Author: Kevin Lawver

Seriously, I think it was the smoke, and Chuck took forever to take the picture, but it looks like I’m gonna cry. And really, I didn’t cry once, not the whole night. I coughed quite a bit, and laughed a lot (them Canadians, James, Brent, and Brent, are fun to hang out with).

And apparently, I’m one of two monsters of blog …. The picture was taken by George, and the guy standing next to me is Chuck Olsen, who’s making a blogumentary. Oh, and we were all at Break Bread With Brad, which was great. I met a bunch of bloggers I’ve been reading for years, some I’ve heard of, and others who were all new to me. Everyone was super-swell, and I had a great time.

After breaking bread (which I didn’t… I don’t think I ever sat down for more than five minutes), we all went to Polly Esther’s for Karaoke. Watching Smokler cover U2 will be burned into my retinas and eardrums for days.

Big thanks to Michael and Ari for introducing me to folks, and for being great ambassadors for their city. You guys rule.

Oh, and just so Jen doesn’t worry, I did eat dinner. I got two pieces of pizza at Onion on 5th Street at 11:30 as I walked back to the hotel.

I dig Austin. I’ve now had barbecue twice, and a chicken fried steak. I had a tasty pork loin sandwich yesterday with the Canadians at Ironworks. It was tender, simple, cheap and perfect. Their potato salad is creamy without the dressing overpowering the potatos, and it had just enough onions. The chicken fried steak was at Threadgill’s. It was lightly battered, and there wasn’t enough gravy, but it was lightly fried and not too greasy. Today, I found House Park Barbecue. Wow. This is real greasy spoon barbecue. The mixed plate comes with homemade sausage and pork loin, ranch beans and small portions of cole slaw and potato salad. The sausage was light, peppery and full of smokey goodness. The pork loin had a great crust on the outside, yet was nice and tender on the inside. The ranch beans were perfect (and I don’t normally like beans); the sauce was tangy, full of pepper without being a true barbecue sauce. The cole slaw and potato salad were both decent and everything got eaten.

Tonight, it’s The Iron Cactus for Break Bread With Brad with Michael and Ari. Tomorrow, things get hot and heavy with tons of panels and <a href=”http://www.dashes.com/kick/”>kickball.

I am so very happy with that picture. I can’t tell you how much. These are the pics from my last morning in La Napoule. Enjoy.

I’ve been in Austin since 11:30 this morning and I’ve already met Michael at the airport, while he was waiting for someone else. That someone else turned out to be James, who is stayingg with his two friends in the same hotel I am. James, his friends Paul, Brent and I ate a late lunch at IronWorks BBQ, and later met Michael, Ari and the boys at Threadgills for dinner (country fried steak… mmmmm-tastic).

This is going to be a good week.

I’m off to SXSW Interactive tomorrow. I’m really looking forward to it, even though I’m still jet-lagged from France, not quite done doing laundry, and haven’t even thought about packing yet (and my plane leaves at 8:40am).

I’ll be sure to post pictures, thoughts from panels, etc, during the conference.

Ahhhhhh, here I am. Home, with my wife, my son, my house, and water from the tap with lots and lots of ice in it (what does Europe have against ice anyway?). I’m a wreck, but I’m home. It feels like 3am, and I’m going to sleep in a couple minutes. And to think, I get back on a plane in about 72 hours for SXSW. Who planned this?

Kevin’s not at home, where he belongs. Kevin’s not at work, and he’s not in France where he was this morning. Where’s Kevin? Kevin’s in Frankfurt, Germany!!! Why? Why? Well, because the plane was over an hour late leaving Nice this morning, which means that Kevin missed his plane to Dulles.

Enough with the third person… I’m tired. I’m sore, because I’m an idiot and thought I could run to catch my other plane (little did I know that I had to catch a train, get my passport and bag checked, and run some more – all in 5 minutes). Didn’t happen. Didn’t make the plane. The guy at the gate when I walked up had a very funny look on his face. Ok, I didn’t walk. I kind of stumbled and ambled up.

I’m in a little room, in a gigantic hotel, listening to Late Edition while I use up my one hour of pre-paid it-ner-net. Then, it’s downstairs to dinner – maybe I’ll have something German.

OK, off I go… thanks a ton, Lufthansa.