Hair
Eitan up early to plan is birthday party, which will be an over-night with five friends. On the agenda is make-your-own pizza, the Manchester United-Sunderland match (on television), a conker collection, football play-match at the park and a “midnight feast” which, I suggest, could be McDonald's. He likes that one.
I am in Paris Tuesday afternoon and sit on the steps of Madeleine staring across Place de la Concorde. I people-watch as shoppers on Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honore march by – this is the stylish 8th Arrondisement and the Parisians are de la mode. The city a bee hive in the autumnal sunshine. From here I meet a new friend Bertrand at Hotel Costes – we sit in the inner courtyard and discuss media and the Internet since he recently sold his company and is now between ventures.
Why does the Pope bother to make his first visit to the UK anyway? Given Benedict's conservative bent (he's no Pope John Paul II), the Catholic church remains in the midst of a never-ending child-abuse scandal and resists outside, transparent, investigation; vocal against gays, abortion and birth control, like condoms, which save millions of lives. Women not allowed in the priesthood and so lesser citizens. This is so not a secularised British society. Unsurprisingly, Benedict's visit fails to fill venues. Sonnet thinks the Pope here on a PR junket to deflect attention from the scandals. I would not disagree – when everything going against you, road trip dude!
Madeleine: “Usually they just go to waste. So I am going to make animals.”
Me: “How do you make animals from conkers?”
Madeleine: “You are writing on your blob, aren't you Dad?
Sonnet: “Eitan, are you going to do something about your hair this morning? I would suggest a comb.”
Eitan:
Me: “What does your teacher say about your hair?”
Eitan: “I don't know. He doesn't really say anything.”
Me: “Hmm.”
"When you arrive at Heathrow you think at times you've landed in a Third World country."
--Cardinal Water Kasper, Advisor to the Pope, voices what we all think
