The Princess And Her Underwear

When an Arabic princess with her retinue enter a shop, all staff stand to attention and the bosses are rubbing their hands with high expectations. But if the princess is Maha al Suidari, everyone start to tremble. At least that's so in the exclusive luxury shops of Paris where she, the wife of Naif Bin bdulaziz, Interior minister of Saudi Arabia, and member of the royal family, is capable of leaving, unpaid, a lot of undergarments valued €70,000. The princess is accustomed to walk on the thick carpets of the Hotel Crillon, and with her body made to measure for Dior gowns, has not paid any bills at all in a whole year at more than 30 luxury establishments in Paris, amongst them Dior, Kay Largo, Divina, Hanro, Marina, Frette, Le Nain and including the Hotel Crillon. Amazingly, most of these shops hadn't opened their mouth about the 'delayed payment', but Jacky Giami, proprietor of Kay Largo, the shop of sports wear where they sell pants of chandal at €600 had told the story to the newspaper 'Le Parisien' that they spent days waiting in the cafeteria of the Hotel George V. That's where in the past all her bills were paid. "She is not the kind of client you ask for a guarantee when she takes away the merchandise". The last time Maha al Suidari visited the shop, she took away goods worth 140.000, representing 7% of their annual business. At the time of payment, he received the message' Come back tomorrow.' till now. Given the habitual discretion by luxury shops in their dealings with important clients, and the diplomatic immunity the princess enjoys, and, her husband being the minister there, some merchants requested help at the Arabic Embassy, hoping somebody would pay the bill, but they receive very cordial reply that 'The princess's undergarments are not embassy business.' It's not a question of money for the Princess I don't think. More a display of power. That she could break some rules and regulations, and nobody can do anything about it. Tags:underwear,princess

Current Mood: Blah

Psychiatrist And Proctology

Two Doctors opened offices in a small town and put up signs reading

Dr Smith and Dr Jones "Psychiatry and Proctology."

The town council was not too happy with the sign

and so the doctors changed it to

"Hysterias and Posteriors".

This was not acceptable either, so in an effort to satisfy the council

they changed the sign to

"Schizoids and Hemorrhoids".

The town didn't like that either and countered with

"Catatonics and High Colonics."

Thumbs down again.

By now the story appeared in the local paper and suggestions began rolling in:

"Manic-depressives and anal retentives"
"Minds and Behinds"
"Lost souls and Assholes"
"Analysis & Anal Cysts"
"Nuts & Butts"
"Freaks & Cheeks"
"Loons & Moons

None of these satisfied one or the other side, but they finally settled on
"Dr Smith & Dr Jones, Odds & Ends".

Tag:Odds-&-Ends

Current Mood: Amused

Bitter Swig And Sweet Music

I came across a very unusual book by F.G. Haghenbeck, Mexican novelist of German origin, and responds to the name Francisco. It's called 'Trago Amargo' meaning Bitter Swig. There are 26 chapters, and in the beginning of each one there's an interesting Cocktail recipe. Don't start the book trying out all the drinks first, or you will never get to the end of the story! The novel is a mixture of fiction and reality, both so well written and presented, that at the end you wouldn't know what is true and what is not. Once upon not all that many years ago, John Huston decided to shoot the film 'Night of the iguana' at the beach of Mismaloya, in Vallarta Port in Mexico, and there came his troupe: Richard Burton who passed most part of the day at the bar, Elizabeth Taylor recently separated from Eddie Fisher, Ava Gartner, named by the tabloid as 'the most beautiful woman in the world', the very elegant British star Deborah Kerr, the Indian Fernandez ... Corrupt police like sergeant Quintero, the lawyer straddled on both sides of the law Bernabe Jurado, and a nice guy Billie Joe who appears and disappears. "Nearly all the characters are real" said the director. The cast of actors hated one another. Huston gave them gold guns with silver bullets in case they wanted to kill each other. Hollywood never liked to have anything to do with the police, much less Mexican police. So the producer contracted Sunny Pascual, Who auto-defined as 'half everything': half Mexican, half gringo, half alcoholic, half surfer, half alive, half dead". Sonny is amoral and sarcastic. Haghenbeck explained that these characters came from comic books, to which he had dedicated a good part of his life. The agile dialect with the mixing of the language is one of the strong points of the novel. It contains a lot of action, alcohol and drugs, under all that is corruption, and Mafia. But this latter is not like those featured in the past in novels or films. They are now high profile executives of Hollywood. There's property speculation converting the Mismaloya beach into the enclave of luxury. The structure of the novel is possibly the most attractive. Each chapter is inviting first with the intoxicating cocktail, followed by the music that best accompanies it. For instance, what goes best with Frank Sinatra's 'Witchcraft' is a dry Martini; the Gimlet with 'Call me irresponsible' of Wayne Newton, and Cuba Libre with 'Compay second' Tags:cocktail,music,novel

Current Mood: Accomplished