You can't hide from Blanche. 

A professional sheep shearer at work. 

I'm not the only sheepophile . . .

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/03/26/HOGHDBTDEF1.DTL

Thousands of Sheep Victims of Iraq War

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/27/international/middleeast/27border.html?hp&ex=1111899600&en=db367316672c1609&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Blanche 

Blanche, in kitchen after she was sheared. 

Blanche, just before she was sheared. 

Mission Accomplished

Note: Before reading this post, you might want to skip down and read the post for March 17th.

Well, Blanche is sheared.

During the course of the ordeal, I resolved to travel to the ends of the earth to find a sheep shearer next year.

By the time we were finished, I considered the three hours well spent; I had experienced a deep communing with my sheep. Blanche and I are now more emotionally bonded than ever.

If my girlfriend Nathalie hadn’t of generously volunteered to spend her Sunday morning helping me, the task would have never been completed. On Thursday, I had made a stab at shearing Blanche; but was not able to make her stand or lay still by myself . . . and Blanche outsmarted me by escaping.

At dinner that evening, I mentioned to Nathalie about my unproductive morning. She volunteered to help. I had plied her with an aperitif. I graciously accepted her offer and told her to wear old clothes.

An hour before Nathalie was scheduled to arrive, I went out with two buckets of grain to seduce Blanche and S-D into the little sheep cottage where Blanche had lived as a baby. I got Blanche into the house, and S-D was entering when Cirq the cat showed up and Soixante-Douze decided that she would rather go play with Cirq than eat corn . . . very strange behavior for a sheep. Then Blanche took off, because she can’t be parted from S-D. The two ewes ignored my lame pleadings, and my rattling of the corn in the buckets. I decided on the course of action that always worked best during my child rearing years: I ignored them. I acted like I could care less if they went into the sheep cottage.

After a half an hour of wandering around the yard, eating the struggling hydrangea bushes down to stubs, the sheep showed up at my kitchen door looking for me (tune in next week to see the photo). Now that they wanted me, I was able to wave the buckets in front of their noses and get them to follow me into the sheep cottage. I locked them in. Blanche gave me a forlorn, why have you forsaken me look, but didn’t bleat. I walked away feeling badly that I had to trick them.

Nathalie looked as if she hadn’t been awake very long. I felt just a teensy bit guilty, knowing that she didn't know what she was about to get herself into.

I wielded my new English sheep shearers. Nathalie used a pair of large fabric scissors. Nathalie is an accountant and so she is much more focused than I am. I wasn’t getting much wool off, but Nathalie made a lot of initial progress, taking a wide swath off of Blanche’s back. When her scissors became too blunted. I handed her my shears and went to the house to get the knife sharpener.

When I returned, I used the scissors, and since Nathalie was getting the hang of the shearers, I let her keep them. My little neighbor, Céline, showed up to watch. I had another pair of garden hand clippers lying around and she took an unattractive patch out of Soixante-Douze before I noticed and could stop her. S-D’s wool wasn’t very long, and I figure that she can wait until this summer to be sheared. I want my husband to experience the joy of shearing a sheep.



Soixante-Douze behaved bravely and admirably, staying close by Blanche, even though S-D doesn’t like to be around people. So it was quite the cozy scene in the little sheep cottage – the three women snipping away at Blanche while S-D stayed glued to the side of Blanche that we were ignoring for the moment.

I was worried about Blanche, because she was breathing so hard. Nathalie snipped her skin three times. She felt badly. I sprayed antiseptic on the shallow nicks. Hopefully, the flies won’t find the wounds before they close up. The antiseptic is a bright blue. When we were finished with Blanche, she looked as if she was a Picasso creation . . . cubist and blue.

Past the outer crust of dirt and grime, Blanche’s wool was long and the color of pale yellow cream. It’s a shame we had to take it off in little snippets. I would have loved to have cleaned it and knitted a sweater out of it. (Of course, I wouldn’t start learning to knit until after I’m done with hand-stitching my king-size quilt, putting in a garden, building a chateau with my pile of rocks, and painting my upper hallway in the manner of a fifteenth-century Romanesque church.)

Blanche and I were both worn out. I took a hot bath and postponed my walk with my neighbor until tomorrow morning. Blanche and S-D went to their hill and immediately fell asleep under their bushes.

What a Beautiful Day!

What a beautiful day. The birds were serenading me when I woke up. A teal-headed duck was paddling in the mill basin when I opened the window.

I bicycled into town. The sheep were yelling at me to take them with me as I rolled out of the yard.

All the houses I passed had their windows flung open wide to let in the spring air.

Monsieur Foissac was putting down the road on his tractor. He motioned for me to stop. I was worried that he was going to tell me he was suing me over his flooded noyer. He just wanted to tell me that he was bringing me another load of rocks. When he clears out his fields, he brings me the rocks. I have a gigantic pile now. I don’t know what I’m going to do with them. I think I’ll be forced to take a masonry class at the local trade school. Then I’ll build a little village for my sheep.

I asked him if he had seen his noyer. He said, non. I told him to go look at it after he dumped off the rocks because everything is bien now.

Today was market day in the village. I ran into Horatio Alger and his wife. While we were chatting, our mutual neighbor Arlette was walking by and joined us.

I went to the bakery/patisserie and purchased some pain vigneron. That’s my husband’s favorite bread here. When I complained about my favorite pain noix being a day old at the other bakery, he suggested that I try the pain vigneron. It’s a version of pain noix but it has some local wine added to it. The problem with my husband’s suggestion is that the pain vigneron is so good, and so fresh, and the crust is so crunchy that I can’t stop eating it.

I went to a wine and local foods specialty store to see if they had the wine my brother had requested. Non, they didn’t have the wine in stock, but the owner would go out this afternoon and pick it up from the vintner. Could I come back in this afternoon or tomorrow? Non, I can’t because I’m on a bike and I don’t want to come back in today and I’m going to the big town all day tomorrow, but could you drop it off at my girlfriend Nathalie’s office? Bien sure, Madame.

I stopped by Nathalie’s office to tell her that the wine was coming by this afternoon. She said she’ll gladly swing the five kilometers out of her way and drop it off at my house after work.

On my way back home, I rode my bike across the one-lane bridge. There’s a very plain sign, in French, English and Dutch that informs bicyclists that they must walk their bikes across the bridge. But if I can’t hear or see any cars coming, I ignore the warning. Just as I was getting near the end of the bridge, I heard the rumblings of a vehicle on the metal planks of the bridge. I was so far ahead of them that I was sure they wouldn’t have to slow down for me, so I kept pedaling.

When I was a little ways off the bridge, the vehicle came alongside me and didn’t pass. I thought, oh, no maybe it’s someone who is going to yell at me about riding on the bridge. Maybe it’s a rare sighting of a gendarme and they’re going to ticket me. It turned out to be my friend Françoise. She lives in the village and owns a summer cottage in the country near me. She told me that she was going out to her cottage to oversee the pouring of the cement for her new swimming pool. I told her that was a fantastic development. The sheep and I would walk up this summer and use it. She laughed her sparkling, infectious laugh.

We discussed the chemo treatments our friend Pierre-Yves has to go through right now. Both of us feeling sad that he, of all the people on the earth, has to be ill, has to suffer. Françoise told me that her husband has lost a lot of weight because the doctor told him that he was going to keel over soon if he didn’t watch what he ate! I didn’t think such things happened in France!

We said aurevoir, and we both went our ways. I passed Monsieur Foissac again. He was in his wife's garden watering the tomatoes that they started in the cold weather under plastic coverings. He gave me a friendly wave and turned around to continue down another row. I’m assuming that he found everything to be in order in his noyer.

What a beautiful day.

Operation Fleece a Complete Disaster

I'm sitting here in my overalls, smelling like a sheep.

Blanche did not take to her chic, new red halter. I got it on her, but she immediately pulled out of it; and it wouldn't tighten up any more. I guess I bought one for a buck, not a ewe.

With the help from a bucket of corn, I was able to trick her into trusting me again so that I could tie the leash end of the harness around her neck. The mail-lady arrived just as I was wrestling with Blanche pulling her over to the fence. I'm sure I'm now the talk of the mail route. I secured Blanche to a fence post, but she wouldn't stand still. I was afraid she was going to have a heart attack (as my husband warned) because she was fighting so vigorously.

I just read Temple Grandin's book about how farm animals think. In it she said that they like to have pressure placed on their sides, that's why they don't mind being in a squeeze shoot. So I pushed Blanche up against the fence with my body, while trying to shear her with the other.

The two of us were making a little progress until she jerked her head and the leash came untied from the fence post. She ran away, tripping as her front foot got tangled up in the halter that hung down. Now I was worried that she was going to break one of her peg legs, and have a heart attack. I chased her around the pasture. Soixante-Douze ran interference for Blanche, always putting her body between me and Blanche so I couldn't make a dive for the harness.

Finally, I chased the two of them into a back shed, where once Blanche realized she was trapped, she calmed down and let me remove her halter.

I came in the house and called the woman from whom I purchased S-D asking her for the name and number of the man who shears sheep. She said he doesn't pursue that line of work any more. Well, no wonder! And, she said she didn't know who to call -- she didn't bother to shear her sheep last year!

I'm a bit upset about the episode. When I initially went outside with the halter and the shears, Blanche was calling to me. I found her and S-D on their hill, under their bushes. They were so calm they didn't even bother to get up. Blanche just laid there, trusting me while I put on the halter.

Well, now I doubt if Blanche is interested in laying down on my beach towel with me any more.

Wish me luck. I'm going outside now to attempt to shear this monstrosity. (Add another six inches of wool to this photo.) Hopefully, we don't stab each other in the process. 

The Failure of the French Paradox

Here’s my simple, eat what you want, never-fail, quickie diet:

1. Exchange your car for a bicycle.
2. Move at least six miles
from the nearest source of food.
3. Eat only the food that you can
transport home on your bicycle.

On the way into town yesterday on my bicycle, I passed by a neighbor’s house that was being emptied out. Madame and Monsieur Garrit had moved to the maison de retrait, the nursing home. A man I had never seen before was hauling away all their things. Their next-door niece told me that they are both in really bad health and won’t live too much longer.

The niece will rent out the house, and I can bet it won’t be to an interesting ex-WWII German prisoner of war like Paul Garrit. I mourn the sad passing of another piece of the vrai France.

When we bought the Moulin in 2001, Madame Garrit was a good looking, spry 91 year- old who could pass for an ingénue in her sixties. Her husband was a lively 81 year-old. I asked Madame what her secret was. Was it the red wine? Non, I only drink a half a glass with dinner. Was it the foie gras? (That’s a theory of Jacques Pepin.) Non, I only eat that at Christmas. Well what do you think it is? She replied without hesitation. The hard work in the fields!

Hard work in the fields!

Her answer was a disappointment for her secret certainly couldn’t be turned into a best seller that would be gobbled up by American suburbanites.

(American lifespans decreasing.)
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/17/health/17obese.html?adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1111035738-yghSNykk/9SXqSZ1G59cwQ

The French Paradox was discovered in this area of France. On average the women live eight years longer in this area than they do in the United States. And yes, I’m afraid that the answer to longevity and youth is not as simple and as fun as drinking red wine. From my “research” it’s a combination of physical exertion, daily interaction with nature (usually in the form of work in the fields and vineyards), not overeating, and eating foods as close to their natural state as possible, avoiding processed foods altogether. It’s not a combo that is eagerly imitated in the “I want it this minute” modern world.

The sad news I have to report, is that eventually, even the French Paradox fails. I’m sorry to be the one to break the news to you, but our bodies are wired to poop out at some point, and more likely than not, before the age of 100 no matter how rigorous we are in monitoring our lifestyle habits. One minute you’re kicking up your heels at the village dance, the next thing you know you’ve kicked the bucket and your friends that can walk are carrying you to your tomb in the village cemetery. This is all the more reason to try and adopt the French lifestyle of emphasizing long meals, made with the best ingredients available, eaten at the table, with good friends and family.

Sheeple

The weather was "absolutely gorgeous" as my husband would say. I worked on my novel in the morning, and it was my intention to ride my bike into town in the afternoon, to make another bakery run. I went in yesterday, Monday, when all the stores are closed except for one bakery and the supermarches. By the time I arrived at the bakery, they were out of fresh bread! I reluctantly purchased a day old loaf of walnut bread. Le pain was fine yesterday, but it's dried out today and not very tasty.

Colin came over this morning and we took an abbreviated walk with the sheep. We were directly in the sun and it was so hot that I thought it best if we didn't go very far. Blanche is too fat and her wool is too long for her to be cavorting in the sun. I didn't want to have to perform CPR on her.

Before Colin arrived, I attempted to trim the poopy "tags" off of Blanche's behind so Colin wouldn't be too nauseated walking behind her. I had this grand scheme to cut them off while she had her head stuffed in her morning grain bucket. In my mind, it all seemed so simple.

But Blanche was not interested in having the ugly clumps cut off and so I got no where. I'm going to try once again tomrrow to get them. I'll tie her up by her halter hoping that I can immobilize her. If that works, I'm going to try and go whole hog and shear her with my new English hand shearers that I purchased in Montana. They're pretty scary looking so I hope that Blanche and/or I survive the operation.

Blanche is very possessive. If Colin was so bold to walk next to me, she made sure that she cut him off by wedging herself between us. She was herding us where she wanted us. She's so large, you pretty much have to either go where she wants, or step back and walk behind her.

I didn't bicycle into town because the plumber was set to arrive at 2pm to fix two leaks in two water pipes and by the time he left, it was too hot to go biking. The plumber knows a few words in English that he was forced to learn for all his British clients like "open" and "close." It's always weird when I'm stumbling along in my French, assuming that the person doesn't know a word of English and then they start speaking English to me. Just now, Horatio Alger the Younger drove in the yard to deliver a notice about a play that will be staged in our small village. I was proudly chatting away in French, asking him if he would come by and talk with me about mowing the grounds when I return to the U.S. Then, out of the blue, he said in perfect English, "I'll pass by here before you leave to talk with you about it." Most of the people in my area, don't speak English . . . it's not like Paris where everyone seems to have studied the language.

The plumber showed me how to turn off all the water to the house and the outbuildings, so that should save us some money next year. We had three pipes burst this year. After he left, I took two beach towels out of an armoire and wentout in the sheep pasture to take a nap. Blanche immediately came over, pawed, or hooved me and my towels then laid her big whale of a body alongside me, aligning herself in the same direction, so that our heads were exactly side by side. I slung my arms over her shoulder and fell asleep as she placidly belched and chewed her cud. Her ear would wiggle back and forth tickling my cheek.

Sometime while I was asleep, Blanche had gotten up and moved. When I woke up, because it was getting cold, Blanche was laying down on the other side of me, turned in the opposite direction from which I faced. Soixante-Douze was near by. Since sheep are prey animals, when they lay down they each keep watch pointed in a different direction. I think that's why Blanche changed her alignment, she didn't think it was safe that the two of us were both looking in the same direction and not covering our backs. Sheep are quite paranoid.

Colin asked me today if S-D and Blanche think they're human. I replied that S-D still thinks she's a sheep, because she was raised by a sheep mother. Blanche thinks she's human because I raised her on a bottle. However, after this afternoon, I don't think that either of them thinks they're human. I think they think I'm a sheep, who lives in the house with the blue shutters.

Covert cell of Evil French People plotting to overthrow the American government. Infiltrator, with pony tail is in left of photo. Hidden microphone is in the frog pitcher.

French Bashing

Enough with the French bashing!

It's understandable that uber-hatemonger Bill O'Reilly mindlessly engages in it; but Saturday's THREE French-assaulting editorials on the opinion page of the Los Angeles Times demonstrates that America needs to find a psychiatrist to help her overcome her debilitating Francophobia.

Editorial Number 1
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-apt12mar12,0,1574289.story?coll=la-news-comment-editorials

Editorial Number 2
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-nato12mar12,0,5654799.story?coll=la-news-comment-editorials

Editorial Number 3
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-film12mar12,0,7363326.story?coll=la-news-comment-editorials

Here's my letter to the editor:

Dear Editor,

Oh my,did you eat some bad escargot?

Are you grumpy because you can't get your hands on any good foie gras
in California?

Your panties are certainly in a twist over la belle France.

The next time some bumpkin tells me that the French are arrogant, I'm
going to whip out a copy of yesterday's (March 12) LA Times editorial page to
show them what arrogance really is.

If France is such a "minor power" then why would you waste your ink and
brain cells whining about a corrupt French politician -- were you too afraid to
tackle Tom Delay's malfeasance, or how about Paul Bremer's missing billions in
Iraq?; why are you having a hissy fit about the unwillingness of France to pour
Euros and manpower into a destabilized Iraq not of their making -- wouldn't your
time have been better spent mulling over the future of this unwarranted and
bankrupting war in which our country is wallowing?; and, it was most arrogant of
you to complain about how [tiny] France, a country with the size and the
population of California, chooses to subsidize and nurture their petite, but
noble, film industry.

If you would have bothered to have done some fact checking, instead of
spouting off cliches about France, you could have read McDonald's most recent
annual report to discover that McDonald's is no longer thriving in France.

Yes, there's ten percent unemployment in France, but at least they are
honest about their numbers. What's the true unemployment percentage in the
U.S.? You remove the unemployed from the tally if they quit looking for
work.

Yes, the French deficit is a little above the EU cap . . . but good
Lord, have you bothered taking a peek at the U.S. deficit? It's a tsunami
compared to France's bathtub splash of overspending.

And by the way, you used Poland and the Netherlands to demonstrate how
good American allies act. Both of those countries are pulling out their
troops this year . . . and it's not because everything is hunky-dory and they
can proudly leave a peaceful Iraq. They've seen Iraq for the quagmire it is.

Look in your own backyard and solve your own problems. Homelessness,
Rising Poverty, Health Insurance Crisis, Your Crashing Currency. Don't be
so arrogant as to presume you know how France should run its affairs.

If you'd like to see the real France, you can come over and spend a
week with me.
Libby Pratt

The late Olympia eating grass. 

Dimanche

I took the girls for a walk today. Blanche is so fat that we can't go on three hour walks any more. She pants like a dog with her tongue hanging out if we have to walk up a slight incline. I also think she has breathing difficulty because she had a mild case of lamb pneumonia when she was young. Most of the way, she walks right beside me, her rotund side rubbing against my leg. Sometimes, she'll see something appealing to eat and stops to nibble. The funny thing is, that if I keep walking and don't look back at her, she'll stay for a long time eating; but as soon as I turn around, she starts running to me. It's a hysterical sight to see this huge blob of wool, loping towards me on her scrawny peg legs.

Soixante-Douze, still petite, likes to do that spring lamb dance where she hops down the road by jumping off the ground and flying a bit forward in the air with all four hooves off the ground. I'll hear this "bop-bop-bop" behind me and I turn around to see her sailing towards me.

She's getting much friendlier towards me. When I was laying down on the side of the road hugging Blance, S-D surprised me by coming up several times and touching me with her nose.

The weather is still below freezing at night, but the days are beautifully sunny and warm if you're bundled up and laying in the sun. The three of us walked over a mile to see if the source of the canal was clogged. The water level of the basin had dropped rapidly yesterday so I had to do a little detective work to figure out what was going on. When we arrived at the source, it was obvious that the grill covering the intake pipe was clogged with leaves. I didn't bring a pitchfork with me to get them off, so we turned around and headed back.

We passed by the Count's cousins' abandoned maison de maitre, a remnant of the past glory of the nobility, and the girls wanted to eat the lush grass around the large house, so I laid in the grass, taking photos of them, and enjoyed watching them eat. (You'll have to wait until after the 23rd to see all my photos.)

Sheep cut off the grass and inhale it without chewing. The grass goes to a holding stomach, where they'll burp it back up later to chew.

Late this afternoon, Roger called me to tell me that he had driven out to the source to check it. He only does this for my benefit because the canal doesn't go through his property. He told me that it was clogged. I told him I was aware of that, but I would just let it remain clogged for a few days, let the water totally drain out of the basin, and then we could telephone the forgeron to come fix the vanne.

Roger was surprised when I told him that most of the water had already gone out of the basin. I told him there were just a few centimeters left. He told me that he would drive over to see if it was low enough for the forgeron to work on it.

He arrived in his Deux Chevaux with Miss his Border Collie sitting beside him. We walked around the back of the moulin and VOILA, the basin was full. Roger seemed to think I was losing my mind, or that my French was devolving and he hadn't been able to understand what I had said on the phone.

I had Roger call Louis Couderc, the property owner at the head of the canal. It turns out that Louis unclogged the intake pipe at noon, after Roger, I, and the girls had inspected it. Louis thinks that fishermen purposely clogged up the grill so that the water from the ruisseau wouldn't be diverted. If this is true, it's disconcerting, because last year, we had to put in a new vanne at the source after someone had sabotaged it. Again, the theory last year was that it was fishermen. The gendarmes were called out, but they didn't have a clue, and I'm sure they didn't pursue any leads . . . like the many bottles of chlorine lying about that our friends speculated were used to POISON the fish for easy fishing. I asked who in their right mind would poison a fish before catching it, and was told by several people that it was probably gypsies!

The gypsies get blamed for everything around here. I think that's the reason the French allow them to squat on small parcels of land throughout the country. The close proximity of the gypsies means there's an explanation for every mysterious happening. Life is much more straightforward that way. Nothing to puzzle over. You can't find your keys? Blame it on the gypsies, shrug, then go find your spare set.

I'm a Virgo . . . that's an Earth sign. I shouldn't be plagued with all these water issues. But this is what I get for marrying a PISCES!!!!!

Death

I don’t have a car at my disposal during my short stay this month. When I have a car, I race into town the first morning I’m here, and gobble down the first perfect croissant of my visit. But on Wednesday, not having a car, and feeling too lethargic from my jet lag to walk or bike into town, I asked the caretaker to pick up some bread for me. I guess she didn’t understand my directions to go to my preferred bakery, because she brought me back some walnut bread that wasn’t as good as the walnut bread from my bakery.

Three days of French bakery deprivation were taking their toll on me, and so I headed into town today, on foot – a ten kilometer round trip. The weather was cool, about 40F, sunny and beautiful. I discovered a new “shortcut” to town, a steep uphill trek through woods that probably cuts off 150 meters of the walk. It doesn’t make the trip that much easier but it’s pretty, and I avoid the traffic from the “big” road, which isn’t very big, but I still like to get as far away from cars as I can . . . to walk through the woods and vineyards and imagine that I’m not in Modern France, that I’m in romantic France . . . where all the people walk quaint trails with sheep trailing behind them and supermarche’s don’t exist.

At the bakery, I purchased my walnut bread (my husband will be jealous) and a croissant. At the patisserie, I purchased an apple tartlet Alsatian and then, thinking that maybe I wouldn’t be walking back into town for a few days, I purchased a chocolate-pear tartlet for good measure, thinking I’d eat it tomorrow.

On the way back home, I thought about sitting on the side of the trail and eating my croissant, but I had the fortitude to wait until I arrived back at the house. It was delicious. There is nothing as heavenly as a really good croissant -- experiencing the pleasure of your teeth biting through that crispy buttery crust, then slowly sinking into that moist flaky inner cloud of pastry.

After eating the croissant, it was my intention to make myself a healthy sandwich of walnut bread, tomatoes, and cucumbers, but I ditched the idea and opted to devour the apple tartlet instead. For dinner I ate the chocolate-pear tartlet and my favorite local combo, walnuts, Papillon Roquefort, and raisins. Today I’m on the high-fat, high-pleasure regimen and I have no regrets.

Life’s too short not to eat good croissants and indulge yourself at French bakeries . . . life is too short to live anywhere other than France where food is a high art and wine made by your neighbor is served at lunch.

My husband has been spending the week with his very ill father. Bill had a heart attack and stroke. He’s ninety-one, so any health issues at this time are life and death. He was mentally robust and enjoyed great health up until two weeks ago, so it’s extremely sad and frustrating for us, and for him, to see him incapacitated, unable to easily communicate or take care of himself. It is very difficult for my husband to watch the only authority figure he has every respected start to fade away.

We all begin at the same starting line and we all crawl across the same finish line. The only thing that matters between those two points is: did you find LOVE in life? I’m not talking about the grand, romantic, mythic soul mate who supposedly fulfills all your needs and fantasies. I’m asking, have you discovered what unconditional love is yet?

This evening, I received a message from my friend Laurie. Her friend of several decades died in a tragic boating accident. He was young and healthy and handsome one minute, and then the next minute, he’s crossing the finish line. Do you see how we don’t have control over our lives? You’re a healthy guy in your forties and poof, you’re gone. You’re a healthy ninety-one-year-old man, and poof, your body just won’t work any more. You’re my beautiful, homecoming queen sixteen-year-old best friend and cancer kills you before you can graduate from high school.

It doesn’t matter if you’re sixteen, forty, or ninety, life is too damn short and if you want to find unconditional love you better start searching . . . this minute … in earnest. Because when you reach the finish line that is the only thing you will regret not finding. Unconditional love. As you lay dying, you’re not going to be regretting that you didn’t work more hours, make more money, that you needed to be slimmer, or that you should have gotten a face life. No you’ll only regret not having experienced unconditional love.

Clarification

Yesterday, it may have sounded as if I was attorney bashing. I didn't receive any complaints but I'd like to clarify that I wasn't attacking the profession or its practioners. I have many friends and even a close relative who are attorneys. When I was young I always wanted to be an attorney. I fervently believe that the world needs attorneys.

However, when one needs an attorney it's because one is embroiled in a stressful situation. So I'd like to clarify yesterday's comment: this was the first time I ever felt blissful talking to an attorney regarding LEGAL matters on the phone. I've had many a wonderful encounter with attorneys . . . when I'm not discussing a case in which I'm involved.

Vive les avocats!

Soixante-Douze and Blanche 

BREAKING NEWS BULLETIN . . .

I called our attorney yesterday and she happily informed me that we prevailed in the Count's lawsuit!!!!

Thanks to all of you . . . to all our French friends who cheered us on and patiently listened to our complaints, and to our American friends who have been so bored with hearing our saga at every dinner for the past three years . . .special thanks to Colin who often took the initiative to be supportive without me first harranguing him with the topic.

Yesterday, before I knew the result, I was proudly explaining to Roger what an avoue is . . . a special attorney that only makes pleadings at the appellate court . . .and then Roger replied, that he hoped that I wouldn't have to learn the word for an attorney that practices in front of France's equivalent of the U.S. Supreme Court.

I had another great experience here in France: it was the first time that I felt immense joy speaking with an attorney on the telephone!

I haven't been able to figure out how to download today's photos . . . so here's an old one of Blanche . . . she looks the same only woolier. 

Here's a photo of a snow covered tree in the Jura. 

Je suis arrivee!

Oh, it's beautiful here. I took the train down from Paris yesterday afternoon. The Paris -Toulouse line isn't a TGV. I didn't quite understand the explanation, but my girlfriend told me it had something to do with the airlines not wanting a TGV route to interfere with their lucrative aviation traffic into Toulouse. Because AirBus is located there, Toulouse is the French city has the most flights in and out, other than Paris.

To take away some of our pain, the SNCF has put some fancy trains on our line. They're called Corail. The interiors are chic and modern, tastefully upholstered and painted in a pale yellow and light beige scheme. The chairs are quite fancy, and high-tech in that they have electric controls, large pull out tables, cup holders (they're following the American car model), and a little shelf you can pull down to hold your books or papers while you work.

I mourn the passing of, and I'll miss the old six passenger compartments, the ones you always see in the old movies. Another piece of romantic France disappears.

But other than that big disappointment, I enjoyed my ride down in the gray March afternoon and evening. The ride was even more interesting than usual because the leaves are off the trees and I could see chateax and old castles and quaint cottages that are hidden from view when the trees are leafy.

I caught the 7:15 bus from the train station. All the passengers were teenagers. The bus driver was a maniac, driving 90 plus kilometers, in the dark on very narrow roads. I've never done it before, but in the future, I'm going to have my visitors who come in on the train catch this bus . . . it will be a wild thrill for them. There's a one lane bridge that the bus has to thread. Other bus drivers I've ridden with stop to line up the bus so they won't hit the stone walls of the bridge. This guy didn't slow down a bit and miraculously barrelled onto the bridge and off of it without a scratch.

I exited the bus in the town that's five kilometers from my farm. I walked to the pizza place, ordered a pizza to take out, chatted with the owner, and he called a taxi for me. The taxi driver was very friendly, even though we probably interrupted his dinner. The two of us talked about the sad state of American politics. He charged me 5 Euros. I tried to tip him, but he refused!

I'm not renting a car this trip. I'm only here for two weeks, and I don't really need one because I have so much work to do here at the house that I don't need the diversion of a car. I had ambitious visions of riding my bike into town to purchase the few things I'll need during my trip, but today, I sent the caretaker.

I spent the morning clipping a hedge while the sheep clipped the grass near me. They were happy to see me, and even Soixante-Douze let me pet her.

My neighbor Francine walked through this morning with a friend of her's. She's leaving tomorrow for a two week hiking trip through the Jura. http://www.monts-jura.com/uk/ete-galeriephotos.html Francine said she'll come by this afternoon to chat. Although she already knows all of my news because she had spoken with our mutual friend Marylen in Paris who I had called on Saturday.

Roger is coming over after his lunch to discuss the flooding problem.

I'll try and take some photos this afternoon, and post them later.

Oh, I arrived just in the nick of time. Today is Jeudi Noir, Black Thursday. The trains and the government employees are on strike . . . and someone told me that Air France isn't working as well, although I haven't confirmed that. Probably the air traffic controllers are on strike and preventing aviation traffic.

While I was waiting for my pizza, the news report was airing video of angry VINTNERS protesting in the streets and being tear gassed. The restaurant owner didn't understand what was going on, I certainly couldn't understand, and when I asked Roger today, a vintner who has been know to take to the streets in protest, he didn't know either. But it was the strangest sight to see well-dressed middle-aged people getting tear gassed!

I love the frequency with which the French protest in the streets. They don't just accept the way things are. They take to the streets. If you want to see real, vibrant democracy, you have to see the French version in action.

Vive la Revolution!

Yesterday, I made orangesicle sorbet . . . here's the fantastic recipe, with no fat and only three tablespoons of sugar . . . and if you want to omit the sugar, substitute Stevia:

1 1/2 cups orange juice concentrate, defrosted
3 cups non-fat milk
2 teaspoons vanilla
3 tablespoons sugar

Mix up the ingredients together then throw them in your ice cream machine, and voila, you have a wonderful low-calorie dessert -- only 124 calories per half cup serving.

I find it surprisingly empowering to have an ice cream machine. I can control the fat and the sugar, and I'm not dependent upon a factory for my ice cream. I have the freedom to create the flavors I want and I have control over the ingredients, choosing hormone-free milk, and organic fruit.

My husband and I out on the town, grazing. 

Gluttony

Have you ever noticed that when someone is complaining or raging about something, the topic usually revolves around something that person is often guilty of?

I'm always chastising my fellow Americans for how much they eat. I probably write about overeating because I'm so guilty of it and my guilt cannot be emotionally hidden or dammed up with my compensating exercise regimen.

At the sake of embarrassing myself, I will describe my day out yesterday as an example of how a "typical" in-shape American eats. My French readers will not believe that it is possible for one person to eat as much BAD food as I ate yesterday.

For my husband's birthday, I bought him a Cuisinart Professional Ice Cream Maker. So yesterday morning, I made a batch of vanilla ice cream with Scharffen Berger chocolate. One cup of whole milk with two cups of cream. That's what I ate for breakfast.

Our plan for the day was to go to a movie and then eat dinner afterwards around six.

On our way to the movie, we passed through North Beach/Chinatown and since we had plenty of time, it having been our intention to go for a long, healthy walk before the movie, I suggested that we stop for a "snack" at our favorite North Beach restaurant, Brandy Ho's Hunan. We stopped.

We were amazingly restrained, drinking tea and only ordering an order of deep fried dumplings and a plate of sizzling rice shrimp. The rice sizzles because it has just come out of a deep fat fryer.

We continued downtown, and after purchasing a large loaf of walnut bread from the Acme Bakery at the newly renovated Ferry Building we headed to the Embarcadero Center to see the movie. I noticed a new place at the Ferry Building called the Czar Nicholas Caviar Bar -- I made the comment to my husband that we must be nearing the end of the American Empire if a place with such an arrogant name and aristocratic aspirations would be packed on a beautiful Saturday afternoon.

At the Embarcadero Center, my husband asked me if he could buy me a truffle at Godiva, and of course I wouldn't refuse him. I was happy to see that this year's Easter promotion at Godiva features the cute and precocious Lucy the Lamb. http://www.godiva.com/catalog/collections.aspx?id=23

We arrived at the theatre and purchased tickets an hour before the show. While sitting on a bench waiting, I suggested to my husband that we take a walk. He agreed, but we only made it about fifty feet away from the theatre door because my husband suggested we get a drink at Chevy's.

I had a margarita, he had a Negro Modelo, we devoured an entire basket of tortilla chips and still there remained a half an hour to kill before the movie.

The movie was Gunner Palace, a documentary about American soldiers in Iraq living in Uday Hussein's palace. During the trailers, my husband announced that he was going to go to the restroom. I said, "Hurry back," and he said, "Why?" and I replied, "Because I love you." Well that was a mistake, because he was so moved by my words of adoration that he brought us back a large, movie-sized box of Red Vines, which only took us about five minutes to devour.

After the movie, we headed towards home, walking. I asked if we were going to go to a restaurant for dinner and my husband said he was too full to think about eating.

Arriving back at the house, I ordered a large pizza. I was well-behaved and only ate two pieces, then for dessert I ate my delicious homemade ice cream.

Analyzing our gluttonous rampage yesterday, I was wondering if it had anything to do with our friend Pierre-Yves' health problems. P-Y is our hero. He's seventy-five. He runs two hours a day. He doesn't drink. He doesn't smoke. He eats healthy, biologique foods.

This year, the doctors discovered that he had prostate cancer and he yesterday on the telephone, he told me that they just discovered that he has lung cancer. The lung cancer seems to be asbestos related, and as my husband pointed out, all men eventually get prostrate cancer depending upon how long they live so his cancer's don't seem to have anything to do with lifestyle issues: for no one could have been living a healthier life than Pierre-Yves did.

So perhaps, my husband and I subconsciously went out on an eating bender because we were telling ourselves that it didn't matter what we did to take care of ourselves, if Pierre-Yves can get sick, then no amount of behavior modification can make us live past the expiration date encoded on our DNA.

Again, proof that you can't control your destiny. The cold hand of fate eventually grabs you by the shoulder.

Enjoy today.

The Grand Zen Master 

"I have lived with several Zen masters -- all of them cats."
Eckhart Toll

Happy Birthday to my favorite Causse du Lot buck. 

For Whom the Heater Explodes

It's a dreary, rainy day here in San Francisco, and we don't have any heat. I'm sitting here with a small space heater, a situation which reminds me very much of my last week spent at the house in France!

Ever since we returned from France at the end of January, leaving a broken central heating system behind us in our wake, our American heater has been making loud, unsettling noises. It sounds like a gun going off whenever the gas has to rekindle itself. After five weeks of this, my husband finally decided to call Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) to have them look at the furnace.

The technician arrived yesterday, and found our heater to be in such bad shape, that he disconnected the gas saying that the next explosion might be the BIG ONE.

So here is more indisputable proof to bolster yesterday's post, that we don't have any control over life. For the past month, our furnace was on the verge of blowing up our flat and us in it.

Young French boy following my method of finding love and tranquility. 

Give it Up

For those of you who read this blog, you’ll be familiar with my Grand Theory of the Universe and why I advise every sane person to not bother to carry an organizer because everything is random and nothing can be planned.

You may have been conditioned by your upbringing so that you flatter/berate yourself by thinking that you got where you are because of your hard work/or laziness and brilliance/or stupidity, but I’m here to tell you that you only rose from the compost heap of life/or were consumed by it because you were lucky/unlucky enough to have been born with a personality that enjoys hard work/avoids hard work and because the egg and sperm that happened to meet one sultry afternoon combined to give you your brilliant/not-so-brilliant mind.

Many people dispute my theory. But those are young, naive people. The older and wiser a person is, the more apt they are to nod their head in sage agreement with me. No one is in control of their life. And perhaps the largest disservice society does, is to drill it into our heads that all our successes, all our failures, are the result of our own decisions and therefore, we should gloat or feel guilty depending on how society is currently passing judgment on our state of affairs.

Par example, one reader, discussing my Breasts post, told me that when he was a kid he wondered why all the women in the paintings of the Old Masters were “fat.” Long ago, fat was a sign of wealth. If you were a peasant, scrounging for your food every day of the year, you were as thin as today’s super models. And that wasn’t considered healthy nor attractive. If you would have qualified for the Fortune Magazine - Versailles 500 List of 1789, you were probably fat, and every Count/Countess was chasing your dimpled derriere. (You would also be dead the following year, but that's another book.)

If you’re currently battling with your weight, because you buy society’s idea that thin is in, that thin is a sign of self control, and you agonize over every morsel that passes your lips, you will understand how cruel it is that you were born in this day and age. You would have had a lot more fun as a tyrant or as a king’s mistress back in the eighteenth century. Timing is everything.

If your horny parents would have mustered some self-control and held off their coupling for a few more hours, or even minutes, you wouldn’t have been born . . . some other self-obsessing, narcisstic combination would have emerged nine months later. But since your parents had no control over their natural functions, voila, we have the pleasant privledge of knowing you.

You were not in control of your conception. You are not in control of your life. You were not in control of that guy/girl who dumped you in high school. You are not in control of your boss, your wife, your kids, your parents, et al. You are not in control of your death.

I harp on this not to depress you, but to free you. Nothing is your fault, nothing is your triumph. Just enjoy your short ride here on earth.

Find a nice, dog urine free swatch of lawn, or a forest floor covered with molting leaves, or a snow bank if you’re currently in France; lay down on your back, arms spread wide, legs spread wide (vulnerability is the sensation we’re going for here), palms up to the heavens and repeat I accept(or J’accepte if you don’t know English) over and over until you really do accept yourself, the Universe, your body, your mind, the people in your life. If you’re lucky, some sort of animal, a messenger from the Universal Oversoul, will approach and nuzzle you.

When you accept yourself, you will find the peace and love for which you have been searching.

Let me know if I've been of any help.

Painting of Blanche and Olympia in French sailor sweaters being attacked by moths. 

For Men Only

More proof that the French take their undergarments more seriously than Americans do. And much to my chagrin, I see that the French are using big boobs to market their products. France is becoming Californicated.

http://www.aubade.com/fr/

Note that you can order the book The Art of Seduction.

For Women Only

http://www.hom.fr/hom.php

Little House on the Prairie

There's an article in today's New York Times about small towns on the American Great Plains giving away land and other incentives, like country club memberships, if people will move into their town.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/02/opinion/02greene.html?incamp=article_popular_3

I hail from one of these dying prairie towns. My town isn't mentioned in the article. And I don't know if the town fathers have resorted to offering free land yet; but they did just tear down an elementary school to put up a retirement home. That's a frightening indication of the state of affairs in rural Monana.

Depopulation has been the name of the game on the prairie since the first whites showed up and confiscated the land from the native population. The government wanted the Great Plains populated and so it gave away free land . . . land that they took by brutal force with their superior Army.

A flood of European settlers built cute little towns, schools, churches, and lots of saloons. Many, they named after their European hometowns. For a few years, everyone had a good time. But then it became achingly apparent that a few hundred acres on the plains isn't enough to generate a consistent income or even keep a family from starving, and so the idealistic settlers turned tail and moved on to the west coast or back east from where they originally ventured.

Manifest Destiny failed trying to settle the Great Plains.

I remember when I was a little kid, and I asked my father why the white man took the land away from the Indians. He told me it was the white man's responsibility to do so because the Indians weren't utilizing the land to its fullest capacity. I bought that line for more than a couple of decades.

But it wasn't true. The Europeans took the land because they thought they could make a lot of money off the land. And like panning for gold, a few did make fortunes, but the majority lost and left, and that is the tale that is still playing out on the Plains. The land is more powerful than man . . . that's something the Europeans hadn't run into before. But the Native Americans knew it . . . that's why their communal, roaming system of living developed.

It would be the grandest of ironies if the people that answered the ads giving away free land were all NATIVE AMERICANS.