Gaieté et Merde

This photo is of my Grand Mother, Miz Hyacinth. I found it yesterday, Sunday morning, rummaging through boxes all marked "Gaieté et Merde" while looking for some old Krugerrands.
In Miz Hyacinths own florid handwriting is a beautiful yet strangely detailed inscription on the back that reads: 11th of April 1957: French Republic, visiting President René Coty during state visit of Queen Elizabeth II. Suit: Dior. Shoes and bag: Dolcis. Pearls: Tiffany & Co. Scent: Thymes Limon.
Hmmm... crustacean as head gear, very Miz Hyacinth, the fact that she bothered to wear Thymes Limon Eau de toilette with the crab chapeau was a rather nice touch- subtle, very subtle. Cohesive. not to mention culinarily correct.

On the same day I attended a late afternoon Bon Voyage party for a friend, a delightful little hoyden named Carlito Cocodrilo.
The party was coordinated by my even greater friend The Lady Jane. I arrived at the party with Comtesse D___, who is now sporting a rather convincing Betty Page look, and Madame Peu de Joie Petrol in an all black and red vintage Mugler that made her naturally uber Aryan look that much more electrifying. (My outfit that particular day desperately needed a striking blonde on one arm as well as a mysterious brunette on the other to properly accessorize my ensemble) Among the howling horde of revelers stood The Lady Jane herself, all of five feet tall yet absolutely filling the room, both hands on her hips, head thrown back and laughing in her infectiously hysterical manner. Parting the crowd like La Mer Rouge, I saw upon drawing nearer, that she was wearing vintage Pucci, (recycling is so in right now) with a considerably ornate hat in the shape of a European squid. Commenting on its uniqueness she whispered "Cephalopod fashion, its the next big thing...keep it on the DL..." "Oh," I said, "I'll certainly keep that under my hat.." My bad pun went unnoticed, so, after quietly commenting to myself on the coincidence of my finding the photo of Miz Hyacinth and then seeing Lady Jane's hat that both took their souffle divin de chapeaux from the oceans of the earth, I grabbed a good bottle of Dom and a twisty straw and went back to mingle and to play Velociraptor at the desert table with the Comtesse D___.
I stopped mid-cupcake to wish Carlito- who was eating ceviche- coincidence?- the best in his new position in Miami, although we had never been more than peripheral friends, I always admired his moxie. Carlito is a thin Latin who'd emigrated to New Orleans more than a decade before. A likely lifelong bachelor and incorrigible swordsman, Carlito lives to party, make new friends (that have to be well connected to qualify) and chase ass. Working his way up in the social strata to be a, um, whatever it was that he does, I'm not sure, Investment banking, Alchemist? He has an expense account and work schedule that allowed him stay out all night doing it. And from my own experience, being connected to people carrying "Cocksucker Blues" quantities of lello, one could easily live two, maybe three lives at once. Which he does. Whatta guy.
As I heartily continued my mingle-mania, there were so many people that had known Carlito much better than myself, so to further figure out his powerful appeal, I had to shut my yap, fill my mouth with cheesecake (The Polie's favorite) and listen. Information is power I thought to myself, but the conversations I was hearing were so much more varied than I ever had imagined- and not necessarily about Carlito.
As I went to the bar to grab another bottle of Dom, I gleaned some 30 startling revelations from listening in on conversations as I moved through the crowd:
1. The last member of the famous Bonaparte family, Jerome Napoleon Bonaparte, died in 1945, of injuries sustained from tripping over his dog's leash.
2. "Mrs. S____ has had a few gay husbands and- like Wal Mart- she is always interviewing."
3. Raleigh Theodore Sakers was the angry old man that can be heard on Sublime's album Robbin' the Hood, and Unwritten Law's album Elva.
4. "A mosquito has 47 teeth..."
5. The Silver Surfer, AKA Norrin Radd, possesses some knowledge of the advanced alien technology of the planet Zenn-La.
6. Someone, whom I don't know, has a videotape of me lip-syncing to Blondie's "Hanging on the Telephone" in drag, "Looking like Baroness Elsa Schräder from The Sound of Music."
7. "Think Ralphie's experiment with the frozen metal pole in 'A Christmas Story,' only the pole is your molars."
8. "Elvis originally had blond hair and The Shirelles were originally called The Poquellos."
9. "No other word in English rhymes with the word orange."
10. You cannot sell an ET doll in France. The nation has a law forbidding the sale of dolls that do not have human faces.
11. "Is there a bigger loss to modern music than Bradley Nowell?"
12. Everyone wonders where Monsieur Moose is...
13. "The new IRS employee manual includes provisions for collecting taxes in the aftermath of a nuclear war."
14. "Sylvester was originally a clown, which explains his red nose, and Tweety was a baby. Tweety's original color was peach, later changed to yellow when the producer decided a cat and bird would do better."
15. The London based Council of the Corporation of Foreign Bondholders is still trying to collect on loans made to the state of Mississippi in 1830 to finance cotton exports.
16. "The back of the jewel case appears cracked, until you turn it sideways in the light and recognize the white grooves splitting the black space between Neil's image and the song titles on the left are actually razor tracks."
17. "I've seen Carlito a hundred times since, and never asked him about it. It's a permanent "Door Number Three." I couldn't bear learning there was a new car behind it, and I took the washer/dryer combo instead."
18. "Alligators are able to out run humans, and can climb trees... did they ever find your cat?"
19. The letters in the word Mafia stand for Morte Alla Francia Italia Anela ("Death to the French Is Italy's Cry").
20. Someone named "Lisa" had gotten a small set of implants earlier in the year. "Nice ones." "And everyone liked them" "...though once a woman gets implants, her breasts are no longer private property, show and tell is near exclusively reserved for other females."
21. "French was the official language of England for over 600 years..."
22. "Ya know, I did Carlito's chart and the Sun was in Cancer on his birthday..."
23. "Oh, it's okay, they're not regular gay, it's more like prison gay..."
24. "...they are naming the baby Duckling-Vortex...very Hollywood, huh..."
25. "Yeah, I guess they met online, so are they seeing each other now, or was it just a Faceboink? "
26. Iran used to be called Persia, but it was called Iran before that.
27. " Her childern all look like Bene Tleilax Face Dancers."
28. "Does this have pineapple in it? Uh, oh...."
29. "It was only later that I discovered that they were not Nazis spies at all but only dirty-clothes hampers... Oh look, Angelina had some work done,,,"
30. "So he was all like, ' I'm into African geomancy', so I was all like, um, 'So, you, like, import cars for a living?"

Reaching over the bar to help myself to another bottle of bubbles, the bartender, a tall handsome man who looked like John Tesh- but hotter- who smelled like an April morning in Tuscany, suggested that I try a new concoction he was proud of -called The Shocking Crab- I thought of it as a continuation of some deranged message from the universe, but what did it mean?
Upon my return to the desert table, with crab in tow, I sat, stood and ate more cheesecake for some time after, pondering this mystery, trying to unravel it's metaphoric symbolism - until the cake was gone- after which I gave up- figuring the lesson simply being that hearing choice bits of conversations, snippets of trivia and mysteries wrapped in enigmas, (some more pedestrian than others) at parties brings a certain kind of enlightenment to those who are smart enough to listen, well, that and the fact that Cthulhu couture is the next big thing. Trust me, it is ordained by the universe.

Cheers.
The Shocking Crab
1/2 oz Everclear® alcohol
1/2 oz Bacardi® 151 rum
1/4 oz Aftershock® Hot & Cool cinnamon schnapps
Mix the Everclear and the rum together in a shot glass. Add the Aftershock last to give the shot a nice red color. Serve. And please, don't be crabby (or cephalopody even)