The Bonnet

Some weeks ago, the Jingo Contingent made a trip up to Philly for a relative's wedding. We all stayed in one hotel room - we're a friendly bunch that way. On arrival, I decided to get a shower, wash off the grime from the trip.

Among the freebies in the bathroom -- the tiny bar of soap, the microscopic bottles of shampoo and body-wash -- was a little box that contained a shower cap. This is not an item I am ever likely to use, so I tossed it aside. It landed French-translation-side-up, and I guffawed.

Towel around my waist, I went back out into the main room. Freddie was watching Mythbusters. I said, "Do you know what a shower cap is called in French?" He gave me the usual withering look he displays whenever I ask him something that he obviously doesn't know. I handed him the tiny box. He chortled.

Bonnet de Douche.

It's a douche-bonnet! How utterly wonderful! For the rest of the weekend, we called each other "douche-bonnet" every chance we got. "Dad, you douche-bonnet, you missed the turn!" "Hey, douche-bonnet -- brush your teeth."

Go ahead. Call your loved ones douche-bonnets -- affectionately, of course. Then explain you've just accused them of being a French shower cap.

I suppose we could use it to set up a system of punishments for transgressions. A shower cap kept handy to be placed on the miscreant's head -- with increments of time that increase depending on the severity of the misdeed: Put a dirty plate in the sink, wear the douche-bonnet for ten minutes. Track mud into the house, it's twenty minutes. A D on a semester report card gets you the douche-bonnet for three full hours.

"Hon, why does Ring Ting Ting have a shower cap tied to her head?"

"She got into the trash and smeared macaroni and cheese all over the kitchen floor. She knows the rules."

Tiger Woods? He's wearing that douche-bonnet for the next five years, or until he wins a major -- whichever comes first. The public douche-bonnet. The worst kind.