Politicking Time Bomb

I have looked all over the internet with no luck. I cannot find it. There was a very funny political cartoon in Saturday's Le Parisien that had me laughing out loud in the checkout line at the grocery store. People were looking at me funny.

It was awesome.

In essence, the cartoon went like this:

There's a cartoon Obama and behind him are two regular joes.

One of them says: "Obama has been in office for 100 days and he hasn't yet saved the world."

The other goes: "Really? Well then, why hasn't Ségolène apologised on his behalf yet?"


Bwa ha ha.


What? You don't get it? No worries. It's particularily sordid and silly. But I shall explain. Aren't you lucky?

Now, as you probably had no idea, well before the U.S. elections, there were the French Presidential elections. The two main candidates that were up for the job were Nicolas Sarkozy (a right wing sort of fellow) and Ségolène Royal (a left wing sort of gal).

Both were less than ideal in their own ways, but where Sarkozy at least gave a semblance of putting forward ideas, Royal's sort of campaigning reminded me more of witchcraft hunters in that her campaign seemed to be based on barring Sarkozy from the Elysée (sort of the French White House) rather than what she could actually do for, you know, the people of France.

So.

She lost.

Then she lost the First Secretary job for the Socialist Party.

And now? She seems to have lost her mind.

Recently, and perhaps justifiably, while in Dakar, she apologised on France's behalf to the populace for a speech that President Sarkozy made 2 years ago. Apparently, the problem with that speech was the following: «le drame de l'Afrique, qui est que l'Homme africain n'est pas assez entré dans l'histoire» (the dramatic thing about Africa is that Africans haven't entered into the annals of history enough) and «le paysan africain qui ne connaît que l'éternel recommencement du temps rythmé par la répétition sans fin des mêmes gestes et des mêmes paroles» (the African peasant only knows the eternal rhythm of time by the endless repetition of the same actions and words).

Um. Okay. Apparently, these words were a slap in the face to the Senegalese though I'm hard pressed to understand why... Then again, I'm just a white girl from a Commonwealth colony.

Also, like for a lot of folks, I can't understand why it took her two years to apologise either. If you ask me, Ms. Royal is gearing up for the next Presidentials already by resurrecting the dead this late in the game....

That being said, her truly baffling move was the next one and if there is reason in her madness, I cannot see it: Her written apologies to the Spanish Prime Minister on the French President's behalf over a rumoured conversation where Sarkozy apparently said that Spain's Prime Minister wasn't particularly clever.

Just what is this game she's playing?

_________________________


And just in case you weren't aware of it, Obama's campaign? Totally "inspired" by Ségolène's failed campaign two years ago. Yup. At least, that's what she's convinced herself...

More what not to do.

Why do people in this country still bemoan the fact that she lost the election? Even if she's right on some points, she's embarrassing on the whole.

I cringe to think of what idiocy will come out of her mouth next.

And yet, my breath is bated...

Evilly, I can hardly wait.

New Work Monday #13

Today we have an image of sloth:

Snoozing at Karnak
India Ink on Watercolour Paper

When Mr C and I went to Egypt last year, I had my sketchbook in my pocket AT ALL TIMES. You don't want to ask me what I learned on that trip because I wasn't listening to our tour guide. I was busy.

I assume that Mr C wasn't listening much either because everytime I asked him what the tour guide said, he'd be like, "What tour guide?"

And then we'd laugh.

So.

Near the end of that trip (a trip which still gives me the heebie jeebies when I think of it. Egypt is CREEPY) we were in Luxor (which used to be Thebes) and since Luxor is right next to Karnak, we went to check out the temple.

Which was A-Maze-Ing! Those Egyptians had it all figured out in terms of manipulating the constructions of their temples in terms of the sun. In order to even get into the temple, you have to walk up a path lined with and guarded by criosphinx (body of a lion, head of a ram) while the sun pounds into your eyes, blinding you.

Humbling you.

Reminding you of who was boss back then.

Stunning is the word.

Near the end of this brain-popping day, tired and waiting for the other people in the group to make it back to the meeting place, I noticed this dog lying on the sun-baked flagstones. Completely oblivious to everyone walking around her.

She was smiling. She made me smile.

So I drew her.

She still makes me smile.

Back in the City of Lights

So Hai! I'm back.

Tunisia? Wonderful. Our biggest decision every day was: should we eat now or have a drink first?

But please don't ask me anything about Djerba. I have no idea. Hell, it took me a couple of days to realise that Djerba is an island. We pretty much did what I thought we would do.

Zip. Zilch. Nada.

Can you blame us?



We are turrible turrible people.

That being said, I feel rested and tranquil. And as I battled my way into the office this morning, nothing could kill my post-holiday buzz.

Now you may be wondering about whether or not I remained my usual pasty white self.

The answer to this question is best illustrated by the reactions of my colleagues this morning, which was: "Bathe much?" and "Jeez girl! JELUS!"

However one much suffer for "beauty" and wow. Did I suffer.

What happened was this. The first day in Djerba was sort of weird. It was a bit foggy and there was this icey wind blasting in off the Mediterranean. On stepping off that plane at 3 am last Thursday and finally getting to sleep around 5 am, I was letting myself in for some fun times when I woke up a couple of hours later.

Namely that I was starting my vacation like this:



And that, barely before lunch that same Thursday, what with the hazy sky and the wind, I would have set in motion the catastrophe that would become this by nightfall:



With skin throbbing and everything.

Awesome. What was truly awesome was how people would stare at me. You know. Like I wasn't uncomfortable enough already what with all my stupidity and beating myself up and the fact that my sunburn lines didn't match my bathing suit by a mile and a half.

Because that's important.

Mr C kept calling me "The Lighthouse" and kept insisting that I wasn't allowed to complain since I've had my skin for a very long time and that I should know better.

Dude is right, which is why I'm not that crazy about the sun: Because I gotta keep hiding from it. And even when I'm not an idiot and remember to wear 50+ sunscreen, it looks like I'm getting a sunburn because I get itchy heat rashes when the sun is, you know, relentless.

Swweeeetttttttttt!

So. I was made fun of quite a bit by Tunisians, who are, IMHO, easily the nicest people on earth. They are also shameless flirts. One particularly cunning elderly waiter really charmed me when he started rubbing ice into my neck and asked if I had children. He expressed surprise when I told him that I had "only" two. Is that all!? You're young! You need more. He told me he had eight himself.

No kidding. He sort of struck me as a randy fellow.

Then there were shopkeepers who tried to convince Mr C and I to buy stuff. The thing that I remember the most was how they tried to convince us that vermeil, a mix of gold and silver, existed. I was all WTF? I don't think anybody would be stupid enough to alloy gold with silver. One shopkeeper insisted and I said, DUDE, I DON'T THINK SO! Save that talk for someone who didn't study Jewellery in school and thinks she knows better.

[Apparently vermeil is an English word too, which means silver gilded with gold. I don't remember that word ever being used in class. Must have been one of those days where I didn't showed up late for class... Ahem.]

By day 4 (or 5) of my sunburn and sitting in the shade with a sweater on (it was freaking cold in the shade BTW) I woke up with little to no pain, but I sure as hell felt like the skin on my arms was part of a suit of clothes that were too small for me because I couldn't bend them right. They felt like limp linked sausages on either side of my body.

Also? I had belated heat rashes on my legs and behind my ears.

Most peculiar.

The only trip we took outside of the complex was the day that it rained just before dawn. We spent the morning wandering down the beach and stumbled onto an abandoned Club Med. Which was the epitomy of cool. I was so annoyed that I had forgotten my camera at the hotel.

How often do you see a Club Med with new tennis courts and a pool full of sand?

Phooey.

And now, I'm home and into the molting part of the whole sunburn experience. Where my shoulders fascinate my fingers as they sneak under my shirt to rip off just a tiny, feathery piece of old skin. Where my arms are a patchwork of white-ish-ness, rosey raw and ancient brown.

Now would not be a good time to commit a murder. Everywhere I walk, I'm leaving a magic trail of forensic evidence. I looked at myself this morning and saw myself covered in delicate wisps of moth wings and I realised that my floor would be littered with their delicate dead bodies when I disrobed this evening.

Nice imagery, but I sure as hell better be smarter when we go to Cuba in July.

Damn.

In a sad way, I was happy to get back to Paris so that I could get back to a climate where my skin could recuperate in peace and where I wouldn't feel obliged to force myself to enjoy sunshine which was making me a bit jumpy as it felt so wrong and so dangerous for my body post-sunburn.

A shame, but there you go.

And while the trip to Djerba was predominated by my asinine sunshine glitch, it will probably go down as the holiday where I felt that Mr C and I were most able to reconnect.

And what's a little flakey skin when there's that?

Yup. When you think about it, it's really too bad that touching me was out of question for most of the trip.

Suddenly I'm wondering if I didn't premeditate the whole thing.

I mean... I feel so rested!

New Work Monday #12

Ha. I love me some blogger. Here I am, basking on a beach in Tunisia and hop! a new "New Work Monday" post pops up.

As if I'm actually doing anything other than reading and trying to avoid scorching my skin a fetching scarlet.

Woot!



Hah! See you soon!

Dring dring

Dring dring.

"Hello?" It is Saturday and I am sitting in the local hair dresser watching my son's hair get walloped off. All the cute little wispy almost Jewish curls above his ears which are testament to how long it's been since I've bothered to bring him the hairdresser? Gone all gone.

Brenna is looking at the woman who will be cutting her hair with a look that mixed fear with anticipation.

I feel fear too. I wonder if there are nits.

"Hi," I hear Mr C. "It's me."

"Hi!"

"Look. Am wondering. How cool is your boss?"

"Um...." I feel a bit lost. I'm suddenly reminded of how Mr C proposed. Over the phone from the city hall registry office telling me that there was free marriage slot on such and such day: was I busy?

"Really cool?"

"Pretty cool. Why?"

"I just booked us tickets to Tunisia."

"Wait. Booked as in paid for?"

"Yup. I figure why not?"

"OOooooohhhhh Kaaaaayyyyyy......"

"So?"

"Wait. You didn't really just buy a vacation package for Tunisia, did you? Am I being filmed?" I look around.

"Yes, I really did book the tickets." I hear a faint ping, "I just received the confirmation email."

"Well, I suppose I could send my boss an email asking him for time off... when did you book the tickets for?"

"Wednesday."

!!!

_________________________


Dring dring.

Fecking alarm. It's too early for this noise.

Kilian wanders into my room, "Maman, get up. It's Tuesday morning. You have to take us to the train station."

"Snorfle. 10 minutes."

Ten minutes later: "Maman?...."

"10 minutes."

Kilian sighs and goes away.

He sounds slightly panicked when he comes back. "Maman?...."

"OK. I'm getting up."

He goes away.

....

He comes back: "Maman?...."

"OK. I'm really getting up this time."

I shower, iron my skirt and get dressed as Mr C loads their gear into the good car. I'm almost awake when it's time to leave. Five minutes behind schedule at 7:05 am. Our RDV at Gare Montparnasse for the kids' trip to Guérande (a region I'm told is pretty) is at 7:50 am.

Of course, I did not figure that there would be actual people on the road at this ungodly hour in Paris. Silly me.

I cannot even begin to illustrate to you the stress of having two adorable badgers in the backseat arguing over whether or not their Mother was going to pull through and get them to the train station on time or whether they would be stuck on the train platform, waving that train forlornly goodbye.

Can. Not.

My! Does time go a lot faster when you are bumper to bumper with all the other cars in Paris (on the freeways and the Périphérique).

Also, at some point after leaving the house, I realised that I had no idea how to even get to Montparnasse station by car. Joy! I ventured a call to Mr C. Yes, while driving. Shut up. We were stopped.

"I think it is Porte de Versailles. No. Wait. Porte de Vanves."

"AAARRRRRGGGGHHHHHH! We're running late and there are cars everywhere. I'm at Porte d'Italie."

"OK. Get off at Porte d'Orléans. Go to Alésia and then on to Montparnasse."

Which we did.

I found the station, threw the car into a parking spot and the kids and I RAN.

We arrived, huffing and puffing and 20 minutes late. We stood around for another 20 minutes and then the kids filed off. Before he left, I asked Kilian if he was worried if we were going to be late.

"No."

"You mean you had faith in me?"

"Yes."

Silly creechur.

_________________________


Dring dring.

"Hello?"

"Hello. It's your daughter's camp counsellor calling."

This is going to end badly. I can feel it.

"Yes?"

"Your daughter is fine." Whew. "However, the little antihystamine syrup that you gave her to bring to camp for the bumps on her hands? Was that prescribed by a doctor?"

"Um. No. I spoke to a pharmician about those bumps."

"I see. Well we cannot give it to her if there isn't a doctor's prescription. So we'll take her to a doctor. We'll let you know how it goes."

Um. Okay.

They never did get back to me... On the way home last night I did wonder if I would be getting a call about how contagious my daughter was, could we come get her...?

_________________________


If all goes reasonably well, by this time tomorrow I should be in Tunisia. On a beach. Working on sheilding my unreasonably white hide from the sun.

New Work Monday #11

You didn't think that a holiday and the rising of Christ was going to stop me, right?....

Pshaw.

Remember the film The Last Unicorn? And the talking skeleton that drank the wine (that drank itself)? Remember how he yelled out: UNICORN!

You're welcome.

The world has been a dire place lately. We need more hoola-hooping hippo unis out there to take the burden from us.

This is one uni of a pair that were done for a little etsy commission. Next week's new work will be the book end.

Hope you had a good Easter...

It's Like I'm Tom Sawyer or Something!

Me: "You know, Kilian.... Your being 10 and all now, I really think that you could start doing your own laundry..."

I'm fishing.

Kilian: "OK."

My! That was easy!

Brenna: "What about me?"

Me: "Would you like to do your own laundry too, darling?"

Brenna: "Oh yes! I really would!"

Me: "Well... if you think that you're old enough....?...."

Brenna: "Oh ppppuuuuuulllllllleeeeeeaaaaaaaazzzzzzzzzzzz, Maman? I promise that I'll get it right!"

Me: "Well. Ok. We'll try it out this weekend to make sure that you're up for the responsibility...."


.....


I am so many kinds of evil.

Rosetta Stones

Well now. How about that?

Remember ages and ages ago? I muttered something about having done a book cover?

Well, the book is now on Amazon for pre-order. Delivery could be anytime between May and September, so you'll want to go over there and check it out.

I read the manuscript before doing the cover and I gotta tell you. It's pretty awesome. I kept sneaking it off to the loo at work so I could read it some more. Shh. Don't tell anyone.

Here's the "product description":

Four close friends witness a terrifying crime when they encounter a psychopathic killer in the remote Gila wilderness of southwestern New Mexico. In the chaos that follows, two entities-one good and one pure evil-fight for control of their souls as they struggle toward a terrifying climax that will change their lives forever. At turns frighteningly violent and nearly sublime, Rosetta Stones is a coming-of-age story that transcends the divisions of race and culture through the power of friendship and redemptive love.

Young Adult fiction at its gritty best. It ain't Sweet Valley High, that's for damn sure. It is finer. Realler (is that even a word?). And liable to make you weep at how quickly the innocent certainty of teenage invincibility can go so totally wrong.

And then some.

Catherine Dix is giving away a few copies to bloggers who swear to read the book and review it. Go there! Tell her that you are willing! We would naturally like to make this the next internet phenomenon so if you've got suggestions on how to get her book noticed by more people, please share!

Also, as you may have noticed if you aren't reading this in a feeder, I've put a little book bling with deets to her book near the top of this web page. For the purposes of promoting her book, feel free to borrow the bling, email it around, post it on your sites with a link to Amazon.

Let's try and sell this baby out before it's even hit the shelves!

Go!

New Work Monday #10

Dieppe Castle

Today I have a little drawing from my sketchbook to offer you. It isn't much, but it has been one of "those weeks" and I haven't gotten much done on the other projects I've got going.

This is a drawing that I did when Mr C and I bogged off to the Normandy coast for an afternoon last summer. We were both feeling melancholy and out of sorts, so I decided that a jaunt up north would drive the cobwebs out. I'm not sure where the kids were exactly. Probably with Mr C's parents.

We got lost on the way. For some reason, we couldn't find the highway (and when I say we, I really mean me, because I was driving). Also? The weather was the pits. It was supposed to be nice all over France. But it wasn't nice everywhere. Guess where the weather was gloomy. Go on.

In Dieppe I learned about the Canadian ties to that town. Mainly that a lot of Canadians died there during The Dieppe Raid. A thoroughly botched affair. How pleasant.

Then, while walking the boardwalk, we got separated because I wanted to walk out to the very end of the boardwalk (which wandered out past a lighthouse) because I wanted the wind to rip the tangles out of my brain. Meanwhile, Mr C wanted to languish on a bench.

The wind on the bench was perfectly good.

He is a sensible bloke.

So of course my portable phone decided to conk out soon after.

Also? As the sun started to sink, the howling "wind off the sea" started to get old and cold quite quickly. Since I had the car keys, Mr C had to figure out how to keep from freezing to death.

He's fine now though. Sorta.

I felt so bad about putting him out when we finally found each other. I didn't know what to say.

I'm so sorry darling, for being such a cuckoo bird of a wife.

Really.


P.S. If nothing else good came out of that day, I finally drew a castle loo. Can you spot it?

Feelings

I might as well talk about it here. I don't really have anywhere else to go.

I've tried to talk about it with Mr C. But I don't know how to formulate the words. How to compartmentalise where my thoughts have been going lately. Mr C is a cut and dry kind of guy. When I say, "I'm sad and I don't know why." He doesn't get it.

I don't get it either.

I don't get why I feel so negative about myself lately. I don't understand why I feel ugly. And fat. And undesirable. How my physical faults niggle the back of my brain [my teeth slope up on one side. Sometimes I feel like a gargoyle when I smile].

I don't get why my spirits are so dampened. As though every little thing I try is destined to fail or at the very least, no matter how hard I try, just get lost in the oubliette of the internet. I'm trying to walk forward despite these feelings, but I also feel a bit unbothered. I weigh the odds: 6 foot drift of crap to wade through or go lie down a bit. My room is dark and the door closes so nicely.

I have this overwhelming feeling of being unimportant. And slightly bored by everything in my life.

Seeing my cousin this week helped. A little. [Sadly, it comforted me that her teeth are weirder than mine (damn genes) and she wears her glasses perpetually crooked, yet she has a presence that says that it doesn't matter: it's only skin deep. What matters is her work as a musician (ie, that which you cannot guess).]

I almost didn't go into Paris to meet her. I forced myself onto that burb train, telling myself that I needed to fake feeling normal until I started to actually feel normal.

At one point, I asked her how that worked, the string quartet thing. How do they live? Survive? Earn a living? I was told that they were all self-employed and that, if they needed to give the name of an employer, then they gave the name of the quartet and the name of the "boss" would be one of the other members. Sneaky. They wrote grant applications, they found university residencies, they odd jobbed in their field.

The bottom line was "something always turned up".

I suppose that I should just have faith that something will turn up. Including my spirits. If you see them, send them my way (don't tell them about the spanking that's waiting for them though...).

Yesterday, I finally made it over to Maison des Artistes to sign myself up as a professional artist in France (I was so proud of myself for taking my life in hand). As I waited for the offices to open, my heart struck my rib cage a little. Me? Nervous? Why yes. This is what "taking charge of your life" feels like I guess.

When the offices opened and I handed the woman my form with my first art invoice, she poo-pooed me: "You should have come in last year! I cannot sign you up now! You'll have to wait until May so that we can give you a tax file to fill out."

"But I need a professional artist number in order to do exhibits..."

"You can get one of those from your local tax office."

Feck.

I should have known that bringing in an invoice from last year was dumb - This is France and There. Are. Rules. Everywhere. But I'm wondering if I shouldn't just "forget" about that invoice and make a new one for a different piece for 2009.

Or maybe it's all too much bother.

I took notes while the woman spoke to me about needing a POPL form and a 2047 declaration from the tax office, but I'm not sure what those two forms are about now (go me and my notation skills). I think one is about the pro number and the other is for income made on sales outside of France.

Add it all this the fear of being unprofitable for too long and if I declare being an artist too soon, I'll lose artist status further down the road if I never manage to sell anything.

Sigh.

So last night, after a difficult session with that therapy guy, and a battle of wills with my daughter, and other hysterics shamefully directed in the direction of Mr C (who did his best to ignore me) I sort of drank too much Pastis.

So today I have a headache.

Yay me.

Bother. I don't feel like writing anything more. Nor ending this brilliantly. My apologies for such shameful blather today. Hopefully I'll be more interesting and more polished tomorrow or soon after... My thanks for even getting this far. Winter in Paris was a tough one this year so am hoping that this is just "hurry up and get here Spring" blues.

...

Does Spring look like a weird word to anyone else?.... All of a sudden?

Does that even happen to anybody else? You see a word and BAM! It suddenly looks weird? Like, there couldn't be a weirder word anywhere.

Sometimes, my own damn first name seems weird to me. I write it, and then I think, WTF? Who even thought of a name like that? And then there was that one time? An Indian fellow wrote my name J-E-N-Y-P-H-U-R and I was all OMG! Someone done gone made it even weirder!

I'm pretty sure I'm digressing here....