[Drawing] Mental Edition

When I feel exhausted, I do feel as if I wanted the whole world to end, or at least my perception of it, in a word, as if I want to die. One night of good sleep and I feel better, but that is if I remember to take a good night of sleep, and an easy morning drawing or playing music or reading. I have one trick to remind me of this: I mentally edit "I want to die" (in Spanish "Quiero morir", in French "Je veux mourir") by "I want to sleep" (in Spanish "Quiero dormir", in French "Je veux dormir"). What helps is that it rhymes both in French and in Spanish (not so much in English).

That motivated the following drawing, titled "Mental Edition":

After making this drawing I realized that I was trying to do my usual work while trying at the same time to advance a big extension project of which the main person, supposed to work half-time on it, resigned: I was trying to work some 66h per week! No wonder that I felt that I was not properly taking care of my PhD students, delegating too much of my teaching to my teaching assistants, not spending enough time and thinking on my research and not even advancing properly the extension project! Just knowing why I was feeling so tired and inefficient at the same time made me feel better ;)
And the process to hire people to whom to delegate most of the administrative tasks is reaching its end, so I will feel less overwhelmed in a few weeks!

[Drawing] Who wants to save the world?

I used to assume that everyone wanted to save the world, that people disagreed only on the need or the mean.

It still is hard to believe that some people just do not care?

[Drawing] On changera tout...

P made a video for J's birthday anniversary, based on a song named "Pleure pas Boulou" ("Don't you cry Boulou", where "Boulou" is an affective term for an older kid to address a younger one), where two kids on the  street discuss their (non and mis) understanding of the adult world. 

The song is very nice (and the new jazzy/gypsy  interpretation at once refreshing and appropriate), and the chorus is catchy (if a bit sad), with a simple melody 'la, la, la, pleure pas Loulou; la, la, la, on changera tout...' ("here, here, here, don't you cry so much; here, here, here,  we will change all..."). With family pictures appearing at key moments, it did bring out a few tears! 

It also brought regrets that my music group with P and G disbanded after only a few months of good fun: there  are so many musics and song that I would like to revisit and record. I could (will!)  buy myself a remix kit and play all tracks by myself as I used to, but it's not as fun as when I play with others. 

In the meantime, it inspired me today's drawing on my kitchen wall, someone in an Guy Fawkes mask singing the second part of the chorus, an image which somehow seems in accordance to the various uses of the mask in cinema and among activists... 

[Red Noses] Javier's Couch Surfing Potluck party

Today I went to a Couch Surfing party. It had been a while since the last time, I forgot how much I like being in a room where there are discussions in at least 5 different languages! I talked a bit of French, English, Spanish, and even Russian :)

I had brought some rice salad, some juice, and some "creme patissiere" in biscuits mold, which disappeared in a matter of minutes:

I took many pictures, and several people asked me where they could get it back: I put a selection here, if you don't see yourself there, contact me by email (with a picture of yourself, so that I know who I am talking to), and I will send your pictures to you.

Here are some group pictures:


Here are some portraits:


It seems that I managed to "contaminate" quite a few with the red noses :)