Wednesday, July 30, 2008

Praha with Pico Tours

3rd week-end of July I flew to Prague to meet Vasco Pico, a good friend of mine that was borned in Czech Republic and know lives in Toronto. On Tuesday night before I called Jon a friend I knew from the days back in Montreal that just moved to Paris a few weeks ago and told him "Do you want to hit Prague on the week-end?", him to reply "Wich part of town is that club at?" I guess its unusual to get that kind of invitation when you just moved here.

Praha


So we had an amazing week-end staying at beautiful Hotel Kampa in the old Prague just beside Charles Bridge. Alot of walking and Pilsner drinking.

Thursday, July 24, 2008

Saturday, July 19, 2008

Carlito's Way

Carlito's way trailer
"NEVER GIVE UP YOUR OWN FRIENDS"
Watching over this classic, thought I'd post the ending/generic down here cause that movie is simply amazing. Pacino at his best, Penn, directed by De Palma, wow. Love that Joe Cocker song 'you are so beautiful' in the you tube video down here.

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

Corsica / Paradise

2 weeks ago I went to one of the most astonishing places I've ever been to with Z team consisting of Benny Blanco, Maximo el grande Torso, Vasco Pico and Maggy May. The people, the chill attitude, the food, the authenticity, the sun, the mountains, the sea, the nature preserved by not selling land to strangers. You see all these little paradises in the world that have been destroyed by all the money and people flowing in, but Corsica is one of those places that fought during all its history to keep it together, to keep it natural, to keep it good, to keep it theirs.
Ile Rousse International Squash Open 2008

Day 0/1
Ride from Paris to Lyon late. After a 4 hour siesta in Lyon, we jump back in the car at 7am to make it to the ferry in Nice for a beautiful ride direction Bastia Corsica. Then we drove to l’Ile Rousse where we picked up Pico and took possession of our amazing apartment by the port and the beach. We ended the night with the guys from PUC @ La Bodega where we had mojitos every night.

Day 2
We went to swim to Les Rochers, nice rocky spot to access the sea between Ile Rousse and Calvi. We all had a few bad cuts to the feet, good way to start the tourney. Had my first squash match in the evening, luckily enough I was able to end it in 3 sets. Then it was the opening night diner in San Ambrosio Miles Sabbords restaurant with all the squash crew. Mojitos to celebrate.

Day 3
Boat in Saint Florant to the beach of Lodo for a little 1 hour trek in the desert of Agriates to reach the magnificiant beach of Saleccia. Then we walked back on the sea shore to Lodo. Squash match in the evening, hurt my back again so the rest of the tourney was a pain. Mojitos to fix the pain .

Day 4
Went on the beach to Losa where there was a little bar on the beach. We went for diner with a few Corsican friends to La Vieille Cave in Acajola, to eat the baby lamb specialty. Mojitos to digest.

Day 5
Day @ the squash club, I lost, then a big match between Benny Blanco and Max with a lot of trash talking going into it, apero avec Bruno with some wine from his wineries in Burgundy.Tourney de petancle ending with Mojitos @ la bodega. Late night.

Day 6
We rented a boat to visit the UNESCO protected reserve of Scandola with Pacal from Squash that was kind enough to bring us around. So we left @ 8 in the morning, we saw dolphins, we caught some Urchins and ate them, we swam with the medusas, jumped cliffs, the sea was perfect for the boat ride that ended in Girolata. We then ate diner at the Villa the guys from Antibes rent every year, with all the Corse, great evening with many good wines and cheese …. We finished that crazy day in the club Acapulco close to Calvi.

Day 7
Chilling day, Pico departure back to Barcelona, and recovering the lack of sleep from the last few days, didn’t play my match in the morning to give a break to my craped back. Then I went on the beach at l’Ile Rousse since I hadn’t seen it and met the boys from le PUC to play ball on the beach. Then it was the squash finals and goodbye party @ the club to finish with Champagne and hitting Acapulco again.

Day 8
Packing, driving to Calvi for a litlle visit and catch the ferry back to Nice. Dinner with Charlotes family in sweet little house in the Nice backcountry before heading back to Paris in the night.

Polaris - Poker bot beats human champs

There's been a big hype on Polaris beating a few good poker players over a set of 4 X 500 hands of limit Texas Hold'em poker last week. They don't stress much the fact that its a limit game, which takes a he'll of a dimension away from the real game of Poker. Nothing against that amazing Artificial Intelligence piece of code these kids have programmed, but how will this Polaris Bot learn where to get balls to call an All-IN.

"An unflinching, uncaring silicon machine beat several top poker champions during “Man versus Machine” match at the Rio Hotel in Las Vegas. The Polaris program developed by University of Alberta researchers was beaten last year, but managed to best the players this year with a 2 win, loss and 1 draw record. And don’t think the machine had it easy, three of the human competitors had more than $1 million in lifetime winnings each."

Full article

JULY 14th, France National Holiday

JULY 14th 1789, the day the Bastille prison was stormed, has an iconic hold on the French imagination. Schoolchildren are taught that it is the republic’s founding moment. It is France’s national day and a public holiday. A military parade is held on the Champs Elysées, and fighter jets waking me up flying over my apartment, blazing a trail of red, white and blue, screech low over Paris.

600,000 people gathered on les champs de mars to celebrate, watch a very disappointing concert, top it with a magnificent firework show. The first few minutes of the fireworks were even dedicated to the 400 years of our beautiful City of Quebec. The fireworks were presented with a great opera which made us feel as we were in Star Wars. This picture was taken by Milot on top of Tour MontParnasse while I was down there on les champs with the Descoteaux broters and a few friends for a picnic before the show.



©Mathieu Milot
http://www.moonerboy.com/photoblog/