Butt Cream and Caca Booda

Alex left me.

Just kidding.  Abandonment jokes are funny.

No, but really, he left me.  For awhile, anyway, for a training seminar for work.  It's a big chunk of time for me to be flying solo, especially with the Loosh still on vacation from school.  To add insult to injury, the training is happening at home.  Seattle, baby, beautiful Seattle.

Alex gets to go home and be surrounded by our old friends and hold the new babies and be taken out to dinner and walk around our house and roll around in the grass in our yard and breathe the fresh(er) air of a smaller city.  My heart aches.  Even with all the good Parisian times, I miss those people and that city and that house and that YARD.

I should've gone.  But for a dozen reasons, it wasn't a good idea.  The biggest reason why it wasn't a good idea was one we didn't even see coming -- this past weekend I was struck down by a heartless bastard flu.  As much as I wish I was in Seattle right now, it's definitely a good thing I wasn't on a plane for ten hours yesterday.

Alex went down to the pharmacy to renew his allergy pills before heading back to the land of grass and greenness.  He took the Loosh  in order to spend every single second possible with him before he left.

Lucien was being himself -- jumping around and being louder than everyone else by a lot -- while waiting for the pills.  Alex, attempting to be funny, grinned at the pharmacist and said, "You can slip him something if you want..."  The pharmacist didn't get the "medicate my child, PLEASE" joke and frowned at Alex.  Then she said slowly, "Wellll, I may be able to find something" and started rummaging around in the cupboards in the back.  She returned and, with a satisfied smile, handed Lucien a small sample tube of butt cream. 

So if you come over to our place and see Lucien carrying around a small tube and guarding it with his life because, "She gaves it to ME!" you'll understand why.  He sets it on the table next to his bed, along with the rest of his collection of beloved objects, when he goes to bed at night.

Alex needs to stop trying to be funny.  His brand of humor just doesn't translate around here and leads to small children with unnatural attachments to butt cream. 

The Loosh, well over a year ago, started saying something strange.  To me, it sounded like "caca booda."  I didn't think much of it, assuming it was some kind of nonsensical thing he'd made up.   He said it all the time, with great joy and enthusiasm and twinkling of eyes.

It became something I said too.  Whenever I wanted to crack Lucien up I'd jump out at him and yell, "CACA BOODA!" and he'd laugh and laugh.  Sometimes we'd be walking down the street and would have "caca booda" fights.  He'd yell, "caca booda!"  Then I'd yell, "caca booda!" Then he'd yell, "caca booda!" and so on and so forth until he was laughing so hard he'd fall down.

Not too long ago, I heard one of the other kids at school say, "caca booda" to Lucien and run off laughing.  I grinned and came home to tell Alex that Lucien was spreading his nonsensical language all around school.  There was a pause, and Alex said, "Euhh....honey?  He's not saying "caca booda."  He's saying, "caca boudin."

I let that sink in for a minute.  All this time, he (and I) had been saying POOP SAUSAGE.

"For real, Al?  FOR REAL?  Is that, like, a real thing they say?"  I asked.  Alex said yup, it's the coolest thing imaginable you can say if you're a preschooler.  It's as vulgar as it gets for the four-year-old set.  The kids say it all the time but if a teacher or parent hears them, they get reprimanded.  It's not "bien élevé" to say such things.

But there I was -- the mom yelling "poop sausage!" in the streets.  God, I hope nobody heard me.  Americans get enough grief for being uncouth.  I did NOT help our case, fellow Americans in Paris, and for that I am sorry.  But on the positive side, Lucien thinks I am the coolest mom ever.  All the other moms purse their lips at the poop sausage, but not this mama.  I embrace poop sausage and holler my love for it all over Saint Germain.

Ugh.  I'm so sick.  Being this sick reminds me of a story I never told on the blog about our first days in France.  Maybe I'll tell it now ahh, screw it I don't have the energy.

We miss Al.  Right before he left, he and Lucien were doing some father-son drawing.  Lucien asked Alex to draw a monkey.  Alex agreed, and, tongue sticking out in concentration, drew..... something.  Lucien brought the drawing over to show me.  I doubled over with laughter.  I couldn't breathe.  Every time I caught a glimpse, I would lose it all over again.  "What the hell is that, AL?"  I managed to squeak.  Alex looked sheepish and said, "Umm.. it's a monkey?"

What kind of freaky Elephant Man monkey is that?

We miss you, Daddy Al.  Kiss Seattle for us.
CACA BOUDIN!
MJ