La Verre du Vin SVP

Paris seems a million miles away, well, at least 350 or so.

Last night we very almost missed our Eurostar home after Steve insisted on buying another bottle of Champagne from the supermarket. Unfortunately for us, with only 45 minutes to spare and a 20 minute cab drive to Gar de Nord, the old lady in front of us in the queue decided to have a mentalist attack at the checkout, and declared, piece by piece, that ‘someone has smuggled these things into my shopping basket, they are NOT mine’ (in French of course). After off-loading her entire trolley painstakingly, whilst cursing under her breath she then had a moment of clarity and realised that ‘silly me, they are my things after all’. Even though we were very likely to miss our (non-refundable ticket) train, we still found this hilarious.

Right then, Paris.

So, on Saturday night we went to the bar where Sex and the City was filmed, if you’re ever in Paris head to the massive Kenzo store go into the building, hit 5th floor on the lift (it’s not marked, it’s far too cool for that) and enter the world of Uber Parisian posing.

Don’t expect to be smiled at, or to be spoken to in English and expect to be given the once over by everyone in turn, repeatedly. Luckily, I was feeling fairly comfortable with being a chic Londoner in this Parisien haunt, so I held my head high and strutted around as best as I could muster, which as it turned out, was pretty good.

Several Bellinis later I was propped up at the bar, being well, one can only describe oneself as ‘a right f**king twat’. I don’t know what got into me, apart from the Bellinis. At about 10pm we were shown to our dinner table, an amazing glass domed affair at the top of the building and truly a stunning place to eat…if only I hadn’t have been too drunk to appreciate it. I had a yummy lobster and crab ravioli for starters and then king Gambas for my main, and we bickered throughout the entire meal. Hurrah. Totally my fault- I didn’t think the food was very good. Infact my main was downright DULL. When we left I was so drunk I can barely remember sitting in a bar called ‘Jade’, or getting home (or apparently getting lost on the way home and crying).

At some point I smashed a glass in the bedroom and cut my foot as the room and towels were covered in blood in the morning. I called Steve a c**t for no reason and was generally an embarrassment and an idiot! I'm almost 30, it's disgraceful.

Goes without saying that an almighty slice of humble pie was eaten on Sunday morning, and I trailed around feeling very sorry for myself after several encounters with Le head in le throne. What a looser. Steve delighted in the tables being turned, and took the piss constantly for the rest of our time away, which was to be fair, well deserved.

Anyway, we did the Eiffel Tower- waste of bloody time, but the ice creams at the bottom were great. It was much nicer sitting in the sun drenched park at the bottom, watching the world go buy, eating baguettes and strawberries and listening to the little quartet clarinet, violin, flute and miscellaneous instrument who were jamming under the tree for many hours.

We then went to see Mona….felt obliged really. She has her very own wall, and really is quite small, but lovely all the same. A little shopping on the Champs Elysee and then off to dinner on the Left Bank in the Latin Quarter, place called Reminnet. Absolutely fantastic snails and some very very rare Thon (tuna). If you ever go to Paris, you must go…but you also must book as it’s one of the most popular traditional restaurants and it’s very tiny.

We managed to avoid any of the political rumblings as a result of Sarkosy being elected and on the whole had a wonderful time away….the crazy granny was just the icing on a very yummy cake.

And as if I hadn’t put on about 3 stone in the past 3 days with excessive pastry consumption, Steve and I are off to our fave haunt, Chez Bruce again tonight. Not gratuitously I hasten to add, his long suffering mum is over from Spain and it’s a belated 30th bday celebration, I’m just along for the ride. Yum. I think I am becoming a proper bonafide foody