the hardware store joke

Lyn Cash has a very funny hardware store joke on her blog. Scroll down a bit to read it. (If you can make it past the picture of the guys washing the car...)

But it reminded me of a real joke the people in my agency played on one of the models. The model was from Germany and very, very uptight. She was always complaining about the French obsession with sex. For her, everyone was obsessed with sex. It made the Swedish girls roll their eyes, and the people at the agency tried to explain that in France things were a little more relaxed, that was all. But she was always complaining. When she went for a job she complained about the changing rooms, and when she was on location, she complained about changing in the street (if you've ever been on location you know what I mean - you usually have to get dressed behind sheets held up by a grinning photographer's assistant, and a scowling stylist.)
Anyway - One day she came in complaining that the toilet in her studio was all stuck and she needed a plunger. Only she didn't know the word for plunger in French. Could someone help her?
The two booking agents who were there that day looked at each other, and then one smiled and said, "Of course. The word is godmichet. You pronounce it 'god-mishay'. Got it?"
The girl then asked where the nearest hardware shop was, and they sent her off with an address.
She went into the shop and asked for a godmichet. The clerk looked blank and shook his head.
"You know," she said, miming plunging a toilet. "A godmichet!" She mimed some more, as the clerk went from pink to scarlet then purple. Finally he gave her the address of another shop, and fuming, she left, thinking that the clerk in the hardware store was a idiot.
She arrived at the address the clerk had given her and frowned. The sign on the door said, 'S*xy Shop!' Frowning even more, she pushed the door open and asked if they had a godmichet there.
The clerk said, "Of Course!" and led her to a glassed counter, where he pointed to a whole range of dildos.
Back at the agency, everyone was howling imagining the girl standing in the sex shop. The girl came back howling - she was furious - which only made everyone laugh harder.
It wasn't easy being a model sometimes.
Once I did a shoot in an outdoor pool (unheated) in April for the July issue of 20 Ans. I was Freezing. The next day I came down with bronchitis and had to work all day with a fever of 101°.