Capitalism...Y'ur doin' It Wrong!

I just wanted to share with you a few local businesses and business ideas that have popped up in the last few months here in Metz, France. Sorry the photos are so crappy. It was freezing cold and pissing rain, but I think you can still get the point.

Cheeseburgerz.....Y'ur doin' it Wrong:

Duck Hamburger discounted to only 15,90 EUR.


Gangsta...........Y'ur doin' it Wrong:

For real y'ur too cheap to reprint this sign?

Discuss.

Last Minute Escape!

This weekend we took a last minute get-away to Paris. As much as we love the Barbie Dream House, we very much enjoy getting away from Metz. Also, I needed a cheeseburger. So, we hopped on the TGV and away we went. We stopped by the Pompidou to see the Pierre Soulages retrospective, and spent about an hour at the elles@centrepompidou exhibition which was just massive in every sense of the word.

The Marlene Dumas paintings just knocked my socks off. If you can get to Paris this year, get thee to this show. After February 2011 most of this work will go back into storage untill the next time some wise curator decides it’s time to pay attention to women artists again. Ahem. Moving along.

Contrary to popular belief, the highlight of our weekend was of our weekend was not inhaling cheeseburgers at the Hard Rock Café while head-banging to System of a Down. Nope. The highlight of my weekend was scoring not one, but these two pairs of Jimmy Choo Nimbus sandals on sale.

Actually only one pair was on sale, but my lovely FrenchBoy managed to talk the sales girl into giving me the 2nd pair at the sale price since I simply couldn’t choose between two Choos.

(I bet you can’t say that real fast 5 times in a row!)

Ladies and gentlemen, I am in shoe love, but obviously I cannot wear these babies untill Spring officially arrives. Unfortunately it is currently minus 3 degrees here in Metz France, so I’m in for a long wait….which is actually a good thing cuz right about now my feet look like Frodo Baggins.

Seriously--My once lovely tootsies are lookin’ a bit rough around the edges due to the fact that I’ve been stomping around in the snow in my Harley Davidson Motorcycle boots every damn day all damn winter. So, for the next 28 days my feet will be in serious full-time in-patient rehab. I cannot be seen wearing my Choos with effin’ hobbit feet.

I’m just keepin’ it real.

There is no French word for 'Happy Hour'.

One of the toughest parts of being an expat, or in my case an immigrant, is the reality of leaving your friends behind and jumping into a new location and trying to make new ones. Anyone who has ever moved to a new city or state knows how difficult it can be to jump ship and create a new social circle. Doing so in a foreign language is just that much more daunting a task. I think I’ve whined about making French friends on this blog before and I plan to do so again one last time and then I think it will beofficially out of my system:

I find Frenchmen lovely. So much so that I married one. French women on the other hand don’t really trip my trigger. For one, I think I intimidate them. That’s a nice way of saying I scare them off. If you’ve been reading this blog for any time now, you know I have a big personality, but to my credit I’m a bit more subdued in person….as long as I’m sober. Unfortunately most casual social situations or informal events in France do not include sobriety. After a few glasses of wine I have been known to do things that seem completely strange and obnoxious to French women, such as laughing. And trust me it's not just Parisienne women who enjoy looking down on fun people.

But I have to admit; If I didn’t live in the armpit of France I would definitely give this a try. The idea is so simple: It’s like a cocktail hour before work. Only the cocktail is coffee of course. Is this a great idea or is this a great idea? And wouldn't it just be a really cool way to start off your day?

If anyone has ever been to one of these events in Paris I would LOVE to hear how it went. Seriously please either e-mail me or post in comments.

Wait, wait, don’t tell me. A bunch of Anglophones showed up.

Shallow As A Kiddie Pool.

And now, on a much lighter note:

For the last 3 weeks I have eaten nothing but steamed fish and organic fruits and vegetables, and about 85 cups of coffee. Why? Not because I want to get healthy and feel good about myself, but because I want to be able to fit into these clothes.

Tracy Reese is a Goddess with a capital G, and that ensemble at 1:32 is the bee's knees. And did I mention she makes clothese up to a size 12?

Is it wrong to pray to Jesus to help you get designer clothes? Will I go to hell twice if I admit that I only want to get skinny so I can wear slutty clothes?

Oh No He Di’int!

You may or may not have heard about the controversy surrounding the new film The Other Dumas. Long story short--Gerdard Dipardoo, one of France’s most famous actors, will be playing Alexandre Dumas, author of such famous novels as “The Count of Monte Cristo” and “The Three Musketeers,”. There is however, one small catch: Alexandre Dumas was kinda Black. Dipardoo is not kinda Black. He’s just kinda fat and kinda ugly as all get out.

When I first heard about this I was offended for obvious reasons. One, Dipardoo makes my skin crawl, and two, he’s daring to play one of France’s most beloved and celebrated cultural icons in black face and a fuzzy afro wig. (OK that last bit was just me being dramatic.) I know it’s tough for Black actors in Hollywood to get the really interesting roles they want to play, but they’ve got it easy compared to Black French actors. Apparently French casting directors don’t even bother trying to find Black actors to play actual Black characters. They just paint the white actors browner and slap a curly wig on their head and say “Whatever. Same diff.”

To clarify, my beef with Dipardoo is not just that he isn’t Black, but that I’m just sick of seeing his bloated face in so many damn movies. I am under the impression that there some kind of French film mafia that requires he be given a role in 40% of the films made in France. I hear he almost beat out Marion Cotillard for the role of Édith Piaf in La Môme, but eventually settled for a supporting role.

There are just so many things wrong with this whole set up that I hardly know where to begin. It’s bad enough that 99% of French people don’t even know that Dumas was kinda Black, did they even try to find a Black actor for the role? My guess is no. I mean does Dipardoo even look like Dumas?

OH SNAAAAP! He does look like Dumas!

OK, that freightening fact aside, the whole thing still rubs me the wrong way. Or maybe I’m just being closed-minded. Film is art and art should be allowed to take creative liberties. For instance when they make the biopic of Barack Obama’s life...

Young Barack should be played by a slightly sun-kissed Zack Efron...

and Rob Lowe can play Obama during his white house years. No fake-bake necessary since he is already lightly toasted.

Gosh darnit! I do declare that I have truly missed my calling as a casting director. I think I really nailed this one, although I am open to discussion. Maybe Clooney would do a better Obama?

"What does it all mean?"

Thank you all for obliging the “mid-blog crisis” I’ve been going through for the last three months. After a few years of blogging you kind of start asking yourself some pretty deep existential questions about why the hell you show up to a blog twice a week to talk to complete strangers. I mean, I didn’t start doing this so I could get a book deal. And I only make $100 a year from Google Ad-sense. Nobody is getting rich chez moi, but still, I show up.

After three months of deliberation I’ve come up with more than a few explanations for why I keep doing this blog, ranging from: my mother didn’t breast feed me long enough, to iron deficiency and lack of sufficient REM sleep. Still, nothing quite adds up.

What I know for sure is that when something strikes me as funny, I feel the unyielding urge to write it down or at least tell a few people. I am a good story-teller. Oh, and I enjoy it. So, I make no promises, about how long I’ll keep doing this, but for as long as I keep enjoying it--- I’m back.

"And I'm just gettin' warm..."

My immigrant ramblings will continue next week.

Madame K has left the building.

Happy New Year and all that, but I just can’t bring myself out of my winter coma long enough to write stuff. All I really feel like doing as of late is napping, playing my guitar and baking chocolate cakes and sometimes watching James Bond movies on Blu-Ray. Blame it on the winter and OH, did I mention I came down with a killer head-cold?

WhingeWhingeWhinge much?

I’m originally from Iowa, so I should be able to handle this better, but lord almighty if snow doesn’t put me in a rightfully evil disposition. So, back to baking and napping it is. With any luck I will be out of hibernation before April showers arrive.

In the meantime I leave you with this delightful paper animation with music that seems somehow wonderfully appropriate for this post.

Why I Heart France Reason #17: Sin Delivery.

One of the things that always made me a bit grumpy about living in the armpit of France is all the modern conveniences that you simply can't get. The French simply can't seem to get the hang of delivery service. Yes, we can pizza delivered, but untill about 2 years ago if you didn't go to pick it up yourself, the pizza would arrive chez vous roughly 1.5 hours after your ordered the damn thing, on the back of a 18 year old motorbike-riding half-wit who clearly jumped up and down on it 3 or 4 times just before he rang your doorbell. And did I mention that said pizza would taste like it had been seasoned with old gym socks?

Somehow in France you can get a doctor to come to your house at 8PM for 5 Euros, but pizza or egg rolls? B^tch, not if your life depended on it.

So imagine my delight when I got this flyer in my mailbox a week ago:



Alert Drink offers free home delivery of aperitifs, smoothies, cocktails, wines, champagnes, salads, sandwishes & paninis, ice-cream, desserts, and....wait for it......Sex toys and accessories.

At first I thought it was just bizarre, but then I realised the Alert Drink genious. We live in a part of France where they roll up the sidewalks at 7PM. What about us drunks and pervs who want to party till dawn?

Ah, finally a delivery service with us in mind!

Not For Nothing....

but as of December 13th, FrenchBoy and I have been married 6 years.

And in classic fashion we completely forgot about it until about 8PM that evening when French Mother-in-law reminded us...by sending us a text message on my phone.

All so very romantic.