Traveling with Mr. Golden Underwear.
Today was a travel day, as we left Paris for a short stint in Lisbon. As is pictured, Scott truly is Magellan and must’ve had mad pin the tail on the donkey skills as a boy, as he could’ve never have been in a place before and he’s say, “we have to go North, then West” and we would magically end up where we needed to go. When he was given a map of the metro, you’d think he was being given a Louis XIII gilded chair, he was so excited. Yet, we’d pop up out of a Metro station, walk a bit, and be exactly where we needed to be.
I recognize that the European me is pretty much the direct opposite of the NYC me in so many ways. In European cities, I stop to take pictures of buildings knowing in my heart that I’ll never look at these pics again, but they’ll make transferring to a new iPhone so much slower a year or 2 from now. At home, I walk by NYC landmarks with the same enthusiasm as passing a Sunoco Station. In Europe, I walk 8-9 miles a day. At home, I wish to win MegaMillions so I can hire someone to carry me around the city in a onesie snuggle suit on a cold day. In Europe, I take the metro. In NYC, I view the subway as if “Beneath the Planet of the Apes” is a real thing (no shout out to racist Roseanne). I’m a surface person all around. I even chose to drive over bridges vs tunnels, you damn dirty ape!
Paris was certainly fantastic, but with few exceptions. It turns out the Hunchback of Notre Dame never had a hump, but was perpetually hunched over lighting up cigarette-after-cigarette like many of his countrymen. Pepe La Pew to all the smoking. I’m not sure if it’s the retaliation against Trump’s tariffs, but you’d think there has to be an embargo on ketchup in this country. They dole it out as infrequently as their warmth towards tourists, yet is a city that serves fries pretty much with every meal. However, I do give them credit, especially the men, that so many of them walk around with baguettes sticking out of their backpacks, while in the US we act like gluten is the second coming of Ted Bundy (I’ll avoid the bad cereal killer joke).
Anyway, we got Lisbon; which they call Lisboa. It’s fairly obnoxious that we don’t call countries and cities by the names they call themselves. It’s like meeting someone at work who says, “Call me Teddy” and we dumb Americans say, “Sure, Ed!”. We had dinner in a wine cellar that used to be a port winery. Beautiful city, but while we were in Rossio Square, we were asked 3 times if we wanted to buy Cocaine. Even European traveling me doesn’t follow those white lines.
Rubber Chicken 