Flamby vs. Talonette or the French elections presidential debate

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Watching the French Presidential debate makes me cringe!

I thought that the level of the debate between Republicans vs. Democrats in the US was ridiculous, often childish and definitely below the belt, but these two French assholes are sadly pathetic…

Not listening, cutting, misbehaving. Like two 5 years old fighting for the same cake or teenage girls discussing who the best vampire out of Twilight is!

My dear friends, if you really believe that the French economy will change the face of the world, think twice! Greece, yes. Spain, probably. And that is not good news for us all! But France, hell no!

Honestly, I am no longer surprised the far right and its usual contestation vote did so well during the first round.

The good news is that I have now decided what I’ll do this coming Sunday… I’ll fracking abstain, you fracking douchebags!

Easter (plastic) Eggs Hunt

Time flies. It feels like we barely hit the new year and the girls are already decorating Easter eggs and talking about Easter bunnies and egg hunts.

On the morning of the day, both girls jumped on our bed around 6:30am, excited for the egg hunting experience to begin and willing to check if the Easter bunny had read the note they left outside for him or eaten the carrot the left out for him. Luckily for us, the Easter Bunny seemed to have visited our garden and various plants in our house very early that morning (or maybe was it late on the previous night). At least, way earlier than the time the girls got up!

As soon as the entire family reached the ground floor, the hunt began and eggs were found behind each and every plant both inside and outside of our house. Cheska, our (no longer so much a) puppy took part in the hunt too, adding some fun to the occasion and complications here and there…

Finally, after a while, all of the eggs were found, collected, counted and split in two. Little baby rabbits sent by MammYvette were found and cuddled and the second phase of the day could begin: eating the sweets inside the 40+ plastic eggs.

And in usual SoCal fashion, we did end up the day by a visit to the pool…

Easter Eggs Decoration

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Sophia has been pretty busy today, decorating Easter Eggs, in preparation for the big hunt on Sunday.

The sole (apparent) issue (no pun intended) with this kind effort is the dye and paint used for the decoration… As a result, my little Loulou is harboring her very own multicolored make up, covering face/mouth/hands and various other body parts (from head to toe would be the best definition)

Sole remedy at this level, as we are way passed the use of usual wipes: grab the kid (trying to get my clothes not to touch her), start the shower and make sure the kid remains under the pouring hot water until all colors have disappeared and the little monster has turned back into a human being.

Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish


Spending the day/evening in the Silicon Valley, there is one thing I absolutely had to do. I’d almost consider this as a mandatory action… Fire my Sat Nav app, enter the revered address “1 Infinite Loop, Cupertino, CA” and drive…

It is no secret that I have been an Apple fan boy for years. I played with my first Apple computer, I was 14 or 15, when one of my neighbor brought back home an Apple IIc and spent several hours walking me through the computer’s feature (beating the crap of my then 6502 based 48k RAM Oric 1). During the same year, I spent some time at my bro’s (Hervé) who gave me access to his Apple IIe and a large stack of games and applications for me to play with. He simply lost me and had to extract me from the machine for meals and sleep.

And this was the beginning of a long list of Apple products around me. From the Mac Mini Color (which I fully admit, I swapped for a dull beige PC when Apple decided to totally suck), to my numerous iMacs (bondy blue and up), Mac Cube, PowerBooks, MacBooks, Mac Mini and Xserve, it has been a long uninterrupted list of fruit branded computers.

Same goes for iPhones (1, 3G, 3Gs, 4), iPads (all), Apple TVs, etc.

Steve Jobs and his infamous personality are no strangers either to my passion for the fruited based brand or my current career as a (kind of ) technologist. The man might have possibly been an asshole but what an grandiose one. And he’s gone! “Boom!”.

So, as I have a couple of hours to lose, driving around “the Valley”, I thought I’d just come here and touch the famous sign, seing if it would give me some special powers! [NB: Didn't]

Best part: there’s a pub at the edge of the campus (BJs).

Maiden Flight

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Instead of a lunch break today, I got to fly a plane. Not a big plane, no! A small one, with a single tiny propeller engine.

How did this happen? Sarah, probably thinking I spend too much time at the back of a lot of planes (as a passenger), got me this initial lesson last year for our wedding anniversary. Between work, travels, Santa Anna winds and more, I had been postponing the flight until last week, when we realized my lesson was about to expire. Sarah booked. I went.

Once at the airport, my pilot/instructor walked us straight to the plane, marched through a quick pre-flight check and within minutes we were in the air.

Once we reached 2000 feet, I was handed the commands and flew us above Beverly Hills, the Getty Center, Santa Monica, Malibu and a bit of the Pacific Ocean. At that point, we turned back and flew back to the valley.

Next I knew, my instructor asked me how I would feel about doing the approach back to the airport. I felt great about it and 5-10 minutes later, we hit the small runway and landed quasi perfectly (ok, honorably) after some few nerve-wracking minutes of descent, deceleration and doubts, my hands and feet still on the commands, “piloting”. That rocked!

Now, how much does an hour of flying lessons costs again? (and how many hours do I need to get my license?)

Thia turns 7 (and I am not even invited to her party)

So it begins! Following last year’s “girls only” birthday party at Disneyland, this year’s party was again a “no boys allowed” one, except that this time, I was asked to leave the house.

Thia, short of one tooth, and her lady friend, enjoyed a full Kids Spa treatment, including chocolate based face mask and other delicacies, followed by a sleepover for both girls and mums (including some teen related vampire movie screening for the mums)

The dads, on their side, spent their night of exile drinking a couple of glasses of wine, eating cheese and simply passing out around 10:00p (yup, we had a party rocking!)

Thia lost her first tooth!

We wait for so long for our little angels to get their first teeth and we monitor them, and before you even know it, they can’t wait to lose them.

So yesterday, at 4:37pm, Thia lost her first tooth, after weeks of telling us that her tooth was wobbly and us denying it!

I have to confess that I have been in total denial for a while. Thia wasn’t growing up. Thia isn’t getting older! Well, wrong and wrong!

Next week, she’ll be 7 and will probably miss another tooth!

NB: Spending the week in Atlanta, I could only get a shot of the new smile over Skype, last night.

An afternoon in the Mojave

Totally using my friend Tom’s Facebook status update regarding this event, during which I checked 2 of the last tasks in my full Americanization list in one go: “Shooting at various objects” & “Spend afternoon in open desert”

“On Saturday, we established a modern-day “Ligne Maginot” on point defending against the Armenians from Glendale.

Then we raced some RC cars through the desert, and drank beer with the local denizens…”

Great time, great fun and yes, I got scared by the locals!

Happy New Year (from the hot tub)…

Only in California, or maybe the Southern Hemisphere.

Jan 1st, after a nice birthday meal for Sarah, we decided to start the new year by jumping in the pool.

The girls both went to the normal pool but quickly came back to the safety of the 100°F of the hot tub. Our visist sadly had to get cut short after Loulou got sick both on Sarah and in the hot tub (muuuuuch better!!!)

01/10/12: This signed the beginning of a week of sickness for almost the entire family (Sarah, her both parents, Sophia and Thia!)