Posts Tagged ‘Antibes’

Over the past couple of weeks, we have gone from helping G climb stairs to watching. Yep, that’s right! Guilliana has informed us that she is big enough to climb stairs on her own now. Check out the video below as we are at the local “jardin” (garden/park) where G loves to hang out, climb the equipment, slip down the slide, and generally just be a kid!

I stopped filming just short of the little troll in the pink shirt pushing G out of the way ONLY to stand on the slide and let NO other kids go down. Looks like daddy going to have to start giving G-Monkey hockey fighting lessons! The little girl (more appropriately little “brat”) had ZERO manners and would be considered the bully at the playground!

Lesson #1 – Grab opponent’s collar at the back of their shirt. Pull shirt over opponent’s head so they can’t see. First punch to your opponent’s nose and then unload a flurry of rights and lefts until opponent begs for mercy. Nice work. You have now graduated to Lesson #2 (to be determined…as needed).

Au revoir, mon amis!

Despite now living in France, I continue to read daily news from my home country of Canada. I like to try to stay in touch with what is happening even if I don’t live there anymore. My site of preference? The Globe and Mail. Earlier today I was reading an article that made a statement that Canadians are still waiting for Hulu to come to Canada. Really? Let me tell you…you don’t have to wait! The article sparked my interest to write a blog and share a bit of information (software program) that we have recently discovered. For the record…you can get any US service: Hulu.com, Netflix.com, MLB.com, US TV station (ABC, NBC, FOX, etc) playbacks, Spotify.com, and whatever other service you fancy regardless of where you are located! Read on and I’ll tell you all about it.

<< "techie/geek" hat now on >>
Most of you probably know that these US services block you from viewing them based upon your IP (Internet Protocol) address. Every country has a unique set of addresses and company websites can filter to be sure that only IP address within their own country are able to view their content (Also don’t forget…the international laws that probably prohibit such transmissions).
<< "techie/geek" hat now off >>

We were recently introduced to a service that allows you to watch any US service from any country in the world! (Special shout out…”Thank you” to a good friend & amazing WordPress developer, Andrew Ryno!) What’s the service you may ask? –> HideMyAss.com – “a free web proxy is a secure service that allows you to surf anonymously online in complete privacy. For more advanced features our Pro VPN service adds increased security and anonymity on to your existing internet connection”.

I can tell you first hand, this service is AWESOME! We pay for the HMA! Pro service HMA! Pro. HMA allows us to watch Hulu along with other sites like ABC.com, NBC.com, & FOX.com without any issue. On top of this…we can surf the internet completely anonymous and all our communication is encrypted! This part comes in handy particularly if we happen to be at an internet cafe where their network isn’t secured. Fire up HMA and surf away! For a 1-year subscription of the service, the cost is $79 ($6.55/month). Now…that is “smoking” cheap to be able to enjoy all this programming from anywhere in the world and have all my internet communications encrypted. HMA literally has 154 servers in 31 countries and you have the ability to choose what country you would like an IP address from. You can literally hide behind 17,500+ IP’s. Good luck on tracking me down now, Mr. Bad Guy! Pretty sweet!

Obviously we always choose to have an IP from the USA and then fire up Hulu and voila! Within 5 mins we are watching the latest episode of Cougartown, House, you name it! Best of all? After 12 years of missing the World Junior Championships every Christmas, this year I will get to watch them on TSN.ca! My IP address on December 26 will be from Canada. I will be cheering from our couch here in France with my Team Canada jersey on and watching our boys compete for GOLD once again! Go Team Canada!

To all our friends in Canada and abroad…enjoy HMA! Watch what you want from your laptop on your own terms!

Au revoir, mon amis!

Yesterday Katherine, Guilliana and I took a walk down to the marina, Port Vauban. We have heard from some of the locals here in Antibes that Port Vauban is the largest leisure port in the World. I have to say…it is quite spectacular! There are some amazing boats, errr YACHTS, that are docked here.

Quoted from Wikipedia:
 

Port Vauban is a French yachting harbor located in Antibes on the French Riviera. Originally a natural harbor in use since before the Roman Empire, the port was fortified by Sébastien Le Prestre, Seigneur de Vauban, later Marquis de Vauban, King Louis XIV’s military engineer.

Port Vauban now serves as the home of the Yacht Club d’Antibes and is the largest marina (in terms of total tonnage of the boats and yachts moored there) in the Mediterranean Sea. Some of the world’s largest and most lavishly appointed yachts have Port Vauban as their home port, including Russian oil businessman Roman Abramovich’s 86 m Ecstasea and his gift to fellow Russian businessman Eugene Shvidler (Le Grand Bleu). Co-founder of Microsoft Paul Allen’s yacht Octopus is a regular visitor to the harbor.

To view the slideshow, click the “yacht” below!

Last week I decided to get out of the house and get some fresh air. Since March this year I have been working completely 100% remotely here in Antibes. However as of tomorrow, August 1, I will have to go back into the office once again. This isn’t exactly to my liking but necessary to continue employment. (For the record, if any of you reading this needs (…ahem, wants to hire) a great software, web application developer, I’m your guy!)

Remote work has treated me well, allowed me to stay at home and see my daughter every single day. I can say that I’m extremely grateful for that and wish it could continue! I’m going to miss working from home BUT will continue my search for more remote work. I think the best part about working from my home office is that my days aren’t 8 consecutive hours of working. I can work for 4 hrs then break for lunch. After eating & playing with Guilliana, I can then come back to my desk and work a couple more hours. I then typically break for afternoon coffee for an hour to relax, collect my thought, and draw up solutions for whatever software issues I may have encountered during the day/week. After coffee I finish my remaining 2-3 hrs and then call it a day. One last benefit to remote work is my commute. I step outside my office and, across the hallway, Guilliana is playing with her toys where I can join her…immediately!

As I was saying…I decided to get some fresh air and hopped on my handcrafted, Canadian-made “Rocky Mountain Slayer 50″ mountain bike and headed off to check out Fort Carre (pronounced Car-ray) and Port Vauban (pronounced vo-bun) both of which just happen to be right down the street from us.

Next time I will have pics from an actual tour of the entire Fort. Unit then…here are last week’s pics…enjoy the slideshow!

Take care, mon amis!

Au revoir!

Actual pics can be found here Fort Carre Album

Here is Guilliana waking up first thing in the morning after her usual 12-hr night sleep. As you can imagine, 12 hours of sleep results in one HUGE diaper that needs some serious attention! Listen closely as we ask G-Monkey if she needs her diaper changed in both French & English. Not surprisingly her answer doesn’t change!

Recently G-Monkey figured out how to tell mommy & daddy what she wants. It’s clear a the day to her so check her out and let me know when/what you figure she wants!

Turns out…she wanted the cordless phone. Who knew! LOL!

Unfortunately I missed the first part of this conversation when I decided to reach for my phone. (Daddy has to remember his iPhone is more than just a phone and can whip it out as a video recorder at a moment’s notice!) I wanted Katherine it see the funny, silly things that G does when I’m feeding her dinner prior to her getting home at night.

In this particular video, it’s like I’m not even there in room for the first bit despite sitting right in front of her. I would really love to know what she’s thinking and where her little thoughts are taking her.

Now at 14 months, you can just see the wheels turning inside her head when we ask her questions. She has a very good understanding of english and knows exactly what we are saying to her. Not only that…BUT we moved here 4 months ago and G-Monkey has spent 8-9hrs a day each week with her Nounou (nanny), Carole. Nounou speaks french to Guilliana all day long and now, she actually understands more french than english! How crazy is that? Guilliana is at the perfect age to learn both languages since she was just beginning to comprehend english prior to our US departure. At her age, she’s a little sponge for all the information she can absorb.

When we ask her “Qu’est-ce qu’une vache dire?”…her response…”Moooooo!” Yep, that’s right, a cow says “Mooo.” Regardless of the language the question is asked for a cow (or vache), her answer is always “Moooo!” Likewise with a cat or dog question, she knows we are asking her the same thing in french and english. It’s amazing watching her go through the changing stages of development and it blows my mind at the same time! I can’t tell is G is speaking French or English…maybe you can decide.

See you soon, friends. Au revoir!

This is just too cute not to post! A few weeks ago before we moved into our new place, I shot this video of Miss G showing us how to dance. We bought her a new audiobook that reads to her and sings songs. It’s her new favorite book! Seriously, how many times can one kid press the same button! Hahaha.

Well…it only took 11 weeks (6 weeks longer than it was supposed to) AND I didn’t have to kill either one of the cats…but we have finally moved into our new home. Mind you our move didn’t come without challenges as well…heck, I’m not sure anything went “smoothly” in this whole adventure so far. HOWEVER, I have to say, Katherine picked out a great apartment for us to live in. It’s awesome – perfect size and location, right in the heart of Antibes!

At first I wasn’t quite sure how everything was going to look or even where it was going to go but everything has now been unpacked and organized. With a few minor purchases, most of the rooms are now complete. (Pictures to come in a subsequent post!)

As I mentioned, not all went off without a hitch. Unfortunately not all of our things arrived in the condition we remember them being packed by Interdean Shipping! It probably didn’t help that our things went through 2 extensive Customs (Italian & French) inspections. Not sure how our things ended up in Italy when its destination was France but…who knows!

We had quite a bit of damage to a number of items with one of the worst being our credenza. The nice dark, wood finish on top looks like the one corner had been dragged across the pavement. Also, our king-sized, white, Duxiana mattress also looked like it was partaking in the same pavement surfing contest as our credenza! The mattress was delivered without any packaging on it at all and was extremely dirty and torn! Even Miss G’s stuff wasn’t immune to destruction. Her armoire was delivered with 3 legs although I’m quite positive it had 4 when it left Arizona! Now how the hell is it supposed to stand?

Come on, seriously? Is it that hard to move people’s belongings without decimating it all, or at least the valuable stuff? I’m certainly glad we took out extra insurance on all of our things. At rough-estimate calculations, we have totalled up just over €15,000 ($21,300 USD) in damages…YIKES, WTH?!? Now comes the agonizing part…we have to fight with the insurance company about the value of things. For the most part, it should be already quantified in a spreadsheet the shipping company required us to fill out with values on everything being shipped prior to packing. BUT…we all know how insurance companies work; get screwed paying high premiums and get even more screwed when trying to make a claim to replace your damaged possessions! So…we’ll see how many rounds this fight is going to go! We’re not giving up easy so they best be ready for a brawl! (Can somebody pass the “foil”?)

On top of these incurred damages, a few items just never showed up! (They must have jumped off the pier in Italy!) Four items, in fact…

• the 4 slats to our bed that hold the boxspring & mattress in place. (Ummm, kind of need these!)
• a 6-ft step ladder
• a 24-ft extension ladder
• 15lb bag of cat food

Seems like a odd combination to go missing, do you think? Yeah, that’s what I thought too! Anyway, again, that’s what insurance is for.

A tip from me to you…and a valuable lesson learned…(especially for our eventual move back to the US)…make sure your have the moving company wrap anything that is valuable 3 to 4 times as well, make them triple pad the corners of everything! This would have saved a lot of our wooden furniture from extensive damage.

Au revoir!

A couple of weeks ago I had to fly to Los Angeles, CA to apply for and pick up my French visa! Long trip you say? It definitely was – 15hrs of flying on the way there and 24hrs traveling back (with 8hr time change included)! Yep…LOOOOONG trip although British Airways definitely made it a lot more confortable in Economy Plus class! Ooooh…I wracked up some serious air miles on this trip too! Cha-CHING! Thanks BA!

Seems a bit odd that I would have to fly from Nice to LA when I’m already in France, right? Well…like a lot of the long, paper processing routines here in France in order to obtain a French visa, you have to go to the nearest Consulate to your home address. Yep…since we don’t legally “live” in France yet, my home is still Arizona and the closest French Consulate is in LA. And, thus, explains the trip.

Before anyone gets all “bent” on the fact that I had my iPhone “on” during take-off & landing in the plane, let me first say that this isn’t something that I normally do when flying. Ever! I abide by the rule of the air always and turn my phone completely off when the Captain requests that passengers do so. However, this time I decided that I was going to photo document my trip and made sure I put my phone in “Airplane Mode” so as not to receive any form of communication (text, calls, whatever).

As always…enjoy the slideshow and I will see you soon!

Au revoir, mon ami!

Full-sized pics (with captions) can be found here. Trip pics