The first in what will no doubt be several blogs about the European Trip of '08 - England, Scotland, France and, entirely by accident, Ireland.

The first thing I noticed when I popped my head out of the St. Paul metro stop was that however beautiful you think Paris is going to be, it's better. You'd think it couldn't be, but it is. The second thing I noticed was an immediate need to do some clothes shopping. Whoever you are, if you are not French, you are very poorly dressed. Trust me. You are. Small French-y children have better cut jackets than you do. Really, it's astonishing you even left the house looking like that. And we aren't even going to talk about your shoes.

I kept wandering away from my husband, following narrow alleyways, partly because they were interesting and partly because the L.A. part of my brain really did expect to catch a lighting guy, set builder and craft services truck all busily making sure the bright red geraniums in the window boxes were lit properly and the walls were just the right amount of mossy.

I never caught them at it, but in a city this good for walking, you know it's going to be even better for running. I had been warned by friends who'd lived in Paris and who know my habit of packing my sneakers everywhere, even if it means not having enough room in my bag for other things - like pants.

"Parisians don't run," they told me. "You're going to stick out like the crazy (read: crass, ill-mannered, obnoxious) American."

But I. Just. Can't. Help. Myself. Crack has nothing on running. So I did. I hit the uneven sidewalks and cobblestones through the Marais until Notre Dame came into view, turned and ran for an hour through the city along the Seine. It will, without a doubt, go down as one of the best runs of my life.

And it's not true that Parisians don't run. I saw at least four that I think might have been trying to run. A little. Possibly. It's hard to say. Maybe it's all the cigarettes leading to some sort of pre-asthma condition. Maybe the really well-cut clothes just didn't let them move enough. Maybe it's not nice to mock the developmentally challenged. I don't know. But, well, damn. Let's just leave it at that.

Of course, you can't talk about Paris without posting pictures. And I will. I swear. But we took well over 2,000 of them, and editing is going to take some time. Bear with me. They're coming.


Side note: I bought, from a small perfumery, the last bottle of something called Amor Amor Sunshine for women. It's the worst name for the most incredible perfume and, as it turns out, was a limited edition production. I have entirely failed in any online attempts at finding another bottle to shore up my stock. Suggestions for hereto untapped sources of rare perfumes appreciated.