Tag Archives: boulevard adolphe max

Well as per usual I got so drunk early Friday afternoon I had to leave Fifth not long after 4 and came back for a Domino’s Pizza

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Well, as per usual, I got so drunk early Friday afternoon I had to leave Fifth not long after 4 and came back for a Domino’s Pizza (4 Stagioni, medium, 12 euro) and then passed out to sleep. Woke 7 or 8pm with a raging hangover and no desire to go back to Fifth, or Cine Paris, or Empire. Some soothing classical music (Klara Radio) then back to sleep till 430am, and awake since then. The morning then just dragging terribly. Finally I can take it no more and get dressed at 730 to go to get a McDonald’s and something from the snack shop next door at least but both are still closed. A rainy, drizzly, dark black Saturday morning. I content myself with a Red Bull in the Max lounge for now. Sad to see the little chip shop next to McDonald’s has also closed down. What with Cine ABC and California Peep Show still standing as empty shells, this end of Adolphe Max is really becoming a wasteland. How much life, sleazy life maybe, the naughty places gave the street a few years ago.

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8pm Boulevard Adolphe Max. How quiet it is. Hardly anybody on the street

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8pm Boulevard Adolphe Max. How quiet it is. Hardly anybody on the street. No traffic at all, because Rogier is completely closed due to ‘roadworks’. Roadworks bit of an understatement. So even more quiet here than usual.

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I am so funny

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I am so funny; after proclaiming all last year that Brussels has come back to life because I have moved from the Ibis and my old nexus around Gare du Midi, to the Max Hotel and my new nexus at the top end of Boulevard Adolphe Max, now I am excited to start staying in the Ibis again and spending long hours in the bars around Gare du Midi! Whenever I have discovered a law of life I then very soon experience a complete reversal and think in fact the opposite is true.

It is always a woman driver who tries to turn down the Boulevard Adolphe Max

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It is always a woman driver who tries to turn down the Boulevard Adolphe Max even though it is one way now—you think I am being sexist but I am not; I am just telling you, it is a woman every every time. They just do not pay any attention to the big red notice signs, “No Entry”. They just remember they used to turn down this way so they carry on; they probably see the big red no entry signs and think oh no, they can’t be for me. I really do think women are not as intelligent as men, I have to say that. Why is it that 99 out of every 100 drivers I see turning down the Adolphe Max, wrongly, are women? I am so anaesthetised now I cannot even get drunk. This is one of the most numb, feel-nothing days of my life. Oh so now, finally, I am ready for Berlin?

Sitting in the Café du Dome I immediately see a woman driver zoom down Adolphe Max

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Sitting in the Café du Dome I immediately see a woman driver zoom down Adolphe Max, braking to a halt and turning around when the wall of traffic alerts her. I think women drivers just think I’ve always gone down this way so they do, even if they notice the big red signs at the entrance they just think “oh, they’re not for me I don’t think, can’t be” and carry on regardless, whereas men are a bit more alert and respond to what they see. I just say this because 99% of the cars I’ve seen going down the wrong way have been driven by women. Now, whoops, there goes another woman, bless her. She realises after about 10 yards and does a very skilful and quick U-turn.

Finding traffic coming towards them

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Finding traffic coming towards them, cars (another woman driver of course) now resort to driving all the way down the cycle lane instead, wondering why do they only have such a small space to drive in now? Amazing if you have been driving down the road all these years and they then change the direction without really telling anyone. The Max lounge is really busy this Saturday morning—I hate it. Hate having to share it with other people, I have always had it all to myself. Starving hungry but I will resist eating anything till later. Last time I came there was a fascinating dark-blonde-haired girl in 5th Avenue who I thought reminded me of Milena in Bad Timing, but she left before 5 with an older woman who looked like her mother. Yesterday there was a beautiful sexy black-haired girl who I really fancied, but she left too with the same older woman before 5, and I now realise it is probably the same girl? I suspect they leave 5th Avenue at 5 to get up to Gare du Nord to start their evening shift at 6. Even more reason to get to 5th Avenue as early as possible.

Yes another woman driver blithely turning out of the side road and heading south down the Boulevard Adolphe Max

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Yes, another woman driver blithely turning out of the side road and heading south down the Boulevard Adolphe Max, despite other road users bibbing their horns and waving their hands ‘No, no!’. And another one, there it goes—this is crazy. There is really nothing to tell people the direction has changed—another one, a taxi. What madness is this. Three cars in the space of one minute heading the wrong way down this now one way street. A fourth. Fifth. Sixth. As it is Saturday and the road is quite empty, there is nothing to tell them it is not a two-way street anymore. It is actually quite dangerous for people crossing the road, now they get used to  just looking one way, when cars are still coming down the other way.

Just to prove my point

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Just to prove my point, I have just seen a car (driven by a woman) cheerfully turn right down Adolphe Max all the way into the oncoming traffic, and followed by a black Mercedes behind her. The traffic bibbed their horns and tried to tell her, but after a brief pause, she just carried on anyway. Lunacy. Who is in charge of traffic in Brussels??? There, another two cars just came all the way down from Rogier and hitting a wall of traffic here at Plaza, forced into hasty U-turns to go back the way they came. Lunacy sir! Sort your city out! My usual cash machine at Gare du Midi said OK to the woman, please take your cash, and then issued no cash. TV not working in my room; from midnight internet not working in my room. Vending machine of cold drinks sends them out warm. Traffic in complete meltdown, 2-way traffic turned into a one-way street overnight and nobody is told, and any signs they have completely inadequate. This is the glorious, lovable (infuriating) madness of Brussels. Mad, not bad? Hmm. Mad, bad & dangerous to know. That is me. A modern Byron, with similar talent and sex appeal, perhaps more. Perhaps less. Opinion is divided.

Traffic seems to cross Place Rogier from all directions at once

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Traffic seems to cross Place Rogier from all directions at once. All Brussels women seem to have a healthy, voluptuous curvaceousness about them. These are my two most striking impressions of Brussels every time I come here. The craziest thing about Boulevard Adolphe Max suddenly being made into a massive one-way street is that people DON’T SEEM TO KNOW ABOUT IT. I have seen so many cars coming out of the side turning by the Plaza and try to turn right slap bang into the now oncoming traffic. Whatever signs they have put up are inadequate.

The traffic in Brussels has always been bad

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The traffic in Brussels has always been bad, but on this trip it is absolutely insane. A complete breakdown in the system. It is like watching The Italian Job when Benny Hill shuts down the Turin traffic computers. I am watching a meltdown. My charming hotel duty manager explains he had a meeting yesterday and was stuck for 2 hours in traffic and had to abandon the meeting as a result. The normally quite tranquil 2-way traffic of the Boulevard Adolphe Max has become a one-way 4-lane snarled up traffic gridlock. It was just made temporarily worse because the police motorbikes just stopped all traffic because of V.VIPs leaving the Hotel Plaza in their black limousines. The hotel manager tells me it is because of the Queen’s funeral, dignitaries and celebrities from all over the world are coming to pay their respects. He tells me Brussels was in meltdown Wednesday because of the opening of Primark, Thursday was a rail strike, and on top of it all the Queen’s funeral and Monday will be a General Strike. The VIPs have left the Plaza now, and normal gridlock has been allowed to re-fill the temporarily empty boulevard. I have rarely seen traffic like this. How on earth can Brussels function? How can its people put up with this? It is madness. This is the main North-South axis of Brussels and it is in absolute complete gridlock. And they are just heading into the churning vortex of Place Rogier anyway. And it is raining. A wet, wild & windy Brussels morning.
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Crowds of Brussels women await my arrival at the Eurostar terminal. “Madames, this is madness! I am a faithful married man!”

The inevitable first impression is oh god what have I come here for?

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The inevitable first impression is oh god, what have I come here for? what is the point? But on first arriving in another city you are always going to feel horribly exposed and uncomfortable I think. Already so many huge voluptuous girls at Gare du Midi, and in the Boulevard Adolphe Max. The Ciné ABC was closed when I arrived in the Dome at 3:50, but its shutters opened at 4:06; that was a relief. The Café du Dôme totally deserted; I the only customer. What is the plan? ABC first I suppose, then Ciné Paris. Perhaps up to Gare du Nord to have a look, or, if it is late enough, to Empire. Early tomorrow to go look for a cardigan, then ride around and around on the buses, getting lost, but getting to know my way around Brussels by bus; eventually, hopefully, I will find myself somewhere near the museum district and I will go to the Museum of Old Masters, Magritte and Museum of the Fin-de-Siècle, perhaps the Wiertz as well. Let me get the obligatory naughty things out of the way tonight, to leave me free for more cultural things tomorrow. I know in the last couple of years I have always gone home from Brussels regretting that I had not spent more time in the ABC, and lay in it like a hot bath for hours at a time.
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Such boring beermats they have here in the Café du Dome

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Such boring beermats they have here in the Café du Dome. I think a beermat is a chance to make a work of art—my two Berliner Kindl beermats are something that I treasure. But so many beermats are just wasted opportunities. I am a connoisseur. The shape of the beerglass makes such a difference; so does the beermat. Sitting here at the junction of Boulevard Adolphe Max and Boulevard du Jardin Botanique I see no pretty women whatsoever. In 10 minutes at Gare du Midi I can capture a hundred beautiful specimens, like a butterfly catcher with a net. Such a shame that there are no longer any bars to drink in within Gare du Midi. Lulu was a massive disappointment. It sucked 2 hours out of my night ( I left at the first interval) and I never got the excitement back try as I might. Ciné ABC and Ciné Paris were both great. The 1970s hairy pornography of the ABC followed by the Marc Dorcel high-class erotica of the Paris. I should have stayed. Leaving Lulu, I headed straight to Gare du Nord. The window girls of the Rue d’Aerschot are the most beautiful Esmeraldas I have ever seen in my life. Every one of them is like supermodel or actress beautiful. Just the environment is so shabby and threatening! In Berlin sex is everywhere but they have no girls as beautiful as this; but the environment is much nicer. Nice art nouveau bars you can sit with the girls in first. From there back to Empire. Empire is a really mediocre strip club, with mediocre girls. Similar to Munich’s Atlantic City but the Atlantic City always has 2 or 3 real stars; not here at the Empire. And each small beer costs 10 euros! The one great and clever thing they do is not charge you to enter. This is so sensible—it makes it easy to drop in and check out what the place is like. Gascogne should adopt this method, and they might not be empty every night. So not a great first night in Brussels, but very pleasant. It is so lovely just to spend 48 hours away from home, from work, just 48 hours to eat and drink and wander around as I like. To spend 48 hours like this every month would be so precious, and I would happily work every other day of the month to pay for it. This is my ideal way of life. My priority today is try to find some boots for —–. After that I can relax in ABC and Paris, perhaps pop back to the Paradise, and perhaps finish the night (briefly) in the pointless American Guest Bar and Gascogne.