Bordel!

Today, synonyms of "mess", most acceptable ones first, most familiar ones last. The top of the list would be more likely to be used with verbs like "mettre" (to put), the others with its slang equivalent "foutre":
(un) désordre
(une) pagaille
(un) chantier
(un) fouillis
(un) tohu-bohu
(un) bazar
(un) souk
(un) barnum
(un) fourbi
(un) foutoir
(un) binz
(un) dawa (not sure this one made it to the dictionary yet)
(un) bounsa (this one is used by the younger generation, don't ask me)
(un) boxon
(un) merdier
(un) bordel (a classic, my personal favorite)

E.g. "Il a mis la pagaille" = "Il a foutu le bordel" = "he made a mess"

Had to

(un) mime = a mime (pronounced meem)

Which brings me to the comic strip of the day by Mike Luckovich. You can see this one in Newsweek this week, and it's a nice touch on the recent riots in France.

Food!

As winter is coming upon us, some hearty meals to keep us warm after a long day on the slopes:

• Fondue Savoyarde: from Savoie as the name implies. Everyone dips small pieces of bread in a pot filled with a mix of melting cheeses

• Fondue Bourguignonne: this time, it's beef that's dipped in hot oil, with a wide range of sauces available for dipping

• Raclette: each guest melts his own piece of cheese. The traditional way to do this is to cut a big, round cheese in two and place it under a hot lamp. Every now and then, scrape (racler = to scrape) the melted cheese and serve it

• Pierrade: a heated stone is placed on the table, where everyone can cook his own thin slices of meat

• Tartiflette: layers of reblochon cheese, potatoes, cream, onions and bacon cooked in the oven

Add side dishes, a good bottle of white wine and a bunch of friends, you're ready to go.

Let's be bad

It's been a while since we had a bad word, so here we go, today "foutre" (pronounced footr), which has numerous interesting meanings:

• As a masculine noun, it is slang for sperm
• As an exclamation, it is very close to "fuck", e.g.:

foutre! = fuck!
j'en sais foutre rien! = I don't know fuck about it!
foutre non! = fuck no!

• As a verb, slang for to do

E.g. qu'est-ce qu'il fout? = what the hell is he doing ?
qu'est-ce que ça peut foutre? = what the hell does it matter ?

• As a verb, slang for to give (a blow, a kick...)

E.g. ça m'a foutu un coup = it was a real blow to me

• As a verb, slang for to put

où t'as foutu les clés? = what the hell have you done with the keys ?

• As a verb, can also simply mean to fuck

va ta faire foutre! = go to hell (literally go get fucked), pronounced vatfayrfootr

• Other miscelaneous expressions:

je lui ai foutu une claque = I slapped him
tu te fous de ma gueule? = are you making fun of me ? / kidding me ?
je m'en fous! = I don't give a shit

Réglo

réglo is a colloquial adjective that means straight, legit, trustworthy.

il est réglo = you can trust him
c'est pas très réglo = it's not legit
c'est réglo = it's OK

Pouf!

(une) disparition = disappearance

E.g. une espèce en voie de disparition = an endangered species

It is also the title of a 1969 novel by Georges Perec. On the surface, it's a detective story that received mixed reviews, but that is far from being the interesting point of the book, that was entirely written without ever using the letter 'e'. Given that it is the most frequent vowel in the French language, and that most common words like and ('et'), the ('le') all contain the banned letter, it is an undisputable tour de force.

Internat

(un) internat (the 't' is silent) = boarding school

For rainy days...

(un) K-way = a windbreaker. Strictly speaking, this is the name of the brand that's responsible for these fantastic windbreakers that you could roll up into small bundles and wear around your waist:
Its popularity turned it into a common noun, as in this rhyme from French rapper Booba:
"T'es un vrai gars, ouais
Depuis hier, moi depuis mon premier K-way"
Le son qui met la pression

(You're a real man, yeah
Since yesterday, I've been one since my first k-way)

In the news...

(une) émeute = a riot

Word that you would find all over the headlines in France these days, after close to a week of non-stop riots in the suburbs of Paris, following the death of two teenagers who were fleeing the police.

A related word:
CRS = Compagnie Républicaine de Sécurité (Republican Security Squad), French riot police. When masculine, designates a member of the squad ("un CRS").
A famous chant of rioters taunting the CRS is: "CRS, S, S!" which manages to compare them to the German SS in barely 5 letters. I am sure tha,t unfortunately, we hear this one a lot these days.
On a side note, you do not want to mess with a CRS, if you ever meet any.