I have just spent 13 full days in France. When you're poor, 
that's all you can spend. When you are spending nothing but time, like everything else, you have to devise ways to make it interesting. I don't have to tell you that spending for stuff that you already have or for stuff that you NEED is no pleasure whatsoever. So, what I do to alleviate my penurious status is to enjoy the creation about me. We all have some of that. No matter where we are. The easy part about creation watching is that you don't have to travel to get there. Of course if you have traveled already to get where you are to begin your random spending, then a slice of the interesting part has already been spent. Nevertheless, not really too much has been lost. In fact, if you traveled in any direction at all, you are bound to find something to spend your time on.
It used to be that spending your time on an airplane was rather satisfying. The working crew was all female of a certain age, minus a few years. So the spending spree started quite early in those days. Now, with the degradation of our national values regarding the inherent beauty of the lithe, young female, spending time on an airplane is best invested in a good book (paper or electronic will do) and or sleep. Either way, you come out ahead. It also makes you ready to start spending wisely and with more enjoyment once you remove your now nearly pretzel shaped body from the tight interior of the sleek titanium tube.
Before we got to France we landed in Detroit and in Amsterdam. I'll spare you the details of the first two since I didn't spend much of anything there. What I did spend in Amsterdam was interesting from the point of view that all the "Dutch Uncles" I saw were not yet old enough to grow a beard, let alone smoke a fancy S shaped Meerschaum pipe. I wonder what it takes to reach 30 in Holland? So, I saved myself for a little more spending in France. This is the land of my forebears, if not my teddy bears. So I happily boarded the plane headed for France, despite the stewardesses of a "certain age" being in the majority. I planned on investing in some sleep rather than spending foolishly. Good move actually. When I left the tightly circumscribed interior of the shiny tube, I started spending right away. It was so different. Good looking people all around. Men and women. Hey, this was neat. Different hair styles. Different manner of dress. Men, young and old actually had their trousers tied around their waist. Women had dresses or skirts on. Now I was spending big time. Every chance I had I would stop to ask for directions. I didn't really have to, but hey, when your spending and you're in the mood, you fall into a state of profligacy and the inebriation that it brings is what makes this kind of spending worth it. It keeps you awake and it keeps you flying high.
I did some of my most intense spending on the observation that there were so few obese French people around. I was really drawn into the spending whirlpool then. I walked all around, looking for the rare fat French person. I didn't know what I was going to do if I found one. But at least, if "getting there is half the fun" I was in to it, having fun. The problem with spending time is that you don't get a discount and you don't get a lower price for "seeking time." It's all the same price. That's a bad feeling, but only when it comes upon you. Usually it hits you when you started out going to the iced yogurt counter to make your sweetheart happy while she decides to hoard her spending time and spend money instead to keep her innards (you know, those things) happy. It's not too cool to make her spend time waiting for the "Yahourt Glace" while you're spending time "people watching." Like this time. Man, I got the old dressing down for spending too much time in non-sweetheart ways and not enough time spending those dastardly expensive EUROS. Time is a lot cheaper, and the exchange rate is 1 to 1. "Merci, Monsieur. 2.00 Euros s'il-vous-plait?" Sounds cool, right? Not when you come to your senses and realize that you just spend $2.75 instead of just 2.00
Maybe that's what keeps the French skinny. They don't spend 2.00 Euros for frozen yogurt. By the way, I looked it up. it is visible and observable that the French are skinnier than we are. In fact here is a statistic that you can look up.
Percentage of obese people in the USA >>>>> 30.6 ranked 1 in the world
Percentage of obese people in France >>>>>> 9.4 ranked 23 in the world
Here's where I got this information : http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_obe-health-obesity
Well, we're number 1 at something, anyway.
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