to Poland or something.

Our daughters were a bit taken aback at a European hotel room, even one in a modern hotel...it was very....compact. No ice machine, no ironing board, no free wireless. It ain't Disney World, let me tell you. But it did have a dazzling view of Paris from it's rather large window, and that was good enough for me.

We went out straight away to see the Eiffel Tower, which was #1 on our agenda, and as we strolled beside the Seine on a beautiful summer evening, we just kept turning to each other and saying "do you believe we're in Paris??"

The Eiffel Tower was way bigger than I thought it would be (I'm not sure how big I did think it was going to be, but I was surprised.) The Mister thought it was smaller than he thought it would be. Go figure. It is far more delicate and lacier than I thought it would be, too. It's really very lovely.
We wandered around a bit (and got asked 50 bazillion times if we would like to buy a cheap, plastic souvenier of the Eiffel Tower, by dozens of interchangable, sketchy looking guys who were so clearly used to being told "no" that they'd have fallen over with surprise if we had said "yes".)
Everyone was getting hungry, so we found a sidewalk cafe that looked like it would not cost all the money we possessed and we got a decent dinner from the most stereotypical snotty French waiter. Seriously, if I hadn't thought he would spit in my food, I'd have asked to take his picture. He was so full of contempt for us pitiful, non-French tourists that he'd have had to add a few inches to his nose to look down on us properly.

On the way back to the hotel, by way of the Eiffel Tower again, the heavens opened and we got full-on thunderstorm. We ducked into some phone booths nearby, Thing 1 and I in one and Thing 2 and the Mister in another. And Thing 1 and I found a cell phone in our booth! We tried to figure out if there was a number in the contacts that said "home" or some such thing, but the fact that neither of us speak French hindered us somewhat. And then it rang! It scared the bejesus out of us! We probably should have answered it to find out who it belonged to and to tell them where it was, but, again, we don't speak French and we couldn't tell them where it was anyway, we didn't even know were we were. ("Allo! Je have your phone! Here in the booth du telephone! Near la tour Eiffel! But I have no idea what street we are on or where the hell your phone is! Adieu!")

Even though I had said that there would be no sleeping on our trip to Paris, we did make our way back to the teensy hotel room and settle down for the night.

How I Spent My Day, Another Day

The Women's Section of the 1975 Eaton's catalogue was bad enough, but you should get a load of the Men's Department....even worse, if you can believe it. I understand that it is entirely the nature of "style" that it changes drastically from decade to decade, but it's really hard to wrap one's head around the idea that any of this stuff EVER looked cool or hip or attractive or even less than laughable, as if that was that was the height of your ambitions. Also, note the collective fear of showing your ears...clearly a phobia rampant in the 70's....

Exhibit A:

You know why these are "no-iron" shirts? Because they are made out of abominated chemical compounds that melt when heated higher than room temperature.Those synthetic monstrosities just last and last and last. (The Mister had several of these shirts when we got married, and I made him throw them out. But not because they needed ironing!) Don't you love the patterns? The patterns that re-arrange your neurons and make your retinas twitch? Between you and me? The guy on the bottom left is wearing "guyliner".

Ahhh, the Leisure Suit. Nothing says "The 70's" quite like the Leisure Suit. And although they look sort of like very formal polyester pajamas, they look anything but comfortable. In the top picture, the two men look like they are doing a very awkward version of "The Chicken Dance", and the two in the big picture look somewhat happier,but as if they have just been caught doing something they shouldn't have. But what do you expect for $29.95?

Whoa, dude....dial down the pose, please. I know what's in those pants, but I don't want to know what's in those pants, got it?? Love the selection on the right: "Brain Spasm", "Clown School Showdown", and "Brown-tastic Fiesta!""The Toughest Denim We Sell" Really? Do a lot of Hell's Angels buy the denim jacket with the ginormous fuzzy, white collar? Who loves these guys? I do. I very much do. Where every other model in the catalogue looks like he could reasonably shoot for a spot in the "Village People", these two look like real men. Look how proud Earl there up in the left hand corner is. And so he should....apart from winning the Shriner's "Man of the Year" award, he also scored a modelling gig in the Eaton's catalogue.

"So, the other day, the guys and I were standing around in our underwear, like we do, and we got to talking about what would happen if we pulled our waistbands up EVEN HIGHER".

I'm sure the next generation will find our fashion choices equally criminal, but at least we fearlessly showed our ears.

How I Spent My Day

Back in the summer the girls and I went to a small town near here that has the, and I mean, THE, most wonderful junk store in the entire world. I could spend all day in that place; it is spectacular. And for 2 bucks, I got a 1975 Eaton's Catalogue, an impressive purchase, I assure you. (If you are not Canadian, you would not be familiar with the iconic Eaton's Catalogue, which was a fixture for many, many years in every household, like the Sears Catalogue in the States. I'm not sure if out-of-date Sears Catalogues were as favored for use as hockey goalie pads like the Eaton's catalogue was.

I spent hours with this catalogue, it is entirely fascinating.

The womens' fashions are, as expected for the mid-70's, uniformly horrible.

Faith and begorrah! That's a LOT of green. The heading is "Durable Knits", for those of you who like your clothing to withstand, I don't know, a rip-roaring St. Paddy's Day.

Those wobbly heads are not the fault of the catalogue, but merely the result of me learning how my scanner works. Anyway, despite her giddy smile and broken neck, I think the one in the middle is seriously in danger of losing her shit altogether, because she is on her way to a very special occasion wearing only a bedspread.

I'm not going to lie, I'm pretty sure I had the outfit in the middle, and was mighty chuffed about it too. That was a particularly omnipresent colour in the 70's, and a highly unflattering one it was, too. "Yes, let me have something in a dull brown, but put some orange in it....now, a bit of sludgy red, almost like dried blood.....maybe a bit of ear wax gold....perfect! Now, lets make lots of polyester out of it! Make sure it's durable!" The outfit on the right looks very, um...resistant to the human form. Almost like it was made out of cardboard and plaster of paris.

From the "Communist First Ladies Collection". Clearly, Raisa Gorbachev did her shopping out of the 1975 Eaton's Catalogue.

This is as racy as the Eatons' catalogue gets. The one on the left with the peach polyester nighty, has a decidedly "come-hither" look on her face, and the kneeling one either has a very short nighty on or has forgotten her pants. The one besider her must be the fastest one of the bunch, because she isn't even wearing sleeves, the hussy. I can just feel that slinky, slimy nylon.

And JUST when you think the Eaton's catalogue is heading straight down Sodom and Gommorah Boulevard at a hundred miles an hour, you turn the page and realize that all is well...

because this nightwear would firmly quash ANY ideas of sexiness the previous page might have stirred up. Honestly, these are 'The Birth Control You Wear'. Although, the lady second from the right might be wearing the equivilent of Clown Lingerie, I don't know. I do know that the fabric these are made of work up some hellish static electricity, and one would be warned to think long and hard before making contact with another human being. (Not that wearing one of these would bring that occurance about.)

There is much to be thankful for in the 21st century, not the least of which is the re-discovery of natural fibers, and flame-retardant fabric.