Remi and the Beard

On Saturday night I went with Daddy and my friend Kalee and her parents to see a band - they're called Pearl and the Beard. Daddy thought they might be a little bit silly, but they turned out to be pretty solid.

The show was at a huge art space with tons of galleries, and the place used to be a prison.

After the show, I talked to one of the girls in the band - Daddy liked her because she was really good on the cello, and I liked her because she had a great bow hold.

We left the show and went to get some food, and guess who showed up? The Band.

So we hung out with them for a while - I think they had fun.

The Meaning of Me

So, I was a little bored today, Daddy said I can't play Wii during the week, on account of I get too many notes home from my teacher, so I went on the Internets to research my name. Here's what it means:

Andre: In French, the name Andre means- manly, courageous.

Remi: French form of the Latin name Remigius, which was derived from Latin remigis "oarsman". Saint Rémy was a 5th-century bishop who converted and baptized Clovis, king of the Franks.

Kishor: Derived from Sanskrit किशोर (kishora) meaning "colt".

Fleuette: who knows. Nobody can figure it out. I think its derived from Latin, fortis : strong, brave.

So, I'm a fearless captain of the seas, and racehorses too.

That Dastardly Dupont

It was Sunday, the first really warm day of spring, and Daddy and I were walking around the mean streets of Dupont Circle. Naturally, I had my Spiderman duds on, and carried my light saber, in the event Daddy needed me to protect him from any nefarious characters - it was tough duty: there were aggressive vendors forcing energy drinks on passerbys, old women singing in out-of-tune Reggae stylings about how great it would be to make a donation for the radical broadsides they were hawking, hungover gals trying to look inconspicuous in their conspicuous walks of shame... And puppies. There were puppies everywhere, which made our stroll treacherous - we had to stay ever vigilant to watch where we walked for puppie doo doo landmines, and to avoid stepping on their tails.

But the biggest threat were the paparazzi. They were everywhere. One photographer even brazenly approached us to ask to take our picture. Daddy said if we gave him one, maybe they'd leave us alone. So I relented.






After all this activity, I started fading. It's hard work being a superhero. I couldn't wait to get back home to relax and play Ben 10 on my Wii.

An Important Birthday Message

Daddy went to see Mark Levin last month, so I drew a bunch of cool Spiderman pictures like this one for Daddy to give to him...and Mark Levin gave me this cool happy birthday video back.

Thanks Mark

Salut

Yay! I got a brand-spanking new cousin today! His name is Christian Peter Andreone. If his mom had been able to hold on for two more weeks, we would have had the same birthday! That would have been cool.

I want to name him "little cutie" because he's a cutie.

I just asked dad "Do you know what babies do?"
he said "poop and eat"
I said, "yeah, and sleep"

Hi Christian. I like your hat.

Hello Sir!

I earned my first belt today in Tae Kwon Do, and it was cool! Its a white belt, and my teacher called me up in front of the whole class and tied it on me, and told me what a great job I'm doing.

I had to learn all kinds of kicks, and punches, and how to be respectful, and to yell HELLO SIR! when my teacher said hello. I can't wait til my next classes starts, and my teacher said I need to learn not to hit daddy when I'm practicing.

Daddy says he hopes I learn that part pretty soon.

I'm not goofing around, I swear

Remi, come on up!

Great job fella!

Daddy, look what I got!

Pretty cool, huh?

Rachael's Tribute to Pepere

Today was the running of the Preakness again. My Pepere used to go every year and win big money on the races, okay, not big money...alright, he went to the races every year. So Daddy and I have taken up a tradition of planting some of Pepere's favorite trees on every Preakness in his memory.

Me and Daddy at the tree

We name the tree after the winner of the race, and this year, a girl named Rachael won the Preakness...so we're naming the tree "Rachael Weeping Cherry". I know, it sounds weird, but really, who names trees anyway? So we name it whatever we want, cause the name isn't any weirder than naming it at all...

I got dirty too!

This year, Uncle Andy and Kaycee helped us plant the tree...okay, Uncle Andy did most of the work, but only because Daddy took so long trying to decide what tree to get, and then where to put it. By the time we got around to planting it, post time was about to start...

Uncle Andy and Kaycee

Uncle Andy hard at work

Me toooooo!

"Hey Remi, I don't think you're supposed to be doing that."

Hi Pepere. We're thinking about you. Daddy always tells me stories about how great you were... I love you.

Take 2

Daddy was dreading taking me to get a haircut...he said I'm too wild to sit still, but mostly he's a little gun shy with the barber because of the last haircut fiasco.

before

It was fun though...they played good music, and daddy was taking a bunch of pictures, plus he bribed me by telling me we were gonna go to the playground if I was a good boy.

during

Doesn't he know I'm always a good boy?

after

Aw poop, I got the Croup

Buggy.

On the morning Daddy and I were supposed to fly out of CA back to Maryland, I could barely breathe, and my temperature shot up to 104.3. So Alka and Daddy bundled me up and dashed to the hospital.

The doc said I had Croup, which makes it hard to breathe and gives me a funny cough. It was no fun. They kept sticking me with things, and putting things over my mouth, and giving me medicine and making me feel worse.

I just wanted to sleep, and they kept waking me up too. What a drag.
We never did make our airplane, until 2 days later. Fun.

Croup!

Croupier!

good stuff

Daddy says there are only two great things that ever came out of Baltimore:

me

and
this guy

Ok, maybe three

I Do Not Like Hot Dogs!

Daddy and Alka and I watched a great movie over the weekend, called Control. Its a movie about Ian Curtis from a band called Joy Division. Daddy and I kept playing it over and over. I was dancing and yelling lines from the movie, but I think Alka was getting annoyed, cause Daddy wouldn't help her clean up while we watched the movie. My favorite line was "I do not like hot dogs!" I want to watch it again. The guy at the credits in the beginning scared me a lot though, but there's lots of good music.

This guy scared me and made me cry.

I do not like hot dogs!


Here's a video of Joy Division

here's the trailer

The Good Clinton...

George, that is. Not a Hillary in sight. Or an Obama for that matter.
A couple weeks ago, Daddy's friend and our neighbor, Andre, invited us to a show he was playing. It was with George Clinton, from Parliament, an old, old school funk band- daddy says they've been sampled more than the ice cream at Baskin Robbins. Oh!



They played a whole lotta this kinda stuff!

Daddy said he used to play this and other funk and soul on his radio show called "Strictly Vinyl" that he did when he lived in LA, at a really cool station called KBLT.

Andre used to play with Parliament, one of the best bands of all time, and was sitting in on this show, and got us backstage passes! It was awesome. I never saw Daddy have so much fun. Me too. I even ran onstage and had a bunch of people clapping.

Daddy didn't bring the camera though, so all we got were some pictures from his cell phone. But its better than nothing. It was a great night. Thanks Andre!!

That's Andre's band. They sounded great!

That's me onstage with Andre

That's me just before I ran onstage with the rest of Parliament!

That's Daddy holding me, with the security guy in front who said I couldn't run onstage anymore. Party Pooper.

Me and Alka resting between songs. I was gettin' my drink on with my baboo.

Daddy also thought of a bunch of reasons why George is the good Clinton-
We raised the roof instead of raising taxes
They were pleasin', not appeasin'
We cut a rug, not cut and run
We took care of business instead of getting the business
Daddy said the music was so hot, he almost started to believe in "Global Warming" or whatever they're calling it this week
Oh Boy!!

The Other Wild One

I was out today, rollin' on my scooter and enjoying an almost perfect day. I checked out the kids skating, played a little soccer, and helped Daddy plant some more trees. When I took a break, Daddy took a picture of me on my ride. When I saw it, I thought I saw the picture before, so Daddy checked it out for me. He found this and said he knew I was a wild one!

That's me!

Like me, only I don't have a hat!

Civics class

Daddy was laughing at this video. He said it was a good lesson in civics for me. I'm sure I would agree, if I knew what civics was.


Daddy said if I really want to know civics, I should take this test. He got a 73.3%. I'd probably do better, if I had time to study.

Pepere's Tree

Today was the 133rd running of the Preakness. My Pepere (that's what I call my grandpa) used to go every year, and Daddy and my uncles used to go with him. My Pepere died before I was born, but Daddy was thinking about him today, and he told me a lot of stories about him.

Daddy wanted to dedicate something to Pepere, so he went to the garden store and got a Japanese Red Maple, which was Pepere's favorite tree. I helped Daddy plant it while Daddy told me more stories about him.

"Big Brown" won the Preakness today, so Daddy and I named the tree "Big Red" to mark the day.







I wish I got to meet my Pepere- he sounds like my kind of guy. I love him.

imposter

there's another remonster on the loose:

(A Really) Bad Hair Day

Daddy's in BIG trouble now! He cut my hair last time and left me lookin' like I had a gorilla bump on my head, you know, where they have that pointy protrusion at the top of their melon-

Boy is Alka mad at Daddy!

So Daddy said he's gonna fix it. He takes me on down to the haircut place, it was kinda neat- it had lacrosse games playing, and all the haircut girls were looking like referees, only they were cute. Turns out they're just as blind as real refs. So she made my haircut go from bad to really bad. Daddy says if she had another eye she'd be a cyclops!

I think she just left her glasses at home.

Daddy was trying to make the most of it and started laughing, he said I looked like Prince Valiant.

You can bet Daddy didn't laugh when we got home.

He said he won't even get to sleep on the couch. Its straight to the car for him. Oy!

At least Prince Valiant is kind of a hero!

Not like this guy!