Cafe Carlyle

My favorite place for Date Night Mondays!

Outlaw Art

“POP UP” OUTLAW FINE ART PHOTOGRAPHY EXHIBIT- ONE NIGHT ONLY!!

You are cordially invited to Outlaw Art’s first pop-up art show. I am collaborating with Town Real Estate, a luxury real estate company, and curating a photography exhibit in one of their gorgeous properties that’s currently on the market.  Town Real Estate gets chic, art loving people like yourself to see their space and the types of properties they have to offer - and I get a fabulous venue to exhibit photographic art!

It’s a win- win situation….Fine Art and luxury Real Estate united. Please come and see what’s up!

Please

RSVP: 212-280-0699 or aretha@visionspublicity.com

FRIDAY MARCH 18TH, 2011

5:00 PM – 9:00 PM

385 WEST 12TH STREET, TOWNHOUSE #1

NEW YORK, NY

I really hope you can stop by and peruse the

photography and art …

Oh! And maybe make an offer on the $7 million dollar

property they are selling…

(smile)

And please check out the web page for more information….

http://www.OutlawArt.org/

Cheerily,

Janene Outlaw

J’ai Deux Amours…

I have two loves: Entrecote in Paris and In-N-Out Burger in LA….

Returning to Paris after a four day carb fest in Saint Tropez/Ramatuelle, I was on a hunt. A howl and a whine and I found myself walking at a pace that might even be described as a trot to le “Relais de l’Entrecote”.

Fortunately, the “New Economy” has thinned usual lines of tourists waiting for a table at this Parisian establishment, and I was seated right away. Usually, I dine alone at Entrecote as most of my Parisian friends wouldn’t be caught dead in such a touristy restaurant.

Like In-N-Out, Entrecot offers little choice and has few complications. There is one question to answer and two to ask: “How do you want your meat cooked” followed with “May I have a half bottle of red?” and later “May I have the Profiteroles au Chocolat?”

All three locations are always full of American tourists and smiling French Waitresses. In-N-Out usually sets me back about $6, while Entrecot sets me back about $60.
I love le “Relais de l’Entrecote”, and I’m not ashamed!

15 Rue Marbeuf in the 8th

49 Rue Saint-Benoit or 101 Boulevard du Montparnasse in the 6th

www.relaisentrecote.fr

Good Intentions Gone Bad…

As I was driving through Provence in search of great villas to represent for the Travel Club, I passed by an empty farm stand, and I thought of my grandmother who lives in a small town outside Aiken, South Carolina (which itself is a small town). My grandmother loves to drive through the county from whence she hails and buy peaches and pecans. This is her form of “recreational shopping”.

I turned to my co-pilot and suggested that we find some locally grown lettuces or parsnips to offer our villa hosts. I think I made the declaration that driving leisurely through the country in search of fresh produce should be the new form or “recreational shopping”, and that I intended to write about it on the Blog.

We continued on through the vineyards and fields somehow winding our way down to the beach. It was after one o’clock, and I thought we shouldn’t “hunt” lettuces on empty stomachs so we ended up at Le Club Key West. The intention of “Recreational shopping” turned into the reality of “Recreational Drinking”…

Two bottles of wine and three hours later, I panicked. All the farm stands must be closed by now!

We ended up “hunting” for a parking spot at the Geant Marche, the French equivalent of a Wal-mart/King Kullen hybrid. We walked to the back of the store under fluorescent lights passing tabloids and frozen foods to pick out four bottles of wine. As we waited in line for the clerk to scan our merchandise, I thought. “So much for finding a farm stand out in the sunny countryside…”

Avoid Brunch on the Champs-Elysees at all cost!

Let’s face it, as a travelisto, one should aspire to have an open mind about new experiences and ideas. One of my goals on this sabbatical to Paris was to try to give up the need to be in control. So when a group of Parisian friends invited me to Sunday Brunch, I agreed without knowing the final destination. In my head I was associating the word “brunch” with a lingering afternoon reading the paper and talking at Estia’s Little Kitchen in Sag Harbor or Babette’s in East Hampton. I’m sure my friends must be taking me to the Parisian equivalent? Why did I need to know where we are going ahead of time? These folks were locals and why should I feel the need to Google information about the restaurant ahead of time or “corroborate” their opinions?

Signs of Danger

Sign 1
My first indication that something bad was about to happen flashed on the IM screen of my new Blackberry Bold: “Meet at the Southwest corner of the Champs-Elysees and look for Danish flag”. Okay, this message was the equivalent of telling someone to meet at 45th and Broadway and look for the Marriott Marquis…

“Open-mind…Open-mind”, I started to chant so I wouldn’t grind my back teeth.

Sign 2
Well, at least Spring was in the air. The sun was out and birds were chirping as I quickly identified the Danish Flags and passed through glass sliding doors into a foyer with ballroom carpet, flowers of questionable pedigree, and a hostess in a black polyester uniform. I felt a bit disoriented…this felt very reminiscent of stepping onto a Carnival Cruise ship in 1987. But, the space was very bright and sunny. It almost felt as if I were in an outdoor atrium or courtyard. Settling into the my surrounds a bit more, I noticed bird nests everywhere in various colors of blue and strawberry as pre-cognitive senses started to send more danger signs to my brain…

These weren’t nests! These were coifs! The room was full of geriatric women swarming around something I could not identify in the center of the room.

Sign 3
The reality of this horrible, horrible situation was finally hitting me. Though I was trying my best to keep an open-mind, in an instant I knew in my heart of hearts what was happening….I was at a Buffet!

In France, I get with the program and can eat snails. With enthusiasm, I’ve tried raw beef, and even smiled when I’ve eaten cow’s cheek or sheep’s brain. Was this a French buffet or a Danish Buffet anyway? I guess it didn’t matter the nationality of the buffet…it was still a buffet. And as I passed a pair of dentures floating in the bechamel sauce, I knew Destiny had sent me to such a place to atone for naughty things I must have done in the past.

But, in the end, I made it through that two and a half hour “experience” picking at a stale croissant trying to smile graciously at my hosts. I thought “I gave up control and made it through this challenge” as I surveyed the carnage of soiled white table clothes and red lipstick scars on countless glasses around me.

Secretly, I longed for the New York Times and a proper Sunday afternoon brunch on the East End of Long Island…

I’ll Take (A) Manhattan

Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité

Face up, I laid sprawled out diagonally across the sidewalk of Avenue Kleber with a twelve year old Louis Vuitton (pre-welovesprouse) tote in my left hand and a Jack Spade messenger bag twisted around my neck, and I thought about the French mottos “Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité, and It’s not possible”….

It was my last week in France, and I had many things to accomplish before leaving. I started marching up the Avenue at a pace that would be more than appropriate in New York, but slightly aggressive in Paris, particularly in the 16th. Rather than kick the woman’s poodle walking ahead of me, I stepped off the sidewalk into the street to bypass her. I misjudged the stoop stepping back up and crashed to the pavement with a grace that can only be described as American. This fraternity of Parisians universally ignored me as they elegantly stepped over me leaving me in silence. The poodle had the well-bred manners not to lick my face.

This Fraternity seemed to have an unwritten, but frequently spoken motto “It’s not possible”. Was I starting to hear this phrase more than Bonjour? Friends had taken me to a fashionable and tasty restaurant called 6 New York a few nights before, and I was so thirsty for a martini. When the waiter arrived at the table I smiled and asked for a Manhattan as I stared gleefully at the bar. “It’s not possible” and he then instantly disappeared offering me no alternatives. Granted, he was probably scared as the sound of me speaking French sounds like Chewbacca the Wookiee being electrocuted, but at least I was smiling…

Earlier that day at the local café I asked the barista if his fruit smoothies were made fresh. “Mais, oui”. Wonderful, could I have the strawberry smoothie on the menu, and could he add one of the bananas sitting on the basket in front of me? “It’s not possible”. But, why not? “Because we only have strawberry smoothies on the menu, not strawberry-banana.” But, I can pay for Banana as well. “It’s not possible”. Hmmm…this wasn’t Burger King, so I guess I didn’t have the liberté to have it my way…

During that same weekend, my friend and I went to the famous fashion haunt, Mathis Bar which is one of my favorite places in Paris. The décor feels like it was created by Kenzo who might have been inspired by a 1920’s Bordello. The music is fantastic and the scene of people is always over the top. We squeezed past recognizable fashion models fresh from rehab and headed directly to the bar with eager smiles in anticipation of a martini. We said good evening to the bartender and asked for a vodka martini and a Cosmo. We really offended this one because he screamed “It’s not possible”. Ignoring us, he shuffled to the other side of the bar to stare at some void in the left corner of the room.

Egalite? I pondered. Was everyone treated equally as badly in this Fraternity or were we not part of the Fraternity?

My companion and I began to sit down at the two vacant barstools to allow the bartender’s hormonal flash to pass, and this immediately caught his attention. “You cannot sit here!” Why I asked? “It’s not possible!”.

Somehow the two bottles of wine that my friend and I shared at dinner had made me very lucid. Within milliseconds, I was summarizing one of two strategies in dealing with this assault on our fun night out. I could use diplomacy to diffuse this bitter little man wearing some sort of Danskin leotard apparently stolen from his younger sister’s closet and made into a makeshift shirt. Or, I could engage him in a New York style confrontation that would result in one of us leaving the bar in tears. What would Obama do?

I chose diplomacy. I smiled and asked “are you having a good night?” Stung, he had not anticipated this. “No, it’s not such a good night”. Well, you could make it a great night for us if you will make us two Grey Goose sodas with limes. He began to pick up the vodka bottle and as his pupils gazed into another corner of the room, the whites of his eyes gestured for us to take the stools. We had passed the test! He liked us, and we felt we were part of the fraternity!

Being in France for over a month, I did start to understand the mottos. I didn’t see any Burger Kings anywhere in the city, and I couldn’t have it my way. The architecture, the culture, the elegance of Paris works because there is a consistency. “It’s not possible” was really a collective resistance to changing too quickly and a preservation of the integrity of the collective society. This City had maintained its elegance because it did not change too quickly and was not subject to the whims of individuals. And, hadn’t I retreated to Paris from the New Economy because of this elegance and slightly slower pace?

Paris had given me the reprieve I needed…time to wander, ponder and write. I was becoming eager to return so I could launch the new website for Mr. Gatsby’s Travel Club. I also understood that I was missing New York where everything is possible!

I’ll take Manhattan…(but I still love Paris and these strong-willed, difficult French!!!)