07.18.2008
Toulouse Part 2
Day Four: TGIF!!!

The work day today was quite long but started off fairly well. I actually got up on time. I met some of the guys from Tewksbury, England down in the hotel restaurant eating breakfast who were here for an ‘emergency’ on some other Airbus/Moog program. In the end, it turned out to be nothing but a false alarm since what was wrong was not what they were here to work on, but something else, as they had said all along. Ah….I love this place. Lol.

We chatted for a bit and I talked to them about my org chart problem that I showed you yesterday, and all of the other gripes I have had in the last 3 months about this program. I guess I’ll spout off to anyone that will listen. Hahha…..

So after I got into the office, Daniel and I got some coffee (which are really so small it’s almost useless) and got to work. We continued on the slides and spent some time discussing a few new ideas of how to increase the accuracy of some stuff we are designing to be more compliant with what’s required.

Soon enough, it came time to go to lunch and we headed over to Moog Toulouse (TF) to pick up the Tewksbury guys and head to the pizza place next door. It is called Espace Vital which I have no idea what it means, but ya.

So they have two menus, one in French and one in English. So we get 3 English ones (one for me and two for the Brits) and one in French for Daniel. In going through the menu, there were some sketchy translations that made me laugh. One was “The team of Espace Vital hope to set you agog” as seen below.

This was obviously a Babelfish translation gone horribly wrong. There was also this weird category of food under “Served on Flaky Boil” which I guess somehow translates into salad? I dunno. I never figured that one out.

I stayed conventional and got a pizza. This one had a tomato base and had ham, chorizo, and cheese, but no egg. The chorizo here isn’t like the pasty chorizo in LA, it’s solid meat, like you can slice it off like a piece of salami. So that’s the dark meat on there and the lighter pink meat is the ham.

It was really good and I have been craving this pizza since I arrived. It’s really good and there’s nothing like it in LA. The cheese is so much different as well as the tomato sauce, it’s really good. They also serve this pizza with a crème base, but I didn’t think my stomach could take that and a beer, so I stuck to the tomato base.

One of the unfortunate parts of eating here is that every 10 minutes or so you have to stop talking to let the plane fly over. This restaurant is at the start of the runway, so they come down pretty low over the top, and it’s a bit scary most of the time because it looks like they are gonna drop the plane on top of your head.

So right next door is Moog TF which is being remodeled right now. If this building was finished, we’d be working in there instead of the dungeon, also known as the Airbus basement. So here are some colorful, yes colorful pictures of the inside.

I guess the French offices are fairly colorful in general, so this isn’t out of the ordinary I’m told. I dunno that I could deal, but it doesn’t seem to bother anyone here.

So, I saw this guy cutting a piece of tile outside of Moog TF.

Now, I’m really sorry I didn’t get the front side of this guy because it was classic. He was standing there using this fairly high speed saw to cut this really small piece of tile he had pushed up against his hip while having a cigarette dangling from his mouth. Dangerous much? I think so. No safety glasses, no safety shoes, no hard hat……nothing. It’s awesome. I think our safety lady would have a heart attack if she saw that.

On the way back, I was asking Daniel how people park in spaces like this.

I really think its close to impossible. I mean with these small cars and some practice I could get it down, but dang, I dunno that I would have the energy to jam my car in a space that big (small) every time I wanted to park. Thanks to the US for its big gas guzzling SUVs (ahem) and monster sedans for providing us with large parking spaces and wide streets. Daniel claims he can do it in 3 turns without touching either car. I may have to get him to show me how it’s done.

Poussez = Push. I think I did this one last time, so I'll have to get more creative. Sorry.

Sweet lowrider in the Airbus parking lot. lol.

When I first got in this morning, Daniel asked if I would like to come over and meet his wife and two kids and have dinner with them. I was very happy that I would finally meet his family. After talking with the guy everyday for the last 6 months, it’s really nice to meet his wife and kids that he always talks about. So I followed him in his yellow truck over to his house, which is about 20 minutes away.

He has a nice little townhouse that he bought about 3 years ago and remodeled a bit to make it more comfortable. At the time, it was just the two of them and their little boy Aubin (pronounced O-bin) so it is a narrow townhouse with three levels; however they admit now with a baby girl Anouk (not sure of the spelling here, but pronounced A-nook) it is a bit small.

It has been nicely remodeled with work he mostly did himself with the help of his father and his step-father. The thing I like the most is how the 2^nd floor has an open ceiling up to the 3^rd floor.

They sleep one the 3^rd floor with the baby Anouk and Aubin’s room is on the 2^nd floor. I asked him if he picked the decorations and he said “No, but I execute them,” which sounds just like how things go in the US. Hahha…..

What’s nice about his place is that even though he doesn’t have a backyard or a garden, has a nice park across the street (it also provides him with space to park his truck). The other thing that is nice is that it’s a small town that provides them with everything they need/want within walking distance.

So upon arrival, I met his two children, Aubin (boy, 2 ½ yrs) and Anouk (girl, 8 months) who are awesome. They are the cutest no? Its amazing how light their hair and eyes are when both their parents have dark eyes and dark hair.

After we met the kiddos, we had to jump on a conference call with the big shots at 7pm (10am PST) to go over some design work. That lasted an hour and after that, we walked down the corner to pick up the pizza they had ordered for dinner.

Dinner was very good and even though his wife Kris (I don’t know the spelling) didn’t speak much English, we understood each other just fine.

In the picture you can see the pizza above, some duck pate (green plate), garlic shrimp in olive oil (right bowl), fried duck skin (in the left bowl), Genoa ham (top right plate), bread, and some pear cider. It was all very good, especially the duck pate, which I couldn’t stop eating.

Here's a another pic of dinner a little earlier, but it doenst show all of the food.

After dinner we talked a bit and before it got too late I headed back to the hotel to knock out shortly after 1am. I must have been pretty exhausted because here I am posting this blog at 1pm after sleeping almost 12 hours. Hahah….I think my internal clock is still screwed up. I’m sure I’ll get the hang of things as soon as its time to head back to LA. Hahhaa…..

Okies….well I’m off to explore Toulouse today. Have a nice weekend guys. I miss you lots.

Aurevoir.