The Funny and Insightful Thoughts of Simone Klugman
Victor Hugo, Voltaire, Emile Zola and Jean-Paul Marat have their last home and resting place in The Pantheon in Paris. This magnificent building is modeled after the one in Rome, which is itself a recreation of ancient Greece’s “home of all the gods.” The Pantheon currently hosts the remains of 100 Frenchmen highly regarded by […]
Simone’s daughter (along with an editor she knows) is planning a trip to Israel. She mentioned the trip to Simone who recalled a street address in Tel Aviv from 80 years ago. A google search found a picture of the house and this blog post was born….. I lived at “#3 Karl Netter str” in […]
I fell down. Don’t worry. I cracked my wrist, wore a cast for a month and now I am back to normal. Functioning without a left wrist was a challenge as I couldn’t work on the blog. As you see that has changed. These events put me in mind of handedness and I have been […]
Editor’s Note: We’re happy to share a guest post from Simone’s daughter, Dina Cramer…. Much has been written about Prince Harry and Duchess Meghan’s recent announcement that they were stepping back from the British royal family, moving abroad part-time, and becoming financially independent. And all this without getting the Queen’s permission. It remains […]
The start of a new year answers an age-old yearning by humans for a fresh beginning, the equivalent of an animal’s shedding of an old skin to replace it with a new, shiny and unwrinkled one. (And don’t we wish that we could). Perhaps we even wish to abandon our chrysalis altogether and fly away […]
Editors note: Simone has a broken wrist so is temporarily limited in her writing. She’s going to be back at it pretty soon, but in the meantime, we are happy to republish this post from 2016. —————————————————————————————————- Simone’s Preface…. “The way this one was born is sort of typical of how I start associating. I […]
If you click on this link, you will be taken to Simone’s blog post that appeared on the site called Medium.com It’s a terrific post and received thousands of appreciations on the site. At the end you find over 100 comments from readers. It was a fun experience going out into the wider world. And […]
Just like their American counterparts, French First Ladies have no real existence. They have no official function and no defined role. They just “come with” and “go with” the President they happen to have married. People mostly see them stepping out of a plane with their spouses looking decorative and smiling bravely. They are […]
It has now been nearly a decade since a fruit vendor in Tunisia set himself on fire in a protest against police brutality and corruption. Thus began, “The Arab Spring” protests driven by millions of people who wanted participation in the governance of their countries. But when it was over the foundations and pillars on […]
France’s role in American life predates the birth of the United States. Our founding Fathers were greatly influenced by French Philosophers of the Enlightenment- Voltaire, Diderot, Rousseau. Thomas Jefferson loved everything French; Benjamin Franklin loved quite a few French women and spent many years in France. These founding Americans absorbed the concepts of “Liberty, […]
