R.I.P., Dad

I was all set to tackle my weekly blog post yesterday, when I was notified that my father Pierre had passed away unexpectedly at age 87 in Cannes, France.  He was in excellent health, and I had assumed he’d live to be 100 just like his father had.  Instead, he caught a virulent form of pneumonia and died within two days of being admitted to the hospital.  So today, I get to talk about my dad.

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Notes from 2011 World Championships in Paris

I had the pleasure of attending the first two days of the 2011 World Championships in Paris.  Here are my comments.

I ran into Michel Brousse, the French Judo historian (among other things) in the hotel lobby.  He was kind enough to acknowledge that my daughter Natalie was participating in the championships.  He also informed me that there would be an International Association of Judo Researchers symposium the next morning, and invited me to attend.  I did, and came away with lots of good information from the morning session, which was dedicated to Judo history.  Unfortunately, I had to miss the afternoon session as I was meeting my 86-year old father, whom I hadn’t seen in some twenty years.

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