February
9
2012
Iconoclasticallly yours by www.iconoclasticallyyours.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License
I am having one of these days, and no, I can’t explain it ! Is it just me or does it happen to you too? You know when everything seems to be going the right way, and you feel good, relieved, and then at the ultimate minute, shit happens? That’s how I feel today.
My throat hurts from screaming outside the name of my cat: Milou, without any coat and in slippers with the snow falling. Please don’t cry yet! It happened last night. Picture perfect at home, I mean, as perfect as it will ever be: the mutts relaxing after dinner except Sophie, the troublemaker, who decided that my arrangement of tulips sucked, so she was just swallowing them one after the other until I saw her and she ran away with the last one in her mouth. What do you do when your dog eats tulips if you don’t have a significant other or even if you have one as a matter of fact? You run fast to your computer and google: “dog eating tulips”, and you push the magic key “Enter”. And here we went with a list of owners of labs – what a surprise! – having eaten the flowers! I can breathe now: as long as it’s not the bulbs, Sophie will be ok, might throw up a bit, or have a tummy ache like if I am going to care! Bitch! I look at the left overs of my flowers, and I am ready to have a fit, but I want to go back to my picture perfect, therefore I start a fire that I will enjoy from the kitchen. I stopped fantasizing about sitting in my rocking chair by the fireplace and reading a book since George the clinger came into my life. I cannot be sitting anywhere for more than 2 seconds without having 80 lbs of dog on me. And yes, I know, my daughters throw at my face anytime I complain that he is the way he is because I cut his umbilical cord. Therefore, Milou the cat decides to enjoy the chair and the fire.
Damn it! I was really working on my picture perfect last night, trying to get rid of the image of a good friend of mine lying in a hospital bed after a surgery for gallbladder cancer where they removed the darn gallbladder, the bladder, the prostate and the urethra. Entering the hospital as one, and knowing that in a few hours from that moment, your body will never be the same anymore and that wounded you will stay for the rest of your life. There too, I went to Google, Google the hope, Google the pessimistic, Google the truth, and learned a lot about that cancer which amazingly is more attracted to women over 65, and is hard to diagnose, so most of the time, you are already half dead before they can figure it out. OK, something is wrong right there: he is a guy, 55? Just got his first grand kid, I mean, seriously? Why is the world so fucked up? And since I am not Santorum, God is not my answer. Google did partially, meaning that he has most likely 15 % of chances to see his grand kid reach the age of 5.
While I am in that half dazed world, I hear a cat meowing by my office, but don’t pay much attention as I go there as well. Sitting at my computer, again some meows but this time from the other side of the house, by the garage. Then, of course, Hell happened like every evening when Jessica comes home and the mutts are barking like coyotes are circling the house. And suddenly, my brain froze with horror: what if Milou the cat went to the garage when I went there. Frantically, I call his name all over the house while Jessica is turning over every single piece of furniture in the house, and we both came to the same conclusion: Milou the cat has to be outside. It’s snowing, it’s cold, and with my imagination I can picture him getting so scared by the noise of the garage door, then running fast away from the noisy door, and being, for the first time in his life: outdoors. In slippers and tee shirt, I go all over screaming his name. Of course, if I had been him, I would not have answered either. I took the car, drove around with the window down, calling him. Nothing. I came home, and went yes, of course to google “indoors cats escaping outside”, and of course I did everything I was not supposed to, like screaming… At that point, Jessica was not even speaking to me, so sure that my negligence had killed her cat. She was even mad at poor Boubou the fox who would kill her cat. I replied that Boubou had already had dinner, so Milou was safe on Boubou’s side! Then suddenly, I saw him. Milou the cat was sleeping in the fireplace in the family room (not the one with the roaming fire, silly!), the other one. When he saw he, he raised slowly extending first his front legs in the longest and slowest stretch he ever did, until, nonchalantly going to try another spot for another nap.
The remaining of the “Milou non escape” is my throat hurting from the screaming and most likely the cold! Fortunately, I do have Ricola candies – the ones that my mother swear she never heard of despite of the fact that they are Swiss! -.
So, taking it easy today, I decided to explore Google and its new policy, and I can tell you: I am shocked. Did anyone take the time to read that crap and realize what is happening here with their new BS privacy policy? Even Europe is fighting over that. But in the good old US is everyone brain dead? I do think though that with Google being Google, we can close a few agencies, and I will go further than Perry, poor guy: we can close all the intelligence agencies, Homeland Security too! Google is the biggest hoarder on this planet. They keep EVERYTHING: your deleted e-mails or chats (OK, I don’t chat), your searches, everything you ever do when you turn on the power button on your darn computer. And you cannot opt out…. No way. You can’t tell Google that you don’t want to play anymore. It’s too late! They already know everything about you. In which category am I going to be? Let’s see, in one day I am now recording every search I do on Google to see what they could come up with for me:
“Dogs eating tulips”
“gallbladder cancer”
“Ricola candies and calories”: none of your business!
“Indoor cat escaping”
“Indoor cat scared by garage door noise”
“Dogs peeing in their sleep”: Guess what? I am not the only one with this one! Do I feel better about it now? Not really!
“best price for Opium” the perfume dummy. I have been wearing that perfume designed by Yves Saint Laurent since I was in diapers or almost.
“life expectancy with gallbladder cancer”
“how to use the net without Google” Amazingly did not find much on that one!
“Callista Gingrich hairdresser”: no, let me explain that one! I am looking for a new hairdresser since mine went MIA without telling me, and I have a few hairdressers I need to scratch off my list. This is one of them.
“where to buy bamboos in Maryland” : none of your business!
“Carl Hiaasen books”: just love the guy and his wicked sense of humor!
“Body of proof”: My DVR went on strike and is refusing to record any new episode of my favorite show. Was just trying to understand why!
“Gladiator shoes AND leopard print”: I love shoes, ok?
So Google Darling who is the fairest of them all? Google? Hello? I am sorry to say that Google is taking the 5th!
Iconoclastically yours,
Dominique
December
3
2011
Iconoclasticallly yours by www.iconoclasticallyyours.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License
He left us without a word, without a smile, without anything. Empty handed we are, with memories of him, sweet, bitter, sad, funny, dramatic memories of him. We do not remember days, just moments, and this is so true.
Arguing with him about literature was a treat. Romain Gary and “La vie devant soi”, I do remember…
« Il m’a expliqué en souriant que rien n’est blanc ou noir et que le blanc, c’est souvent le noir qui se cache et le noir, c’est parfois le blanc qui s’est fait avoir. » and, yes, you are going to get a tentative translation of it ! “He explained to me, smiling, that nothing is white or black, and that the white is very often the black hiding and the black is sometimes the white which got tricked.” He left one day with all my Romain Gary’s books. It was the last time I saw them, and the last time I saw him.
We argued on spaghettis cooked in water and oil (hey, I am Half Italian) or cooked in Champagne! When I look back at the past, I got glimpses of him. The gawky teenager of 15 with a shy smile making fun of his eyes. He had diverging eyes, so you did not know all the time which one to follow! But even at 15, age where most of the teens take themselves so seriously, his dry sense of humor was already there, not missing a bit. He was cool, knowing already what to let go of.
The first time he was in love, and going to his rendez-vous at dusk. Life was blooming, so full of promises.
18 and wondering how he could reach 30. He would be an old man by then! His trip in Europe with his partner, and how he came back to the US with eyes screaming freedom, happiness, youth. Having so many funny stories to tell.
20 and the eyes of an old man after his partner died in front of him. Silly, hard, awful world when, in the glimpse of a second, horror happens and Mike, that handsome smiling young blond man, is just shattered dreams. Months later, telling me how he stopped brushing his teeth after the death of his companion, how he was questioning the meaning of every single step he was taking, and how he paid for it, months later, when his teeth started protesting. Life was stronger than anything, but was it?
The stories when he starting teaching French in a very famous University in DC. He was following his path, being unique in whatever he was starting. And then, the broken man he became when he lost his job, and stopped fighting.
The last Thanksgiving we shared. What an irony? What could he have been thankful for? Don’t get me wrong, I love Thanksgiving. This is my favorite holiday after you peel the huge skin of hypocrisy surrounding it. Celebrating the meals offered by the Indians….. Ooops…. I mean Native Americans (I will never understand when the word Indians became a bad word…. Or is it a bad word just for the white people?) then we killed them. I wonder if Native Americans really celebrate Thanksgiving? What do they have to be thankful for? The white man introducing alcohol to them? Anyway, at 32, he was back for Thanksgiving and more. He spent a few months with us, enjoying taking Jessica to school, even though Jessica was screaming at me “I am 10, Mom, and it’s a block away.” But she understood that he needed it, he needed to go back in time or try to go back to these carefree teenager years, and one day he left…. It was the last day I ever saw him. He left with Romain Gary. It could have been worse than Gary as travel companion. Couldn’t it?
And the last chapter of his life: homeless in Paris. It gave me such a different perspective of every homeless person I saw in the streets of DC. You always wonder how people get there. Do not dare to judge them. You don’t know them, you will never know them, and you will never know why. Their eyes won’t ever meet yours, grey shadows in cities who take one day at a time, and live a parallel world to ours but with paths that will never cross.
I remember reading some years ago an article about toddlers and young children in Paris who develop a lot of new diseases from the pollution. They are so small; they get the worst of everything. And I thought about him. Imagining him sleeping on benches, under bridges or in the streets. He, too, will breathe the worst air in the city.
I started looking for him, became addict of sites like “deaths in the street” which reports every death of a homeless human being, hoping to never see his name there, hoping that one day, I will hear his voice, see his smile and that these past 11 years would be memories.
It won’t happen. He died on November 15, 2011. As his sister put it, he took another path, not the easiest one, but he made it his own and stood by it. Now I wonder, maybe he did not lose himself, maybe it was the only path he could have taken. No matter what, I feel privileged to have known him. He was a Gentle Man.
Iconoclastically yours,
Dominique
August
27
2011
Iconoclasticallly yours by www.iconoclasticallyyours.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License
What a week! First, I missed « the » earthquake, hopefully of the Century! I was in my personal earthquake on wheels, my Jeep Wrangler, when Jessica called me. First, I did not believe her, thinking it had to be one of those trees which fell down, but hearing the anxiety in her voice, I turned around and headed straight home with a few, just a few people! Suddenly, the cellular phones stopped working. Don’t you hate that when you can’t call anyone while driving home to see if your house is still around? There was that guy with spiky green hair in his red convertible who was exactly thinking the same than I. Why is my phone not working? Amazingly, we are almost neighbors and how could I have never noticed his red car?
And now, Irene the hurricane or its leftovers? Can’t I get a break? On top of it, I got a cold in the middle of the summer, and a bad one! Each time I sneeze, the mutts are reliving the earthquake! Hurricane, did you say hurricane? I rushed to my pet store to keep the mutts busy and with a full stomach, and quite to my sadness, Pawlitics had huge signs for clearance. They are closing down. After so many years, one small shop just could not compete with the huge Bark stores, etc…. I am joking around, but I am really sad. The two guys who owned it were just sweethearts with knowledge. It sucks! Sorry, I don’t want to bond with anyone anymore. I just found “Taste of the Wild” on the net, no taxes and free shipping. But seriously, I would not have done it if Pawlitics had stayed open. I like diversity, and the thing which we are missing in this country it’s just that!
Since I still have one kid to feed, I did go to Giant too, where as usual people were buying tons of toilet papers! Some aisles were empty. I still don’t get that. Seriously! Why the toilet paper? I need an explanation one of these days! While I was shopping, Pepco, our beloved electricity company, called me and delivered me the sweetest message. They already knew they are pathetic, so, they just wanted to let me know in advance that they were going to be pathetic again, and that power outages were going to last for days! It was so sweet! Why do I need that crap in my life? At the same time, I just read online the last interview of a friend of mine who is retiring from fighting against global warming and the inertia of everyone. The title was: “we failed”. That sounds really good, and even if it’s true, which I do believe, I just did not need that statement today. I don’t want to imagine my kids or my grandkids getting fried by the freaking sun. Speaking of future generations, I have to work on my recipes book for my daughters. I have been lazy about it, not lazy. I had that weird feeling that once it’s written, I can go, and I am not ready to go yet, sorry guys!
It’s raining, and raining, and I have such a hard time with Maia. She is a beautiful black Labrador Retriever. She is stunning, but she HATES water. The first time I tried to make her go to the canal, she put half of a toe in it, looked at me, disgusted “It’s wet!”, and yes baby girl, when it’s wet outside, I can’t make you go pee! She has that stubborn look in her eyes “Try me!”, and I know it’s not even worth it but each time I try. She must feel so uncomfortable, but there is no way that Princess Maia will ever wet a toe! If she were human, she would be that silly girl of Kim Kardashian! I barely knows who she is but she fits the profile.
Can’t we make a deal with Mother Nature? We got so much crap in a week, can we have at least a whole quiet month? I mean it. I need to cut trees, I need to mow my wild weeds, I need to paint my front door, I need….. Is anyone hearing me between my sneezes? Because, on top of it, right now, I feel like in that Jean-Luc Godard’s movie where the main female character keeps saying: “I don’t know what to do, I have nothing to do, I don’t know what to do, I have nothing to do….” Never cared much for Godard, but I have to say, I am getting restless. I just finished the book “The Help” by Kathryn Stockett, and like any great books, I am now in a no man’s land where I am not ready to open a new page just because I am not ready to let go of the last page of “The Help”.
So, tonight, I am not complicated. I have only one desire: that my trees stay exactly where they are. I really kind of get accustomed of seeing them there. The wind is blowing. Let’s see if Pepco will be failing one more time!
Iconoclastically yours,
Dominique
August
5
2011
Iconoclasticallly yours by www.iconoclasticallyyours.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License
Breaking news: The Mutts read my letter, and have now realized that, no matter what they do, they stay, so…. They just went berserk!
The ink was not even dry on their letter that Jackson, with the help of Fat Cat who knocked it down, ate AGAIN the whole container of fish food, so the fish could starve to death! Then, my pesto just disappeared from the counter….. I wonder where it could have gone! Who smells like basil around the house? George! And then, the same day, when I opened the garage door, I had quite the surprise of my life, if those mutts can still surprise me with anything! – they were all in the garage, and had a ball running around the forbidden front yard!
I am not even talking about Sophie who was so busy outside running after every squirrel on the block, that she forgot to pee outside, and while she was in the arms of Morpheus, she peed on Jessica’s bed. Since then, the washer and dryer have been working nonstop! Yes, I know, I know, Pepco loves me!
Everything happened on the same day: the day where my Toyota went to see my mechanic because it just decided to strand me on a highway! I was dreading the diagnosis and was quite surprised when I heard that mice were the problems. Mice nests had been all over the A/C and mysterious other places in my truck! Then the mutts were loose in the front yard, and it went on, and on! I slept on everything, and when I woke up this morning, the first thing I saw on my rug by my bed was Pouch, our Golden retriever who passed away on March 19th of this year. The image disappeared fast, but it was so vivid.
Today is his birthday. He would have been 14, and would have had – like every year – a roasted chicken with candles . So, here to you Pouchie, the best dog ever, I mean if I forget the kitchen cabinets, the moldings that you ate in the kitchen when you were a puppy! And we discovered together your love for Tabasco. I put Tabasco as a repellent on the moldings. Yeah, right! You loved it! Let’s also forget the Cognac glasses that you chewed, and when we had to give you some croissants to make it easier for you to have swallowed my brand new clean glasses! I loved those glasses. I never drink hard liquors, but I loved those glasses!
Besides that, you were our goofy boy, full of love, trust, and with sometimes a lost look in your eyes when you did not understand something. You were such a fixture, a quiet one in the house, that you could have gone unnoticed sometimes. I don’t even remember your voice because you never barked, not like some others that I know!
Missing you is the understatement of the year, especially for Jessica who lost her best friend. So, today, our thoughts and our hugs are flying over the rainbow, and I hope you catch every single one. I know retrieving was not forte but try hard, ok? It just hit me after your passing, that home was wherever you were, so we are still a bit lost around here without you.
Iconoclastically yours,
Dominique
August
2
2011
Iconoclasticallly yours by www.iconoclasticallyyours.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License
Dear Mutts:
I know, I know, you are not mutts but splendid Labrador Retrievers with the best pedigree ever. I remember the first time I took you to our new vet. You must have been around 3 months old, and I told Chet: “Meet my mutts!” Chet looked at me puzzled and managed to say: “They are not pure Labs?” You were all protesting with tails up in the air! But you are my mutts! No offense there! I am a mutt too with some French, Scandinavian and Italian blood!
I know, before you were born, I was ready to change the face of this Earth with your birth, imagining your new families, and how they would be amazed by each of you. I had them lined up at that time. That was before you were born! And the miracle happened, and I just got crazy with my camera. Yes, George, I did make some mistakes. Not my fault if Zoe was coming so fast after you, and I thought Lola was lost in the process, and yes I did cut your umbilical cord which made my poor Lola not understanding something. She knew she had to do something that she did not do. OK, George you won! I am paying it every minute of every day when I decide to sit down! You won’t allow me a second without you on my lap. Mea Culpa! Mea Culpa! You were my first born! There was a reason; we nicknamed you “Big Mouth”.
We were so careful not giving you names but just funny nicknames going with your personality! The second one was Zoe, aka Blondie! She still has some blonde moments now and then, meaning 24/7! But Zoe even though sometimes I wonder if Lola did not have a thing with the postman’s dog, you are the cutest one! And you do watch TV!
You don’t remember it Mutts, but we waited a long time, Deborah, Jessica, and I for the entrance into this world of his Majesty Jackson, nicknamed “Boubou!” Sophie, my reddish girl did not wait a second to go on Lola’s tits, and of course she became “Ms. Piggy”. Max I owe you an apology too! If we had not known that day that there were 5 of you, I would have gone to bed by then, but instead I fell asleep on the floor, and Jessica was the only one to witness the arrival of “Baby” into the world! It took you two hours darn Max to grace us with your presence.
I don’t know if you remember Mutts but the first month was a dream, besides cutting your nails! Gosh you were worse than cats! But after a month, Lola decided it was time for me to help, and I thought “Gosh I better enjoy them, they will be gone in 4 more weeks.” No, I am not saying it was wishful thinking! I loved you before you even opened your eyes! I knew it was going to be hard to let you go, at least four of you were almost taken, almost…. Until everyone, one after the other decided it was not the best time to have one of you! I did try to find you new homes, I did! I built that website, put ads at our vet, but I rescued dogs before, and the one who will stay forever the dog of my life, Zeus. And I could not let you go without being 100 % sure that you would not end up like Zeus did, changing owners every year until I came into the picture.
Mutts, you also have to realize that Spring 2009 could have been named “Morons Spring”. I got them all…. The moron who wanted two of you boys after losing his three labs one winter after pouring anti-freeze into their kiddie pool, the one who wanted Miss Piggy so bad because she was tired of intelligent dogs…. What do you say to that? Wanna tell me? I was going to forget the hunter who wanted Sophie too. Sophie was very popular, and still is! But what could I have said after he told me it would have been his second lab, he discarded the first one because she was too old to work…. Yeah, right. And I was almost going to forget the one who wanted to get a yellow lab to give as a gift to her daughter going to college? Were you on crack lady?
Engraved forever in my mind is the way you were glued to each other in your playpen when someone was coming to see you. It was like you knew that there was a risk someone was going to take one of you away, and you had that funny way of backing out up the end of the playpen and being like a huge ball of fur with 10 scared eyes, and no happy tails! You broke my heart that day…..
One more time though, I had someone for Sophie, a nice lady who had just lost her dog, and wanted Ms. Piggy again, and I said yes… until the next day where I called her back to say no. I couldn’t let go of my smart ass Sophie, half monkey, half lab. Do you remember Sophie when you were back in your playpen, and I was turning my back 2 minutes and you had already climbed over the fence? Smart ass you were, smart ass you are! I swear I can almost hear your brain work!
The day I decided that no one was leaving was just a regular day. No special recollection of it except that phone call. That lady who barked at me without even introducing herself “what are the colors of your females?”, and it takes a smart ass to know one Sophie, my answer was: “I have one with blue and green polka dots, and the other one has orange and purple ones. Any color you are interested in?” She hung up on me. No big surprise there!
Mutts, the worst thing we had to do when it was clear that you were going to be forever ours, was to pick up names. I am so picky about names, and usually one takes me a long time, five, are you kidding me? Fortunately Jessica was around and helped a lot, and that’s how that Jackson, George, Max, Sophie and Zoe became our mutts….
Some could say that with the pedigree they have between Honor who is the most amazing living being, and Lola, my born to retrieve girl, I wasted you. Do I feel guilty that you did not become champions or working dogs hunting in the fields? No, I am not guilty your Honor! How many mutts have the opportunity to stay together, and live together ever after? You stick together, you sleep together, you play together, and Lola the Mom is still the one in charge. And we are, I mean the humans, the privileged witnesses of it. And I learned more in the process that I could ever imagine, besides the fact that I am not and never will be a breeder.
This letter is to tell you Mutts that even though sometimes I can get upset with one of you or all of you on a very bad day, I am like in the Edith Piaf song: “Je ne regrette rien.” And you don’t have to give me that worried look when someone you don’t know comes to the house. You are family. Case closed.
Iconoclastically yours,
Dominique
July
22
2011
Iconoclasticallly yours by www.iconoclasticallyyours.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License
A girlfriend of mine in France just called me, and for the first time in years, the sound of her voice was peaceful. Alternative medicine has not secret for her, and she even started to practice Reiki. She explained to me that she is in the middle of the Tibetan Cure, and all her bad numbers went back to normal (cholesterol, diabetes, etc….). I asked her if she had done a diet, and her answer was so much her: “Are you kidding? You know me!” Yes, I do. Last time she stayed with me, during one movie in the evening, she managed to swallow a box of 12 ice cream cones! I am not judgmental here, just the facts Ma’am! But then, she started to advertise the unbelievable powers of garlic.
I knew some of them. It always takes me a while to get things rights, Jessica do not laugh! But after spending tens and tens of dollars on warts treatment, I used garlic on it, and it was gone in ten days. I also knew that the Amish people, who wanted to sell a pretty tired horse, used to stick in his butt a garlic clove which was making him or her acting like a young thing for hours. So, I know, garlic is great, but still! I am not Amish, and have no horse to sell. As a matter of fact, I don’t think I am a horse person because a horse, like anyone else who comes into my life, will stay there, for as long as he shall live. That’s also one thing I do not understand in the English language, I do not understand why animals are “it” when boats are “she”! Sorry to rain on your parade, but in my book, animals deserve the “he” or “she” more than my canoe!
I went on the net, after I talked to my girlfriend, and sure enough, I found the miracle recipe in French as well as in English. Who needs a husband when you have Google? Google answers your questions, doesn’t talk back, and is so knowledgeable. What did I do last night? Cozy night with Google? Why are you asking?
So, I got the recipe. Funny story though: That recipe was found in a Tibetan monastery in 1972 when I was barely walking – just kidding! –. It was called it the Jouvence Cure: 350 grams of crushed garlic mixed with 250 ml of grain alcohol 75% minimum. Since I am not that patient, I rushed to my Liquor store to get that alcohol. None. Are you kidding me? “Nope!” said the clerk. “No one has any, and I don’t even understand why.”
Since No is not French, I decided to call every darn liquor store around, and yes, I got my bottle for $ 12.00 which is apparently a good price since my girlfriend from Florida got the same one for $ 22.00. You see what happens when you are persistent? You win! Not so fast though! I still had to get the Garlic. How many heads of Garlic do I need to get 350 grams of naked garlic? Found the garlic at Giant, and then went looking for a scale. Where are the scales? Did they remove every one of them just for the heck of it? Seizing the garlic heads, I decided that I should play safe, and I got 15 of them. And wait, I also needed a glass bottle! I decided to treat myself with a Snapple green tea thing. I was so proud of me! It would be the perfect bottle, yeah, right!
Of course, there was no cashier anywhere, and Giant makes you feel so special by making you do their work and on top of it you pay top dollars to play cashiers! I do have to acknowledge that it’s a good company. While I as scanning my 15 heads of garlic, three or four Giant employees were joking around while the customers where like little busy bees scanning, bagging when the computer voice scolded them for keeping the bagging area full, and then, scanning again. $ 14.00 for my garlic. You gotta be kidding! No, you are not? Sighing, I allowed the computer to swallow my $ 20.00 bill and I was waiting for the change. Suddenly, it was like Vegas, the machine starting beeping, the lights flashing, and my three joking employees c ame running! What did I win? Tell me? Tell me? Nothing! The computer thingy did not want to give me back my change. It just took 15 minutes to get someone who had enough power to be able to give me back my change. Welcome to Giant! It’s almost as bad as going to DC!
Talking about DC, last time I went there, it ended up as bad as my Giant’s experience today. It was around 8:00 pm, starting to get dark, and I was driving on a parkway next to the Canal where pedestrians are not allowed since sidewalks are MIA. Years ago, one of my neighbors got killed there while dragging his bicycle which had a flat. While driving and minding my own business, I suddenly passed a guy who was walking with the traffic. I barely missed him to tell you the truth! So, I did something forbidden in DC. I picked up my cell, and dialed the Highway patrol, and got the 911 DC Emergency. I explained to the guy who answered my issue, and his answer was: “Why do you care about it?”. Mute for a second, I told him that maybe just maybe I was calling him in order not to read in the paper tomorrow that a guy was killed on Canal Road. I do not believe in infinity except for one thing: stupidity. So my guy asked me to describe him. Trying to keep my cool, I told him that it was a guy! Yeah! Tall with jeans, but I was driving, it was dark, and I did not stop to get his picture! So his answer again was: “ So you really care about it?” WTF? Is that guy on crack or something? Then, he probably saw the light because the next question was: “ Are you calling me with a hand free device? You know it’s illegal to talk on the phone in DC if you don’t have a hand free device?” I am sorry to say that I did hang up at that point.
From garlic to DC, what a stretch, even for me! I went back home, and started peeling the garlic. I was excited. Hey, after that cure, maybe you won’t even recognize me; maybe my own mother won’t recognize me. Last time I was on Skype with her, the first thing she told me was “How come you don’t have wrinkles?” “Mom, I got Dad’s genes plus some of some out of space aliens, Capisce?”
I used every single head of garlic. I just couldn’t believe how many I needed to have my 350 grams! After crushing it, I realized my Snapple bottle was a joke. I needed something much bigger. Got the bottle, and started to stuff the crushed garlic in it. My fingers started to burn. What am I doing? Am I getting insane or something? Anyway, the garlic got into the bottle, every single gram of it, then the alcohol, then I put the lid on it, and now it’s resting in my fridge for the next ten days. So? You won’t know more today? You have to be patient, but let me tell you, I am going to keep you updated on my transformation. Especially after I received another mail from my girlfriend warning me that the cure can give me headaches, red spots on my body or worst….. What can be worst? Toxins getting out, I will feel good about it, not matter what, I will feel good about it, I will feel good about it……
Iconoclastically yours,
Dominique
July
15
2011
Iconoclasticallly yours by www.iconoclasticallyyours.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License
This morning, the mutts got berserk when they got outside: there were vultures on my roof, and let me tell you, they did not want to move! I had to pick up the hose and copiously watered them before they even moved a feather! I almost thought I was the witch in Snow White! I knew something was up. It just stinks on the side of the yard. It has to come from my neighbor, hopefully a dead deer and not a human body! Hey, you never know since my old/new house was rented to a guy who spent 25 years in prison in the interval while I was not there. He did a great job by the way. I have to salute him for that! He stole all the doors inside the house. Now, it’s quite cozy, let me tell you! Just kidding. I put some doors back! He also fenced the whole 4 acres with barbed wire, kind of homey I guess for him after all these years in prison, reminded him of good old times! I just finished this morning removing the barbed wire without gloves if you please since I might have a death wish!
I am now surrendered by animals with attitude. Is it the zip code which went into their head? In the birds bath outside my kitchen window, there is a dove, no it’s not a statue, but that dove has decided that it will stay in the bath, no matter what! Dove and peace are going together, right. This one is not aware of it, and if anyone, squirrel included, tries to get there, it will defend its bird’s bath ferociously!
I have a bird’s feeder, and of course, today, one of those smart asses squirrels decided it would look better on the ground, so it just chewed the rope away until the whole thing collapsed, barely missing the chipmunk which has been working nonstop since I moved here! Darn squirrels! They do want everything! I put some peanuts on the ground, and they went around, especially a black one which believes that this specific area is its! He turned, and turned those peanuts around, and I do believe it was thinking: “Do I really have to break that shell? Where has she been? Has not she heard of shelled peanuts?” I almost had the same way of thinking to tell you the truth, and I was expecting a big mess (even though it could not be messier than the way I got the yard!). After 3 years without me, a felon first, then a district attorney who did nothing, it’s not TLC that the yard needs it’s me slavering there the whole summer! I hope that district attorney was more aggressive in Court than he was in my yard. Yesterday, I was cleaning part of the yard, where a big pine tree fell down during the district attorney’s tenancy! Let me tell you, he did a great job, he cut all the branches, and started to make a cute little pile with FOUR small cut pieces of wood, then, I guess he decided it was too much work, since all the remaining branches are scattered around and if there is any logic in it, it even beats up the logic of the statues of the Easter Island! One day I will go to Easter Island. It’s on my bucket list.
To go back to my sheep, then I have the deer. I started reopening the front of the “what was a lawn before”, and is now a field to my wild friends. No more barbed wires to prevent them to come. I could spend hours watching them. One doe has such a beautiful face with a big black spot on her head between her ears. They are creatures of habits, and for 3 years, it was forbidden land for them. The first time, she came, she left her twins on the other side, and miracle, they stayed there, and waited for Mommy to come back! I might have to ask her to teach me a few lessons in order for instance not to have to climb on a chair when I open the back door to the mutts in the morning. My toes have no interest in their paws stampeding them. I will probably call George the trainer to help me with a few things. You see, the mutts are good except for two things: going outside, or greeting me when I come in! I wish I could have one of those iron armor suit. Renaissance is my favorite period for those. I would even scare the vultures if I had one!
Being creatures of habit, now, every morning around 5:30 (yes I am an early riser). I can’t help it with Zoe having a fit every day at the bottom of the stairs. She doesn’t know how to climb them. Don’t laugh! She is a smart cookie, and has abilities than the others don’t have. But, when she can’t do something she howled, and howled! She did that last night too when I was trying to watch “the Lincoln Lawyer”. She watches TV, I mean, she really watches TV and reacts to images, not only sounds. I guess she did not care for Matthew Mc Conaughey, and she barked at him, and barked at him, and barked at him, and I just turned off the TV since I cannot absorb one more second of the Casey Anthony thing! Hopefully, she is going to disappear into the wild, and the TV anchors are going to be able to devote their time to more serious stuff like Kim Kardashian’s bachelorette party!
I am getting lost in my thoughts here! But every morning, I put my 50lbs of corn with molasses and apples for the deer. The yard is empty; I mean if you exclude all the dead branches not picked up yet by cute little me! Those two guys before me: let me tell you, Attila was a sweetheart compared to them! I turned my back, and they are here! They don’t even wait now for me to go inside, they just come from nowhere. The fawns are now allowed to come to. I don’t know at what time they decided it was safe again. They are just a delight for my eyes. One of the bambis wanted some serious milk, while the other one was eating like a good little doe some corn. Gosh, the Mom spanked him a bit with her back legs until she just gave in! Then, in a minute they are gone. That’s one thing with deer, they don’t eat like pigs, they eat a bit of these, and a bit of those, and then move forward…. Until tomorrow…
I am exactly like those deer. I knew I was not a neighborhood person, but that land even as violated as it has been, brings peace in me. Every little thing I managed to do either in the yard or the house makes is special. In a way, little by little I am freeing it of all the bad vibes left by others. A new chapter with quite some hectic first pages…. and a few war wounds!
Iconoclastically yours,
Dominique
June
11
2011
Iconoclasticallly yours by www.iconoclasticallyyours.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License
You know what I like in Summer in the evening? OK, it’s not Summer yet, at least on the calendar! I never understood why people are bragging about Spring in DC. If we are lucky, we get one week of Spring, and then it just jumps to Summer. This year we did not even get the week of Spring, that famous week. Instead we got insane temperatures right away. Thank you very much! Just when I was moving. Who want 95 degrees with 99 % of humidity? Great news though, we are getting a cold front, which means that tomorrow it will be only 85!
But to go back to my sheep, matter of French speaking, I love a glass of Rose de Provence. It’s a pink wine, but a dry wine. I never cared for sweet stuff! Pause: the mutts need to go out. George just got an antler from a 4 point deer, not bad! I am not into dirty Martini, whatever it means, but I do like wine, hey I am half French, half Italian, what can you expect? Gatorade? I remember years ago, my daughter Jessica, when she was in elementary school, and they had to say something about what happened at home every day, and she reported that her Mom was an alcoholic because she had a glass of wine at night…. Am I? Hey, I always wait until 6:00 pm or so!
Each time I move, I always wonder why I have to carry so many bottles of gin when I don’t drink gin! When I was working at the French Embassy, alcohol was duty free or so, but I must have been out of my mind to get so many Gin bottles…. I have a question though. What can you do with Gin?
Carla Bruni is pregnant, Dominique Strauss Kahn is in house arrest. You would think he is a serial killer with the security surrounding him. I think he needs to thank Polanski for that. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t care about him. He is a pig, but even a pig needs to have a fair trial. And Weiner, please, make him go away, pleaaaase!
Today again, someone asked me why I moved to the US. So, now I have the right answer, it just took me 25 years or so to have it. Let’s forget about the dead and the not so dead ones. I move to the U.S. because I love shoes. For the first 20 some years of my life, I have been a freak, I have been sentenced to wear the ugliest shoes on earth. In France, if you are over an 8, you are dead meat. I was a 9 since I was 12. As a teenager, I wanted to wear cute shoes like my classmates, but it did not work that way. As soon as my mother – hey I was only 12 – was saying she is 40 (US 9), with a sigh like she had delivered a freak, there was a frown from the sales person and the same answer over and over again – just thinking about it makes me dizzy!: “That shoe comes only in small sizes.” Yeah, right, and once again, I felt like a freak. The shoes I wore as a teenager were all freaking ugly. As a matter of fact, it was dreadful to have to go to a shoe store. Italian shoes are not for me though since they still cater to shrimps with small feet! I love Italian shoes though, and I have a dream that one day they will go to the size 9. There is a but though, I love shoes, but I don’t wear shoes anymore! No, I am not going barefoot. Are you nuts? With my thirty two paws, my feet would not survive. Speaking of 32 paws, I have to call George, the trainer. If you take one mutt at the time, it’s great, but if you have 8 in front of the door, it’s worst that the rush to attend Caysee Anthony’s trial. Did you see that guy with a neck brace running 100 miles an hour to be among the first 50 who can go to the Court? Hope his boss is not watching that. If he can run that fast, I am sure he can do some work, no matter what.
Nadine was the name of my classmate who had such cool shoes. And they looked so good on her because she had small feet! Now that I think about it, she was not that pretty, especially now, no offense, but when you go to those classmates sites, you are in for a huge disappointment. Why are these people so old? Am I looking that bad? I guess I stopped growing up at 35. 35 is a cool age not too young, not too old. Now, I have to think to figure out how old I am. How pathetic is that? But even now, I love shoes, but flip flops and my running shoes which are good for everything are so comfy. And the sidewalks are so uncomfy. But I still have them. I displayed them. I cherished them, but ….. I don’t wear them anymore.
I am not as big on bras, but it’s quite the same story. They look so sexy and cute, but honestly, they are so uncomfy. I have them in one, no two drawers. Do I wear them? Gosh, no! But I know there are there. One day, I wore one, and Jessica noticed it, but she noticed everything anyway, and asked me what was wrong with me. Was I sick or something? No sweetie, I was just trying to be in the normal range. I guess it’s just not me, but I was so much into shoes when I was young. Did I just tell you that?
Iconoclastically yours,
Dominique
May
19
2011
Iconoclasticallly yours by www.iconoclasticallyyours.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License
I have been silent for so long that I did not even know if my fingers would remember the keyboard. Great news….. They do!
In the middle of a move, in the middle of installing a fence for the mutts, in the middle of refurbishing my soon to be beautiful walnut wood floor, I had to put my chores in transit to scream loud and even louder if I could: ENOUGH!
It did not take long for some morons to associate the alleged rape of the Sofitel maid in NY by Dominique Kahn-Strauss with the French way of life. I guess the morons in question flanked high school and hibernated their brain with just a few images like French and frogs, French and fries – even though the fries are from Belgium – French kiss for whatever reasons, and French with affairs. Rape? Since when rape is associated with sex. Rape has nothing to do with sex. Rape is CONTROL, nothing else. So, please, do me a favor, and drop the French thing because it’s just too ludicrous even for you!
Are we happy with ourselves by putting a powerful guy in a jail, waking him up every 15 minutes just in case he would try to kill himself supposedly. They acknowledged later on that it had nothing to do with suicide watch, just with the way they do things. The real reason is to humiliate someone, guilty or not. I thought that you are presumed innocent until you are proven guilty. Is that notion gone too in the aftermath of 9/11?
Watching TV and seeing the Nancy Graces or other talk shows hosts getting disgusted by the price of his suite, $ 3,000.00. So what If he can afford it? Since when is it a crime in this country to be wealthy? Is it when you decided he was guilty? By the way, he got upgraded. It only cost him around $ 500.00. Are you happier now?
Rape has no citizenship. Maybe he did it, maybe he did not. I am not there for sentencing him. I just have to say that the story doesn’t make any sense in my mind. Someone coming out of the shower doesn’t jump on a maid out of the blue when he is supposed to have lunch with his daughter an hour or less later. And, let me be honest with you – I had to say that sentence. This is the most ridiculous sentence ever…. If you don’t say you are honest when you say something, does it mean that you are lying most of the time? Did you get my point there? On top of it, if someone stuff an unwelcome penis in my mouth, let me tell you one thing, I have TEETH. I might not be Lorena Bobbitt, but I have sharp teeth! And that penis won’t be alive when he gets out of my mouth! Just my two cents. Innocent? Guilty? I am not the one to decide. I guess the Justice system must still have stuck in the throat Roman Polanski, so we got another powerful guy, let him be our punching ball for all the powerful ones who did not get caught.
I love this country, and I react as American when we are criticized for no reason, but I do react as French when France is under fire for no reason either. Guilty, not guilty, conspiracy, no conspiracy, I don’t care. Let’s just stop being a nation of voyeurs and move on please!
Iconoclastically yours,
Dominique
April
24
2011
Iconoclasticallly yours by www.iconoclasticallyyours.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License
A few days ago, I had that great idea, and asked Jessica if she would like to help me in the new yard to have a “bones hunt” on Easter Day for the mutts. She looked at me like if I were crazy, and told me: “What about me?” So, feeling guilty, I ran to Whole Food to get her a chocolate bunny. Nightmarish bunny since all their bunnies had broken ears! I finally managed to get one, and quite to my surprise, she was really serious about the darn thing! So, no, the mutts did not get a bones hunt! When my girls were younger and did believe in the Easter Bunny – in France, it’s the bells. Stupid! Who has seen bells carrying chocolates? – No one of course, but the Bunny, it’s another story, right? I cut myself in the middle of a sentence again, why can’t I have more respect for what I am about to say? So, when the girls were younger, I used to find the coolest candies for Easter at the now defunct Woodward and Lothrop, good old Woodies! So when we were lucky enough to have some sun on Easter day, I was hiding my treasures in the yard! But it had to be an organized hunt. I did not want to have one girl with two sugar swans and the other one screaming that it was not fair. So, I organized my hunt with signs and arrows. One way: Jessica, the other way: Deborah, and peace landed on our home!
This week was peaceful as well. Are you kidding? No week is ever peaceful at my home. Ever. But, I did get the keys for the ex/new house. I had a huge job waiting for me there: removing the carpet in 3 rooms in order to have tiles in one, and refurnish the walnut floor in the other two. Why? It will be the topic of another column! While I was there, I noticed some movement in my neighbor’s yard, and realized it was a fox. Could it be my Boubou from three years ago? Crazy as I am most of the time, I called his name. The fox was at least a hundred feet away from me. When I said “Boubou”, he just stopped right there, looked at me, hesitated for a second and ran to the fence. He then sat there on his butt a few feet away from me. And like a nut, I started crying because it was our Boubou. Humans forget about you as soon as you turn your back, but my fox, three years later, still remembered me. This is the main reason iconoclastically yours is going to be replaced soon by Dominiqueplus8 because it just makes more sense. Animals are a bigger part of my life than any humans except my girls. I don’t want to be Don Quixote anymore fighting against the windmills. I just don’t care anymore, or don’t care enough to keep talking about humans. Even though I can tell you, if I hear one more time Kate and William, I swear I am going to barf. Does anyone really care about their wedding? Seriously! Even Anderson Cooper has to be involved in it! I already almost barfed after watching the movie “Eat, Pray and love”. I mean, just watching the movie made me gain 10lbs! Just watching Julia Roberts gulping down pizza, pasta, mushrooms, polenta made me feel guilty! How could I have forgotten how divine the food is in Italy, hey the best 50 % of me are Italians. I just don’t know how to cook without tomatoes and garlic, I just don’t.
Not long ago, my brother went for the first time in Italy with his wife, and when he came back, I was talking to him on the phone, and of course because Italy is my second or first country, and he was still a novice, he became defensive. I was stating that any pizza at any corner of any street in Italy is better than anything in a fancy restaurant. Of course, as usual, he had a lame reply: “We did not eat in the streets. We only ate in 4 star-restaurants!” Once again, he did not get it, but this time I did not start WWIII, and just greeted his stupidity with my silence.
Talking about stupidity, I saw this week an acquaintance, and was shocked to see her look: bruises all over her face, broken nose, later on I learned that broken ribs were part of the package as well, and while I was staring at her with surprise, she said “You won’t believe what happened to me?”. Was it a logical reply to say: “What happened to you?” I guess not, since her answer was: “I just got married!” The groom did it, but as she put it, “it was an accident, he did not mean to”. Yeah right. Just wonder if he is thinking maybe of suing her or something because he hurt his knuckles? What did I say earlier? Yes, you are darn right: I do believe in animals.
Iconoclastically yours,
Dominique
