Those 'women' on Rue Blondel

Advice columnist Amy Alkon takes note on her blog of the Times' Paris-based travel writer Susan Spano's recent perplexed observation that the prostitutes on Rue Blondel are "all gigantic and fleshy, like something out of a Fellini movie...I exchanged a polite bon jour with one of them, trying not to gawk, wondering what to think of her and what she thought of me." Actually, "takes note" may be understating Alkon's reaction.

These prositutes are MEN! They're MEN! They're MEN! Note the nearby rue St. Denis -- the homo porn capital of Paris! Look at the "girls'" big, ham-hock-like knuckles! The faint five o'clock shadow under the caked-on foundation! The manly thighs!

Alkon visits Paris frequently. I'll take her word for it.