THE 2012 FRENCH PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION: A PAPER NAME

A large brown envelope arrives in the mail. Inside are 10 campaign flyers, perhaps an updated voting card and 10 thin slips of paper about the size of an index card. Each carries the name of a presidential candidate.


On Sunday, with your paper names in hand, you go to the local bureaux de vote. You take one last glimpse of all the candidates' faces plastered on the wall before you walk inside, take a small blue empty envelope, enter an 'isoloire', choose a paper name and place it in the envelope. Then you seal it, slip it in the transparent 'urne justement', have your voting card stamped and voila, you're done.

Take that, you sad chad.



It's a voting system that sounds somewhat archaic, but damn, it really works.

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YAY! GUESS WHO CAN BE NAMED HEIDI THIS YEAR?!

In 1926, the Société Centrale Canine (SCC) decided that all dogs registered in the Livre des Origines (LOF) and born in the same year would be given a name beginning with the same letter, excluding the letter Z (not too many name choices in French).

Then in 1976, this practice was standardized for all animals and excludes the letters K, Q,W, X and Y, for the same reason as Z. You can add a nickname between the time an animal is identified with the S.C.C. and when he/she is given a birth certificate.

Pretty wild, yeah?

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EXPRESSIONISMUS/MI: GIVE ME LIGHT

Often during winter the skies in Lorraine are grey. When grey skies begin they continue well into March. Grey skies can be lovely for awhile but then the grey…well... makes one feel grey. 

I have learned to appreciate this time of year with its coldness and slowness, but the grey still trips me up. I’m simply not wired for so much grey. 

My body expects light, tons of light and color, all the time. In California, color and light are everything. We wear orange in January and pink in February. Our winter skies are normally a clear, bright blue, and though we need every drop, we become terribly grumpy if it rains for more than 5 days. 

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RECIPE/RECETTE: BEET HUMMUS

Beet Hummus
(Based on a recipe by Clotilde Dusoulier)

300 grams beets par-cooked
35-40 grams tahini
1/2 shallot
1 tsp. olive oil
1 tsp. lemon juice
1/2 tsp. ground cumin
1/4 tsp du sel
@ 10 twists of the saveur pepper

Mishn everything in a cusinart at pulse. Tastes better the next day.




Recipes on Pedaler probably only make sense to me. They are here so I don't forget what I did.
If you can comprehend my scratch-notes, yay for you! Ask if you have questions.

MARK ROTHKO: THE KITCHEN AT WHITECHAPEL GALLERY

I hadn't read closely the description for the exhibition Rothko in Britain. I expected perhaps paintings by Mark Rothko done in Britain or at least from a collection in Britain or maybe painted while eating digestive bickkies in Britain, but the exhibition turned out to be really an exhibition about an exhibition.

There was only one painting present by Rothko, Light Red Over Black (1957) which was shown during Rothko’s first British solo show held at Whitechapel Gallery in 1961.


The exhibition is about this particular exhibition. It displays wonderful photographs, film footage, detailed correspondences between Rothko, galleries and other artists as well as a series of recordings made by visitors to the original 1961 event.

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WATER

I see, with mindfulness, how good habits can be obtained in a very short period of time. I also see how good habits can be easily sabotaged (by me) in an even shorter period of time.

I'm focusing on how to make good habits so routine in the pattern of daily life that I don't need to even think about them. They are just done, like brushing your teeth.

Bim-Bam-Bum-Done.

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HAVE YOU A LETTER FOR MRS. TYBURY?

My morning walk ended, not in the forest as I had planned, but through a small village just outside the forest, and it was the perfect walk.

I discovered a brook, a grotto with Mary and the dying naked Jesus covered in snow, firecracker remains, a luthier's shop, oh, and I did not fall - not even once.

I say yay.

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AI WEI WEI: WHEN THINGS GO RYE WITH SUNFLOWER SEEDS

I think an artist who is clear on their intent make a stronger artist. I know that sounds stupid and basic, but believe me, there are many artists out there simply throwing up and tagging it art without understanding (or caring) what just took place, which is cool, I guess... just doesn't draw me into their world.

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LA TOUSSAINT Á L'ITALIENNE

Autumn this year in the Lorraine is amazingly sweet. People are all a bit giddy by the sunlight and crisp blue skies we are experiencing.

Me  Like  It

With such an abundance of clear skies lately, many took advantage of the beautiful weather to clean and prep their loved-ones' cemetery plots for the upcoming la Toussaint.

People take scrub brushes, buckets and rags and spend dedicated time spiffing up burial plots of those they love. A dirty cemetery plot on la Toussaint could leave people talking for weeks. 

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SOLAL'S PAGE PRIVÉE #1

BONJOUR TOUT LE MONDE!

Cette page était crée pour Mr. Booger Breath lui-même...SOLAL!! Et lui, seulement peut voir cette page.

Mr. Pas Beau m'a dit que tu aimes les batteries - c'est les drums baby, les drums! Voila ce dessous c'est les drummers fabuleuses:

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RECIPE/RECETTE: ANN'S CHEESE MADELEINES

Anne's Cheese Madeleines

100 grams flour
5 grams levure chimique
50 grams sugar
70 grams butter
2 eggs
120 grams comté rapé
1/2 citron
a pinch of salt ( 2 grams)

Faites together and let settle in the frigo for about 15 minutes. Put in prepared madeleine mold (Anne used silicone). Cook at about 180C for 20 - 25 minutes.


Recipes on Pedaler probably only make sense to me. They are here so I don't forget what I did. If you can comprehend my scratch-notes, yay for you! Ask if you have questions.

MUDAM FOOT'S CAUGHT IN SPACE

Living near four borders gets me to and from certain countries in about the same time it takes to get to Santa Monica from Pasadena -- going 65 mph. Being able to say things like "See yah later, off to Germany for tofu!" does keep my spirits up. It's just too wild.

On my way for tofu one day, I decided to go via Luxembourg, to a museum in a city within the city, which has lots of space and an installation by a woman from Korea who lives in New York. After the museum and getting lost on the highway, going towards Brussels, I returned to France via Germany, with my tofu.

What the heck just happened here?

It's called space, babee, space. I played with space which played with my mind and allowed me to experience things and places in such a way that will never take place in space again.

cool...

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IN COGNITO - WISH YOU WERE HERE

RECIPE/RECETTE: WHOLE EGG MAYONNAISE

Whole Egg Mayonnaise
When I arrived in France, mayonnaise sans mustard was sometimes difficult to find. I add a bit of  dijon or grain mustard (moutard à l'ancienne), if I wanna feel oh, so french.

1 egg from Madame Lapin's farm
a good pinch to a 1/4 tsp. salt
a good pinch to 1/8 tsp paprika
a gooder pinch to a h. 1/4 tsp of white pepper
a scant 1/2 cup sunflower, colza or grapeseed oil
@ 1 T lemon juice (a squigh from half a lemon)

Everything at room temperature, please. Let the magic begin...

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FAITES DE LA MUSIQUE

Fête de la Musique is a free music festival taking place on the longest day of the year, June 21st. Its purpose is to encourage both amateur and professional musicians to perform on the streets together, and basically everyone have a groovy time. These all night extended music block parties have been going on in France since 1982 and now can be found all over the world, even in Pasadena!

It's a wonderful thing really. Sometimes known to get out of hand, but for the most part, people are there to have a good time.

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BLOOD DAY: ARE YOU MY TYPE?

Before I left for Francie-pants, I dropped by the Pasadena Red Cross Center to give blood. If you qualify, giving blood is pretty darn easy; you can call or go online to make an appointment, or like me, drop in when you are in the midst of doing a ga-billion errands before you leave the country for 7 months.

Besides, if you give blood while running about like a crazy person, you have an excuse to eat 3 packs of mini oreo cookies afterwards*.

When I asked my nice nurse "what's your type", he flashed me gangsta-style:

                                  

   A Negative.   

You rock doll.

Don't worry, my nice nurse does not have legs growing out of his elbow. That's someone in the back giving platelets. Takes so long, you get to watch a movie, giving platelets...

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LOUISE BOURGEOIS

I arrived in France last week not remembering how to speak french at all. Blah. Or rather, le blah...



So, I threw myself straight back into frenchy-isms, by listening, reading and trying to understand what was being said around me. It was while struggling to comprehend TÉLÉMATIN one morning that I heard a familiar name being said. "Louise Bourgeois" then something, "mort".

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ART: PHOTOMATON-1

Photobooth images have been ruminating in my brain, ohhhh, since last September, easily. These palm-sized portraits are so joyous, often without inhibition. Sit. Smile. FLASH!

Anatol Josepho (Anatol Josephewitz), a Jewish immigrant to the US from Siberia, invented and patented the first fully-functioning photobooth in New York City in 1925. A few years later, he was paid one million dollars for his invention, giving half of this large sum to charity. Josepho continued his philanthropic ways after his move to Los Angeles, along with his actress-wife, Ganna, and their growing family. He died in L.A. in 1980.

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A QUICK COLLAGE STORY

The moment he walked into the café, he coup de foudre'ed for her something serious.

As she placed the coffee in front of him, it was all he could do from planting a big one, smack on her lips....


...ahhh, love.



*There are 3 references to coffee in this collage - can you figure out what and where they are?

(˙ɹǝʇןıɟ ǝǝɟɟoɔ ɐ :ʇɹıʞs ɹǝɥ ˙3 ʇǝʞɔɐd ɹɐƃns ɐzzɐʌɐן :ʇɹıɥs sıɥ ˙2 „ǝsןǝ ʇɐɥʍ„ 'pɐ ossǝɹdsǝu :sʇuɐd sıɥ ˙1)*

SPRING IN ALTADENA

It's raining in the Moselle again. Blustery rains. Gray skies have been there for quite some time now. When the sun does peek through, folks there in France try and grab up as many rays as humanly possible. Lack of sunshine can be brutal on a human being.

Frankly, I'm glad to be in California right now.

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