V. PUTIN, IN SPORTS BRA, ENVISIONS WAR.

V. Putin fastens a Cold War, Soviet-style sports bra: straps like umbrella handles, indifferent material akin to upholstery, a clasp that pinches his upper excess as would an inebriated toothless granny. Yet the bra—and the leader—exude the kind of sturdy defiance one might expect from the products of a durable if blundering empire. The sports bra, however abrasive to his Caucasian epidermis, holds; the contraption creates a bloc; the bloc holds. Once supported, V. Putin can dress in formal attire, a rose pinned to his lapel. Not far away, a catering staff prowls around the diplomatic affair, offering small pours of spritzers. The catering staff offers small bites of salty cakes. “Wired”, notes an American spy, “every living soul electric.” The American spy thinks of the difference between “W” and “V”, the difference, in English, between Wladimir and Vladimir. In glides V. Putin. He crouches. Judo rises into his eyes; he performs virtual parries and slips; he takes virtual advantage of the momentum he perceives about the assembly: a pair of ladies drifting in glittery gowns. His expression crosses from feline hungry to feline kill, crosses back to feline hungry. V. Putin slides invisible armies across the great steppes of his mind, swift columns of vehicles governed by gritty throttles. Every sweet, doomed soldier resembles V. Putin, arriving at a pock-marked destination shaped, in advance, by the shortages of his Second World imagination.

Too serious? Prefer animal-themed photo essay? Click on Fred the Dawg Cheers-up the Blogger.

PHOTO ESSAY: FRED THE DAWG CHEERS-UP THE BLOGGER.

Fred is named for Fred Couples, the golfer, although Fred is a female dawg. How many dawgs are named after golfiz? I don’t know her handicap. Fred may be a Rhodesian Ridgeback. If so, she’s probably a runt. It’s possible that she’s not a ridgeback, and not a runt, but instead, a red-brown dawg. Fred is a good dawg. She’s affectionate and she likes writiz. She also likes the friends of writiz. Fred used to drink a little stout. I’m encouraging Fred’s parents / owniz to allow her a smidgen of stout now and again. We’ll see how that goes. Fred runs very, very fast. It ain’t nobody around who could outrun Fred. You may think you can but you can’t. Unlike most dogs, Fred is a country-city dawg. I’ve known Fred in the city, and I’ve known Fred in the country, and the deal is: she’s basically the same dawg in both locales. Sometimes she doesn’t know who I am in the country. There, I’m just the dude who slept in the basement, but even then, she allows me some basic latitude. These pictures were taken in the city. It ain’t such a cruel city, after all, despite what you read in the papiz. See how the dawg cheers the blogger. It ain’t no little cheer, either. That’s big-time cheer. Thanks, Fred. 

Too furry? Prefer incisive journalism on controversial leader? Click on V. Putin, in Sports Bra, Envisions War

RIMBAUD: FIRST BLOOD.

Yo, Verlaine! That poem sucks!

Sylvester Stallone stars as Rambo in Rimbaud: Première Sang, an action-adventure film in which a young French poet escapes persecution by literary critics and avenges this persecution with surreal verse. “Yo, Verlaine!” says Stallone as Rambo as Rimbaud. “They drew first blood, not me!” Verlaine, played by Bruce Willis, sits in a hovel with Rambo as Rimbaud, having helped Rimbaud elude water cannon and the poetry cannon. On the one hand, Willis plays Verlaine, but on the other hand, Stallone plays Rambo playing Rimbaud. The production crew can’t automatically compute where Stallone ends and where Rambo begins, where Rambo ends and Rimbaud begins. One scene, a bro-mance entitled “Ram-bro”, calls for a passionate fist-bump between Rambo as Rimbaud and Willis as Verlaine. Afterwards, Stallone and Willis compare their future engagements. Willis will appear as a Jewish wine merchant, in a TV series entitled Chico and the Manischewitz. Stallone will appear on a rival network—as a fellow who suffers from gynecomastia—in Chico and the Man Boobs. “Yo, Verlaine!” cries Stallone as Rambo as Rimbaud, but the camera shows the viewer that Willis has departed. Rambo as Rimbaud holds a battered sheet of onionskin to his face. The camera shows a dirty, sweaty, camouflaged man reading verse. He is Rambo one minute, he is Rimbaud another minute, he is a real laughing hiatus.