PE Awards

I am in my penguin suit (Eitan assembles my bow-tie with complete confidence) to attend the annual RealDeals Private Equity Awards 2012 in Mayfair. About a thousand of us fill the Grand Ballroom at the Hilton Park Lane.  Astorg is up for "Fundraising of the Year" which goes, instead, to BC Partners who raises €6.5 billion to our €1 billion.

Joining my table, along with a number of Astorg investors, is Justin who notes that Natalie's first deal with GMT Communications, a London buyout firm, was BigPoint, which is up for the "Dach Deal of the Year" award. When sold in 2011, BigPoint produced GMT's highest return of any investment the firm made during its 17-year history. Mind you, Natalie had been a partner for less than one year when she convinced her colleagues to do it. Midas touch.

Otherwise at home the kids use their after-school time to bake Martin and Helen a thank-you cake for the trampoline, which the Shakespeares not only use but now invite their cohorts to join along with them. Soon Madeleine may get the idea to sell tickets. It's coming.

Summer Term Is 'On'

Back to school dude.

The Brit school year runs from about early September until July the next year. Most schools , including ours, has three-terms , split by a week-long ‘half-term’ break used to fly to Spain or some other colonised coastline. The terms are separated by Christmas and Easter, giving us a couple more weeks of holiday. Another six to eight weeks breaks one school year from the next. ..   Generally the public (ie, private) schools have more holiday than state (ie, public) schools : this allows us parents to max out on skiing or where ever.

This works out to 13 weeks of school holiday in the UK vs 10 or 11 in the US, depending on the school district. The difference, of course, the concentration : in the states, summers may go from mid-May to September. Endless. I sure recall some lazy yuf , waking up with a couple dollars for comic books, walking across UC campus to Telegraph Avenue for vinyl records and video games. Lunch a slice of Blondie's pizza+a Coke.

Sonnet and I now debate the Shakespeares freedom. By 4th grade, I was solo on public transportation (No. 7 bus from Milvia to Euclid). By 6th, it was the paper route (unaccompanied, of course).  9th I was biking from swimming practise to West Campus.  Eitan and Madeleine have yet to experience similar liberties , though I am pretty relaxed by it all.  Parenting now more protective than ever - plus the media freaks us out.  In a city : who lurks and where ? 

Black Death

Me: "You won't believe what I learned."
Eitan, Madeleine:
Me: "First, who can tell me what the plague was?"
Eitan: "It was when disease was passed from people by the fleas on rats."
Madeleine: "There were two plagues. One of them was a blood plague, which is when you cough blood until you die. The other plague, right before the London Fire, so that would be 1666, made your nose, ears, toes and fingers fall off. And your eyeballs would bleed."
Me: "Good stuff. Anyway, you know how they built a new cafe at Palewell Park?  Well, during the excavations they found skulls and skeletons. They believe it was a plague dump."
Eitan: "What's a plague dump?"
Me: "When people died during the plague they chucked them on a barge and brought them up-river to Mortlake then took them to a pit in Palewell Park where they would dissolve the bodies with lye.
Eitan, Madeleine:
Me: "Still want to play football there?"
Madeleine: "Yeah. What's the big deal?"
Me: "Fair enough I guess."

Dad's note: The Great Plague from 1664 to 1666 was the last major epidemic of the bubonic plague in England. It happened during the centuries-long period of the Second Pandemic, an extended period of intermittent bubonic plague epidemics which began in Europe in 1347, the first year of the "Black Death" and lasted until 1750. The Great Plague killed an estimated 100,000 people, about 20% of London's population. Bubonic plague is transmitted through the bite of an infected flea. The 1654–1666 epidemic was on a far smaller scale than the earlier "Black Death" pandemic; it was remembered afterwards as the "great" plague only because it was the last widespread outbreak of bubonic plague in England during the four-hundred-year timespan of the Second Pandemic.
Source: London City Museum
Photo: Wellcome Trust Library

Xavier

Xavier has built one of the most successful buy-out firms in the world : according to the Wall Street Journal, Astorg #3, by performance, for the vintage years 1997 to 2010.

Over breakfast. Madeleine: "What would be your last wish if you were going to die?"
Me: "Not to die?"
Madeleine: "I mean seriously."
Me: "OK - To be surrounded by you, your brother and Sonnet."
Madeleine: "But what if you have a disease and we could catch it? Then we would die, too."
Me: "Good point. Any suggestions then?"
Madeleine: "Me wearing a dress ?"
Me: "Wow. You would do that?"
Madeleine: "Yeah. But only if you were really going to die."
Me:
Madeleine: "And no faking either, Dad."
Me: "I will do my very best."

Cap Ferrat

I am in Saint Jean Cap Ferrat, Cote D'Azure, France for a few days with Astorg.  CF located on a peninsula next to Beaulieu-su-Mer and Villefrance-sur-Mer and extends out to Cap Ferrat, pictured. The charm and weather attract European aristocracy and international millionaires : Larry Ellison and Bill Gates, have a place here.  In fact, the most expensive house in the world just behind my hotel, purchased by a Russian Oligarch, for €390 million. 


Madeleine and I walk home from my office. Madeleine: "Can we stop at a store? I want to buy something."

Me: "Sure. What do you want to get?"
Madeleine: "Candy. Crisps. Or beef jerky."
Me: "Beef Jerky?"
Madeleine: "I haven't had it in a really long time."
Me: "I bet."
Madeleine:"Did you know that Mr. B  [Madeleine's teacher] lives there?"
Me: "Oh? And how do we know that?"
Madeleine: "He told us. Plus he has a room mate."
Me: "A man or a woman?"
Madeleine: "A man I guess."
Me: "What would you think if he was living with a woman?"
Madeleine: "It would be OK. But only if she were married."
Me: "You mean married to another guy?"
Madeleine: "Yes."
Me: "That's interesting. What do you think would happen?"
Madeleine: "They would probably get divorced."

John Elway

Whenever I see John Elway, pictured at DIA, I think of the '82 Big Game and smile. 

Elway, coached by his father Jack, the best college QB in the nation and Stanford a top ranked football team. Cal, despite outnumbering Stanford by 33,000 students, suffering another mediocre season. Then The Play : a five lateral kickoff return touchdown, no-time left , giving Cal an improbable 25-20 victory. Followed, five days later, by Thanksgiving with my cousin Carl, the trombone player for the Stanford band which made The Play possible by being on the field. And, finally, Elway on the Today Program, in tears, interviewed by Jane Pauley. All this makes a Bears fan proud. 

Elway, for his part, drafted #1 in the NFL, played five Super Bowls (winning two), voted to nine Pro Bowls, selected NFL MVP in '87 and inducted into the NFL Hall of Fame in 2004.

Elway equally adept at business, too: co-owner of the Arena Football team Colorado Crush; owner of two steakhouse restaurants named "Elway's" (One in the upscale Cherry Creek shopping district, and the other is in the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in downtown Denver); owner of five auto dealerships, called John Elway Autos (sold to AutoNation in 1997 for $82.5 million); owner two Toyota Scion dealerships, one in Manhattan Beach, California and another in Ontario, California; owner of a Chevrolet dealership in Englewood, Colorado, and a Chrysler Jeep dealership in Greeley, Colorado.  In September 2008, Elway became the spokesperson for OpenSports.com. In 2008, Elway had LASIK eye surgery and endorsed Icon LASIK in the Denver area in November 2008.

He still does not have the Axe.

Moe Sonnet Katie

One more from the wedding.

We arrive in London in one piece.  I assign chores : Eitan gets the backyard, Madeleine the front. Plus each must write a report on a New Yorker article I hand them in Denver, which Eitan turns into paper airplanes. Fair enough.

Over dinner. Me: "What do you kids want to ask your grandparents, seeing how they are sixty years older than you."
Sonnet: "Not to put any pressure on you or anything."
Madeleine: "Like what do you mean?"
Me: "It's like looking into the future. You can ask them anything and they will answer it."
Moe, Gracie:
Me: "Anything at all."
Madeleine: "Do you like sushi?"

Marcus's Groomsmen

Usher #1 

The Best Man

Usher #3

And the Ring Bearer . .. .

Untucked

 

Madeleine, for her part, keeps her shirt tucked in throughout the service then begs me to release her from this onerous responsibility. Her whole being craves this freedom.  I relent.  Note the handkerchief in the left pocket. That's my girl.

Marcus And Adrianne Get Married

The wedding party

Me: "What do you think of Marcus and Adrianne's wedding?"
Madeleine: "I am really happy that they got married."
Me: "Why do you think they are such a good match?"
Madeleine: "Well, I can feel it when I am near them and they act really happily around each other."
Me: "Who do you think is the boss?"
Eitan: "Well, um, Marcus is kind of like you because he is funny all the time but is not quite as strict. And Adrianne is like mum because she tries hard to make everything as nice as possible for people. And tries to be as organised as possible."
Me: "Nice brown-nosing."
Eitan: "What's that mean?"
Sonnet: "What your father means is that you are trying to pay us a complement."
Eitan: "No it's not. I'm going to look it up on my Kindle."
Me: "Try a Google."
Madeleine: "I am going to ask Mr B  [Madeleine's teacher]"
Me: "I imagine he would enjoy explaining it to you."
Sonnet: "Can we put a stop to this please?"
Eitan: "I am definitely looking it up now."
Sonnet: "Let us all just be happy for Marcus and Adrianne."
Gracie: "Yes!"

Marcus And Sonnet

Brother and sister

Marcus and Adrianne's wedding day goes to plan. We awake to glorious sunshine and ready ourselves for the festivities which means an hour of preparation for Sonnet and a two-minute shower for me (Grace stays at the hotel since Maggie bites the bride's niece on the face).

The kids have to be roused from their slumber-party in Auntie Katie's room, where they have been sleeping all week; both eager to don their skinny ties and full-Windsor knots, something new for me but happily I have instructions from Macy's where I buy my lavender shirt.  Madeleine insists on a pocket kerchief and a silver tie-pin which she wears with her khaki trousers, similar to Eitan.  Both kids look fab in a 10 and 11 year old sort of way.

The bride and groom show up and in good form.

Pre Wedding

We visit the Chief Hosa lodge where tomorrow's Big Day shall take place.  Bill, who will conduct the services, assigns us our marching orders. Eitan given the responsibility of ring-bearer which he takes particularly seriously when told, by Bill, that if he loses the rings we can all go home.  Madeleine, for her part, practises her tie knot - she will wear a tie - and I look at her dress-up shoes which are black trainers (she: "but I wear them to school, Dad").  Since the groomsmen in various pastels, Sonnet irons my lavender as the pink and blue shirts taken.

As with anything involving family and family-planning there is plenty of stress but Marcus and Adrianne take it in stride. Or at least out of site. On my wedding day I chose to have a Chinese with Eric and the Best Man instead of a haircut and barber shave AND I failed to produce the wedding license. But, hey, Sonnet and I have a great marriage and laugh all the time. I wish this for Marcus and Adrianne.

Trading Post Trail

Red Rocks

We visit Red Rocks Amphitheatre, known the world over for John Denver (RIP), but also : a mecca for athletes of all ages and abilities .  The amphitheatre, which holds 9,500 spectators, built into the mountain from 1936-41 , rises 60 or so rows making for the perfect criss-cross jog or, for the more serious , straight up-and-downs, stopping occasionally for a few push ups or to catch one's breath. This is 6,340 feet.  I can see downtown Denver about 14 miles away.

When we arrive there is an outdoor yoga class with a couple hundred people getting their morning high on; others stretch in the sun on the wood seats or do balancing poses either shirtless or in colourful form-fitting Lycra (My grandmother would have been aghast).  A man proposes to his girlfriend and she whoops for joy and throws her arms around him while others clap.  Technicians prepare the stage for the annual Easter mass at sunrise tomorrow, Easter Sunday, checking the sound system with Bob Marley tunes. They erect three giant crosses. So trippy.

The earliest rock-and-roll performance at Red Rocks was the Beatles in '64. It was the only concert not sold out on their US-tour.

Rocks

The rocks in the Rocky Mountains, stretching from 3,000 miles from the northernmost British Columbia, Canada, to New Mexico formed before the mountains raised by tectonic forces. The oldest rock is Precambrian metamorphic rock that forms the core of the North American continent. There is also Precambrian sedimentary argillite, dating back to 1.7 billion years ago. During the Paleozoic, western North America lay underneath a shallow sea, which deposited many kilometers of limestone and dolomite.

The Rockies formed from 80 million to 55 million years before, like, Christ during the Laramide orogeny, a time of mountain building in western North America over the Late Cretaceous period. Since then, erosion by water and glaciers have sculpted the mountain range into dramatic valleys and peaks. At the end of the last ice age, humans started to inhabit the mountain range.

The first modern-day explorers,  Sir Alexander MacKenzie (a Brit) then Lewis and Clark, searched for minerals and furs , which drove the initial economic exploitation of the mountains.  Today it is hydraulic fracking. CO Governor John Hickenlooper, a geologist, of the persuasion : "Drill, baby, drill." (source: Rocky Mountain National Park)

"A small group of thoughtful people could change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has. "
--Margaret Mead, on a trailhead plaque entering preserved Elks Meadows

An Unfinished Story

I ask (demand) Madeleine write a story.

" Once there was a young boy called Tom.  His parents were very rich, though they never spent time with him.  They both had very good jobs that paid well.  His father's job was to design buildings.  He, for example, designed the Empire State Building.  Tom's mother made movies and won an Oscar award.

One dull, grey, day Tom was walking down a long winding road when, suddenly, the whole world seemed to flip upside down.

When the world stopped spinning, Tom opened his eyes and gasped.  He was no longer in Little Hangleton (his boring village) but he was in the swampy marshes of Africa!

Suddenly a figure came swooping from the sky on a vine.  He landed in front of Tom and Tom realised that this thing was half monkey, half human.  He had broad shoulders and long arms that reached past his knees.  He had a rough New York accent.  Tom shrank away revolted.  "Please, don't be revolted by my appearance. It was an accident in the lab." Sighed the monkey man.
"

(Presumably) to be continued . .. .

Denver Art Museum

The Avalanche

The wedding party assembles from Denver, Portland, Buffalo, Montana, Montrose, Vermont, Manchester (UK), London and, of course, Alaska.  Dinner, drinks and hockey.

Eitan catches me and Sonnet kissing: "Ew, gross! Can't you stop doing that?"
Me: "You know, Eitan, it is our love that made you."
Eitan: "But do you have to do it in front of me? "

Sonnet: "I am going to get gas - do you want to keep me company ?"
Eitan: "Ha ha ha ha ! You said gas!"

Following morning wiginess and a stand-off over exercise activities, Eitan agrees to execute a non-sugar contract, which I own during our trip:

"I will not ask for, nor receive, junk food* on the holiday to Colorado 2012.

*Junk food=candy bars, sugary snacks and ice cream."

El Rancho

Katie and Eitan occupy themselves at dinner.

El Rancho has been serving the Eastern Slope since '48, or "longer than you have been alive" Stan points out to Sonnet, having been to El Rancho long before Sonnet has been alive. The restaurant a classic steak and burger joint (note to Justin: hand-to-mouth) but it is the martinis that stand out - and why not, since we are near the Interstate with its 6% gradients from the mountains ? I can think of no better way to cruise into Denver.  Marcelle (who arrived Tuesday) and I agree: they go down nice.

We celebrate Moe's 76 birthday : the kids spend the day preparing presents . From Eitan, a hand-written story and origami flower poster; and Madeleine: a landscape painting of the mountains. Here are some things that happened in April 1936, the year Moe is born:

April 3 - Bruno Richard Hauptmann, convicted of kidnapping and killing Charles Lindbergh III, executed New Jersey

April 5 - A tornado hits Tupelo,Mississippi, killing 216 and injuring over 700 (fourth deadliest in US history)

April 11- The first Butlins holiday camp, in Skewness, NY, is officially opened by Amy Johnson from Hull, the first woman to fly solo from England to Australia.

April 19 - The 1936-39 Arab revolt in Palestine against the British Government and opposition to Jewish immigration begins.

Super Size

We go to the largest store I have ever been to, in this case, Walmart, to buy a $2.59 roll of masking tape.

Walmart has over 8,500 stores in 15 countries under 55 trading names including ASDA in the UK (which is ghastly : ASDA, to manage inventory, makes shoppers select item codes from an in-shop catalogue which are then used to draw an item forward from an underground warehouse. Believe you me I have done this once, and only once, in 15 years).  Our Walmarts today is around 200,000 square feet which is remarkable when one considers the closest town, Evergreen, has a population of 9,038 which works out to the average apartment size for a New Yorker.

While at the mall, I try on some Polo by Ralph Lauren (you know, that little green bottle with a polo player about to strike a wooden ball or a servant's head).  I have not smelled the perfume since 1982 or '83 when every 15 and 16 year old in America doused himself in it before going to school or a first date.  I sure did, and the memories come flooding back.  I consider buying a bottle for old times sake but some things should not be re-lived. Even from the glory years.

I overhear a 14 or 15 year old girl with boyfriend: "I am going to Victoria Secret, Mom. Don't worry about us."

Bride's Maid Dress

We cruise the SUV Tahoe, about the size of Maine, into Evergreen, Colorado (elev. 7,014) and a foot of snow.  Stan greets us at the hotel with a cheerful 'hello' and we are off to the airport to pick up Gracie and Moe, Katie and Maggie the dog.  This is the first time our families have been together in maybe ten years when we were re-unioned in Montrose over the winter holidays.  The Shakespeares hum with anticipation.

Emerald Lake

We hike to Emerald Lake, 10,080 feet.
 
"Ice measuring 500 feet thick moved across Bear Lake basin between 15,000 and 30,000 years ago.  Originating in the uppermost valley heads, glacial ice eroded high basins, called cirques, and quarried the sheer granite cliffs of Hallet Peak (pictured).  Rock debris from these glaciers formed the ground moraines, or ridges, that surround Emerald Lake."
--Trailhead plaque

Duckie

This is what the kids fought over all morning.

Madeleine: "Dad, Eitan keeps punching and kicking me and pushing my head under water. Make him stop."
Me: "Give it back to him double."
Madeleine: "Really nice, Dad."
Sonnet:
Me: "What? Poolside rules."

Madeleine: "Eitan is always being mean to me."
Me: "It's tough being the younger sister."
Madeleine: "You will never know."

Bones, Bolt and Bob

Me: "So who do you look up to and want to be? Who are your heroes ?"
Madeleine: "Michael Phelps and Usain Bolt."
Me: "Good choices. Why do you admire them?"
Madeleine: "Because they are in the sports that I like and they work hard. And they are winners."
Me: "Excellent. Anybody else?
Madeleine: "Bob."
Me: "Bob?"
Madeleine: "Yes, Bob. He jumped, like, seven meters in the Olympics."
Me: "Bob."
Madeleine: "I think it was 1974 or something."
Eitan: "Mine is Chris Holmes.  He is almost blind and he had three goals, to swim for his country, win a medal at the Olympics and go to Cambridge."
Me: "And did he?"
Eitan: "Yes."
Madeleine: "Plus he had a dog."
Me:
Madeleine: "A guide dog named Lotty."
Me: "It all makes sense."

Dad's note: Madeleine means the great Robert "Bob" Beamon (born August 29, 1946), an American former track and field athlete, best known for his world record in the long jump at the Mexico Olympics in 1968, which remained the world record for almost 23 years until it was broken in 1991 by Mike Powell. This is the second longest holding of this record, as Jesse Owens held the record for 25 years, 1935-1960. Powell's record has stood for over 20 years.

Brisk

The mountains temps drop from 80 degrees to snow and the kids race out of the hotel in shorts.  We get a few strange looks at Kind Coffee and the locals further baffled by the accents but, hey, that's the way this family rolls.
 
Me: "We are going to do some homework today."
Eitan, Madeleine: "No! No!"
Me: "Yep. Just because we are away does not mean we don't practise our skills."
Madeleine: "That is so unfair!"
Me: "You kids are going to be in for a shock come September, and we might as well start preparing ourselves.  I want a book report, both of you. On what you are reading."
Eitan: "Can I write a story? I will re-write the story of Heracles."
Me: "Affirmative. How about you Madeleine?"
Madeleine: "I am going to draw a painting."
Me: "Great."
Madeleine: "What should I do?"
Me: "How about something for Gracie and Moe?"
Madeleine: "OK."
Eitan: "I once had a dream that some parents forced their kids to do work on their holiday. And it was a nightmare."
Me: "Welcome to your world, little dude.
Eitan: "You don't have to seem so happy about it."

Family Peak

I don't have many of posts us together and this one taken on top of Mount Sanitas. We are with Chip and Jenn and their three fabulous kids who are about Eitan and Madeleine's age and so it is a par-tay. We meet them because of David and Tab, who Chip brought together in NYC.  Before that, Chip and David at Chemical Bank  back in the day in first-job territory.  Those bonds are tight. Now Chip travels around the world setting up financial exchanges for Morgan Stanley. Last week it was in Istanbul and before that, Kazakhstan.

The first thing one notices about Boulder is that everybody  is a freak.  We pass groups of cyclists on HW 36 (more riders than cars by a multiple) and runners who are, like, 10 miles from the nearest anything.  It gets no better in town: middle-aged women, ripped, with leathery skin having spent half their living lives outdoors.  The men no different - equally at easy in lycra spandex.  At 9:45AM, this is Sunday mind you, crowds spill onto the sidewalk drinking coffee and eating vegetables and tofu or whatever the hell one eats after three hours of working out before dawn.  Running World magazine ranks Boulder the #1 running city in America. It is also the thinnest.  This the place one goes to live to a 100. We should all be so lucky.

Trailhead, Cub Lake

From urban to outback in one day. Go figure.

Rocky Mountains

Up at 5AM - jet lag ! - and we hit the hotel pool open 24/7 just for us.  Eitan three-peats the breakfast bar.

Today we are in Estes Park and go for a medium ramble to Cub Lake, pictured, in the Rocky Mountain National Park which has 60 named peaks over 12,000 feet with Longs Peak reaching 14,259. Me: "Shall we climb it?" Eitan, Madeleine: "No! No!

"National parks are the best idea we ever had. Absolutely American, absolutely democratic, they reflect us at our best rather than our worst."
--Wallace Stagner

Patriot

Pictured : general sentiment after the long haul.  At least the Shakespeares carry their own bags.

In 1990, 11.1 million Americans had passports, according to the US State Department, or about 4% of the population (I recall an investment banker at First Boston in a panic because he had to go to Mexico for a deal and did not have his documents).  Now, 109.8 million have a pp, or 34% of US citizens (I got mine in 1980).  The change, of course, for security : Americans scrutinised by USA Patriot Act signed into law by el presidente in 2001 in response to 911.  It allows roving wiretaps, searches of business records (including libraries) and doing surveillance of "lone wolves" - individuals suspected of terrorist-related activities not linked to terrorist groups. The irony : the Patriot Act led by the Republicans who otherwise want Big Government off our backs.

So I am not surprised then, passing through US Customs, to find a digital hand scanner (this has been a feature, along with cameras, since 2008). I ask the agent who gets finger printed ? and , for now, it is foreign nationals.  Soon, though, it will be any one using an airport : in fact, this would occur now but there is not the budget to tag and track every American. I note that this is an invasion of privacy and the agent replies happily: "only if you are a bad guy."

USA Patriot Act acronym : Uniting (and) Strengthening America (by) Providing Appropriate Tools Required (to) Intercept (and) Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001

We connect in Dallas. Madeleine: "Gosh, I've never been to Texas before."

America Here We Come

We depart Terminal 5 this morning which now seems like last month after a 14 hour flight to Denver connecting via Dallas.  Eitan and Madeleine bloat on media including "Puss in Boots" (Eitan), "Sherlock Homes" (Madeleine), Simpsons (both) , Lion King (both), Premiere League football highlights (Eitan) and other in-flight crapola (Me, I read "War And Peace." No kidding - I really am ).

Me: "Good news, guys, they are going to let you on the plane." 

Eitan: "Yessss!"

Me: "You know, Madeleine, if they find a knife or a gun when you are going through security they lock you in that room over there, sometimes for three or four weeks."

Madeleine: "Really? Mom, is dad joking?"

Sonnet:

Me: "I never joke about security."

Madeleine: "Now I know you are joking."

Me to security guard, winking: "Do you lock kids up in that room for three or four weeks if you find a knife or a gun in their bag?"

Security officer: "Yes siree. We take passenger safety seriously here young lady. I would hate to see you in that room for a while . ."

Me: "See?"

Madeleine: "Oh my God."

Good Bye Rusty+Girls

I take Rusty to the kennel, feeling guilty, as we depart for Colorado tomorrow.  Rusty is all, like, "woof, woof, woof" and I am sure he knows he is being dished off.  Maggie, for instance, gets first class treatment and travels with my mom whenever she flies, like this week, when we will see them in the Rockies.

I drive Eitan, Jack and Joe to football practise. Me: "So who do all the boys fancy?"
Eitan: "Dad!"
Joe: "J - everybody fancies her."
Jack: "In my class, it's A."
Joe: "They all fancy her. But she is really annoying. And she stinks."
Me: "She stinks?"
Joe: "Yeah."
Me:
Joe: "Like perfume. And I have to sit next to her all the time."
Jack: "Ha ha!"
Eitan:
Me: "So what do you boys do if you fancy a girl?"
Joe: "Well, everybody knows it.  Like S, he fancies J 95% and B 80%."
Me: "That doesn't even add up. It must be the addition of L'Amour."
Eitan:
Me:  "Do your palms get all sweaty and you break out into a terrible rash?"
Eitan: "It's not like we're teen-agers or anything."

Eitan and I watch Mission Impossible III; Tom Cruise kisses a women and takes off her blouse:
Eitan: "Arggh, Uggg!"
Me: "Turn away! Turn away!"
Eitan: "Why do they always have to do that?"

Post Practice

I pick up Madeleine from swim practise, pictured, while Eitan jumps in for his two hour work out. It is all about the logistics : Madeleine and Zara get a ride to the pool from Zara's au pair; an hour later, Eitan and I pick up Georgia (Zara's sister) and I drop them off while collecting Madeleine and Zara for their return home. Thalia (Georgia's mom) picks up Georgia and Eitan after their session finished.

Sonnet: "Has anybody fed the dog?"
Me: "No. Madeleine feed the dog."
Madeleine: "Why should I do that?"
Me: "Feed the dog and I will give you the thing I got you in Paris."
Madeleine: "Are you lying?"
Me: "No."
Madeleine: "So you are not  lying?"
Me: "No I am not lying."
Madeleine: "So this is not a gamble?"
Me:
Sonnet: "Good word."

Blue

Me: "What's in your pocket?"
Madeleine: "Um, nothing."
Me: "Come on, let me see it."
Madeleine: "It's nothing . . "
Me: "Out, please."
Madeleine pulls a roll of "Butter Candies" from her pocket: "I wasn't going to show you because it was a surprise."
Me: "Oh, really now?"
Madeleine: "Yes, Dad. I was going to surprise you with a gift."
Me: "Do you think I was born yesterday?"

Later. Me: "What's in your mouth?"
Madeleine: "Mffmmm."
Me: "You have a Butter Candy in your mouth. You are so busted."
Madeleine:  "I wasn't trying to hide it or anything."
Me: "Oh?"
Madeleine: "You never believe me when I tell you anything."
Me: "I always believe you, just not everything you tell me."
Madeleine: "What's that supposed to mean?"
Me: "Spit it out please."
Madeleine: "You are so mean."

Place de la Concorde

Out of picture: the crescent moon+Venus and Mercury - the only lights in a sky otherwise drowned out by Paris.

Girlz

Madeleine and I contemplate the future , which is in our face at the Kingston mall.

And some food for thought : The number of teenagers living in Britain will decline by 10% over the next decade. By 2017 there will 4.9million of them, down from 5.4M today, according to the Office of National Statistics.  The fall due to the so-called 'baby slump' which occurred from the 1970s , when women began having far fewer children (and far more fun).  Compared with the baby boom of the 1960s, birth-rates have steadily fallen thanks to the pill and family planning.  This impacts everything from education to retail.  Sonnet and I are happy to make a contribution.

When the Shakespeares younger, I had them evenly scared of teen-agers : "Look!" I would say. "Teen-agers in their natural habitat. Smoking cigarettes and holding hands."  We would peek through the curtains and thank goodness we did not have them in our house. This about the time I told Eitan and Madeleine that , when a fellow falls in love , his hands turn sweaty, he cannot think straight, and he starts babbling like an idiot .  Both kids horrified by the prospect of love : they, then, ensemble : "La la lala la la la la llllaaaa."

Shop 'Til U Drop

Madeleine and I have a day together which means, after the dog-walk, I am pre-occupied with the wi-fi and other home-tech CRAP that I would rather NOT be doing on the NICEST day of the year so far.  At noon I give up on the Edimax range extender to wash the conservatory windows and lay chores on the Shakespeares.  So far, it's bleak. Sonnet escapes to the V and A to process an acquisition : "lots of random little things" (she tells me now).

The afternoon turns for the better, as it always does on a Saturday in spring, and I take Eitan to Nadine and Kate's joint-birthday party at Kingston bowling. Post drop, Madeleine and I shop for Uncle Marcus' April wedding. We start at the old stalwart Marks & Spencer which is, like, endless Dockers. We then hit the High Street : Gap, Northface, Apple .. I suggest green trousers ("No way Dad! Mom would kill me") and here we are at Uniqlo for Dad, who flirts with the cashier with a nice smile, red-dyed hair and a dinosaur tattoo on her arm that looks like the Loch Ness monster ("I also have one on my ankle and other places" she tells me - "other places" left unsaid)

The great thing about shopping with  Madeleine is that she shops for boy clothes. We aim for the same stores. She has terrific style, too, and, on her recommendation, I get a new pair of trainers. Sweet.

Any Given Morning

Emily

Emily, pictured, is in Eitan's class and the smartest kid in her year. She might be the smartest 6th grader I have ever met.  Emily accepted to every secondary school she applied to and will attend Lady Eleanor Holles, which is next to the Hampton School so she and Eitan will take the coach together. I tell her "no funny business" which makes her squirm, poor dear.

Madeleine has Zac over for a play date. They do what all boys love to do : try to catch frogs in the backyard pond, have a water-fight and, now, they are at Helen and Martin's jumping on the trampoline.

V. Collis

Eitan's primary plays Collis on the home pitch in the borough school semi-finals. We lose 7-3 to a superior team.  Coach hoping we would meet Collis in the finals as SM the second best team in Richmond.

Eitan, this morning: "It smells like America."
Me: "What does that mean?"
Eitan: "I don't know. It just does."

Mal Boeuf

God bless McDonald's.  God bless America. 

Last year, McDonald's had its strongest comparable store sales in the US since '06 and it plans to invest $2.9 billion in 2012 to open another 1,300 stores including 250 across Europe and France.  This data remarkable when once considers 2004 : Jim Cantalupo, the CEO, died of a heart attack 16 months in the job. Seven months later, his successor, Charlie Bell diagnosed with cancer and resigned. Then there was the film Super Size Me which showed the dire effects of eating at, well, McDonald's.

Super Size probably the best thing to happen to McDonald's, which went into overdrive to upgrade the quality of the dining experience, including the food, while bringing "value-meals" to recession-hit eaters : it introduced a dollar-menu.   The combination a winner, too, and the 33,510 restaurants made $27 billion of turnover in 2011, up from $19 billion in 2004 (Burger King, by comparison, was $2.3B in 2011 and $1.8B in 2004). In February, McDonald's had its 106th consecutive moth of positive same-store sales growth in the USA.

Of course McD's success comes at a cost: obesity rates for children and Hispanics, where McDonald's focuses its marketing, have risen disproportionately since '06 according to Corporate Accountability Intl. Photo from the www.

"When your stores are generating that much money, the question is how do you keep growing?"
--Draren Tristano, restaurant consulting firm Technomic

Self Portrait XXIV

Madeleine: "There's a kid in our class. And he had a heart operation. And they sowed his heart together with cow skin."
Me: "Oh?"
Madeleine: "I think so."
Me: "There are a lot of people who need hearts, you know.  For an operation."
Madeleine: "Do you mean if you are, like, 70, and going to die in three weeks, they can take your heart?"
Me: "I think doctors are more interested in younger donors.  Did you know that I am a heart donor? "
Madeleine: "Really?"
Me: "Yes. I filled out the donor papers so, if I die, and somebody needs my heart, they can take it."
Madeleine: "What do you mean?"
Me: "Well, assume that I am at an intersection waiting to cross the street and a helicoptor comes landing down and - whack! - one of the blades lops off my skull and my brains spill out."
Madeleiene: "That would never happen, Dad."
Me: "I'm just saying. So, there I am, brains and blood everywhere, so the ambulance arrives and cuts out my heart."
Madeleine: "Would they really do that?"
Me: "Yep."
Madeleine: "Even if you are still alive?"
Me: "Of course not. That's why they have a mallet. Every ambulance has one, you know."
Madeleine: "Now I know you are joking."
Me: "No, way. You have to be dead if they are going to take your heart. So they wack your head a couple times with the mallet. To make sure you are dead."
Madeleine: "Could they get in trouble? I mean, if you are still alive?"
Me: "Only if there is a law suit.  When the lawyers get involved there is always trouble."
Madeleine: "Can helicopters really land in the street ?"

Shard

The Shard nearly complete. Omnipresent.

I am at the far edge of the City for a meeting with an asset manager who may sell us some venture assets cheap. The 12th floor view uninterrupted five-miles to Canary Wharf on the Isle of Dogs and the Olympic Development Center in northeast London.  This area got shallacked by the Germans, aiming for the docks, during the Second World War; afterwards, it became a wasteland, deprived of transportation links and home to new ethnic arrivals looking to build a new life for their families. Now, areas like Shoreditch and Hockney, have become la mode complete with gays and dance clubs and trendy restaurants .. . bowling lanes.  A vibrant start-up tech community has grown from the area's dot-com 'new media' roots and Google opened up a tech centre in 'Silicon Roundabout' near  Old Street just last week.

Overheard between two schleppers in the City:  
"I've got a bit of an interesting day today. I'm going to prepare a 'what if' scenario and the Big Boss isn't going to like it."

The Real Mitt Romney

Kreos

My friends from Industry Ventures in town for Kreos Ventures AGM - Kreos is a venture-debt firm that is now a "growth debt to high-growth companies" since nobody in Europe wants to invest in European venture anymore.  The keynote given by an older dude that I have known for some time whose presentation a bunch of cartoons describing how terrible private equity is , which manages to bore and insult everybody at the same time - no small feat. He  manages assets for wealthy individuals and families and, if he took questions, I would ask : why are you here ?

Otherwise it is a happy gathering at Sommerset House overlooking the Thames on a gorgeous early-spring morning, everything shiny.  This is one of my favorite places in London.  Sommerset House once home to the Admiralty (Churchill) and the Inland Revenue and Registrar offices before somebody realised the building too beautiful for admin.  The Courdault Art Institute here, too, which brought Sonnet and us to London, and home of one of the most efficient collections of impressionist paintings anywhere : Modigliani, Monet, Manet, Gaugin, Pissaro, van Gogh, Sauret , Degas .. .  today I see an exhibition of neo-platicists Piet Mondrian and Ben Nicholson : only 20 paintings in two galleries but, oh, so perfect to capture them at their creative peak during the Second World War.

At Kreos I bump into George, an investor in Ezoka, and we catch up on old times and people. George founded Intel Capital then opened Benchmark's European offices when I met him.  Today he invests in clean energy on behalf of Europe's largest family.  Back in the heady false dawn of the Internet, George and I drank martinis at Dukes, out to conquer the world.

Rusty At Work

I take the pooch to work. Rusty generally pretty good, too, mostly keeping to himself and not jumping on the tenants. We usually go for a lunch-time run along the Thames : good for the dog, good for me.  I begin southside - there is a well-used towpath - by Barnes , then St Paul's and the Hammersmith Bridge, my favourite, which I cross and return north side for a five-mile loop. Rusty off-lead for a third of the time which gives him a chance to chase squirrels. Now he naps.

San Fran - Madeleine Dishes

San Francisco - fog free! - from an oblique-angle in 2004.  Image from the Space Imaging and NASA Earth Observatory.

Madeleine refuses to finish dinner and so we stair at each other across the table.  No desert, Sonnet-made chocolate chip cookies+vanilla ice cream, unless she eats her rice and chick peas (she glares at me).  I helpfully remind the girl that she had plenty of room for the ice cream truck (she uses her fork to spread some chicken across her plate).  Lying back in her chair, big sigh : "I'm done." When this don't fly it's both elbows on table and the scratch of cutlery on plate. Poke, poke, poke.  "You know, Dad, you always spend time on your computer and never with us" but I know her game: she aims to distract from the subject-to-hand. "Are you going to make me eat the bones or what?" Finally, I compromise: three bites but I am the judge re size. She measures each to the acceptable limit, Dear Reader, and quickly fills her mouth before I require more. Then bolts.