Crushed!
I try hard to understand some people.
They fly first-class to UNESCO World Heritage sites and live in super-luxurious hotels there or get driven by limos to rain forests to indulge in glamping – yes, glamorous camping, meaning, they live in an air-conditioned “tent” equipped with microwave ovens, refrigerators, multiple TV sets, even Netflix.
I am 66, maybe half my brain is dead and I am already one foot in the coffin but I try, trust me, I really try very very hard to understand why entire families jetset to Maldives or Mauritius to try to get skin cancer when they already live in Singapore, an island, with more than enough sun to cancerize their entire clan many times over.
The behavior of the rich and famous?
I also do my utmost to understand those retards who make a beeline to expensive private hospitals when they get as much as a mossie bite on the arm or a little bruise when they stub a toe. “Oh help, I need an X-ray!”
In my household, we self-medicate. That’s the first rule of thumb. We only go to the doctors when we are in our death throes.
The behavior of the rich and famous? And the stupid?
As stupid as the French?
For years, Miller High Life, an American beer, has used the “Champagne of Beers” slogan. In April, that appropriation became impossible for the French to swallow.
The slogan was first used in 1906 and has been printed on Miller High Life beer packaging for decades.
But it was deemed an “infringement” of France’s protected designation of origin for Champagne, the French wine region known for its sparkling wine.
At the request of the trade body defending the interests of French champagne makers, Belgian customs crushed more than 2,000 cans of Miller High Life in April.
The French are too petty. Come on, no one will mistaken beer for champagne. Miller referring to its beer as the champagne of beer is simply an expression, a figure of speech, a metaphor. It’s like us saying Harley Davidson is the Rolls Royce of motorbikes. No one will mistaken a motorbike for a car, just like no one will mistaken tabac 101 for smokingpipes.com, or Singapore Pipe Club to Singapore Pipe and Cigar Smokers, a legit entity, the only one of its kind in Singapore accorded recognition by CIPC. (By the way, we have a great relationship with the founder of Singapore Pipe Club.) Surely the French, thick and dense as they are, must understand that a metaphor is a comparison between two things that are otherwise unrelated, though with metaphor, the qualities of one thing are usually figuratively carried over to another. Miller is actually paying homage to the French. The French should bask in that glory accorded by Miller and not become so litigious.
Incidentally even the village of Champagne in Switzerland, which had traditionally been producing wine labelled as “Champagne” was stopped from using their own name on their wine 15 years ago. It didn’t matter that they were producing long before Dom Pérignon started with the production of wines in the Champagne region of France in 1668. The Swiss production dated back to 1657 and the name related to the village itself rather than the wine.
Not only are the French petty, they are big bullies too. In 2008, Marc-André Cornu was told he could no longer use the brand name his family had used since the 1930s. Three generations, beginning with his grandfather, had labeled their breadsticks and cookies – yes, breadsticks and cookies – “de Champagne,” after their Swiss village, nestled among the vineyards that creep north from the shores of Lake Neuchâtel.
Does that mean that French toast is next, or French fries? Or what about Belgian waffles and English muffins? And pad Thai? And Muay Thai? Or Sarawak laksa? Or Welsh rarebit? Or Parma ham?
And when I say to my grand-daughter that she is the apple of my eye, will Tim Cook sue my pants off because Siri listens to everything, right?