The End of Summer

A bitter sweet song by my friend François which felt appropriate to mark the end of holidays and close this third season of your summertime series on a high note. To listen, click on the arrow of the player on the picture (if you can't, listen on Soundcloud instead). If you like it, please, let him know in the comments or on one of the links in the footnotes. It's always nice to hear from you.

Ey@el

Summer

The rain is falling down,
In the heat of the night,
We give us kisses on the beach.
Our hands are shaking,
Our eyes close to tears,
So hard that the heart bleeds.
You move me like a wave,
Crashing on the sand
That surrounds us.

My hands through your hair
Playing lullabies.
You’re a symphony,
You are everything.

Your blood is flowing deep in my veins,
My heart is beating in your breath
Leaving is a fall
Feeling suicidal, rain and tears.

Our summer is dying now
We are dying now
Few minutes before our last breathe together.

Our summer is dying now
We are dying now
Few seconds before our last heartbeat together.

Our summer is dying now
We are dying now
Few heartbeats before we are vanishing now.

For it’s time for us to leave
Anything we could have share
Anything we could have lived forever.

You move me,
You are everything,
Oh my my.

I wanna hold you,
I wanna kiss you,
I wanna surround you,
Be you babe babe.

I love you,
I need you,
I wanna be everything,
Anything that deals with you,
Oh babe babe babe…

Oh you move me...

Original text by FRANÇOIS DEMERCASTEL
© La Pensine Mutine. All rights reserved. Reproduction prohibited.

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Something to Get Your Breath Back

While it's very cool to keep your feet cool, breathing fire is definitely not. Please note I'm talking about dragon breath not feral breath (which might be a symptom for mouth, teeth or digestive disorders you should take seriously rather than merely trying to suppress). One may be natural and wild without going feral and sometimes need a little breath-freshening (kiss-kool effect) not just when dating. Lucky you, your good fairy godmother Ey@el (also known as the wicked Don't-Mess-With-Me fairy) found the magic solution to carry with you in your bag or pocket at all times.

Ingredients:

• 10 ml (2 teaspoon) vodka
• 0,02 g menthol crystals
• 0,5 ml vegetable glycerin
• 1 drop lemon EO
• 5 drops peppermint EO

QSF 10 ml

Instructions:

Dissolve menthol crystals in vodka, making sure they don't accidentally come in contact with your skin or mucous membranes (wear protective mask, gloves and glasses).

Dissolve essential oils in vegetable glycerin then stir into the menthol-vodka mixture.

Transfer to a small sterilised essential oil glass bottle with a spray cap (or a perfume bag spray).

NOTE: Spray in your mouth and be careful not to spray in your eyes. I find it also brings relief in case of nausea or indigestion. Do not over-use.

CAUTION: Not suitable for children, pregnant women and epileptics. Don't use with homeopathic treatment. And make sure not to spray near a flame as this is a flammable product. Keep out of reach of children.

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Head Over Heels

During hot weather, the water in our bodies tends to evaporate more quickly (which is why it's so essential to stay well hydrated even if you're not thirsty) and our blood will thicken, causing veinous stasis and oedemas or at best, heavy legs. Besides, walking may cause swelling and burning feeling in your feet which is bad news since walking is actually supposed to improve blood circulation.

For a bit of relief, here is arefreshing gel that do no stick, providing a strong cooling effect which I always carry around as I walk a lot. It should help you put up with these inconveniences (but won't suppress them). The anti-fatigue sensation it provides is just like magical. Only you should be careful not to spread it all over your body, on ly on your feet, ankles and calves. And don't rub your eyes after applying with your hands.

You'll find all the ingredients you need in specialised shops or online sites and, as always, all your tools, containers and workspace should been thoroughly clean and desinfected with alcohol (use cheap rubbing alcohol for that, do not waste your precious organic alcohol).

Ingredients:

• 70 ml mineral water
• 0,04 g blue mineral oxide (optional)
• 4 g guar gum
• 2 ml organic alcohol
• 4,8 g menthol crystals
• 20 ml liquid ivy or butcher's broom extract
• 18 drops lavender EO
• 20 drops benzylic alcohol (preservative)

QSF 100 g

Properties:

Menthol crystals are obtained by cooling of mentha arvensis essential oil and used for their refreshing, decongestant and anaesthetic effect. They also promotes the absorption of active ingredients. As for ivy and butcher's broom, they both improve blood circulation.

Instructions:

Dissolve blue oxide in water by stirring well. Sprinkle guar gum into the water and whisk vigourously until you obtain a thick homegeneous gel.

Dissolve menthol crystals in organic alcohol and gently fold into the gel (use protective gloves and glasses to prevent accidental contact with skin or mucous membranes).

Mix plant extract with essential oil and preservative and fold gently again into the gel.

Transfer to a clean jar or tube and store in a cool place.

NOTE: In order to carry in your bag for when it's hot or if you walk a lot, you can transfer a small quantity in a mini gloss tube which is more convenient to use while away from home.

Recommended shelf life is 3 months.

CAUTION: Since menthol may induce allergic reactions, you're highly advised to make a preventive test inside your elbow 48 hours before using to make sure. Also, menthol should not be used on children, pregnant women or epileptics as it may cause seizures. Keep this gel out of reach of children as you would for any medecine.

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The Grinch's Truffles

As you know, I'm orthorexic which means that I suffer from a mental illness that makes me eat only healthy food that meets the real needs of my body and not those of Big Pharma and food industries. And since you definitely cannot trust these people as their business would be jeopardised by our good health and well-being, I never buy processed food. I cook everything myself from basic products, which is not only cheaper and doesn't take that much time when you get organised. I'm well aware that those who don't understand and can't imagine eating to sustain themselves rather than for pleasure often see me as a killjoy. Which by no means is what I am as unlike what they think, I don't refrain myself from eating any food I like. I simply stopped liking what was not good for me.

The recipe I'm sharing below has given me the opportunity to prove them wrong and everyone even asked for more. If classic butter truffles usually tend to make you sick, those won't because coconut oil is excellent for your heart and arteries in spite of false claims made my health and food lobbists.

Ingredients

Makes about 15 truffles:

- 85 g ground almonds
- 2 tablespoons grated coconut
- 2 tablespoons coconut oil (solid form)
- ½-1 teaspoon honey
- 10 drop natural vanilla extract
- 1-2 caps rum
- unsweetened raw cocoa powder

Directions

Melt coconut oil in a double-boiler. Mix all remaining ingredients EXCEPT cocoa powder in a bowl. Add liquefied coconut oil and mix until smooth.

Cover and chill for 2 hours.

Spread a couple of tablespoons of cocoa powder on a plate. Make small balls with the dough (approximately one teaspoon make a ball) then roll them into cocoa.

Keep refrigerated like classic truffles.

NOTE: You may use other liquors such as Armagnac, brandy or Cointreau (or none at all) and substitute 10 drops of essential oil of orange instead of vanilla. I had previously tested this recipe without honey but raw cocoa is very bitter. It's fine for me but it may be a put off for those who are still on sugar.

Enjoy these healthy treats without feeling guilty!

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Banana Rica

As you may know, about five years ago, I have been forced by circumstances (a gift of providence) to remove gluten from my diet and have weaned myself off that dangerous hard drug with pernicious effects, still freely available off the shelf, widely promoted and added to everything we eat or drink (or as a synthetic form even more harmful known as sweeteners). I am talking about sugar, of course. Believe me, life didn't become tasteless for all that, rather the opposite. Now sugar really puts me off and the fact I can remain unaffected by the sight or smell of the most tantalising pastries, candy, chocolate or else is proof that my withdrawal has been successful.

Here is a recipe from my previous life as a “sugar-addict” adapted to the diet of my new healthy life which tastes even better than it used to. It is of course gluten-free and contains no added sugar. The emphasis is only on “added” as bananas naturally contain sugar (especially when ripe), rum is obtained by fermenting sugar cane (alcohol = sugar), and any flour contains slow sugars (complex carbohydrates) that your liver stores as glycogen and processes as glucose, the essential fuel used by metabolism and cellular functions in your body.

Ingredients

Makes 10-12 crepes :

- 2 bananas
- 80 g rice flour
- 45 g quinoa flour
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp apple cider vinegar (ACV)
- 2 tbsp rum
- olive oil (to fry)

Directions

Mash bananas with a fork and add rum.

Mix flours with baking soda and add ACV.

Add mashed bananas and mix thoroughly until you obtain a thick smooth batter.

Heat some good quality olive oil (use stainless steel and avoid non-stick coating frying pans as it's made of toxic materials) and deposit small heaps of preparation. Brown each side for a few minutes.

Serve as is or as a side dish and/or with tea or coffee.

NOTE: You may add sultanas (soaked for 10 minutes in rum), vanilla or spices such as ground cinnamon, ginger or cardamom. I never tried because I'm allergic to most tropical fruits, but  I guess it must tastes great with fresh pineapple. Why not sprinkle with grated coconut or pure cocoa powder? Be creative, experiment and let me know about it.

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A Musical Journey

Just like every year by midsummer, the Sun is back in Leo, its own sign, highlighting love, generosity, creativity and self-expression in direct connection to the heart chakra. A perfect time for revelling into and sharing my artistic crushes.

Des Vies (Lives) is the extracurricular musical project of a young French composer and producer. A musician since the age of six when he was given his first keyboard, he immediately began experimenting with his own sounds and melodies, but never learnt how to read music properly. A genuinely self-taught artist, he trained on his own or “perhaps guided by external forces”, he concludes with a touch of mystery and humour.

Once an adult, he decided to take some formal artistic training to acquire basic knowledge and skills, which later enabled him to write and stage musicals, but as often-times in the entertainment world, he “mostly learnt on the job”. Music definitely is his passion to such an extent that after ten years he dumped a comfortable job to devote exclusively to music “as if I had no other choice but to create“ he explains.

His very eclectic musical influences range from Mozart to Muse including the likes of French-speaking artists such as Serge Gainsbourg, Francis Lalanne, Mylène Farmer and even Stromae. “I love MUSIC” he apologises.

He also uses a great variety of instruments. “Some sounds are produced by synths while for others I use external plug-ins or samples of my own. I'm a keyboard player so it's easy for me to sample let's say a flute, or a tambourine for instance, and replay it exactly the way I want it on keyboards.” Also, all his music is being self-produced in his personal home studio.

The Des Vies project came about almost accidentally (almost, for in truth there is no such thing as chance) after experimenting with “bits and pieces of movie soundtracks to bring emotions to life using unusual instruments or "hypnotic" sounds to instantly recreate feelings when first hearing them”. And most of those who happen to listen to his experimental productions suggest he should publish them online.

You may listen to whole playlist on YouTube.

Which then triggers a trail of synchronicities. Some of his tracks are used by spiritual therapists or “coaches” for meditation workshops. Upon which he finds out that his music relates to “lost civilisations, places of ancient mysteries”. He is also told that he connects souls through his melodies.

“Some words did resonate with me” he says. “Even though I never worried that much about it, upon closer look some of the titles I gave to my completed tracks truly had a definite spiritual note. So the next step was naturally to opt for a musical project to share on the Internet. Using music as a conduct for emotions, meditation and reliance, that's how Des Vies came about.”

The playlist opposite is a selection of the 21 tracks (that is 3x7, a very spiritual number) featured on his three albums — “but expect more to come, many more” he confided — all available on Spotify, Apple Music and Deezer. I hope it inspires you to continue this musical journal and discover some more. In this regard, you will find all relevant links in the footnotes.

Des Vies is an instrumental music project. A virtual journey through imagination, a walk through soundscapes. Des Vies is designed to make our thoughts drift through music and to connect our souls through musical frequencies.

Des Vies

Links

• Des Vies Project
• Des Vies on Spotify
• Des Vies on YouTube
• Des Vies on Facebook

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Let the Sunshine In

In summer, how can you get a healthy glow on your face while looking free from make-up without getting sunburnt when you're a woman? Self-tanners? No thanks!

My solution is a compact foundation worthy of the top luxuary brands without the toxic ingredients and very easy to make. Upon application with a latex or silicone sponge, it will give your face, neck and shoulders a slighty tanned look and protect your skin against UV radiations as it contains zinc oxide.

Ingredients:

• 4,6 g silica microspheres
• 4 g magnesium stearate
• 0,06 g yellow mineral oxide
• 0,02 g brown mineral oxide
• 1 g coco silicone (coco-caprylate)
• 6,8 g fractionated coconut oil
• 1 g white pasting (see below how to make your own)
• 0.9 g white beewax
• 1,2 g natural colourless mica
• 14 drops natural fragrance (optional)
• 1 drop vitamin E

QSF 20 g

Instructions:

Ground silica, magnesium stearate and oxides with a mortar to develop colour.

Melt oils and wax in a double boiler. Then add natural mica and the powder mixture, stirring well.

Remove from heat and add fragrance and vitamine E.

Pour into a compact and smoothe the surface with a spatula. Harden in the fridge for about an hour.

WHITE PASTING:

To make your own, in a double boiler pour 10 g castor oil and gradually add 12 g nanoparticle-free zinc oxide (be careful not to inhale in powder form) stirring well until you obtain an homogeneous paste. Pour in a clean jar and keep refrigerated. Be warned: it's very sticky and will stain.

NOTE: If you have pimples, blemishes or dark rings under your eyes, this foundation won't conceal them as it only unifies your complexion while preventing it from shining (and getting burnt). If you need to conceal skin flaws, use my homemade concealer first.

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Paranoid Invasion

Do you remember, three years ago I had shared my artistic crush for the work of Argentinian illustrator Gaston Viñas. Here is my new one for a Filipino artist named Chester Calayag. Painting is the only way he knows to make a living, but “really not an easy job” he says. “As far as I know since I was a child I've been earning things with this yes given and learned talent. But as I grew more the struggle is getting different especially nowadays it's easy to make a good art. Sometimes you don't need to think of any concept or say something. Well that's not how I was raised or that's not how I understand art.”

Most of his paintings deal with everything and anything he sees, his own story and interpretations about his own life and how he sees the world. “Doing a painting is another way to give life” he explains. “Music already did this, now it's time for art to give a hand.” His work is influenced by a variety of artists from Renaissance, fantasy/surreal and many modern arts. Dali, Varo, Klimt, and also some local artists and Stanley Donwood, Radiohead's friend and illustrator, a band he's a big fan of too. For music really inspires him a lot and is always giving him the energy to start the day, to start working everywhere he goes.

His striking style can sometimes be quite upsetting. Chester is a visionary artist. Both tortured and full of love, and fully aware of the painful struggle every man has to face to balance his inner darkness and light, just like the strong contrasts he enjoys so much in his painting. “Light is very important for me, maybe to all of us. but it's really hard to find.”

“I believe that nothing is impossible” he says. “There's always a possibility in everything, we just have to find the way how to do it. There's always a way, a right way. and i'm happy I found mine. it was like a portal into something inside ourselves”.

Since pictures speak for themselves and can express much more than words can ever do, I invite you to browse the gallery below by clicking on each thumbnail to enlarge. You may also wish to pursue by visiting his websites as indicated at the bottom of this page.

Here, you can see some of my works, and I hope it can give you inspiration even just a little or anything positive — anything that can help you on your way too.

Chester Calayag

Links

• Chester Calayag's website
• Chester Calayag's blog

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I Love Chocolate

After getting you drooling on inedible chocolate sunscreen bars, you deserve something sweet. Except it's not exactly that since I'm on a crusade against all kinds of poisons both mental and physical, and for me (sorry but) junk food doesn't stop with fast-food restaurants but also includes the whole of what we call gastronomy — gastro-ignominy would be more appropriate as it sometimes even causes gastro or stomach flu — and in France, land of the sheepcock,¹ we are the world champions of eating to our death while even taking pleasure at it and being very proud of that (wherein lays the sickness)!

So, here is a great classic revisted: chocolate mousse, but sugar, dairy and egg-free, all with genuine chocolate — not the usual cheap 20% cocoa substitute laced with 80% junk additives pigs themselves wouldn't eat² (for unlike most ovine-sapiens, pigs are very clever animals). Certainly it will cost you more but better spend this money on healthy food supplies than on pharmaceutical supplies (do you need me to tell you why?).

Ingredients

Serves 4:

- 100 g dark chocolate containing 100% cocoa
- 330 ml coconut cream (or rice or almond cream)
- 100 ml chickpea juice (from jarred or canned preserves)

Directions

Melt chocolate in a double boiler, then add cream and stir well until the mixture is homogeneous.

Whisk chickpea juice with a pinch of salt and a few drops of lemon juice or apple cider vinegar until firm.

Fold into the cooled mixture gradually and transfer to individual cups.

Réfrigerate overnight. Mousses will thicken and taste much better.

NOTE: Since pure cocoa might taste too bitter, you may want to add some honey or agave nectar, but you may also eat this dessert with banana pancakes (I'll make this recipe available soon). You can also flavour it with some natural vanilla extract or about 10 drops of orange or mint oil. Since it contains no egg and no dairy, it should keep longer without turning sour even during scorching heat.

Endnotes

1. ^ Sheepcock: untranslatable pun sounding like coq au vin, a French dish of chicken braised with wine in reference to the Gallic cockerel.
2. ^ Another unstranslatable pun as junk, in French, would literally translate to piggy stuff.

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High Five!

How's that “what are we celebrating”? You, bunch of @*$#%! Today marks the fifth anniversary of the main blog in French — five years!

Five years sparing no effort to share my thoughts with you about how I feel about the world and how I enview it through my own writings or translations (note for this blog in English is more of a side project for people who can't read French, I simply cannot translate everything I post on the main blog, I'm afraid this is virtually impossible). And what do I get in return? Nothing. Nicht. Nada.

All this, I'm not doing it for glory, recognition nor even for some monetary compensation (given the amount of time and energy invested, it still would not be charity for work must pay, whether it's a job you hate but are forced to do or something you love and chose to do — if you feel outraged, shame on you). Neither do I do it because I've nothing else to do and need to keep busy. Nope. I do it because I feel strongly about it and because this is what my soul aspires to.

So, now Little Me is ranting to her heart's content in the face of such indifference and ingratitude. She's offended by silence. You see, it doesn't take much time to leave a comment, but it makes a huge difference for a blogger. Otherwise it makes us wonder. Why can't they say anything? Is this because they don't like it? Too lousy perhaps? Or too complicated? Does it bore the s**t of them? Well, you see, that's how it makes us feel. Especially after working so hard on writing or translating an article.

So yes, Little Me does hurt sometimes. Ever so close to jacking the whole thing. In times like these, she's easy prey to grey entities, Dementors, kill-joys, and the like of those who claim to be self-righteous whereas they would do humanity a huge favour if they stopped righting altogether. They're so grotesque and pathetic. Pot, kettle, you know the story well.

As for Great Me, from her elevated perpective (which, let's say it, is no big deal given the actual height of Little Me) she has a very different outlook on things, that is wider and less intense. Easy peasy: she's not in it, she's above it. Great Me even sees stuff that Little Me can't see. Not yet, that is.

For as reckless as she may appear, going off the deep end time and again, on and off the rollercoaster, Little Me is one of a rider. Yes, she is. She's well determined to do what it takes to align herself to Great Me. So she keeps doing it even if she doesn't know where she's heading to. Great Me does know. And Little Me understands that she can rely on no one else but Great Me.

Little Me has faith in Great Me and so she's grateful of the steady increase in people visiting her main blog everyday (over 323,000 to this day, that is approximately 117,000 since last year). So thank you — thank you so much again and again!

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Spellbound

The lunatics are in the House,
The Mad Hatter ate the mouse,
And all of them puppets on a string
Filthy greedy pigs on wings
Soulless ragdolls on a pole
Weighing their heavy toll
Down on you people.

All of them possessed,
Mesmerised, anaesthetised,
Radicalised.

Cut cut cut
Cut the rope that leads!
Bite bite bite
Bite the hand that breeds!

No fear no feed.
No pain no drain.
No lies no blinds.
No war no blight.

Hold on to love,
Love the light,
Light the hope,
Hope for light.

Remember, recover,
Reclaim.
Remind, redeem
Reinvent.
Recreate, reconnect,
Reflect.

Expose, explode,
Expel.
Blow, breathe,
Break.
The spell
That binds.
Outsmart
The masterminds.

We are the light.
We are the life.
They are nought.

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Sun Bites

This article marks the start of the third season of your summer series for the whole of August, providing you with more trivial yet practical reading. It doesn't mean you should not bother to post any comment as sharing should never be a one-way process. The all-for-my-ass mindset or familiar crappy remarks such as “no one asked you” or “you agreed to it” cannot be free of consequences (especially with karmic returns being so much quicker nowadays). Except that in that mindset you hardly ever see the correlations with what befalls on you. Such a shame since everyone could enjoy a much better life. But only fate can force you to change or stay in a rut.

She burns like the sun
And I can't look away
And she'll burn our horizons
Make no mistake

"Sunburn", Muse (2000)

Incidentally, talking of karma, last June yours truly has been stupid enough to stay out in the sun during the hottest hours of the day in a the Tuileries Gardens in Paris and the price was hot as hell. My excuse is that I was meeting an old friend of 30 years ago and we had billions things to talk about. Nonetheless I should have prepared for a chance in weather conditions and anticipated an eventual twist of HAARP in the midst of all this downpour and cold and get some sunscreen made beforehand. A lesson I won't forget.

So yes, these homemade sunscreen bars do look and smell so yummy, they could be mistaken for chocolate bars. Actually they do contain cocoa butter but you'd be ill advised to eat them. On the other hand, they're very healthy to apply on your skin unlike the carcinogenic ingredients and other toxins found in most overpriced manufactured products purchased in drugstores and pharmacies. Of course, you need to apply it often (every hour at least) and avoid getting out when the sun is at its highest. They also have a soothing effect on sunburns as they nourrish and regenerate the skin (they contain a lot of vitamins A and E which are natural antioxidants).

Ingredients:

• 15 g coconut oil
• 10 g cocoa butter
• 10 g shea butter
• 15 g white beewax
• 5 g nanoparticle-free zinc oxide
• 10 drops vitamin E
• 5 drops carrot EO (optional)

QSF 50 g

Properties:

Coconut has so many benefits we won't list them here again. Both shea and cocoa butters are rich in fatty acids and tocopherols (vitamins A and E) which effectively protect and  regenerate skin, especially cocoa butter since it contains squalene, naturally occurring in the deep layers (dermis). Nanoparticle-free zinc oxide provides an excellent barrier against UV radiations. It also has a soothing effect and is the main active ingredient of calamine you may have heard of. Carrot essential oil has both healing and restorative properties, however you may not like its fragrance. Besides, if you intend to use these sunscreens on children or pregnant women, replace the essential oil with some organic vanilla extract.

Instructions:

Melt oil, butter and wax in a double boiler.

Add zinc oxide and mix well until you obtain an homegeneous mixture (wear a mask to avoid inhaling).

Remove from heat and add vitamin E and essential oil. Then quickly pour in silicone mould or ice-cube tray.

Leave it to cool and harden for about 30 minutes in the fridge before turning out.

It's best kept in a cool place but you may keep a couple in your bag, they won't liquefy. Apply directly on your skin. It will melt and penetrate.

NOTE: You're advised to crush the zinc oxide with a mortar and pilar before adding to the mixture so as to obtain a finer powder. Stir well before pouring into moulds as zinc oxide tends to stay at the bottom of the dish.

I, personally, found some mini-sticks to keep in my bag which are more handy than cubes that tend to get sticky on your hands especially if you wear rings. The larger bar can also be transfered into a deodorant stick.

I have tested it on a hot day walking in the sun, applying every hour and didn't get burnt. On top of it, mosquitoes hate it because they slip off your skin!

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