Reanimating old ladies

A few days ago, an old lady fell uncounscious on the subway. Everybody started screaming (including me) but didn't come up with any practical suggestions to facilitate the old lady's return to life.
Suddenly Nurse Betty (she did look like Renée Zellweger) showed up from behind a weekly gossip magazine and performed CPR on the old lady. I fell in love with her instantly (the nurse). The whole scene happened in some kind of slow-motion movie-like scene, Nurse Betty's hair flapping on old lady's chest. Expressions of terror on bystanders's faces.
When I came back home I thought about how cool Nurse Betty looked as she performed CPR. I immediately wanted to be as cool as her (I hadn't fallen in love with her, I just wanted to BE her!) in case some good-looking creature were to faint in front of me. As I can't bother to take a CPR class thing, I decided to google CPR in order to find an easy and clear way to know the basics. Thankfully, I found this...


If the video doesn't work, don't ask me, I won't be able to help.

Yesterday night, I thought I had to start performing my new CPR skills on the old bitch from the second floor (Bitchum Magna) when she saw that a very good looking tranny moved in our building. This is just so great! I hope he/she organizes wild and glamorous glitter-parties.

Before I let you go and enjoy your weekend, please take a few minutes to meditate on this marvellous poem I learnt a few years ago:

Jack and Jill
Went up the hill
Jack wanted to lick Jill's fanny
But Jack's in such shock
His mouth full of cock
Didn't know Jill was a tranny!

Bon weekend mes amis!

Weird jobs

Last week I got together with some relatives whom I don’t get to see very often. The occasion was not the most fun but we did find time to discuss, laugh and talk about something else than the reason why were all gathered that day.

My relatives have never really understood what I do for a living. I’ve told them 300 times but they never seem to remember it. Who can blame them since I barely understand what I do myself and I have had my share of strange jobs throughout the years! It would have been easier if I’d been a doctor, a teacher, a sales-person or even a stripper for crying out loud. They get really confused. My grandmother asked me a few years ago if my Russian studies were still interesting, while in fact, I was studying American literature. (although I did study Russian briefly when I was in high-school).

Last week, a distant cousin asked me if I was still selling coffee in German supermarkets. The question puzzled me at first but I suddenly remembered that I actually did sell Italian coffee in German supermarkets. How crazy was that? How crazy was I?

I remember it was in 1992, I had a whole summer break from university, I jumped on a train to this destination with an exotic name: WUPPERTAL, learned some basic German with some self-study book on the train and started touring Germany selling Italian coffee. I did that for two months and made A LOT OF money! The French accent thing does work in Germany as well and was definitely a great customer magnet, although some were disappointed that I wasn’t Italian.

I wonder how I’ve had time to do all that. Especially considering that I’m 33 years old (a real spring-chicken in other words!) and that I’ve been with the same company for 10 years! I did most of these weird jobs when I was still a student. It was fun, varied. I guess the variation and the fun end when you start a career.

- I cleaned rooms at a hotel in Wyoming (very Brokeback Mountain-ish innit?)
- I was later promoted to bus-boy! (How successful am I?)
- I worked as a Swedish-French interpreter at a soccer cup (very butch)
- In the Navy, I taught French officers to read and write (unbelievable but true!)
- I played in a Danish and a Swedish movie (although it wasn’t the kind of movie you’re thinking about!). The Swedish movie was a short film made by an Egyptian movie maker that nobody has ever heard about. I was a waiter in a Stockholm restaurant, he saw me and asked whether I wanted to play the leading role in his new film. I was highly sceptical but accepted after he told me I really looked like Sean Connery. The movie was a flop and the director never managed to sell it. The plot: I had an alcoholic wife whom I beat in the sofa on a regular basis out of some kind of therapeutic proof of love.
- I taught English to a group of 25 eighty-year old French ladies (I know it’s hard to believe it considering all the mistakes I make in this blog!) Gee, these women were OUT OF CONTROL!
- In Sweden again, for a few months I played the French lover in a radio soap-opera. My part, basically, was to say “Oh mon amour je t’aime” or “I want to make luuv to you on zeu beach” with a very thick French accent. It didn’t go much deeper than that. The program is still aired in Sweden despite its poor quality!
- I did street surveys for some obscure company, asking people to sign up for free apartments-in-Mallorca-kind-of-contest. Many people were totally ripped-off because of me and I never got paid.
- The Swedish government used me as a successful example of integration of a foreigner in the country. I had to tour various schools and exile-centers to show poor Kurds and Iraqis how easy it was to integrate in their new country. I had made it so why not they? To this day, I’m still really ashamed of this experience.
- I gave theater lessons to a bunch of kids although I had absolutely no idea what I was supposed to do.
- Back when I still had hair and cheek bones that showed, I had a brief and unsuccessful modelling career for a leather store in Spain. I had to catwalk wearing 1989-style leather jackets in front of tourists to make them buy the coats. The company asked me to look the old women in eyes and openly flirt with them as I was sashaying since they were the ones making the decision. A few German grannies asked to have their picture taken beside me! Some benefited from the picture session to discreetly touch my tushy.

Now, I'm sure you've also had your share of weird jobs, right?

(The pictures above were taken by Favorite Mr. B a few weeks ago at the Palais de Tokyo, Modern Art Museum in Paris and have absolutely nothing to do with this post, as you may have noticed).

What day is it today?

While everybody spent the whole day making out by the fire place, giving each other presents of all sorts, proposing, kneeling down for various reasons... I spent my day shedding tears at my cousin's funeral who's died of a sudden heart-attack at the age of 36. A handsome, successful man with a 9 year old kid and a nice uniform has just left us without any notice, heart problems or anything. It's really sad.

But let's talk about something else please! I was at my uncle's place last night and found a few minutes to check my emails and this blog. He uses Firefox and for the first time I realized that my blog looks completely retarded on Firefox! I could barely see anything! Now I understand Nomad's * cryptic comments about having to highlight the posts in order to read them. I really thought he was speaking in tongues as usual or he may have had too much of these weed-pies he serves his maids, but he may have had a point...

What should I do? I'm completely computer illiterate! Help!

*You can nominate Nomad's blog for the best South African blog award here.

(I should be nice to him, you see, 'cos he might be able to help me)

The angry housewife in me

I'm not fussy really. I never clean, I never iron, I never do anything in my apartment but sleep, blog and watch TV. Consequently, I am no good housewife and nobody will ever want to marry me. However, I do turn into a ruthless & maniac housewife when I cook for friends. Having friends over for a little dinner is the best thing I know. I love it, love it, love it!

I come from a country where food is art and should be prepared and debated for hours and hours. Dinners take time and food can be discussed endlessly. The only problem with the French (yes there's only one!) is that they usually love food as long as it's French food, or at least relatively mild western cuisine. Anything else is unknown, scary or even worse: not worth trying.

Oral needs - a parenthesis

One other thing you should know is that I've had the chance to live and/or travel in many different places around the globe and unlike many of my French counterparts, culinary speaking, I've been exposed to lots of different cuisines, taste sensations (read between the lines, I'm much better than everyone else). Anything from biscuits & gravy for breakfast, piri-piri seasoned bobotie for lunch to killing spicy sea-cucumber for dinner. I love spicy food, well actually I just love food in general, well.. actually I just love everything that I can put in my mouth really (food, drinks, cigarettes, finger nails, people, words, etc...). I can eat anything, at any time, whether I'm already full or not. Any kind of food is interesting. For me, traveling always includes visits to different restaurants, reading menus for hours and buying local cookbooks.

Man with a plan

As the kitchen goddess I aim at being, I feel I have a mission on earth (I'm a goddess, remember), my mission is to reveal well hidden international culinary secrets to my fellow citizens who come to my little dinner parties.

Tough mission because it never works and I never learn.

Ok, I don't always succeed, I often mess up and some of my dishes taste like genuine dog food, but still I do put an extra effort into it and at least one could appreciate learning something about the rest of the world. WHATEVER!

The last supper

Yesterday night, I had a few friends over. The theme of the night was: the Canary Islands. Did you know that behind the tacky clapping-charter-flight-destination-façade, a fantastic food culture hides. In the small houses hanging from the slopes of the vulcanoes, big Spanish hairy mamas prepare the Mojo for their numerous children and grandchildren. The Mojo is a very salty and spicy sauce that you should eat with very salty (extremely salty) potatoes (so salty, they actually get covered by a thin layer of salt after cooking, see pic above). It's DE-LI-CIOUS even though the first taste can be daunting because of the salt. But as you eat it, your tongue and your taste buds get used to the salt and that's the moment you discover the amazing taste of this Canarian specialty.
What you should know is: don't cook this dish to people who just care for steak and fries.

What usually happens - another parenthesis

As the amazingly homey housewife that I am, I serve my guests by presenting the dish as if it were "a little something" I cooked quickly right before they got to my place while deep inside I spent 14 hours swearing "why the f### did I invite people again?". I get haunted by the stress that they won't like it or that they won't eat it, or even worse that they will get sick and vomit on my Kelim carpet. After the guests have a first taste, I usually wait a few minutes (pretending that everything is normal and that I don't give a shit about what they think) and then comes the verdict.

1)"Oh it's really good!"

or

2)"Oh my God, this is the best thing I've ever tasted in my whole life!"

are both highly appreciated comments.

When I hear such compliments, I'll just give a little shrug and a well rehearsed "oh, don't exaggerate, it's nothing really" while - deep inside - I experience a mini-orgasm.

The very last supper

Back to last night's guests: they didn't say anything and they didn't eat anything. Had a little bite, said it was salty and continued playing with their forks and knives, making cling-cling sounds pretending there was some action going on in their plates. But they can't fool Anal Annie! I had perfect control of the table situation and I knew no swallowing was taking place.

Finally, they said "well, you know, we weren't really hungry ".

That's all!

Ok, had it been disgusting, I would've understood, felt ashamed and hated myself for being so crap at cooking. But honestly, I thought what I'd made was purely orgasmic. (if I may say so...)

Shocking
So can you believe it? I mean, how rude is that? Just because something tastes different, does that mean you can't give it a chance? I know that very salty food sounds scary but if the whole population of some Spanish islands like it, there must be a reason!

They didn't get dessert.

Sleeping with the escalator people

Ok, can anyone tell me why I suddenly have so much space here??? I can't move my text upwards grrrrrrrr......

Have you ever played that game: Who would you do? For example: Would you do Brad Pitt or Ricky Martin? Well that's an easy one of course. As you know, this game becomes much trickier when you start getting questions like: Would you do Roseanne Barr or Millie Jackson? and you HAVE TO make a choice or your whole family dies in atrocious pain... then the game goes on, alcohol flows and the game gets out of control: Would you do Michael Jackson or er... a black labrador?...

Well anyway, this game follows me all year round. At the store: Would you do the butcher or the baker?, on the street: Would you do the bag lady over there or the policeman in the tight uniform? (well, as I'm asking myself the questions, I have to make it easy on myself at times) and finally there's the escalator variation.

When I'm on an escalator, whether it be in the metro or at a shopping mall, I can't stop looking at the people who use the other escalator going in the opposite direction. Then I MUST choose one person I would have to have sex with in order to save my whole family from a terrible death. This game is tricky because you HAVE TO choose someone before you reach the top of the escalator or you end up sleeping with the last person who steps on the opposite escalator. It's a stressful game as you must be quick. It does make commuting entertaining though. It's also another proof of my being a total basket case. Ok, I'm going to bed.

But seriously, who would you do? Brad Pitt or a black labrador? ... Tough one uh? As far as I'm concerned, I've never really fancied Brad Pitt.

Are my muscles taking over my brain?

Tourette syndrome — also called Tourette's syndrome, Tourette's disorder, TS, or Gilles de la Tourette syndrome (GTS) — is a movement disorder with onset in childhood, and characterized by the presence of multiple motor tics and at least one phonic tic, which characteristically wax and wane. Tourette syndrome was once considered a rare and bizarre syndrome. It is no longer considered rare, but is often undetected because of the wide range of severity. (Wikipedia)

I'm seriously starting to wonder if i don't suffer from Tourette after all. You know this terrible disease that affects your muscles and your speech and makes you say dirty things out loud!

Actually, I think my Tourette is still sleeping but is just waiting to come out. Let me explain: Whenever i'm in a situation in which I don' feel at ease, I have this sudden urge to scream something naughty. I still manage to control it but it's getting harder and harder. For example, the other day I was at a classical music concert. The music was amazingly beautiful and soft, an impeccable silence would spread through the concert hall as the flute player did her solo. That's when I started struggling with myself, sweating, biting my tongue to not scream "HAIRY DICK" to the crowd as they religiously listened to the flute player.

Another example is the old lady from the second floor. She's a racist, she's ugly and I hate her. Sometimes she talks to me about the strange sounds she hears in the stairwell late at night. I can't really concentrate on what she tells me though, the only thing I can think of is: "What if I bitch slapped her right here, right now". I can almost feel my hand move towards her wrinkled cheek. Basically, if my body took over my brain for a few seconds I could do or say the worst things.

Lately I've been wanting to scream "VAGINA" at the movie theater, also I feel like stripping whenever I hold a presentation in front of people... As well as I feel I could jump off the top of a tower, I feel I could just take my willy out anytime if I wanted to. At the store, at work, anywhere embarrassing. One little muscle movement + one little brain absence and ::oh my God:: it could be out there, flapping in the breeze...

But I've neither screamed insanities nor taken it "out" yet. I don't think I ever will. It's just the forbidden aspect of things that makes me want to put out really... But imagine, if I really have Tourette and that my muscles suddenly start taking over my brain? Oh my God, it's starting now: