RANDOM MUSING AND OTHER THOUGHTS

Been a while since I've posted, but that's because I was drinking and carrying on up in Brittany on holiday. There a couple of pieces of hate and one of unparalleled loved that I want to throw out:

1. That fucking Coldplay song does not get better with time, it just keeps getting worse. Who said, "yeah, synthesized violins*, that'd be a great idea?" On top of that, Julie told me the other day that she "liked that song." I went as far as searching "avocats de divorce" in the French Yellow Pages, but figured I'll give her one more single off the new album to change her mind.

*I know they're probably "real" violins, but it doesn't make the song any less sucky.

2. The Olympics are in full swing and that means of course that French TV has been avoiding US mens basketball and all of Michael Phelps races for women's handball and men's fencing. For the most part I just ignore the asshole announcers as they toss the salad of 3rd rate French athletes, but I can not avoid them in the track and field events. They have this fat fuck with a lazy eye who has some weird hate for the Americans. Since there are no French athletes in any of the "real" track events (silver in the 3000m steeplechase! WOW!), this fuck spends his time attacking the Americans. Jamaica has kicked ass sprinting this year. As opposed to taking time to admire Usian Bolt's absolute dominance in the 100m, Mr. Lazy Eye instead had to talk about how he "beat down" the Americans..."Hey dickwad, where are your tricolore sprinters...yeah, that's what I thought, shut up now!"

3. It's the time of year where I have to renew my residency card here in France. I should, allegedly, be issued a card for 10 years now, which will mean less hassles with the administration. I have the list of papers that I need to provide. Most are black-and-white: Copy of passport, ID photographs and then I come to "Any document that can prove your integration into French society...such as proof of a social life." Hmm, I have a lot of receipts from bars. I don't think that's what they're looking for. As soon as you give a civil servant the power to "interpret" the validity of documents the system goes to hell.

4. Just a quick cargasm. I know that they used a Ferrari 250 GT California in Ferris Bueller's Day Off, but that was a movie (and I think the car was a replica too...), so you rarely see "actual" examples of them and this black one is just freaking beautiful. As soon as I have $4 million in disposable cash, I'm getting one (of course if when that happens, inflation will have made these cars worth 2x or 3x that.) [via Autoblog: more car porn at that link].

HOW FRANCE SEES THE USA

I've been looking for train tickets for my parent's this summer and I've past through the TGV international page a few times, but never paid much attention until just now, when I realized that they represent France (and W. Europe) as bigger areas than the USA. I understand that they have a limited space, but come on, is anyone going to argue that some digital artist or French manager didn't do this on purpose to spite the US?

THE AWESOME LICENSING POWER OF RENAULT

First, they worked with renowned Belgish animator Guionne Leroy (from Chicken Run and The Toy Story fame):



Then, they hired that crazy ambiguously strange couple, Wallace and Gromit:



And finally...O.F.F. makes their appearance in a Renault Kangoo commericial:



I couldn't find one with English subs, but it's not really hard to figure out what they're saying...and yes, that's what The Simpsons sound like in French.

T.I.H.™: TAX LOVING ASSHATS

Really quick: Fuck France. There are so many taxes here, I think the take-home pay is about 2% of your gross pay. And sometimes they tax you on "imagined" earnings.

As the creator of a company, I can't pay myself yet, but the French somehow figured this out and they make you pay social contributions (~30% of your gross salary) based on the minimum wage (which is something like 12,000€ or something). So even though I don't pay myself anything, I still have to pay ~3000€ per year because I "should" make that amount of money.

Luckily, there's a loophole for the first year. I can apply for a grant that waives most of these taxes, except two little taxes: The Generalized Social Contribution and Reimbursement for the Social Debt. 300€ that [according to the government] should have earned.

Fuck them. Since they make me pay taxes on imaginary income, I'm going to go on imaginary business trips and reimburse myself money for them.