As of about now, Carlo has spent over half his life in France.

It's hard to get Carlo speaking French at home, though when someone asks him a question in French he responds as easily as if he was asked in English. And he and Maria sometimes have conversations in French, when they;'re watching the French cartoons especially.

Today we bussed down to Carrefour, because sometimes you just have to spend €300 on a shop. Yeah, NZ$600 and it was about what you would get from Foodtown on Saturday. (The Carrefour is near Roland Garros, so we perved at the tennis glams coming and going for a while. Nice hats, nice cars, flowing dresses, hot sunglasses, that sort of thing).

Once we got inside, Carlo spied a book, in French, about tv cartoon character Franklin. "Yes," I assured him, "it's Franklin." He frowned up at me. "No, Daddy. Eets Fronklar." Then we went round to the divine fish section and Carlo rushed up to a dead mullet and shouted, "Daddy, Daddy! Poisson! Poisson!"