I feel I need to give y’all fair warning:
Idiot: the French for “washing machine” is “femme”, so of course it’s feminine. And speaking of femmes:
More swimsuits, I heard you say? Oh, why not.
That’s the latest trend: completely transparent bikinis. More of these next week, unless someone complains.
Here’s an actress we Murkins are mostly unaware of. But in her native France she was, and remains, a national treasure: Danielle Derrieux lived to over 100, and acted in well over a hundred movies. She survived both WWII and one-time hsband Porfirio Rubirosa’s (reputedly) elephantine manhood. A hero(ine) of France indeed. And as for her looks:
Oh yes, she had sensational legs.
And she looked just fine in color, too:
Call her France’s answer to Grace Kelly or Deborah Kerr, if you want; I certainly wouldn’t argue the point.
Here’s a little (okay, hour-long) look at 1965, a year which changed, well, pretty much everything. (It’s horribly edited, but just go with the flow.)
Imagine releasing an album that had all these hit songs on it — from a band that nobody had heard of, and who have since been forgotten.
My favorite of that lot? Needles and Pins.
Never mind all the other more well-known stuff from the Stones, Beatles, Beach Boys, Dylan, Yardbirds, Four Tops… and the list goes on an on.
Now let’s talk about the changes in fashion, and attitudes. My Generation, indeed.
And then came Rubber Soul.
This is a silly topic to discuss, but whatever. Even though I am by no means triskaidekaphobic, it’s nevertheless Friday the fucking 13th, so here we go.
Back when I worked in an office, I always used a coffee cup with a lid, because knocking an open cup over your PC keyboard was not one of life’s pleasantries, both in terms of the actual mess, and the hassle involved in cleaning the gunk out from under the keys. Likewise soft drinks: never a can, always a bottle with the screw-off top.
It’s a habit I’ve carried into my private life too, not only for all the spill containment, but also because these thermal cup thingies keep my coffee hot in case I forget to drink it quickly. (I’ve talked about this topic before, under different auspices, but note the El Cheapo Magellan thermal cup I mention in passing.)
But it appears that this is no longer enough. Advancing age has brought with it advancing clumsiness, and the problem with all these wretched thermal cup thingies (as you will see) is that very few of them have a screw-on lid — they all, even the nosebleed stuff like Yeti, have a simple press-in lid with a rubber gasket to hold the lids in place should the thing be knocked over.
And alas, with continuous use do the rubber gaskets deteriorate and loosen their grip, which means that if you do knock your adult sippycup over, the result is the same as if you’d just been using a regular plastic glass filled with the drink and (if necessary) ice: a veritable flood of sticky liquid all over the floor.
Which is what happened to me the night before last, when in trying to move my tall Magellan sippycup over so I could see the beloved face of New Wife, I knocked the fucking thing off the side table and yea did the lid come off the cup, emptying the contents of ice and OJ all over the frigging carpet.
So yesterday was spent visiting various retail establishments, trying to find a container with a screw-on lid that wasn’t the size of a Thermos flask and resembled more a coffee cup, like the Magellan.
Total failure — and I went to Academy, Cabela’s and finally, Wally World, where I got what I was sorta-looking for, except that it’s tall and skinny rather than short and squat.
It’s also too capacious, at 16oz where I was looking for something in the 10-oz-12oz range. But at some point one has to resign oneself to what the world actually provides rather than what the world should provide.
Earlier on I did find (and purchase) one such thing with acceptable dimensions and the proper screwtop from Cabela’s, but it’s so fugly that I was worried that New Wife would forbid its use in the public domain, and confine it to doing duty as my night-time cold-water source on the bedside table. Surprisingly, she agreed that it’s kinda fugly, but likes its patriotic theme. So she agreed to let me use it.
(Yes, she’ll be becoming a U.S. citizen as soon as the DHS/State Department/whoever gets their collective ass in gear.)
All this could have been avoided, of course, were I just to apply a leetle care in the handling of coffee cups — I could use actual china cups or ceramic mugs like civilized people do, and not have to look like an overgrown child with an expensive fucking metal sippycup. But that’s the world I live in, and so it goes.
Anyway, having said all that, I’m off to make myself another cuppa in the tall black thing. And by the way, it works really well at keeping its contents hot — actually, a little too well, as my scalded tongue will attest. I might just go for the Patriotic Barrel instead… alert the media!
If I get too irritated by these two replacements, or if New Wife Puts Her Foot Down With A Heavy Hand© after all, they will be sent off in disgrace to live in our travel trunk, which we break out when heading for an open-road adventure and style is not a prerequisite. They will join the regiment of other utensils which have been found wanting.
Whereupon the whole bloody search for the impossible sippycup dream will resume and my irritation, never far below the surface, will explode once more, to the consternation of New Wife and the chortles of my Readers.
You bastards.
And speaking of huge dicks:
...by which he means people with names like “Trump”, “Orban” and “Meloni”.
From the Department of the Blindingly Obvious:
...in other breaking news, Allied landings in Normandy have been successful. Also:
...not only that, it appears as though Lindbergh made it across the Atlantic.
...rise in crime rate beginning in 3…2…1...
...forget it, Jake. It’s Houstontown.
In Medical News:
More medical news:
...and you’ll never guess the guy’s name.
...reminding people why Reagan and Thatcher were so popular for breaking the power of the unions.
...of course, anyone who drinks tea with a ribeye and salad deserves to die more painfully than from iron deficiency.
...guess he drank tea with his 5lbs of daily steak.
...that’s going to work about as well as their gun ban.
And once more unto the linkless breach known as 
...in the dictionary under “Overkill” will be her photo.
...nope, no bells are ringing over here; anyone else?
And sauntering down 
we see:
...ah yes, the former Disney princess who introduced us to teenage tits is at it again:
...but wait! there’s more!
And on that knee-knocking note, we end the news.
Via Insty, this little snippet:
The danger for China is deflation could snowball by encouraging households reeling from falling paychecks to cut back on spending, or delay purchases because they expect prices to fall further. Corporate revenues will suffer, stifling investment and leading to further salary cuts and layoffs, bankrupting families and firms.
China? How about right here in the U.S.?
The Fed’s beige book, a survey of economic conditions in the US compiled by the regional Fed banks, suggested that the US economy was slowing. Five out of the 12 Fed districts reported flat or declining economic activity, three more than in May’s survey.
And just for (bitter) laughs:
“Inflation has also fallen faster than expected, hitting 3 per cent in June.”
Tell that to my grocery, fuel and utility bills.