It isn't a rat . . .

it's giant monkeys running around my kitchen at night. See the surveillance photo on the left.

I had complained to my husband that a rat was eating my bananas. The wise husband suggested that I hang the bananas from the pot rack that hangs from the ceiling in the kitchen.

I followed his advice, and this morning, after gingerly picking my way down the hallway to avoid two piles of dog poop and one pile of dog vomit, I entered the closed kitchen; and there, to my great horror, was the bunch of bananas, lying on the floor, with two of them eaten . . .only the skins remained.

The French word for vomit is: vomi.

This isn't about France . . .

but the article covers the disappearance of a country's heritage . . .in this case, thatched cottages in Ireland.

Happy 1000th Execution America!

Interesting isn't it? When the Saudis behead someone for a crime, we think it's barbaric . . .yet the majority of Americans are cheerleaders for capital punishment in the U.S.A.

U.S. nears 1000th execution since 1977

Since 1973, 122 prisoners have been freed from death row. The vast majority
of those cases came during the last 15 years, since the use of DNA evidence
became widespread. While there is no official proof an innocent person has been
executed, opponents of the death penalty say the number of prisoners whose
convictions have been reversed should fuel skepticism.

"I don't think any rational person seriously examining the evidence can
have any confidence that an innocent hasn't already been executed," said
Scheck.

Using post-conviction DNA evidence, the Innocence Project has helped in
more than half of the 163 cases vacated — 14 of which were from death row.
"We've demonstrated that there are too many innocent people on death row,"
Scheck said.

But that argument does not impress Charles Rosenthal, district attorney
for Harris County, Texas, which has sent more prisoners to the death chamber —
85 — than any other U.S. county and all but two states, Texas and Virginia,
according to Texas Department of Criminal Justice statistics.

"I don't know about every death penalty case in Texas, but I feel quite
sure that no one that this office has had anything to do with was factually
innocent," Rosenthal said.

Scheck believes Rosenthal's claim is based "more on faith than fact."
He noted that the police DNA lab in Houston has been shut down since 2002
because an investigation found problems with poor training and contaminated
evidence.

"What kind of confidence can you have when the jurisdiction that
executes more people than any other is fraught with unreliable testing results?"
Scheck said.

(snip)

___
On the Net:
Death Penalty Information Center:
Innocence
Project:
Throw Away the Key:
www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/
www.innocenceproject.org/
www.throwawaythekey.org/

I reported it here first, but here's the San Francisco Chronicle's article informing us that the French are getting fatter . . .because they're adopting American eating habits.

But Socialist lawmaker Jean-Marie Le Guen, a doctor by training, is not
satisfied. Earlier this year, he introduced ambitious fat-fighting legislation
that would ban food advertising on television and make weighing children
compulsory in schools.
"Are we expected to watch this obesity epidemic grow and assume it's fate?" asked Le Guen.

My latest painting . . . 

Blanche leading the protesters to the corporate offices. 

Blanche at the window . . .quite stunning. 

Antoinette at the window. 

The American Gestapo in action . . .

The New York Times reports that the U.S. is charging Jose Padilla, the so-called "Dirty Bomber," with lesser crimes because they can't use testimony that they TORTURED out of their witnesses in the U.S. gulags.

Un-fucking believable!

Another reason I love France . . .

They don't have a death penalty. This article should make you sick and ashamed that the U.S. is the only western nation that still executes people.

Blanche's Favorite Vintner

Would have to be MOUTON-Rothschild!

Blind Taste Testing

Doesn't this sound fun?

It really does still look like this in some places around here . . .

And they don't charge for pillows or decent wine!

Air France/KLM second quarter profit more than triples. (scroll down for the news headlines)
So much for French boycotts.

The Rat

The majestic Blanche sunning herself . . .and the neurotic, hyper-vigilant Soixante-Douze standing guard.


Some things are difficult to admit.

Even when I had a blurry glimpse of him running across the kitchen floor one morning I told myself he was just a big mouse.

After several days of finding turds that are indisputably bigger than mice turds . . .and several days of the compost bowl being turned over and finding banana peels mysteriously moved to the other side of the room . . .I am ready to admit that I have a rat living in the kitchen.

This morning I came down to find a half eaten banana!

I don't want to deal with rat poison . . .it has killed too many of the neighbors dogs and I don't want to add mine to the grim list.

Maybe I'll just grab the barn cat and let him sleep in the kitchen tonight.

I have a girlfriend coming to stay this weekend who keeps a very tidy house . . .she'll be in shock here . . .puppy feces decorating the doorstep every morning . . .chicken droppings wherever you step. . .rat droppings on the kitchen counter . . .I bet she'll be insisting that we eat breakfast, lunch and dinner in restaurants.

If my tiled floor is shining, it's only because there's a leak from the hot-water heat radiator or the puppy has just taken a leak.

Wish I would have known about this protest in Madrid. The girls and I are up for a good protest . . . especially one against the taking away of the indigenous rights of sheep.


"Sheep out of luck: Shepherds parade their flocks through Madrid's Sol Square to protest the destruction of ancient transhumance routes used to lead livestock to high pastures for the summer and back to lower fields in the winter."

New buck is the sheep in the left of the photo who is looking skeptically at the camera. 

Biberon is in the left of the photo. 

Perfect sheep. 

Dear Husband . . .have no idea what caused this! A wild boar being pursued? Blanche leading her flock in the night? 

Got Sperm?

Got Sperm?

Here’s an interesting article from the New York Times about the offspring of sperm donors finding each other.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/20/national/20siblings.html?hp&ex=1132549200&en=19a9c34b71b8af37&ei=5094&partner=homepage

So what does this have to do with life on a French farm?

Why it’s about the eternal quest for sperm.

The belier, or buck, arrived last week! So we finally have some sheep sperm roaming around. Course, he’s still young; and he has to survive until February when his equipment should be working.

I'm happy to report that he is interested in the obese Blanche and the neurotic Soixante-Douze . . .and the Husband didn’t think I’d be able to find ANYONE interested in Blanche . . .course we’ll have to provide the buck with a sexual aid (step ladder) to mount Blanche.

It’s a fact of life that when you’re looking for sperm, it’s hard to come by.
When you could care less about it, it’s abundant and flowing and it needs to be warded off like the bubonic plague. That’s why the American government spends hundreds of millions of dollars a year in its War Against Sperm (abstinence programs).

When you really need some sperm, it’s no where to be found . . .or you have to pay top dollar for it as that NY Times article details.

I can’t believe how long it has taken me to find sheep sperm here . . . Blanche is about ready to collect retirement (yes, the French social system is that generous).

This buck is not as handsome as Napoleon was. But at this point, I’m desperate and looks don’t matter. That country western song is right on the money, when it croons that the Bucks all get handsomer at closing time . . . or something like that.

I bought the buck . . . who shall remain nameless so that I don’t get attached to him . . . and three other sheep from a neighboring farmer of my American friends who live over in sheep country on the eastern side of the departement. I picked out the buck, who was an orphan, and made the mistake of letting the farmer pick out the other three young ewes.

It took the farmer two months to deliver the sheep. I was worried that he wasn’t going to bring them, and that I’d have to start searching anew for another buck . . .and Blanche would end up dying a virgin.

But lo and behold, the farmer shows up one day; backs his little camion into the field, and lets out the sheep. They were dirty, and I was a little concerned about the black midget sheep the farmer chose for me, but after my cursory glance I thought the others looked okay.

The farmer told me the sheep had NEVER been outdoors in their five months of life! I think it took them two days to figure out that they could eat the grass.

I took the farmer in to the kitchen to pay him and give him a cup of coffee. He charged me a lot more than the farmer that sold me the five beautiful perfect sheep this summer . . .but I didn’t dicker, because it’s difficult to dicker in a language you speak with the fluency of a five-year-old.

The farmer left, a large smile on his face, my check in his pocket, laughing all the way to the bank. “Stupid American,” I’m sure he was thinking.

The next morning, I went out to give the sheep their ration of grain, and I noticed that my new sheep, except for the midget, had malformed front hooves and ankles. Well, this pissed me off . . . it was obvious that the farmer, as my husband put it, unloaded all his freaks on me.

So I internally debated with myself what I should do.

I was already attached to the overly friendly dwarf, and was calling her by the name the farmer had called her, Biberon . . .which means “baby bottle” in French.

I didn’t want to send the buck back, because I desperately needed sheep sperm.

I looked at the two other ewes with their rubberbanded tails and knew what that meant, that their tails hadn’t been cut off because they were initially selected to go to the slaughterhouse . . .so I didn’t want to send them back to face certain death.

The sheep I had purchased this summer were so perfectly bred they would make a Nazi weep with pride. These misshapen creatures would have gone to the slaughterhouse if I hadn’t paid a sheep’s ransom to free them. No, I would not send them back.

I resolved to accept my freaks.

Throughout the week, the neighbors arrived to check out the new lambs. Oh they were polite, you know how the French are, not like an American who wouldn’t hesitate a second to tell you what a fool you were; but I could tell that the neighbors thought the sheep were freaks, and that there was something wrong with me for trying to build a flock based on these misfits.

“I think you need to cut their hooves,” said Steeph.

“Oh, the little black one is the buck,” said Francine. (She must have really thought I was deranged, to buy a midget buck; couldn’t she spot the large testicles dangling from the white sheep with the twisted ankles?)

“They look different from the other sheep,” said another. Steeph had told this neighbor about my sheep so she ran down to see them.

I told this neighbor that the Husband thought it was good to inject some different genes into the pool . . .when all else fails, blame the Husband . . .especially when he’s in the States.

This frosty morning, I went out to feed the new sheep, and miraculously, their feet look a lot better, much straighter. Perhaps it’s because they’re exercising now. They aren’t laying in a stable all day. Amazing what a little love and fresh air can do!

I'm a little worried about the buck's penis though . . .it always hangs out a little bit . . . even though it's minus five Celsius now. Napoleon's penis didn't hang out all the time. Leave it to me to buy a buck with a broken penis.

Found this old photo . . .I think it's out of Arkansas in the 30's and it looks like a double of my brother Bill . . . Bill's current girlfriend is a lot cuter. 

Depiction of "Charity" from the 17th Century 

Blurry Antoinette with a Bone 

Your Papers Please . . .

Woke up at 2:30am this morning to drive the Husband to the airport in Toulouse.

Driving out of a mid-sized town about a half hour from Toulouse, we were stopped by a roadblock of gendarmes.

There’s a curfew in some towns that have been hit by car burning. So we were viewed as a suspicious vehicle at 3:30 in the morning.

Four good-looking, physically fit gendarmes descended on our car. I swear that the main requirement for becoming a French gendarme is that you have to be a good-looking, white male . . . your have to pass the blue motorcycle pants test.

I was driving. Luckily, the Husband had shaved off his beard two days ago so he no longer resembled a Middle-Eastern terrorist. He had his hair pulled back in a pony tail; but that wouldn’t send off alarm bells here in France where the “intellectual” men wear their hair flowing.

Whenever I get stopped by the gendarmes, they make me nervous and my French language skills disintegrate.

The tall studly gendarme asked me to do something, and I just assumed he wanted to see the papers for the car. So I asked the Husband to hand them to me, and he fumbled around in the dark, finally locating them in the glove box.

The Husband handed me the papers, and the PATIENT gendarme said, in French, “I didn’t ask for your papers, I told you to turn your car off.”

“Oh, okay,” I replied in French and turned off the car. “But you need to speak slowly.”

He nodded. “Now, give me your car registration and your drivers’ license.”

I handed him both. He matched up the name on the registration card with my license, then consulted with his colleagues over the meaning of my birth date . . .not knowing if I was born in July or September because the French write the day first and the Americans write the numerical month first.

He handed me back the documents. I assumed the check was over. But then, to my amazement he told us to get out of the car. I had just read something on a blog about what pricks the French cops can be, so I admit that I was a bit worried. I left the keys in the ignition, and the Husband and I both got out of the car.

The main gendarme told me to open up the trunk. I had to go retrieve the keys to do that. I opened the trunk. It was packed with the Husband’s luggage. The gendarmes gathered around the trunk to look . . .but they didn’t touch anything.

The main gendarme told me we could go on. They didn’t ask us where we were going or coming from at 3:30 in the morning. The Husband told me as we drove off that they were looking for gasoline cans . . .it’s now illegal in France to have one in your car.

That was our excitement for the morning! Next time, I’ll fix my hair and slap on some make-up when I make the airport run.

I mentioned to the Husband that I thought the gendarme was very calm and patient when we were fumbling around in the glovebox . . .I said an American cop would have barked out the order again to turn off the car. The Husband agreed and pointed out that the French cops aren't paranoid about getting shot like the American cops are so they can be a bit calmer.

I arrived back at the house at 6:16am, and promptly went back to sleep. I was awakened at 9am by the barking dogs when Roger came over to let the chickens out of their coop as we had pre-arranged. I didn't know I'd be back so early.

The chickens gave me an egg today . . .so I made dumplings for dinner.

The buck has arrived . . .I’ll write more about that at a later date.

Europe . . . where bad means good

Marketwatch.com marvels at the strong showing of the European, especially French, bourses this year.

You Gotta Read This One . . .

Paris riots demonstrate superiority of America.

Excellent, Excellent Analysis

Read Juan Cole's suberb analysis of the French riots, and the misconceptions the U.S. press are fostering with their coverage.

He's a well-regarded expert on the Middle East.

Here's a surprisingly good essay that the Wall Street Journal, of all sources, ran on it's opinion page today regarding the French riots.

Things are getting exciting . . .

One step away from martial law!

Car hasn't been set on fire yet . . .

Last night, the husband and I took Roger into our big town to see a New Orleans gospel singer perform.

When I called up Roger in the morning to make sure he was still going with us, he asked if I was worried about our car getting set on fire. I replied, "Why, are they now burning cars in ________?" And he said that they hadn't started yet and asked how we would get home if it was set on fire . . .I said we'd hire a taxi.

It's really uncomprehensible to me that there could be rioters in our little town.

In not so far away Toulouse, the rioters commandered a bus, told the people to get off, and then set it on fire.

I have this AWFUL habit of creating paintings that fortell the future. I'm not kidding. All my paintings of my two sheep Blanche and Olympia had them standing side by side. Then, I painted one where the two of them were separated, with a strange tree in between them. Within a week, Olympia was dead.

This January, I made a small painting of our house, looking quaint and idyllic, the sheep standing in the foreground, snails crossing the yard, with bomb blasts going off in the hills behind the house. I wanted to point out that no matter how cozy you make yourself, evil is always lurking in the background.

Just before the rioting started, I began painting a larger version of the painting . . .and was shocked to realize that what I had painted in January, our little heaven coming under assault, was the unbelievable scenario that was happening now.

Life is stranger than fiction . . .

Now here's a guy I admire!

He hasn't driven a car since 1995!

Is Paris Burning?

Here's an interesting "analysis" from a Parisian blogger I trust and enjoy reading . . . it's in English.

New York Times' report on the French riots

Interesting aside, this article states that in 2003 France became the #1 country for people seeking asylum . . .surpassing the U.S.

Well, here's another health care horror story from the U.S. . . .and this family even has health insurance.

The rioting is spreading all over France. Here's LeMonde's coverage for today. It has now come to the capital of our region.

Believe me, all the car burning has got the undivided attention of the government here.

I can't help wondering, if these "disenfranchised" French poor, who have food and medical care and other services that the working poor don't have in America, then when are the poor in the U.S. going to engage the services of that venerable Congressional lobbying firm Pitchfork, Molotov and Cocktail?

Those kind hearted men and handful of women at the U.S. Capitol are even making cuts in the school lunch program for poor kids. Can't blame them though, after all, they've got the mother of all wars to finance in Iraq . . .and 70 billion more in tax cuts to push through . . .a bridge in Alaska to nowhere to build . . .and the 35 million American poor, well, it's their own damn fault they're poor.

Dear Reader . . .

Would you comment on our seemingly unending American quest for a better zip
code, (schools, parks, public amenities, Huck Finn's or was it Jim's "Territory
Ahead". While Huck and Jim didn't give a hoot about school.. that American
impulse is still there.) As you have found the perfect Zip in relatively obscure
(not Provence) area of France, how do you view your quest? Is yours the
culmination of the American Dream... to live abroad, The new Territory Ahead
under the Neocon Regime, or is yours a rejection of it.



Dear Reader,

No, I don’t view my move to France as a CULMINATION of the American Dream. I view it as a REJECTION of the American Dream.

I really was tired of the endless seeking, the endless consuming.

I just wanted to escape back to my Ohio farm roots; but the Ohio farm was surrounded by suburban developments.

I was searching for contentment. That’s something I couldn’t find in the U.S. . . .within myself, or the people I know there.

The unending American quest of which you write, that treadmill existence, that’s what was driving me nuts.

All the best,
Libby

Ouch!

Here's an interesting Washington Post article detailing how messed up the health care system is in the U.S.

And just yesterday, your beloved and kindly Senate had their noses to the grindstone figuring out how to worsen the situation, as they passed a bill that " . . . makes mild cuts to healthcare programs for the elderly, poor and disabled . . ." but allows drilling in the Artic wilderness.

Vive les Oil Companies!
Fuck you elderly, poor, and disabled!

I think the elderly, poor, and disabled need to hire better lobbyists.

Read this editorial from the Chicago Sun-Times (not a liberal bastion) for a more elegant analysis regarding the outrageousness of these healthcare cuts.

The husband and I just went through a stress inducing two month period where we didn't have health care coverage in the U.S. . . .simply because his old firm changed insurance providers so they were legally able to jettison us.

The re-application process TO THE SAME PROVIDER we've had for fifteen years, was Kafkaesque, to use a polite word.

We're working on migrating over to the French healthcare system.

When people ask me why I want to live in Europe I often reply, "Because it's comforting to live on a continent where every citizen has health insurance."

Weird, un-American concept, isn't it? Everyone on the continent has health insurance.

Now is not a good time to visit Paris . . .

Revolution Redux

It's rather timely that I read both this article today about rioting in the Paris suburbs and the cover of a French magazine today which had side-by-side photos of Marie-Antoinette and Madonna: the headline asked , "Why the enduring fascination with Marie-Antoinette?"

Michelin Guide Comes To New York City

And the winners are . . .

Cool Bed and Breakfasts in Burgundy

Here's an article from today's New York Times regarding Burgundy.

Halloween

Religious parents want to ban Halloween. . . in the U.S.!

Well, the first Halloween in our little village took place. It was quite cool . . .the village kids all came in one large group, accompanied by adult chaperones who were also dressed in costume, and they were travelling the back paths through the woods . . . so it was really scary for the little ones.

Our dog Attilla just about had a heart attack when he saw all these goblins, dressed in black and wearing masks, walk out of the woods.

The husband was yelling at him to quit barking at the trick-or-treaters . . .but I pointed out that Attilla was doing EXACTLY what I wanted him to do . . .go crazy and attack goblins that come out of the woods.

My husband commented on how polite all the kids were.

The Case of the Dead Duck

Grippe Aviare (Bird Flu)

The husband found a wild duck lying dead by the canal.

We didn’t know what we should do. Should we report it and cause a panic among our poultry raising neighbors? Should we just ignore it? Would it be a problem if our dogs ate it?

So I did what I always do when I’m not sure what to do: I called Roger.

He came over, looked at the duck, and suggested we call the vet to see if he wanted to examine the maggot-ridden fowl. We were certain he would want to investigate.

I dialed the number for the vet and handed the receiver to Roger.

The vet replied that he wasn’t interested in doing any analysis on the duck.
He was insistant that there wasn’t any grippe aviare in our department, and that wild ducks do die now and then.

I felt badly that he was a bit snide to Roger.

The vet said that if we wanted to get the duck analyzed, we had to take it into a laboratory in the big city. But he suggested that we just bury the carcass.

I’m happy to report that the chickens are doing fine . . . in fact, all three of them gave me an egg yesterday . . . but the husband stepped on one when he went to shut them in for the night.