The Big 4-0

Big 40 coming up... :-( Anyway, I always say, any excuse for a party. So I decided to organize something for dear friends here in France, and overseas. Naturally, due to my disorganized nature, the organization was a bit last-minute. But to cut a long story short, I ended up renting a villa for a weekend, conveniently located in Haut-de-Cagnes (the medieval part of our hometown). And in the end, the turnout was quite good as well - about 20 participants in all.

Things started a bit badly, as somebody rather rudely decided to pirate my credit card just the day before the big party. So I had to make quite a large withdrawal to cover the deposit for the villa, cleaning charges, and not to mention all the grocery shopping. I took Friday afternoon off to get things organized - quite thankful to have some invaluable assistance from Isabelle, who arrived Friday afternoon (Isabelle, if you read this - BIG THANK YOU!). The rather busy afternoon involved picking up the keys from the villa, a visit to the bank to sort out my credit card mess, shopping, a quick visit to my aunt Tutta's place to have coffee and pick up my cousin Maikki and Jarkko, and a ride to the airport to pick up Flore. To make things easy on ourselves, we decided to have pizza for dinner...

On Saturday, things didn't start out brilliantly either. After a couple of weeks of typical sunny Cote d'Azur weather, mother nature decided to curse us with some torrential rainfall... In fact, enough rain to cut off the electricity for the garage (yep, it did indeed mean we were unable to get the car out of the garage - until we managed to get a hold of the owner who helped us with the manual override system)...

Due to the downpour, we rather quickly gave up on the original plan, which was to do some touristy stuff somewhere with our "overseas visitors" - and contented ourselves with lunch at one of the several nice restaurants located in Haut-de-Cagnes - Le Goutte d'Eau. Pretty nice & reasonably priced food, just what the doctor ordered.

No sign of the rain easing off, so the prospects of enjoying the superb garden the villa possessed were looking slimmer and slimmer. Thankfully, the villa was more than big enough to accommodate everybody. We had a great turnup; apart from the overseas visitors (including Nathalie & Patrick, who had arrived Saturday morning), quite a few local friends made it, we ended up with quite a nice mix of locals, Finns, and a couple of odd ones out (an Italian, a German...).

Everybody seemed to have a nice time, including (of course me!). I was treated to some pressies that can only be described as super: a Suunto sports watch (hint hint: somebody needs to do more sports?), quite a few bottles of alcohol (don't know where people got that idea from?), a wine "subscription" where I get 2 bottles of wine per month (everybody knows, of course, how sensitive my taste buds are to a fine bottle of wine) as well as three laps around a race track in a Ferrari (midlife crisis approaching, anyone !?). I was truly moved by the generosity of everybody (both people present and those who couldn't make it) - THANK YOU to those who happen to be reading... And thanks to Sarah, Aurelien and Antoine as well for the delicious cakes they prepared!

So as you've probably guessed, I at least had a brilliant time! The party carried on well into the morning hours (comforting to know that I'm still able to last past midnight! ;-) ), and a rather insistent headache (and quite a few empty bottles) reminded me that it must've been a good party!

The next day was rather chilled out, with most people heading off pretty early. We hanged out at the villa for a few hours more with Flore, Isabelle and Vincent (who had a rather long sleep, waking up around noon...), finally getting to enjoy a bit of sunshine.

All in all, a super weekend, makes it easier entering middle age...! A huge thanks to everybody who helped with organizing the party, for the present, and for your presence!