02.22.2008
Day Six:
Friday, Le début du week-end (The start of the weekend)

The Friday workday went by pretty quickly. Lunch came in a flash. On Fridays, most of the guys from work go home to see their families or wives for some reason, so I was left with one of the EA guys. For those of you not up to speed, we have a Moog facility in East Aurora, NY,(referred to as EA from here on out) which is just outside Buffalo. I’ve never been there, and I am trying to not go there since the weather is a piece of crap out there almost the whole year long. Anyways, there’s some bad blood over there with the Torrance guys b/c we do things a different way than they do, so there’s some conflicts there, but nothing that can’t be worked out. So I have no idea what that has to do with this blog so I’ll just stop there.

Oh yea, ok….so I went to lunch with this guy from EA, and we decided to walk down to St. Martin du Touch to get some sandwiches from a little market/bakery over there. St. Martin du Touch is about a 15 minute walk down from Moog TF (Toulouse Facility) and in that time we did a little get to know each other session since it’s basically going to be just him and I here for a few days.

So I got this big pita sandwich with ham, vegetables, and some other stuff in it, and it was ok. I also got a small square piece of ham and cheese pizza. Everywhere I go, they seem to have pizza. There is also a big pizza place next to Moog TF, literally next to it, like on the other side of the fence. We went there on Tuesday, and I could probably eat there everyday if it was really that close to work, but it’s a bit far from the Airbus facility, hence why we’ve only been there once. But yea, so lunch was good and work went on until about 6pm.

Since I was itching to get out of there, but my French and I counterpart needed to talk to my boss, we just went back to my apartment to make the call, since it was on his way home. All was good and we were on our way, except that he has this HUGE big yellow bus that he drives when he’s not riding his motorcycle. Now, being the huge car guy that I am, have not been impressed with ANY of the vehicles I have seen so far, but this bus of his is quite a site. So I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves here:

So now that you've seen the outside, you figure, ok, well that's kind of big to drive around the city, what the heck is the point in that thing? And really, baby seats in the front seat? Yikes! But here's where it gets good, check out whats the in back:

I mean really, isn't that thing ridiculous? I guess he purchased it in that condition, and then added a few things to spice it up. He's a big traveler, and so his wife and kids all travel around France, and when they go, it's very convenient for them to travel along with everyone in tow, but in a civilized manner. I thought this thing was totally awesome, hopefully he didn't think i was laughing at him, but its a great idea. Who needs an in car DVD system? Just build them a bed and put them to sleep.

Well, after taking care of business on the phone with Torrance, I decided to head down to the city for my first experience on my own and to scope out the place for Saturday evening. I took the Metro again down to the city, which is a sweet deal really since its only 2,50EU round trip and there’s free parking at the Basso Cambo right down the way here.

I was a bit overwhelmed with the activity there on Friday night, it was much busier than it had been during the week. There are all kinds of teenagers running around like idiots there, not to mention some of the people my age that are idiots too.

There are several different districts around the city, but it’s all really one big place to be honest. One of the nice things is that there is a small market like this one every few blocks, so wherever you live, you can just walk down and get whatever you need from the local market. It’s too bad I’m staying in the ghetto, so things like this are pretty inconvenient.

While I was taking a picture of the market, this…….thing…………drove by. It was so weird, but I guess if the streets are so small it’s almost impossible to get a tow truck in there. I found this rather amusing, and stood for a few seconds afterwards watching them go down the street. Pretty funny.

I continued down the street for many blocks until I got to the end, which is the Garonne river. Along the river, is a big park, and you can sit by the river and eat and drink.

There are a few bars along the street above the river, but I didn’t stop, I was just scoping it out for the Saturday.

I did have tot stop and make sure the shoes got some love, since they are the only pair of Jays I brought on my trip, and they are getting plenty of action during the trip.

After my walk down to the river, I decided to eat back in the city at Le Captiole. Since I’m dining by myself, I figured I should eat somewhere with a view, and since the weather was perfect, I found a nice table outside at this restaurant called Le Florida. I had a nice spot outside facing Le Capitole.

I had a few glasses of wine, and my main course was this filet of a fish called sea bream; I am not sure what kind of white fish it was really, but it was close to sea bass the waiter said. It was baked with a ton of garlic and some natural spices and came with some really good rice pilaf and vegetables.

I ended the night with dinner since I had to be back for my Boeing telecon tonight from 10pm-midnight French time, which is 1-3pm PST. I ended the night with a beer and some soccer highlights from the week. Overall, not a bad night.

BTW.....what's up with this small ass beer? It is only 0.25L in this bottle. So sad that I have to drink like two of these for a normal bottle. It seems like such a waste of glass. lol.

On to Day 7!