Some of the haiku I wrote this week were tagged #haiku #humour #yoda and they were an amusing attempt at writing haiku as the character Yoda from Stars Wars might do, with his odd endearing manner of speaking and succinct wisdom.

To: info@cannes-centre.pizza-shop.fr, postmaster@cannes-centre.pizza-shop.fr, contact@cannes-centre.pizza-shop.fr, riviera@angloinfo.com, riviera.forums@angloinfo.com.

CC: info@mister-pizza.com, contact@mister-pizza.com, postmaster@mister-pizza.com

(Note that some addresses may not be active, though RFC requirements do require a postmaster@ address, though many domains choose to ignore this at their peril.)

I thank you for being fuckers.

For all the claims of quality, you fail to respect service. I’ve already
announce on Twitter #Cannes

http://twitter.com/SirWumpus/statuses/9787915922

your failures and I’ll publish in other Internet places related to Cannes / Cote d’Azur your refusal to respect common practice concerning 10-points for a free pizza.

Your most current flyer claims free delivery and makes no exceptions concerning 10 points for a free pizza. All the competitors, especially Mister Pizza (http://www.mister-pizza.com/index_fr.html), respect the concept of delivering a 10-point free pizza. PIZZA SHOP DOES NOT!

Your requirement that I must order a regular pizza at the same time as the free pizza is unreasonable for single person. How do you expect one person to eat two pizzas?! Totally stupid. Typically french as the english have come to know; certainly wanker behaviour

I’ve including Anglinfo.fr, Mister Pizza, and friends in this communication. I hope that they publish these details about your
failures to respect common practices.

Update: since the Pizza Shop fuckers won’t respect the “10-point get one free” concept, I’ve opted to order from a new different delivery place in Cannes, Wasabi d’Azur(04 93 39 55 70). This is my second time trying their service. No point system, but at least honest and friendly thus far.

I can’t say enough nice things about this first experience with Porter. My mother, Jovette, warned me that I’d love flying with Porter. It must be the first stress free flight I’ve had in many years of flying.

Porter flies from Toronto’s island airport, which was only 15 minutes from the down town core and in spitting distance from the skydome. The island airport is handy to people living and working down town and really removes all the hassle of driving out to Pearson International airport, thus avoiding potential traffic problems and all the fussing, queuing, and waiting associated with going to any major airport the world over.

I arrived at the ferry terminal, which is a free service to passengers. I had some trouble with my reservation while using the automated check-in terminals and the ground attendant, Danielle, was very kind and helpful in resolving the issue with my ticket. The ferry ride was so short, one wonders why they just don’t build a road or concourse bridge. Still I welcomed the brief pause and chatted with Danielle as she shuttle back to the island at the end of her shift with the front desk.

Having already been issued a boarding pass, proceeding to the lounge was a simple matter of weighing and tagging my check-in luggage and passing through security, which was simplicity itself; I still had to pop-out the laptop, remove metal objects from my person, and my coat, but there were so few noon-day travellers that it took no time at all.

The lounge offered complementary coffee, sodas, juices, and bottled water along with free cookies, nuts, and WiFi. The lounge was clean and tidy, with lots of space and comfy chairs, lots of power points near chairs, several cubicles with internet connected Mac workstations and extra plugs, also free it appeared.

I had a short 15 minute wait before the flight. Boarding the aircraft took all of 5 minutes, partly do to the few travellers, but also because the Bombardier Dash-8 Q400 aircraft only seats 70 passengers in total. It’s not like the typical overcrowded jets with their frustrated and tired travellers all fighting for storage space, arm rests, and comfortable exit row seats with some leg room. This aircraft appeared to have more leg room and comfortable seats than the average passenger jet. Departure was 5 minutes after the last person was seated; no long wait for tower clearance.

The Q400 is a turbo prop aircraft, yet is extremely quiet inside, maybe even quieter than your typical jet. Another nice thing about this flight and aircraft was that we flew much lower at 25 000 ft. vs 35 000 ft. of most commercial jet aircraft; this difference means there is actually a lot more interesting things to see outside the window on a clear day. Certainly handy for those who travel with children.

The flight attendants, Kathrina Celio and Joanne Perera were wonderful and because of the few passengers on this particular flight, had time to talk with me about the airline and listen to my cheery first impressions. They did say though that morning and evening flights tend to be a lot busier with almost full flights of people coming and going from one day meetings. The pair quickly served small sandwiches packs and choice of beverages from sodas, juices, beers, and wine were all free and included in the service. I myself had two small glasses of Canadian red wine served in a real glass, not plastic.

The hour and 15 minute flight to Montreal Trudeau (Dorval) passed by so quickly. The flight was so pleasant, that I wish it was just a bit longer, so that I might just sit and enjoy the moments of peace it afforded. Flying with Porter gave me the impression of train travel in Europe, simple, efficient, and comfortable. In many ways I wish I could fly with them between Canada and France. I’m sure Porter could out do the major international airlines for quality of service.

I found all the staff I talked to smiling, happy, and eager to help. Service was simple, efficient, and courteous. Once again, my thanks to Joanne, Kathrina, and Danielle for such a positive experience. It was much like how air travel used to be when I was a child travelling with my family.

I certainly will fly Porter again given the chance.

I’m Canadian and live in France. I speak and read both English and French, but English is my first and preferred language, especially for all things technical. I’ve configured my web browser Firefox (Opera and IE have this facility too) as to which language variants I want. The HTTP/1.1 web protocol as described by RFC 2616 supports the Accept-Language header that the web client software specifies in HTTP requests as to which language the user wants to receive in order of preference.

So !WHY! is it that web sites like Google, YouTube, and many others select a web page language based on the user’s geographical location (determined by country assignments of IP addresses) rather than my personal preferences!?! Especially when there is a protocol mechanism to facilitate language choice! Why should I then have to change the web site preferences and store a language cookie (RFC 2965) to remember that choice, when my web browser keeps telling the web site my preferences as part of each request I make where ever I go!?

Why do web sites insist on pissing users off by making broad assumptions about as simple a thing as preferred language? “Oh! You live in France, you must speak French by choice. We’ll give you the French version of the site.” Bzzzzt! WRONG! Game over! Thanks for playing! Bloody wankers! (I can make similar comments about language selection when installing software, my region is set to France, but I have a UK QWERTY keyboard! What does tell you about me? Grrr.)

My second peeve concerns Contact Us links on web sites, either the lack there of, that they are often buried deep deep in the web site in some obscure corner of a page, the poor choice of options such as no means to make general comments, suggestions, or ideas, or that the page is inaccessible or won’t display at all. I wanted to comment on my language selection peeve to YouTube, but there was no link for comments, just how to complain about copyright, abuse, security, get API information, and the like. Trying some of the alternative choices, like Help Centre, would not even display at all in the browser – as though the web page request was stuck in some sort of redirection loop.

One thing YouTube/Google have done is publish their postal address and phone numbers, so I’ll probably print a hard copy of this rant and mail it to them. If I had a fax (OK, I could use the computer’s fax service I suppose), I might do it that way, but I’d probably find their fax machine connected to an automated telephone system menu that I’d have to navigate first before I could get a carrier tone. Hmm. Maybe if I press zero for an operator and blast the modem tones in their ear. That might give me some small measure of pleasure and assuage my need use a clue bat on someone.

• Baka: My white fluffy little dog; a bichon frise. Word from Japanese means fool or idiot, though I meant it, when I named him, in the context of clown, bouffon, or jester. And Baka’s friendly, affectionate, and often amusing personality has developed along those lines.
• Cotton: my previous bichon frise I had from just after graduation from U(W) in 1990 to his passing in early 2005. Still in my memories.
• Eos: Greek goddess of the dawn.
• fée: French for fairy folk.
• Helios: Greek god of the sun.
• Selene: Greek goddess of the moon.
• Tatty – A online friend from Norway. Witty, fun, free spirited, chatty friend, who likes dark beer and light bruises.
• Thor – Norse god of thunder.
• Unclr – An excellent photographer from Norway and friend of Tatty.

I often write of dawn, dusk, scenery, and storms as I find them interesting times of change often mixed with beauty, colour, scents, sounds, turbulence, and emotion. They act on the senses and the mind in infinite ways and every day nature offers a new painting to begin and end the day. It also happens to be times of the day that Baka and I go for walks and the places we go when I might reflect on the world around me.

It is also the best place to watch the summer fireworks. In Cannes and many other towns along the French Riviera, they have a fireworks competition throughout the summer. The Carlton is dead centre of the event in Cannes and going there for dinner and the fireworks is a grand experience.

It does require some planning though, as parking is a nightmare and there is always crowds of people. When my parents lived here, we’d drive the car down early in the day and park it in a nearby garage, then return home by cab. In the evening we’d get a lift with friends or the domaine’s guardian back down. After the event we’d often stay and luxuriate at the restaurant, while the crowds and traffic dissipated.

These days I don’t live far by foot from the Croisette, so it is often a nice walk with Baka to the sea side. Sometimes he and I would go at the end of the Sunday afternoon and walk along for a bit and then stop in a café for a glass of wine and maybe a light snack.

Last night though was the last fireworks in Cannes for the summer and I did not attend. Opted to stay home after the large lunch I had had earlier. Also Baka probably wouldn’t enjoy the boom boom of the huge speakers playing music as the fireworks go boom boom in time. And last night must have been a grand show as the boom boom of the fireworks seemed to be exceptionally loud, even from my apartment and seemed to go on for a whole hour.

Alas with the last of the fireworks come soon the signs of summer’s end; cooler nights and breezes, the departure of the tourists (yeah), the return of kids to school (boo if you’re a kid, yeah if you’re a parent), the return of daily life in the streets. The south of France doesn’t have a distinct change of seasons like Canada and northern climates, with autumn colours and fall of the leaves. Summer here just fades into winter, as the sunset into night.

For the most part it is done, though I still have to do the final cleaning and get the washer moved, once I get a plumber in to disconnect the water hose that I can’t do because the tap is frozen open, as is the flat’s mains (which has no knob to boot). Of course since it is August in France, everyone dicks off on vacation almost all at the same time, so trying to get someone around is like trying to drag an air-conditioning repair man by the toe nails away from the beach along the river Styx.

Today I hope to finally get my phone reinstalled in the new apartment, after a two week wait, and hopefully still have my ADSL service connected, since my number hasn’t changed nor did I cancel it. In the interim I’ve been using my GPRS cell phone modem for Internet access.

Just the end of last week I finally got, after four weeks waiting, a replacement Yokohama car tyre installed by a nation wide tyre specialist chain that is suppose to be a reseller of the brand! Thankfully I work from home and have had nothing really urgent requiring a vehicle, but I am amazed at how pitiful service in France can be. I could have taken a vacation in Japan and brought back a new tyre as extra luggage for the same price in less time.

Add to the fact the people in the north from France, England, Germany, etc. all seem to make there way to the Côte d’Azur to laze about in the sun, drink Côte de Provence rosé, and scratch at their navels.

Since moving in to the new place, I’ve not been sleeping well. Either the traffic noise is louder on the second floor; all the bleeding tourists need new mufflers for their cars, bikes, and scooters; or everyone lefts their brains at home before going on vacation. For example last night, as with many nights these past two weeks, someone came home that I finally spotted around 23h00 on a Harley Davidson that sounds like all the helicopters from Apocalypse Now during the Ride of the Valkyries.

Of course there are also the multitude of pizza delivery scooters buzzing back and forth; there have been what sounds like a Ferrari club doing time trials around the Gallia apartment complex; and then this morning at 4h20 it was a drag race complete with with squealing hand brake turns at each bend or corner. And they doubled back for good measure. All this was immediately followed by a hurling of shouts into the dead of night in what sounded like a mix of Arabic and accented French for about ten minutes.

R.O.U.S. aka Rodents of Unusual Size is a reference from the film The Princess Bride and these past couple of weeks, I’ve been wondering if the R.O.U.S. were suppose to be a metaphor for the French. After all that has happened lately, it’s a hard call.

Views from the top of Cannes following a mistral are beautifully clear and sharp. There is a vantage point from the Voie Julia that looks out over Cannes south to the sea, west towards the Estérèl range, and north towards Grasse and the start of the Alpes. Wonderful place to sit and watch sunsets.

When it’s just the sparrows and pigeons, that’s not so bad and kind of melodic when they get a good rhythm going, but when the seagulls join in I just wish that my super hero power was the ability to rob them all of their voice, along with people who talk at the theatre.

I didn’t think much of this place when I moved in back in 2001 and I never really did anything to fix it up. What was meant to be temporary, turned into a seven year stay. Now I’ve come to enjoy this neighbourhood. Close to supermarket, baker, doctor, pharmacy, yet quiet residential, with plenty of greenery, and some nice running routes. So staying in the area would be nice and I thought I would luck out when I was told about an apartment on the 4th floor for rent, little smaller and same rent. Unfortunately, the French are rather anal when it comes to renting to people. My official status as a “micro enterprise” (think self-employed), despite making slightly better income than when I had a regular salary, have been at it officially for two years, and made my French tax declarations without issue isn’t good enough apparently.

So I’m stressing out big time. Had some skin irritation on my arm for about a month and a half, before the itching drove me to the doctor’s to do something about it. He thought it might have been stress related or that it didn’t go away because of stress. Oh hum. Next.

Even now, writing this blog, is just yet another distraction from what must be done. My worry of course is that no one will rent to a self-employed software developer, especially those that are managed by real estate & property management agencies, since they have more anal requirements. France can be a nice place to live, other times I wonder why I stay.

There is an old Internet saying my server, my rules or more precisely with respect to the topic at hand my blog, my rules. If I own, operate, and pay for the hosting of a web site or blog, then any content generated on that web site belongs me, thus comments left on my blog would belong to me, with proper attribution to the commenter of course (otherwise why bother having comments at all). If someone wants to save and/or protect their comments, then they should use their own blog and link back to the source article or comment to form the thread of discussion for readers.

My blog, my rules is a question of simplicity and easy of management of content. To do otherwise would be chaos.

What about issues of liable? The Internet has already seen cases where blog owners linking back to defamatory articles have been held liable, even though they did not write the original article. As a person running a blog, I need to be able to manage the content, especially when someone else contributes commentary, in order to protect myself legally. I do not think blog owners will have the same protection as an ISP or social network site (ie. America’s “safe habour” provisions). What happens when the blog owner and the commenter live in different countries, each with different laws with respect to freedom of speech and copyright?

Consider too comment spam. If commenters had rights to their utterances on blogs and you delete or edit a comment that is spam, would you be liable in some manner? A blogger has more risk in terms of hosting costs, what they publish, and general reputation, such that they must have ownership and control of what is said on their sites, especially when it is an opposing opinion. Commenters are more like hecklers in a comedy club audience.

Probably the best solution is to disallow blog comments altogether. Force people to remain silent or use they’re own blogs or web sites to voice their views in response to articles. At least then each blogger takes equal responsibility for what is said in public.

Also yesterday there was a nationwide train strike in France, against the government’s proposed pension reforms, which of course kept a lot of people from getting into Monaco for the F1 practise sessions. And there is talk of about a French road haulers strike concern the price of petrol and the taxes on it (1.60 Euro a litre), but they said they’d at least wait until after the GP to take action. Oh how thoughtful. Mind you if they do succeed in getting the French government to reduce petrol duties, that would be good for everyone.

The Monaco Grand Prix is special more for the venue than the actual race itself. I’ve watch the GP several times on TV in the past years and qualifying is far more important, because who ever gets pole position will most likely be the race winner barring any mishaps. This is because the cars are too broad for the narrower track, which makes passing very difficult. However, it is not impossible, as I remember a very clever and imaginative pass a couple of years ago by David Coulthard, where he made an inside pass on the hair pins just before the tunnel.

Still passing is very rare and so any drama typically comes from unfortunate mishaps rather than skill. Every GP I’ve seen has been dry and sunny. However, the weather forecast for this weekend is calling for rain on Sunday, which many of the drivers have comment on, saying that Monaco would become 10x more dangerous. I’ve never seen a wet race in Monaco, but given how boring a dry race is, if it rains on Sunday, then the drama through misfortune will be high, unless all the drivers decide to play safe.

Now I don’t wish anyone harm or misfortune, but personally I think a wet race in Monaco would be a more interesting test of man and machine. And for the fans that brave the weather, should prove very memorable. One way or other, I have a sense that this coming Sunday is going to be dramatic.

I mentioned before how Cannes triples in population during the Film Festival, well Monaco is probably no exception and possibly worse as it is only about 5 square kilometres in size. So with both the Cannes Film Festival and Monaco Grand Prix, you can imagine how trying to do any normal day-to-day business in these two places in the days leading up to and during these events can be a nightmare.

Nice Airport is saturated with the influx of travellers (provide the French unions aren’t taking advantage of the situation to stage a strike), the A8 highway sees increased congestion, accommodation is scarce (often booked a year in advance), traffic and parking are more painful than pulling teeth. If you can afford to go by helicopter, boat, or have the patience for the train, it is highly recommended to leave the car at home (or better yet, stay away).

Most employees working in Monaco during GP try to arrive by train, car, or scooter before all the parking is taken and before the track is closed to the public around 7h00, as the race circuit uses the streets of Monaco. Some repair services for bars, restaurants, and hotels even put up employees in hotels during this time in case of customer emergency.

I am a programmer by trade, preference, passion, and pleasure, but have also done technical field support over the years for some ISPs I’ve worked for. I still have one or two clients in Monaco that I still service and on a handful of occasions someone’s computer goes tits up in the days leading up to the GP or worse during race days. Panic occurs faster than Louis Hamilton can shift gears. Needless to say, it is always a good idea to have working backup and recovery solution.

The closest I’ve ever been to the Grand Prix was the week I spent “on-call” at Stars’N'Bars one year, in case of networking and computing problems with their Internet café. I didn’t really have to be there, but I was between gigs and could afford the time, and thought it would be a neat experience. SNB is on Quai Antoine (by Rascasse corner) on the sea side of the track where all the F1 mobile garages are parked. It’s impossible to access when the track is closed, unless you take the long walk around the Roche, which is pretty good exercise when you’re lugging a 5 kilo laptop bag packed with tools, CDs, parts, clean shirt, etc.

Stars’N'Bars is an American style sports bar, three floors, supervised kids room, video games, sports memorabilia, and 21+ TV screens. It is one of the livest spots in Monaco for young and old year round. The food is pretty good too for American style cuisine. (I sort of treat SNB as my “local” even if it is in Monaco.) SNB is a popular spot for many of the motor sport fans, because of its proximity to the “paddock”, since many of the F1 drivers and their crews can be seen nearby (or even in the restaurant at day’s end) and it’s often possible to snarf an autographed cap or shirt.

Unfortunately, it is not possible to see the actual race from the restaurant, even from the third floor, due to all the spectator stands and the low profile of the cars, but you can watch on all the TV screens they have going. However, forget about listening to the commentary, even if SNB bothered to turn it on, because when the race cars are on the track, all you can hear is something that sounds like a trillion mosquitoes on Red Bull. And you know how much I like mosquitoes.

All in all, Monaco F1 Grand Prix is said to be the highlight of the F1 calendar. It’s a very special F1 event for motor racing fans and I’m sure it’s worth attending at least once. Monaco and the surrounding region just have so much character both by day and by night, that there is always something to do, even if it’s just finding an out of the way restaurant for a long lunch or attending the restaurants, bars, and clubs after the days events.