May 30, 2011

The Child's Ear: OPINIONS

Opinions: grownups always seemed to have lots of opinions. My mother had cigarettes and opinions. My father had cigars and opinions, and they often had cocktails and opinions as well. It all went together: they were entitled to drinks and opinions, as they were much older, had travelled all over, were so clever (and could hold their liquor).

Then one day I woke up and found I had some too: My Own Opinions. Later I began to blog.

Seriously, I’ve had opinions for a long time, but formulating them was hard, i.e. putting opinions into cogent words (because opinions are nothing if not words), as opposed to feelings (which are nothing if not not words, thus even more complicated than opinions).

Blogs are the bolder older sisters of private opinions.

Blogging gives me a bit of time to think before I open my virtual mouth to express my virtual opinion.

(Meanwhile what am I talking about?)

May 29, 2011

"The mundane non-negotiables of daily life"

I just had to share this beautiful phrase from Zachary Karabell's article entitled “Economic insularity imperils change in Arab World” in the IHT of May 26th 2011. Will probably follow up with commentary at a later time.

CHRONIC FRABBLER

A British friend who ran a bookstore here in the eighties and nineties told me the English she spoke was what they’d spoken in the UK thirty years before--- correct, a bit formal, with a turn of phrase and vocabulary that was not close to what she heard when she returned there for visits. Hers was good colonial English, not Estuary or any other incarnation. And the rest of the time she spoke Geneva French. Or sometimes both.

Language evolves with your language environment. There’s a certain stasis in our spoken English, yes. But then there's FRABBLING! (copyright please!)

Like so many others here, I am a terrible FRABBLER!

Sprinkling daily speech with French words and phrases is natural: they’re just a better fit, the right flavor for my sentences, they are just there for me, ripe cherries rolling around on my tongue.

Do Rabbit’s friends and relations back in the States think it’s [hip] [groovy] [bodacious] [cool] [intense] [bad] [down] etc. etc.?

No sirree, as they used to say back in the day. To them it sounds pretentious. I look at them helplessly.

Of course they understand and forgive quickly because I don’t live there anymore.

And they have to get back to their tweeting.

May 26, 2011

Schubert is the It composer of my life

OK, so the secret's out. He's my desert island composer. A desert island with an excellent sound system, a piano and a full symphony orchestra.

He's the reason I wanted to continue playing piano at the tricky age of 11 (Moments Musicaux), and began singing lessons at a ripe age (am working on Romanze from Rosamunde). Sentiment without sentimentality, purity and depth. Je ne me lasse jamais....well I'd better not, because I'm working at the song over and over. Over and over.

Vanity Without The Overhead!

One definition for a blog could well be Vanity Without The Overhead.

Of course the Alpha of vanity presses-- Vantage Press -- still exists. Vantage Press has appeared for decades in the Trib, promising printed glory from a little ad box. Vantage has survived newcomers of all stripes, and will likely outlive publications in which they've placed their ads!

But I don't have the patience or vanity to go that route.

So the raison d'être of Bicontinental Boomer?

A forum for expression, a sort of busy intersection where my ideas have write of way. (Sorry 'bout that).

Many ideas wither on the vine of inner monologue. And get overripe, and then forgotten.

So I want to select my better grapes and.....blog them!

May 24, 2011

Opération Séduction Is everyone in France out to rope you in?

Opération Séduction Is everyone in France out to rope you in? Mais oui! Elaine Sciolino unmasks a nation forever obsessed with the soft sell.

"It is not enough to conquer; one must also know how to seduce.--Voltaire, "Mérope"

Thus begins an article published in the May 21st edition of New York Times T Magazine. No doubt it was planned prior to DSK's arrest on Sunday, May 15th. There's a half-page photo from 2002 of Jacques Chirac kissing her hand, "cradled it as if it were a piece of porcelain from his private art collection".

She goes on to discuss the kind of seduction that "does not always involve sex", the grand séducteur as "someone who never fails to persuade others to his point of view (sic)".

Sciolino writes beautifully, and her forthcoming book, entitled of course La Séduction, is sure to titillate and.....seduce.

Entitled. I wonder about the word entitled in the fresh aftermath of the Sofitel events of Dominique Strauss-Kahn and the chambermaid. Droit de cuissage was the right of the man of noble rank or even wealth to the women who worked on the estate, in the palace, manor, country home. It seems something went awry after he asked her repeatedly, "Do you know who I am?" She didn't seem to know who he was, this famous man. Perhaps this was not in the world-famous DSK script, the script in his head (the head on his shoulders).

The chambermaid didn't know who DSK was, he reacted, did something, and she paid a heavy price.
And he'll pay his own price.

He did not take time for any séduction at all. He did not play by any rules at all. He had no rules.

May 17, 2011

Denounced near Saint Paul's

Avis au détenteur

Madame, Monsieur,

Nous vous signalons qu'une infraction a été constatée le: (bigger numbers and letters) 16/03/2011 à 14 H 00 lieu : Parking Avenue de St-Paul Cologny motif: Circulation et Stationnement des véhicules sur terrain privé. DENONCIATION SUR PLAINTE.

I have been DENOUNCED. Special registered letter to France. I can't just pay a fine.---they don't even say how much I'll have to pay--- ominous. I was parking there as there were about fifty free places in the parking lot of St. Paul's church and center at Grange-Canal mid- week and I was visiting my friends of 87 and 92 at their apartment in the neighborhood.

I guess it's better than being arrested in the first class compartment of a flight from NY to Paris and held at Riker's Island for attempted rape. But wait, this was just a lunchtime parking offense.

Do not go directly to Jail, but do not pass Go until you've paid 200.

Oh Saint Paul, save me from my sins!

May 16, 2011

The full moon and song

I might as well resume, any point is good. So this is the night of the full moon, or what passes for one. And fatigue, with a minor resurrection in song---attending the rehearsal of my Spanish choir Matices, directed by the almost indefatigable Julian Villaraga, who guides with charm, humor and intelligence. Almost missed it, as body and spirit were flagging in the late afternoon. But now I'm in the soprano section, wavering mezzo that I am, and have to make that little extra effort, that extra lifting....