Unattended Baggage

Mickelino doesn't have a life so he takes the Métro. What is more worrying here? The fact that he only writes about transportation systems or that he speaks about himself using third person singular? hm... Oh well Today has been my very first rather quiet day at work since July, that's why I took advantage of being "free" to go and pay my taxes. Because you see, I still haven't paid my taxes although I should've done it in April. That's a long story and a very boring one too. You don't want to hear about it anyway, let's just say that, as usual Mickelino has been a lazy bastard and hasn't done things when he had to, so now he's being fined for it... (hope there's no punishment for obnoxious people who keep on referring to themselves with third person singular, 'cos it's getting OUT OT CONTROL here!) Anyway, my subway trip to the tax office was quite an adventure! First, I got on the platform and there I saw two female Japanese tourists lying on the floor, screaming pling-plong words at some very hunky Arab-looking guy was lying on top of them both. My first thoughts: 1) Are they having sex? 2) Is that what you call MetroSexual people? 3) Oh my god is he raping them? 4) Why can't I be a Japanese tourist too? Well, I was kinda disappointed 'cos he was just a pick-pocket! But wow! What a dramatic act that was! Both women were dressed in some kind of back-in-trend woolen sweaters that made them look like actresses in some 70's Swedish soft-porn movie. Really entertaining! Then, I got on the train, pretty shaken up by the event, holding my bag real tight but still looking a bit available just in case. That's when, Henry51 got on the train. Henry is a beggar, but a civilized one, with a clean Gap sweater, trendy shoes and a soft smell of vanilla perfume. "Hi, I'm Henry, I'm 51, I'm unemployed, so if you could spare a euro or two (inflation! inflation) blah blah...". Well, no big deal, quite a common sight in the Métro. After the speech was done, he went among passengers to collect his money and got off through the same door that Marie-Jo44 used to tell us about HER life story. She did her little begging tour as well, but we were all starting to get bored and the old lady next to me was growing poor as she kept on giving money to the speech holders. I didn't give any money to the lady so she wasn't happy. She looked with her small whack eyes and said "Do you ever wonder why boogers are green when nothing else in your body is?". For a second, I thought that she had a point but then Henry51 reappeared and started holding the same speech. People were not happy. Again, Henry went on his begging tour among passengers who were protesting but suddenly, the old lady beside me saw a big bag and shouted "UNATTENDED BAGGAGE! OH MY GOD! UNATTENDED BAGGAGE"! People wouldn't have given a damn about that bag if she hadn't screamed so much, but as soon as you hear someone scream, well either you scream with them (that's what I did) or you start running around in all directions to find an exit (that's what I did too and so did the other passengers). But since we were in between stations there was no escape so people kept on running and pushing each other making small ridiculous running motions that would lead them nowhere, it was pretty crowded in there and nowhere to run so we basically looked and were as static as my grandma Sue on a treadmill really. When we got to the next station, everyone exited the train really quickly, and Henry51 took his big bag and ran along. I am REALLY tired now!

Insulated picnic bags and ugly cunts

and you're wondering why there's so much empty space here? Well, so am I...

Streets and Metro stations do have weird names in this city and one often wonders how people could come up with these names, such as Glacière (Insulated Picninc Bag), Filles du Calvaire (Agony Girls), Bonne Nouvelle (Good news) or Penis street (see my previous post about that street). Enter Jack Jack is a colleague of mine. He’s from the U.K, has been living in Paris for more than a year and his French really sucks! (am talking about the language here, of course!) Jack lives in the 18th arrondissement near the Porte de la Chapelle (Door of the Chapel) Métro station. For a year now, Jack has been commuting on the Metro and has been hearing the names of these stations on the PA system with the sexy voice without really paying attention to how those names were spelt an what they meant. Near Porte de la Chapelle, Jack usually travels through a station named Marx-Dormoy believing the name of the station was Marx Dors-moi, which in turn meant in Jack’s slow-French-learning-brain: Marx sleep with me. Well, with some imagination and an extra preposition, it does mean Marx sleep with me. However, what scared me the most was what never occurred to Jack: Why the F-#£% would anybody name a métro station Marx sleep with me??? Well, no, Jack thought “why not”. The French are weird and they only think about sex and politics so why not, and after all, let's face it, France is a totally centralized totalitarian state… hence its passion for Marx... After going through various stages of disbelief, panic, laughter and Roast beef animosity, I started thinking like Jack: actually why not? That’s when I took my little subway map, read a few of those names and realized that by just reading the names out loud, some of them could actually sound weird and DO mean crazy stuff to the poor foreigners based in this city… So many stations and so many names, so let’s put them in different categories: 1) The sad stations, like how depressing is it to live there? Ternes: dull, Concorde: Stupid rope, Saint-Maur: Saint Dead, Sully-Morland: Slow-Death-on-bed. 2) The stations where animals have turned mad: Charenton: the Cat-Gives-Back-the-Tuna, Lamarck-Caulaincourt: The Brand-of-the running cod, Poissonnière: The female fish seller, Faidherbe-Chaligny: Made of grass, the cat reads and denies 3) The Communism nostalgia stations: Stalingrad: Stalin City, Marx Dormoy: Marx sleep with me 4) The "like, hello!" category: Maison Blanche: White House, Franklin D. Roosevelt: like HELLO!, Villejuif: Jewish city 5) The "like hello, what the hell?" category: Rue du bac: High-school Exam street, Monceau: My bucket 6) The intimate ones Bourg la Reine: Fuck the Queen, Choisy le Roi: Choose the king , Bourse: Scrotum, Châtelet: Ugly Cunt, Saint-Cloud: The-Holy-Nail, Rue de la Pompe: Fellatio-Street 7) The gross ones: Saint-Sulpice: Saint piss-on-it, Charonne: Dead meat, Rambuteau: Vomit-Drunk-Early 8) The appetizing stations: Gobelins: Gulp-the-linen, Parmentier: Mash-Potatoes-and-Minced-Meat Welcome to Paris...

No news from Mickelino!

Tired of reading the same entry about some stupid inflatable doll week after week? Well, me too. First of all, I am really busy, 'cos believe it or not, Mickelino works even though none of my friends believe me. Secondly, I have been trying to write a new entry for days now but they won't let me publish it just because it's called: "Insulated Picnic Bags and Ugly Cunt". Is there any watchdog out there on the Blogger system who spies on me? If there is, TALK TO ME! My faithful readers can't wait to hear about picnic bags and other juicy stuff, right? Please, sign the petition in the comment box. Thanks, Love, Mickelino Forever

The true story of Uncle Dédé and Judy

C’est l’histoire vraie de mon tonton Dédé et la seule qui soit digne d’être racontée car le reste de sa vie est aussi vide que son crane dégarni et aussi intéressante qu’une aire d’autoroute. Vous vous dites que je suis un neveu ingrat qui se délecte du malheur des membres de sa famille mais détrompez-vous, je l’aime bien mon tonton Dédé bien qu’il n’ait pas toujours été clément avec le reste de la famille, surtout le jour où il a fracassé le crane de mon petit cousin M contre le pied du parasol. Et pour vous montrer à quel point je suis respectueux des valeurs familiales, j’ai même changé son nom pour que les membres de ma famille qui lisent ce blog (salut Nico !) ne s’en offusquent pas. Chui un mec bien non ?

Mon tonton Dédé est le frère de ma grand-mère. A huit ans, le petit Dédé - qui à l’époque ne laissait rien présager de sa future incapacité à affronter le monde des humains – tomba la tête la première dans l’âtre de la cheminée et se fracassa le crane contre un chenet incandescent. Puisqu’il ne fut pas blessé et puisqu’en 1922, au fin fond de la Champagne profonde, personne n’avait entendu parler de chocs psychologiques pouvant provoquer l’insociabilité, on résuma l’incident en un « l’est d’venu un peu con l’Dédé depuis qui s’est pris la tronche dans la ch’minaih ».

Tonton Dédé était toujours présent aux repas de Noël sans que personne ne s’en aperçoive. Il était en fin de compte aussi transparent que la nuisette de ma voisine d’en face et aussi peu présent qu’une classe de sixième un trente juin. J’ai toujours connu mon tonton Dédé regardant la cheminée dans laquelle il était tombé ou encore la fenêtre, la bouche légèrement entre-ouverte et les yeux vitreux sans qu’on ne sache vraiment qui de lui ou de la fenêtre était le plus transparent, entre-ouvert ou vitreux. Il lisait la rubrique nécrologique des journaux pendant des heures et ne parlait à personne. Il vivait chez ma grand-mère qui le considérait comme un demeuré et lui rendait la vie impossible.

On ne lui connaissait ni ami ni conquête ni sexualité. Au point où Dédé n’était plus un être humain mais un substantif de description. «un vrai Dédé çui-là ! », me disait-on, alors qu’à 18 ans je n’avais toujours pas présenté de gueuses à mon troupeau.

Cependant, un simple week-end de Pâques 1984 devait à tout jamais changer notre vision du Dédé en question et le faire passer du transparent au flou total voire à la fascination.

Ma grand-mère avait passé quelques jours chez mes parents et venait de rentrer chez elle plus tôt que prévu. Or, pas de Dédé, ni devant la fenêtre, ni devant la cheminée. En aucun cas inquiète et caressant au contraire l’espoir qu’il fût peut-être mort quelque part entre la cave et la chambre, mon aïeule entreprit d’aérer la maison trop humide et « cette odeur de caoutchouc était vraiment insupportable ». Dédé avait dû encore récupérer de vieux pneus de vélos dans la décharge pour en faire des lance-pierres.

Ma grand-mère ouvrit toutes les fenêtres de la maison une par une avec une énergie qui ne la quitterait qu’il y a un an. Mais quelle ne fut pas sa surprise en ouvrant la porte de la chambre de Dédé…

*petite musique exprimant un suspens intenable**

Ma grand-mère, prise de panique, courut se réfugier dans la cuisine et empoigna aussitôt le téléphone. Il fallait prévenir mon père. Je me souviens encore de l’appel et mon père qui me rapportait des bribes de la conversation. A l’autre bout du fil… quelque chose d’ignoble s’était produit. Une vision d’horreur, cette odeur… et ces yeux, vitreux, ce corps odorant sur le lit, la bouche grande ouverte, les membres flasques, ce corps nu qui avait commencé à se vider de vie… Ma grand-mère n’avait jamais vu pareille horreur. Le choc plus que la tristesse envahit ma grand-mère qui, au téléphone, essayait tant bien que mal de décrire l’ignominie qu’elle venait de constater. … et mon père de répondre par un éclat de rire sonore. Ce même éclat de rire qui égaye encore nos repas de Noël 20 ans après.

Ma grand-mère venait, malgré elle, d’être présentée à sa première poupée gonflable.