And now nine is official.
Madeleine's 9th birthday party today and we prepare ourselves for an afternoon of 10 kids, the movies (Gnomeo & Juliette in 3D, groan), pizza and an overnight. Our gal excited.
Sonnet and I visit Musée de La Mode et du Textile, which is a wonderful museum inside the Louvre (She gave a lecture at Les Arts Decoratifs at the Institut National du Patrimoine at the Louvre in 2009). The exhibitions include various famous designers like Viktor & Rolf, pictured, augmented by video display of their costumes on the catwalk. I find the image one of the creepiest I have taken. V&R's work strongly influenced by The Eyes of Laura Mars.
Here Sonnet in the French Paintings, the largest of its kind anywhere.
We give the Grand Dame a full day. I am pained to acknowledge that despite my visits to Paris I have not been to the Louvre once though within walking distance of my hotel. In fact the last time I was here, I believe, 1989 when my family on a lay-over en route to Africa. I was so jet-lagged I could not see straight let alone contemplate the enormity of the museum - 35,000 objects from prehistory to the 19th century exhibited over an area of 60,600 square metres.
Sonnet and I sit outside Cafe Ambasade facing the pretty Frenchies walking determinedly to their work on Rue du Faubourge St Honoré which, Dear Reader, we know is the shopping avenue of Paris. The men own pointy shoes and tussled hair while the young ladies with black leggings or flair trousers, capes, or fur shawls; they walk with the unusual lope of the model. The travailleurs boutique are as pretty as their wares.
I pick up Madeleine early from school to visit the High Street optometrist and our little dear's dreams come true : glasses. I tell her she can have the ones pictured which gets an "oh, Dad" and I spend the better part of an hour waiting for her to pick out a pair. This is her decision though I am quietly delighted when she chooses a pair of flash rectangular injection molds in Halloween orange. She is torn between these and the more sensible metal frames. The helpful Dr offers something in the middle and our bookworm sold.
Katie's Harvurd friend Susan Wojcicki profiled in today's San Jose Mercury News as "The Most Important Googler You've Never Heard Of" (photo by Robyn Twomey). Susan oversees Google's two main advertising products, AdWords and AdSense, which bring in the vast majority of Google's revenues (and even more of its profits). Back in '98, when Serge and Larry venture-backed by Kleiner Perkins (who BTW thought Google the least likely company to succeed in their '97 fund - because of Google, the fund the best partnership ever created based on returns) they needed a cheap work place and Susan rented her garage to the company (This really does happen in SV). Eventually Susan left a comfortable job at Intel to became one of the earliest employees and the first woman employee and then the first mother employee (she has four kids). She was behind Google's most important m and a's: DoubleClick and YouTube, after failing to keep up with YouTube as head of Google Video. She rocks.
I return to lap-swimming which is really the best sport for any age but especially older-age. No pounding nor possible sports-related injury accepting a blocked ear maybe. I have threatened to join a Masters club but their pool-times the worst: work-outs from 9PM. We have a couple of good (at least clean) public pools in Richmond and Lord knows we know them as both kids practice 4X a week. I do long for those outdoor Californian 50-meter basins which are a staple in the West Coast suburbs.
Madeleine: "Every day I keep waking up in the middle of the night."
My second birthday cake, pictured, probably taken, and eaten, in San Francisco before we moved to Berkeley. It kinda looks like me.
From last week, Scotland Yard makes UK crime data available at the street level. I can punch in my postal code and see the number of burglaries, murders, rapes &c. that have taken place nearby my, or any body's, house. Pictured, drug use per 1000 Londoners. This is a bold move and we are the first metropolitan area to have access to such rich data at our finger tips. True, one can find similar reports on US cities via Google api but this culled from public information and misses smaller or petty crime. The Police hope transparency will help make our streets safer. I would not disagree.
I am within fifteen-feet of these mysterious, ancient, beasts.
I visit the VA yesterday and check out the European 11-13th century, which is in a neglected gallery off the main entrance. Shame, too, because there are beautiful treasures here from the High Renaissance including this c.1150 statue of Jesus. I wonder about the lone guard who sits in his chair all-day-long. From there I visit Raphael's cartoons ("cartones" in Italian) which are seven large cartoons for tapestries, painted in 1515-16 and showing scenes from the Gospels and Acts of the Apostles. They are the only survivors of set of ten cartoons commissioned by Pope Leo X for tapestries for the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican Palace, which are still (on special occasions) hung below Michelangelo's famous ceiling. My visit less than 20 minutes but how lucky am I?
I ask Madeleine's mood and get a "thumbs middle," even though Saturday. A blue vibe has caught our family - lots of home work, freezing temperatures and a white, low-ceilinged sky which drags for days. I recover from food poisoning. Even Rusty gets in on the scene - the pooch eats hamster food and sick all morning giving me forlorn looks whenever our eyes meet. Sometimes you just have to work through the days and hope for the better.
Eitan bakes a cake and I play us music on YouTube including favorite "Video Killed The Radio Star" by The Buggles. The Song released in '79, was the 444th number one in the UK charts, spending one week at the top and shooting The Buggles to fame. I've never heard of them since. At the time of the single’s release, The Buggles did not have an album’s worth of material so they wrote most of the other tracks for their debut record The Age of Plastic (1980) while travelling around Europe promoting their hit. We also listen to Human Leagues' "Don't You Want Me Baby," Devo's "Whip It" and Madness' "My Girl." Like all parents before me I cannot stand the stuff Eitan listens to on Capital Radio. At least the '80s was original.
Since I have meetings in town and no office in town, I find myself at the National Portrait Gallery to see the “Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize 2010” with 60 portraits on display from nearly 6,000 submissions entered by 2,401 photographers from around the world. Law firm Taylor Wessing sponsors the competition for the third year. Photograph by Clare Shillard, which is my favorite - she has shot for Marni, Hardy Amies, Warner Music, Lyle & Scott and H&M, and her photographs have been published in i-D, Italian Rolling Stone, GQ Style and Teen Vogue amongst others.
Grace and Moe in Berkeley- I am guessing 1983 or '84?
Joe's Dad John is one of KPR's two coaches and from Scotland ("hit the bloody thing!" he once bellowed in a game. Today he called me "daft" when I offered to pay for a white coffee). Joe plays left-wing and whenever he gets a touch there is never a doubt. He and Eitan feed each other opportunities as often Eitan plays right-wing or center/ striker. The better kids can drop a floating ball to the pitch with the adroit placement of the boot, advancing quickly around the defending player, moving the ball up-field. The best players, including Joe, see the play unfold two or three ticks before the action and work towards some idea in their head. The set-up, after all, being equal to the strike.
KPR back to its winning ways defeating the Twickenham Tigers 4-2 in an away game. The Tigers score first but KPR answers with four goals (Eitan sets up two and takes KPR's second goal himself). James, the tall fellow pictured, a taxi driver and fireman who tells me that the London's Fire Brigade installed 500,000 fire alarms across London last year. Mostly, he says, for elderly people or poorer neighborhoods. Government knows, from our property insurance, who is protected and a state goal to make it everybody. Alarms last ten years (tested and installed for free upon request) while a database delivers an auto-letter when a replacement due.
Jihad? Nuclear Iran? Kate wedding dress? All brushed aside for reports that Silvio hosting "bunga bunga" parties at his 145-room, 16th century Villa outside Rome. Milan prosecutors are into an investigation, begun in May, of prostitution and orgy parties preceded by pole dancing, strip tease and "lesbian displays" at the PM's house. The case began when Karima "Ruby" El Mahroug arrested on suspicion of theft - Berlusconi telephoned the police asking to free her, claiming she was the niece of Hosni Mubarak, the president of Egypt and a bold faced lie. 100,000 leaked wire taps and text-messages include Ruby who, when shagging the PM for bracelets and cash, was inconveniently 17. Consent in Italy is 14 and the legal age for being a whore 18. Berlusconi denies the orgies took place and that, anyhow, he thought Ruby older than 17. He said this in the same breath. Most Italians, based on an Istitutio Piepoli poll in January, think Berlusconi will fight on - this his style -or, if government dissolved for an early election, his Freedom Party will remain in control somehow (today it has a three-vote majority in parliament). Umberto Bossi, head of the Northern League, and Berlusconi's biggest ally, jokes: "Silvio should go and rest somewhere, we'll handle things." And Luca Brasi sleeps with the fishes. More ominously this month, Italy's Constitutional Court struck down key parts of a law that would protect Berlusconi from prosecution.
The last we saw Lars at his book launch on the Strand and here he is yesterday with the twins. Lars and Puk bought a house not far from us after many years in Bayswater and Notting Hill and now they are in the cool part of London. Not. Lars sits on five boards, including a publicly traded company, and engaged in various interesting activities like triathlons. He follows a 26-week "Iron Man" schedule which, he tells me sheepishly, accelerates rapidly to three-hour runs and five hours of biking at a go. Edwin an inspiration. Me, following 2009, I am glad to do some push-ups and the occasional jog usually while waiting for Eitan to finish football practice. It seems to be enough yet Eitan gleefully points out to Shai and Ada the other night: "Dad has has a beer belly." His contribution to the adult conversation, the little rat.
We spend Friday cedar with Shai and Ada in their new home in Chelsea, which they have redone from top to bottom. Shai told me a year ago that from the basement he could see the blue sky. Now, it is a wonderfully designed modern house in a smart part of town. Shai raising his next clean energy fund with Richard Branson. He has a big IPO in ten days and soon he will be the Chairman of a publicly traded company. That doesn't happen every day.
