An Enema of the People

Unlike the old Soviet Union, Russia nowadays is trying for the tourist trade.  While Moscow and St. Petersburg are major destinations, and Volvograd is sometimes managed by tourists primarily because of the Stalingrad battle site and the huge statue of Mother Russia, there are many places that have a struggle for identity, a reason for strangers to go there.  Part of the problem is the sameness of the old Soviet architectural style, if you are loose enough to call it that.

The Mashuk-Akva Term Spa in Zhelenovodsk. Russia wanted to put itself on the map as the last word in Russian spas.  They had constructed an 800-pound monument to the enema, featuring a giant enema bulb supported by three putti!  Needless to say, this questionable monument made the news!

It's a definite opportunity to pose next to, especially for groups.   The artist must have had a large sense of humor! 

Boudreaux's Vacations

Boudreaux,while managing the pogie factory in Mamou, made a remark that work was getting him down and that he needed a vacation.

Thibodaux said to him, "Then why not take a long, luxurious trip?"

Boudreaux answered, "Well, ma frien', remember when I took the trip to Paris?  Michelle got pregnant at that time."

"Oui, mon ami.  It was a romantic place to go."

And Boudreaux said, "And the next year, when I went to Hawaii, Michelle got pregnant again."

Thibodeaux said, "Oh, that one was Tee Marie.  Hawaii is so stimulating."

"And there was the trip to Rome.   Michelle got pregnant again, this time wif Tee Boudreaux.  So I'm not taking your advice no more, Thibodaux.  I'm taking her wif me to go to Shreveport.

The Perils of Passez

I hope you don't mind a little story from earlier times of Tee Angel (Little Angel, in Cajun):

Girls are as aggressively disposed as guys.  But they tend to be expert at three forms: relational aggression, reputational aggression, and shaming.  Let me give you an example of the last: putting someone in an utter humiliating circumstance.  One of the more juvenile examples of cloddish behavior is to pull off a girl's bikini top and play passez with it.

Passez (pronounced "pos-say," roughly) is a teasing game that kids in the New Orleans area played for as long as people can remember.  It involves a pair (or more) of people swiping a person's posesssion (hat, glove, paperback book, etc.) as tossing them back and forth, keeping it from the owner while taunting him or her with "passez!  passez!"  Swiping a girl's bikini top is especially frustrating for her because she's usually handicapped by the protection of her modesty that she cannot effectively retrieve her possession.

Other girl's reactions tend to be one of amusement; or "better her than me," I'm sorry to say.  There's no feminist solidarity in that evolutionary crucible: the playground.

After she's sufficiently angry, the cloddish offenders make her an offer: "Show us your ta-tas (or some less pleasant term), and you'll get it back."  If she doesn't, they can throw it in a tree or over a telephone line.

I experienced this kind of juvenile prank some years ago when a group of three older girls (!) did that to me.  You have to handle things when ordinary passez is played on you with coolness -- no hard feelings, on the surface.  I didn't; being half-naked, humiliated, and with a bruised knee and bloody chin.  Therefore, I went for the nuclear option!  

Finally, after they threw my top over a tree limb, I lost all concern for modesty: I hauled off and bopped one of them in the eye.  I was pleased  later to see that she got quite a shiner.  Her old lady went and complained to Mama, who stood up for me and the response was less than genteel.  The boppee was a head taller than me. 

 I will say that my copain, Dee-Doh, climbed the tree for me and retrieved mine.  And he didn't peek at all!

Princess Lum, on the other hand, would have had a way of dealing with people who misbehaved in that fashion:  Give them an electrical zap!

Actually, we have the final answer in that most of us have long memories.  Whether a victim or an observer, we remember who did that sort of stuff and this affects how we reacted to her or him later on.  Sometimes revenge may be well-served cold on bullies.  

How About a 1960's Saint?

So recently the Vatican came up with a twofer with regard to new saints who were also Popes, an amazing category in its own right: Pope John XXIII and Pope John Paul II.  So, stick that rank in front of these worthies.

Just don't canonize Innocent VIII, Leo IX, or Pius XII, okay?*

What's not as well-known is that some pious or otherwise folk get their sainthood chops from local cults.  If, for some reasons, a group of people deem someone worthy of sainthood status, there you go: someone getting promoted from below.

Now, most often, the Church is okay with this practice, within limits.  Thus we have a St. Philomena and a St. Expedité; probably nonexistent persons misidentified as saints.  Oh well, it makes a few people happy to pray to them for intercession.

Well, suppose a group of people who were young in the 1960's experienced some good fortunes in their times.  Someone laid some good stock market tips on Jennifer, Wally hit it big in the futures market, Tim was elected governor of some dismal Midwestern state, and some states legalized weed.  It so happens that each were thinking about, and asking for the intercession of, Jim Morrison for these lucky turns of events.  They talked about Jim Morrison having answered their prayers, and thus a cultus emerged with time.

It snowballed.  Jim Morrison's grave in Paris became a site for a pilgrimage; and believers came in droves.  Some seeming miracles were ascribed to St. Jim such as a bountiful crop of marijuana growing in California, and the sainthood express snowballed!  Religious kitsch providers in the St. Germain des Prés parish in Paris trotted out some graven images of Saint Jim Morrison, such as the one below.

Even Father Devereaux, in distant St. Cletus Parish, got on the bandwagon.  He thought that his parishioners would like the new status of St. Jim looking suspiciously like the Infant of Prague more than the gory ones already present.  Most people, after all, were grossed out by St. Agatha carrying her boobs on a platter!


*Catholics are allowed to have their own opinions about popes or bishops; they will, anyway.

The Lizard King as Saint

Quite Contrary About Mistresses

The term 'mistress' refers to a woman who is in a long-term amatory relationship with a man who is not her husband.  This relationship might include a component of her being at least partial supported by her paramour.  Famous mistresses, in the sense of being remembered historically, include Diane de Potiers, Nell Gwyn, Madame de Pompadour, Madame du Barry, and Lily Langtry.  One English king, Charles II, managed to have at least two mistresses simultaneously: Nell Gwyn and Louise de Kérouliac.  Now he really got around!

Recently I read in the New York Times about a misuse of campaign funds investigation in New York state.  Among other peccadilios to be investigated, one involved a legislator who was alleged to use campaign funds to pay for a girlfriend's apartment and visits to tanning parlors.

In my opinion, paying for her apartment and tanning puts her in the mistress category.

But wait!  Maybe this is just a sign of the times; or a more sophisticated usage.  Or a way of fending off eager lawyers.  Has the term girlfriend expanded into a euphemism?  I've already commented on the vagueness of that term as including female pals or buddies as well as women that a person (male or female) has an emotional relationship with.  But this is a different category of girlfriend: one that a man does not bring home to meet one's mother.  But maybe one's dissolute uncle!

This gives a new twist to that horticulturally-inclined Mistress Mary.

Gloomy Sunday: A Musical Downer

Recently Bilbo posted a most delightful German love song on his blog.  The singer sings most charmingly, even though I don't understand German.

Here a song of a different type of some minor historical note.  Upfront, I will say that I don't know Hungarian or Hungarian culture; I'm familiar only with Litsz and Zichy.  This is the infamous Hungarian Suicide Song!

This is a melancholic song entitled Vége a világnak (The world is ending), written by Hungarian composer Rezső Seress back in 1933.  Soon afterward, László Jávor wrote a poem that was set to music and translated as Sad Sunday.  It was a despairing song, apparently motivated by 1930's pessimism and the rise of fascism in Hungary,

 It was commonly entitled Gloomy Sunday in English and was by urban legend related to a number of suicides back in Hungary.  Therefore, it was banned from radio play.  Frankly, the song is a downer; the only evidence for it being banned was by BBC in the 1940's because it was deemed demoralizing to the war effort.  Gloomy Sunday was covered by Billy Holliday back in 1941; later versions were done by Mel Tormé, Sarah Vaughn, Marianne Faithfull, Serge Gainsborough, Ricky Nelson, Ray Charles, Lou Rawls, and Elvis Costello among others.

Don't listen to it if you're feeling depressed; as a matter of fact, just taste it by listening to the intro.

Bjork does a good version, even though this is a departure from her songs which are usually upbeat and bounc.:

Then there's Gustav Mahler's morbid Kindertotenleider (Song of Dead Children)  to make you blue, should you choose.  There's a country song that's hard to take: Sunday Morning Coming Down.  It's for drinking beer and feeling sorry for yourself.  It lacks that special pizazz that country music has.  Taste these kinds of music in small doses.  Life is too brief for gloomy songs.

Is Louisiana Really Arcadia?

Arcadia is a land within Greece which was associated in antiquity with the natives there living a bucolic existence and lived in happy bliss.  Arcadia was used as a place name in more than one state because of its evocation of rural happiness.

Now happiness is subjective; it ultimately involves the person's self-assessment of his or her quality of life.  A recent article in the Huffington Post reported that the ten happiest cities out of 318 in the United States were:

1.  Lafayette, LA
2.  Houma, LA
3.  Shreveport-Bossier City, LA
4.  Baton Rouge, LA
5.  Alexandria, LA
6.  Rochester, MN
7.  Corpus Christi, TX
8.  Lake Charles, LA
9.  Nashville, TN
10.  Fort Walton Beach, FL

It's startling that six of the top ten cities were located in Louisiana.  God knows why.  But the data involved self-assessments of happiness. 

Louisiana is not a particularly wealthy state; nor do jobs abound.  When hurricanes come, they can be seriously scary.   It's not an especially well-educated state; and it has a lot of social problems.  So what do these places have going for them?  Well, it's probably the Cajun joie de vivre in Lafayette, not to mention the fine cuisine.  Baton Rouge has primo entertainment from LSU sports and the clownish legislature.  Houma is laid back; a safer alternative to New Orleans with some nice bars.  I don't know why Shreveport came out third, or Alexandria fifth. 

Wildly surmising, it could be that this happiness comes from being content with one's life.  Why so many urban dwelling Louisiana residents manage, I have no notion.  At any rate, the happiness of Shreveport cannot be because of the cuisine!

By the way, New York City came out 318th, Boston 253rd, Los Angeles 233rd, Chicago 240th, and Washington 40th.  Having so much to experience does not necessarily make for happiness.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/07/30/the-appeal-of-unhappy-cities/