Today was, in some ways, the opposite of the past few days. First, we got an early start (thanks to the maid service showing up at 8am!!!). Second, we paid full price for everything, as opposed to all the previous days when our London Pass saved us some money, and third, we saw three things, instead of the usual one or two. Of course, that comes along with the early start, but nevermind that.

The kids had picked out two things they REALLY wanted to see before we left London, so we thought Wednesday would be a good day to fill with those things. The first was the London Eye. Officially, it's the British Airways London Eye (or BA London Eye if you're lazy...) It's a huge ferris wheel where one revolution takes about 30 minutes. It wasn't what I would describe as fun, but it was pretty cool none the less. We got great veiws of the city, and it's situated just across the river from the houses of parliment (and Big Ben) so there was plenty to look at, even for a rainy/windy day like today.

The second thing they wanted to do was take a ride on the London Ducks. These are a "fleet" of old DUKW landing craft from WWII. You drive around the city while your guide makes horrible jokes about what you're looking at. Then you drive into the river, drive up and down for a bit and drive back out. This was amusing enough, and the boys were quite impressed with driving right into the water. Considering that this thing was built in 1942 (or so) and it seems to still run like a charm, I was forced to be proud of the American engineering in the thing.

This has been an interesting trip, actually. I've spent the last, or say 8 or so years being a bit embarassed about my country and what it's done to the world, but the past few days have re-adjusted my view a little bit. I know we all still think of ourselves as the guys who rode in and kicked some German (or Japanese) butt to free everyone from their opressors, but really, that was over 60 years ago. What have we done lately? On the other hand, WWII was a time when we were really sure we were the good guys. There were no moral complications like Korea or Vietnam or Iraq. The bad guys were clear. They lived over there in that country and they wore clothes and spoke in a way that made them easy to spot. Some of that feeling is still in the people's hearts and minds here in Europe. The French may think they liberated themselves, and the Dutch may resent having been involved at all (since neutrality was their plan) but there are too many physical reminders (memorials, bomb damage, etc.) for it to all just slip away. Just as the Napoleonic Wars left their mark, so did the "great wars."

The third thing we saw today was Westminster Abby. My goodness, what a lot of dead people crammed into one small space. I'm not sure what you have to have done to get buried (or memorialized) there, but the place is wall to wall plaques and tombs and such. The first portion of the Abby was built on 1050 by King Edward the Confessor who is buried there. His son Harold is the guy who lost to William the Conqueror in 1066 and thus the French and English histories were intertwined ever since.

The place was expanded over the years, with the final construction happening 1745, but with lots of repairs and retrofits since then. It's a beautiful place, but it does seem a bit cluttered inside, since they had to cram 942 years worth of notables into the place. It's also been used for every official coronation since 1066, so the place has been busy. We scurried out just before the evening prayer service, since it's not sung on Wednesdays (for some reason) and we were getting ready to head back to the hotel.

Just a couple of tidbits from the week I wanted to share:

The station we arrived at is St. Pancras. I've been thinking of this as St. Pancreas for about a week and looking up the acutal St. Pancras hasn't helped me remember it any differently.

Both M and I are a bit frustrated by our lack of knowledge of European history. I knew a bit more about who Admiral Nelson was, but the details were still fuzzy. There's also a big blur between the Elizabethian and Victorian mucking about compounded by my difficulty in placing the Napoleon stuff in between the two. YES I KNOW WE'RE TALKING CENTURIES APART HERE!!! Ah the joys of a public education...

I've been a bit amused by traveling around to all of the cathedrals and abbeys and churches here. Of course, everything is C of E (as they say.) I suppose this amuses me because a close friend of ours is very involved with his Episcopal Church back in the US. For those of you who don't know, the Episcopal Church is basically Anglican or Church of England (I'm sure it's more complex than that.) I'm not sure exactly why this amuses me, but I keep thinking I should write to my friend and ask if there's something we can bring him. (No, I don't know what. I'm not about to steal a bit of Saint Whoever's knuckle bone...) Or maybe it has something to do with the fact that part of the reason the C of E exists at all is that the Pope wouldn't let Henry VIII get a divorce (but, again, it's more complicated than that.) By the way, based on his suit of armor, Henry VIII certainly thought a lot of himself.

The British people (if one were to generalize...) are quite friendly and funny. It's nice to be in a place where I get most of the humor, and it's been a HUGE relief to not worry about speaking English, although we are immediately picked out as being from the States. No surprise there, I guess. All it takes is one sentence and it's clear we're speaking American and not English. None the less, I've never felt unwelcome and people happily come to your aid when they see you struggling with things like the payment system at the grocery store or the gates in the Underground. Not something you catch the Dutch doing too often.

Tomorrow, we have tickets to Stomp! at 3pm, so we're hoping to head to that side of town in the morning and check out some of the art galleries. The Older has shown quite a bit of interest in art, and has some talent for it himself, so I'm all for encouraging him. The Younger shows some interest, but seems to enjoy the spaces of meuseums more than the exhibits. But that depends a little bit on what the subject is. At any rate, we'll have more to report tomorrow evening when we get back here to the ranch.

Today got off to a very slow start, largely because of me. I got angry with the kids pretty early in the day for no clear reason, and it hindered me taking charge and dragging us out onto the streets as soon as I'd wanted to. I think part of the problem was that I was feeling tired and underappreciated for being the lead organizer of this trip so far, but it didn't help that the kids were acting like wild men (since, afterall, they hadn't been out of the house yet) and I was a bit nervous about dragging them to St. Paul's Cathedral in that state of mind, and I hadn't looked beyond that to any other possible venues.

St. Paul's is a beautiful place. I have a sense (from my art history classes oh, so long ago) that it's really a fairly average cathedral, but if that's the case, then the bar is set fairly high. There's a heavy weight of history and intriguies about the place, and I can't help but feel it would be even more so, if the whole thing hadn't burned down in 1666. Apparently, this is the fifth church at this particular site, with the first being built in 604. The current building was started in 1677 and finished in 1703, which may seem like a long time, but was about how long these things took at the time.

We managed to climb all the stairs to the very top (or as high as they would let us. The Younger was pretty nervous on the way up and down, especially on the spiral staircases with grated steps. I think being able to see through really put him off. On the other hand, he loved the views and showed no fear once we had a stable base to stand on. Both boys really enjoyed the place and were very well behaved (as I should have expected) the whole time. We briefly thought we would be able to see the Evensong service, but we were an hour too early, so we set off for the Brittian at War Experience instead.

Unfortunately, work in the tube made it hard to get there before they closed, so we ended up grabbing a fried chicken dinner at a hole in the wall a few doors down and then wandering along the Thames to the Millennium Bridge. This bridge was built in 2000 as part of the Millennium Project which also inluded the infamous Millennium Dome. The bridge is for foot traffic only and is quite beautiful. It ends just south of St. Paul's, which was a nice way to end the day.

So far we're not making a lot of progress on seeing London (only one exhibit a day!) but we're enjoying ourselves so far. M and I need to do some planning tonight so we can get ourselves off to a better start in the morning. We also bought tickets to see "STOMP!" on Thursday afternoon, so that day, at least, has a focus.

Turns out my last post was lost (or more likely, never actually sent somehow...) Oh well, it didn't say much anyway.

This was the long week of being sick. On Monday and Tuesday, I spent the day in bed, and not really by choice. At one point, I wasn't sure I'd survive to Wednesday. This cold seemed to have it all - fever, shakes, headache, runny nose, dizzyness, coughs, and general lack of energy. It was also very inconvenient getting sick the week before taking a week off of work. I'm sure it will take at least a month to catch up.

We've all had this stupid bug at one point or another, and not one of us is completely symptom free yet, but we've all returned to the land of the living at least. I wondered for a while how sick you'd have to be to cancel a week of vacation, but we never really had to find out.

Saturday was a blur of bus, train and subway travel with lots of hurry up and wait thrown in. By the time we got to London and to our appartment, we just had time to get some dinner (at a very good, and too nice nearby Indian restaurant) and then go to bed.

Today (Sunday) we had a little more time to see things. We'd bought the "London Pass", a card that gives us free or discounted entry into a bunch of attractions along with a bunch of other beneifts, including free mass transit rides and free sundaes at some restaurants. The place to pick up the cards was two miles away, so we decided to see a bit of London by walking there instead of taking the Underground. The weather held for the walk, but the kids complained bitterly about how far it was in between running and jumping and looking at all the statures and cool buildings. They particularly liked the Lions in Trafalgar Square and had their pictures taken with them in various poses.

After we picked up the passes, we bought some fast food at a street booth and sat on the grass under a tree in St. James Park. At this point, the rain started and continued on and off for the rest of the day, but not so hard as to ruin our outing. We ducked into the Guard's Musuem (free admission with the London Pass!) to get out of the rain. It was an interesting little place, full of history of the Guards, the special branch of the British Military charged with protecting the Monarch. Well, that and getting sent to whereever the British want to send them, since, afterall, it doesn't take five battalions to protect the queen these days... I couldn't help but think how interesting my grandfater would have found the place.

After we came out of the museum, there was some hub-bub out on the street and we scurried out to see a parade consisiting of a band of guardsmen (you can tell the Guard by the bearskin hats they wear. You know, the big black bushy ones that make their eyes hard to see) followed by a band of pipers, followed by a bunch of men in suits. It was pretty cool, but we couldn't figure out what was up. I suspect (from looking around on the internet) that it was something to do with the rememberance of ANZAC day (I'll leave that one for the interested reader to look up on their own...)

We ran to get ahead of them so we could watch them march past, then went off into the park to head toward Buckingham Palace. Before we got very far, we heard them coming back. We scurried back to the street, the whole procession marched past again. Afterward, we went back into the park. On the way, we stopped at a play ground where the kids decompressed (a good plan!) We watched some of the other parents struggle with their kids, and it help us feel a little bit more normal.

Afterward, we walked over to Buckingham Palace and saw the end of a simple changing of the guard ceremony. It wasn't the full blown guard changing that everyone takes pictures of. This was a simplier one solider taking over for the other as the seargant checked the papers and dressed them both up and down to make sure all the proper protocols were being followed. Again small, but pretty cool.

We then wandered over to the big fountain/memorial to Queen Victoria that sits in front of the palace. I guess Victoria was the height of British power, but it sure felt like a momument to excess. Lots of gold and a gigantic stature of Victoria in all her "beauty?" She was not the most attractive of queens, I have to say.

After that, the kids were making hungry noises, so instead of taking any food risks, we took a short walk to the Hard Rock Cafe. At least we knew we could get fries there. On the way, we passed the Wellington Arch which commemorates the guy that finally beat Napoleon. It's interesting to see how much of the Napoleanic war era is built into Europe in brick and mortar (and marble and gold...) Wellington should ask for a bigger Arch though. Napoleon's momuments in Paris are quite a bit bigger and more centrally located.

After dinner, we headed back to the hotel. Overall, the trip has been pretty successful so far. The Older and I have been fighting a lot, but it seems to happen only when one of us is hungry, so we'll tote a lot snacks tomorrow to see if we can prevent a third day of it. Well, I'd better get off to bed now. It's getting late again, and we have a big day of trapsing about to do.

But I worked through all my piles today. Mind you, I didn't do much else, but it's comforting to know that everything (or at least most everything) I need to do is in one place. On just a few sheets of paper in fact.

Here's how the day went:

First I collected EVERYTHING that represented something to do into one big pile on the dining room table. This was intimidating, and it was hard to get started, just because I was worried about how big the pile would be. Then I spent an hour with a pile of blank paper writing down everything that I could think of that needed doing but wasn't already in the pile. In the end, it was somehow comforting to see that I only filled half the table (if you count my work and my home laptops).

The second step was to process everything into either actionable tasks or file them into reference or future lists. This took even longer, and was much harder to start. I struggled at first with figuring out the next actions for each item. For example, one of the things on the list was to fill out a form for the hotel we're staying at in London next week. They want our credit card information, but I need to figure out which card to give them, so I can't just put down "fill in form" since I need to do something first. In this case, I need to decide if I can afford to break the company travel rules and use my corporate card, or if we need to use our US cards and get charged for currency exchanges, or if our Dutch cards will come in time to get the form back to them. But what is the first step in deciding? M helped with this a lot, since it's much easier to deal with someone else's piles of stuff than your own. I returned the favor later in the day when she started the same process, but she got waylaid by children and ended up going off to bed before finishing piling things up. I'll help her finish up tomorrow.

After a while the processing became easier and easier and I made some good progress through the piles and e-mail in boxes. Now I have about 10 pages full of lists of things to do next, projects that are (or should be) running, things I'm waiting for other people to do, and a list of things I might want to do someday, but don't need to plan now (like cleaning up the old computers so they'll run faster.)

It feels pretty good at the moment, but I now need to turn these lists into a system that I can carry around with me, and that may mean a PDA or a day timer. I'd be more excited about a PDA if I could actually sync it with the Lotus Notes we use at work, but our IT department doesn't want that (security issues) so they make it VERY difficult to do. We're supposed to switch to Outlook by the end of the year, but that's what they said last year too. I'm not holding my breath.

Anyway, I'm feeling much more on top of things now. There's still a lot to do, but at least I can see how much now.

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In other news, the Younger continues to be slightly sick, and now the rest of us are starting to develop coughs. I'm reasonably convinced that this is just a cold, but a bad one. I hope we're better enough to enjoy London next week.

Well, I'd better get off to bed. I know lack of sleep is one of the key problems we've been having lately, and I need to hold up my end.

This was quite a week. It's a bit hard to cover it all here, but I'll try to hit the major points.

We got our copy of GTD last Thursday, and M ate through it in 24 hours. Since I was busy on Friday and Saturday, I didn't get around to starting it until Sunday. I was immediately grabbed by the
methods presented and quickly realized that my notebook method wasn't going cut it (a conclusion I'd come to already.) I was collecting things that I was worried about, but not really helping me get things off those lists.

The book suggested clearing your schedule for two whole days to collect and process all of the things you have to do. I couldn't clear my calender to do everything at once, but over the course of the week, I somehow stopped using my old organization system, leaving me with no good way to track what needed to get done. I started collecting things ad hoc, but I got a growing sense of being completely out of control. I managed to fight my e-mail inbox back later in the week, but I still have a sense that there's something I should be working on that I'm forgetting. This really messed up the entire week, since it added an additional layer of stress on top of the "what should I be doing?" feeling that caused me to look into GTD in the first place. Ironic that trying to help my organization would cause me to completely lose track everything. The main plan for tomorrow is to get back on top of things.

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Last Monday, I was planning on going back to the game night at the local bookstore, but I was contacted by some colleagues from the US who were in town for a few days only. We ended up going out to dinner in Amsterdam, but that meant that I didn't get home until quite late. It was good to see them all, but I needed to do some work afterwards, so I was up pretty late, and I still failed to get very organized.

Tuesday was a fairly typical, but long day. I found myself working late again, mostly because of the severe feelings of missing something important.

Wednesday, I traveled by train to Brussels for a business trip. It was a three hour train ride each way for a six hour meeting. My colleagues and I all questioned the use of time, but most of them stayed down there for the following two days as well, so it made more sense for them to make the trip.

That evening, the Younger woke up late at night with a pretty high fever. It peaked around 104, and we worked pretty hard to bring it down, taking off his pajamas and putting cold cloths on his head. The Tylenol that we got into him finally started working around 3am and we all got a bit of sleep before morning came. I was concerned with how high the temp had gotten and concerned that he'd been sick on and off since our Paris trip. M agreed to take him to a doctor on Thursday since she'd gotten a name from one of the other Mothers at the school.

Thursday started out pretty well, as I had a bit more time to sit and plan. I managed to clean out my e-mail which gave a little sense that I wasn't completely out of control, but I was sure I was still missing something. Later in the day a bunch of meetings stacked up on each other. We got a lot of useful work done, but I ended up getting an SMS from my boss asking me to call into the teleconference that I was late for.

During the call, it became clear that she was a bit annoyed with all of us for not being prompt to the call (I was not the only one to be late) and she gave us a quick summary of all the new work and processes that are being implemented on or by us in the next month or so. In the middle of this, M called, asking for help in translating the answering machine message for the doctor, but I couldn't drop off the call to help her and since I was feeling overwhelmed, I got a little frustrated with her for not going to one of her contacts first. To top it off, the boss asked us to let her know if anything was going wrong in our businesses, and when I brought something up for my business, she made it clear that I would probably be held accountable even though the problem was left to me by my predecessor.

M managed to get the Younger an appointment for that day, but the doctor was confusing with his instructions, including telling M to go to the hospital for a blood test before he would be willing to give any antibiotics (even though he seemed to think the Younger might need them.) When M called me with an update, it sounded as though she didn't want to get the test at all, and I hung up on her in frustration.

This is the single biggest thing that M and I fight about. I hate doctors and going to doctors (stereotypical American male attitude, I suppose) but I also tend to imagine that the worst is happening. M, on the other hand, has never really had any experience with bad medical outcomes, and thinks (and has said so) that nothing bad can ever happen to her or her family. This wasn't such a big deal before we had kids, but now I'm left feeling incompetent to deal with medical problems myself, but worried that she wont act on a big problem until it's too late.

I spent the rest of the day convinced that the Younger was going to die on us, feeling completely out of control at work and at home, and more than a little angry at M. I considered going home early a couple of times, but decided to stick it out and try to start organizing things a bit better. Needless to say, I failed to make a lot of progress given my mental state at the time. Overall, I'd say this was the worst day I've had since we've been here.

When I got home, we had dinner, and I made sure the Younger went straight to bed. I laid down with him and quickly fell asleep myself. No surprise, given the week we'd been having.

The next morning was Dutch class, and I really wasn't up for it. M's alarm went off, but she wasn't in bed, so I turned it off. Turns out she'd been sleeping on the couch, since the Younger had been in our bed and had been kicking her in his sleep. She was rushing around getting the Older ready to go to school and upset with me for turning off the alarm. At this point it was a wonder that either of us was holding it together at all, but we managed to get everyone some breakfast, get the Older off to school and do some clean-up before our teacher came.

Lately, our Dutch teacher has been engaging us in conversations (in Dutch) about whatever topic seems to be at hand. We talked with her about our big world map that I'd hung last weekend and where we grew up, where we'd lived in the past and some of the stereotypes the Dutch have about the other Europeans. It soon became clear to her (she's trained as a social worker) that we, and especially M, were struggling with the move right now. With me being gone or late home every evening, we were feeling very disconnected from each other, and we'd both had a really crappy week. It was helpful to have someone tell us this is "normal," but it was only after she left and we could really talk about it that things started to feel better.

I ignored work (except for dozens of phone calls) for the rest of the day and set out to get the Younger to the hospital for that blood test. Even though neither of us was sure it was needed, the Dutch doctors don't tend to order tests without reason, so it seemed prudent. Getting to the zickenhuis (sick house) was quite a challenge, as the taxi number I called was not for a normal taxi, but for a community shuttle that stopped to pick up a few other folks before it finally got there. We wandered around for a while looking for the right department (we hadn't gotten a normal lab request form, just a little note from the doctor) and we ended up in emergency. They helped us out, but ended up re-checking the Younger, declaring it a viral infection (just wait a few more days) and prescribing nose drops to clear his sinuses.

He and I had a pretty good day together, and he's a little trooper when he needs to be. He was too shy to talk to the doctor at first, but by the end was telling her complicated stories she had no interest in.

We took the bus home, and in contrast to our unhelpful but friendly doctor experience, the bus driver helpfully (but grumpily) pointed out to us that we need to change buses to get back to Hilversum faster. He even called ahead and asked the other bus to wait for us, but he seemed extremely annoyed at us the whole time.

I used the last of my phone charge to have M meet us at the station. I dropped the Younger with her, then caught a train to Bussum to pick up the new glass for our stove. I don't know if I had mentioned it, but we managed to break the glass in our oven/microwave combination twice. Both times by melting a little butter in the microwave. The landlord decided not to pay this time (yet another annoyance during the past few weeks) and so we decided that we could install it ourselves and save a bit of money. By the time I got back home, I was too wiped out to do anything about dinner, so we called for pizza while M and I disassembled the oven to replace the glass. It turns out that a gasket around the window had been eroded somehow and was collecting grease from the normal oven operations. When we used the microwave with just a little butter in it, this grease heated up, causing a hot spot on the glass and breaking the window. In the process of cleaning the grease out, we managed to break the gasket, so the full repair had to wait.

Today was spent hunting down a car. After the experience of trying to get to the hospital with the Younger, I was committed to getting something soon. I searched online at a garage that a co-worked had highly recommended and went in armed with a few cars I was interested in looking at. In the end, we ended up with a 2003 VW Golf stationwagon. It will take a few days for them to clean it up and check it over, but I'll pick it up on Thursday on my way home from work and we'll suddenly be much more mobile than before.

Later in the afternoon, the Older and I biked off to pick up some super glue to tack together the oven gasket until the glass was in place. I don't think it will move when it's under the pressure of the window, and the little bit of glue will burn out very quickly and is unlikely to hurt me much, as I spent long days in my bedroom with airplane glue when I was a kid.

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Well, that was most of the week. I left out the altercation I saw between a neighbor and some punk kids in the park next door (he managed to run them off before they started their drinking party) and how when I saw him with his family at the bus stop the next day, he looked a lot more like a gentle dad then he had the night before when he loomed over the teenagers and convinced them to leave. I'm sure I left out a bunch of other stuff as well, like how hard it has been to blog all week when I feel that there's something else I should be doing, even now when bed is more important than anything else. I've also left out that we've survived this week, that next weekend we'll be in London, away from all of this, and that the car will make our lives very different than they have been the last few months. I also left out the realization that I don't have a place that is mine to do my work, and how that's been contributing to the general sense of being out of control.

Tomorrow, M and I will work together to organize our lives a bit better, and hopefully we'll be more on top of things for this next week than we've been. We will make it through this, and we're both still dedicated to being here for the duration. We're learning a lot about ourselves and about living in another culture, and while it can sometimes be pleasant, we're sure this will be a good thing in the end. At least we'll keep telling ourselves that until we're back in our house with our community where we so long to be right now.

A question for those of you who know something about it...

Should I switch this blog to LiveJournal or Blogger (or something like it)?

On one hand, some of the features of LJ and Blogger (letting people add comments, RSS feeds to automatically notify people when I update, etc.) seem really nice. I'd like to let people give me their thoughts more directly.

On the other hand, I think that these features (and the ability of my friends to link to me directly) make my privacy more at risk. I don't know if this is really something to be worried about or not, but I'm concerned that if my company gets the idea that this blog is negative publicity for them, then it could have bad, and possibly lasting, consequences for me.

Thoughts?

This week seemed to fly by. Maybe taking Monday off helped...

Since there seems to be some confusion out there, I want to state with no uncertainty that our trip to Paris last week was a great success. Yes, we saw a lot more of the Younger's lunch than anyone cared for, but we all really enjoyed ourselves and want to go back for longer. I have to admit was a little disturbing that I found the Parisians more friendly and helpful than the Dutch (in general.) Service was certainly better there than here. Of course, we don't have a whole lot of restaurant experience here to compare to, so maybe it's not a fair comparison. Also, Paris is like a huge museum with monuments everywhere you turn. It's impressive, but you start to understand why the French couldn't hold onto their empire. They spent all their money on these sorts of things, and not enough of bread and circuses.

In other travel news, we just bought our train tickets to London for the end of the month. We'll be there a week, and we need to book our hotel today if we can. I'm looking forward to it, and our plan is to just stay in the city and see what we can see. Stonehenge and the like can wait for a later trip.

So, I'm clearly pulling out of my funk. My head still hurts with all the things that need to get done, from Dutch class to work stuff to general house tidying. Couple that with the fact that not all of the work from the move is complete yet, and there simply is a bunch of stuff needing to get done. Nevertheless, spring is well on it's way (finally.) We've had a couple of shirt sleeve days, and I think shorts weather is just around the corner. It was light until almost 9pm yesterday and we still have two more months until the Solstice. I'm not sure how we'll ever get the kids to sleep when it's still light past 10pm.

We finally got the GTD book we ordered. There was a little confusion around payment. It looked like the site would take the payment from our account number, but we needed to go online to our bank and place the order from there. M has already read the book once and wants to start implementing some of the suggestions. I've just started working my way through it, and it's clear that the notebook I started, while a good idea, is not the entirety of the system. I'll post more when I get a better idea of how this all works, but I think it will help manage the long list better and that, all by itself, will help relieve this mental stress.

I'm am feeling a little bit in between things right now. I'm neither up or down in terms of the emotional roller coaster, and there is so much change going on at work (with all the new bosses and co-worker) that I'm reluctant to put in too much effort until our new goals are really clarified. We've already made one mistake by spending a lot of money on a project that now looks like it will be canceled, not because it can't be done or isn't being done well, but because we're not sure we can sell the resulting product. It's my job to make sure we don't do too much of this from here on out.

Yesterday, the Older and I took a long bike ride through the countryside around Hilversum. We had a great time, even though I got us a little bit lost. I wasn't worried about finding our way back (since M was on the other end of the phone if we needed her) but we did end up on a couple of streets that were busier than I'd have liked, given the Older's lack of biking experience. In the end, he did really well, and we had no problems to speak of. We even managed to stop at Gamma and get some things for the house including one of those umbrella like clothes lines and some wall hangers to put up our gigantic world map from Ikea.

In other news, I've decided that we do want to buy a car. Talking with the other ex-pats around, I think our weekends will change significantly once we have one. Then we can take day trips to castles, parks and camping instead of feeling a bit housebound. I'm not sure we'll use the car that much, but the feeling of freedom will be worth the trouble. First I have to work out the insurance implications, but that should be tied up next week.

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On one last note, take a look at this video for an idea of how the Dutch view Americans (the description says "Typical American Scene"). I think that no matter what your view on our gun culture, you have to find this guy a bit scary (the neck beard doesn't help). Couple that with the fact that the Dutch associate guns with crime (either police or criminals) and from their perspective, it's even more frightening.

I've talked with my Dutch colleagues about this a lot, and as near as I can tell, the two countries have just come to a different equilibrium point. Crime rates in both countries are quite low (in an absolute sense) and about equal, but the violent crime rate (murder, rape, assault) is higher in the US, while the property crime rate (theft, burglary, etc.) is higher here. Here the assumption is that a criminal just wants your stuff, and killing them for that is considered excessive use of force. In the US, there's an underlying assumption that the criminal is willing to/capable of hurting you, so using a gun to defend yourself only makes sense.

That said, some kids in the park here the other day were waving around a toy, but realistic looking gun, so maybe things will change over time. For the sake of the Dutch, I kind of hope not, since I'd rather spend my time worrying about someone taking my stuff than taking my life. Of course, I'd rather just worry less, and given how low the chances of either type of crime are, maybe I'll just do that.

I forgot to tell one little story about our Paris trip that is a bit telling about my psyche. Thinking about it, I'm a bit surprised that we got here (to Europe) at all.

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When we went back to the hotel with our niece before dinner, I was starting to get a headache. The Dutch drink a lot of coffee, and I've picked up the habit, since every meeting starts with the question, "coffee?" The cappuccino I'd had with breakfast was all I'd had that day, so I left M and the kids at the hotel and set out in search of java.

At this point, it was close to 6pm on a Sunday, and as in the Netherlands, most stores were closed all day, and many of the non-restaurant storefronts were closed or closing as well. I wandered down the street, hoping against hope that I would spot a Starbucks or McCafe (don't laugh, they have some of the best coffee here) so that I wouldn't have to have a cultural encounter while my head ached. I quickly realized that I would have no such luck, and it would be necessary for me to go into an actual cafe or bistro.

Now, you wouldn't think this would be a problem, and I guess it wouldn't have been if I'd seen what I consider a normal cafe. Instead, there were several establishments that looked a lot like full restaurants, and I was somehow embarrassed to go in and only order a coffee, never mind that the cappuccinos were running €5. So I continued to wander, checking menus on several places and sometimes wavering at the door trying to decide if I would go in or not. Of course, all this time my headache was getting worse and worse and my chances of actually going into a place were going down and down.

About this time, I started to get really annoyed with myself. I mean, for goodness sake, here I am in Paris, and I can't even manage to go into a cafe. A place that is, by it's very name, intending to serve coffee. I'd also commented to a friend at work that I was looking forward to sitting in a cafe in Paris and drinking coffee as I watched the people go by on the street, and yet I still couldn't get up the courage/energy/what-have-you to go into a place. At the same time, dinner was fast approaching, and I would need to be getting back to the hotel soon to meet up with the group.

Eventually, I turned around and went back down the street in the other direction. I was really running out of time now since I'd walked a long way in both direction. Finally, I spotted a creperie, and I knew I was saved. Somehow, I could manage to go into this little hole in the wall and order a coffee and a crepe au chocolat. I didn't really need the crepe that close to dinner, but it was nice to sit and eat and enjoy the coffee for the few minutes I had left.

The small bit of irony is that the place was only a block from the hotel, but in the opposite direction from where I started. I don't really have a good idea of why this was so hard for me, except that I've noticed it before when I was first in Amsterdam. I think when I'm tired and in a new environment and possibly expected to speak at least a little of another language, then I get really nervous, and sometimes that causes me to lock up. When I was staying in Amsterdam, I ate more meals from roomservice than I wanted to, just because I couldn't work up the energy to face the Dutch. I'm glad that's changed here. Now I go into stores and restaurants all the time, apologize for not speaking Dutch and then manage to (usually) get what I went in for.

I guess I've come a long way in five months, but I clearly have miles to go.

On the second day (Sunday) we were to meet M's niece at the Louvre at noon. A co-worker had recommended brunch at a little tea shop, so we set out to give that a try. It was relatively close (by Metro) to the Louvre, so it seemed like a good bet.

Unfortunately, it is always hard to get kids (and adults) moving in the morning, so by the time we got there, we were all hungry and grumpy. One look at the menu made it clear that it wasn't going to work for us that morning, so we wandered aimlessly down the street looking for something open. The Older spotted a place across the street with someone going in, so we headed over there. Good thing too, because we were at our limit. Two hunks of bread, one croissant, a hot drink and OJ later, we were back to normal.

After breakfast, we headed back to the tea house to buy my co-worker some tea and then headed off to the metro to meet our niece. We found her surprisingly quickly, given the sea of people at the Louvre. It was the first Sunday of the month, which is free Sunday, so the place was packed. She had just finished seeing all the art she wanted, so we wandered off toward the Arc de Triomphe, passing through the very large sculpture garden to the West.

It's a pretty long walk to the Arc de Trioumphe from the Louvre, but we made it all the way. In the process, we stopped at a carousel for the kids, a creperie (which sells crepes) for lunch, watched a bit of the Paris Marathon next to the Seine, and shopped for chocolate and souvenirs for our niece. We also saw the Quatarian Embassy. Not very interesting, but somehow notable.

The Older really wanted to go to the top of the Arc, so we bought tickets and started to climb. About 280 stairs later, we found ourselves with a lovely view of Paris. The weather was supposed to be very cold and rainy the whole time we were there, but it turned out to be pretty reasonable. We did get wet from time to time, and we woke to a very light dusting of snow, but the sun was out for part of the time we were up there and the views were lovely.

That night, we tagged along with our niece's travel group to dinner and a boat cruise. It was nice to hang out with her some more, but all in all, I could have passed on the boat ride. It was very cold, which made it difficult to stay out on the back deck very long. Under the Plexiglas roof, it was hard to see anything. By the time we go back to dock, the Older was asleep, and we carried them both part way back to the Metro. We said goodbye to our niece at her Metro stop

The next morning, we planned to see the Eiffel Tower. Our niece had seen it earlier in the week, so it seemed like a good idea at the time. We got breakfast in the hotel (to avoid the previous morning's problem), checked out of the hotel, and caught the Metro.

There is a saying about the best laid plans...

When we got within a few blocks of the tower, we found our way blocked by metal barriers and gendarmes (the French police.) It took us a while to put together what was going on, but it turns out the Olympic Torch was in town and we'd found ourselves a prime viewing position. We hung around, laughed at Samsung truck (full of gymnasts and followed by people in silver body suits on strange scooters...) and tried to explain to the boys that they weren't going to the top of the tower today and by the way, if we stood around for 90 minutes, we'd see some woman carrying a burning stick. Needless to say, they were less than impressed, and more than a bit disappointed.

We also saw a couple of scuffles and one outright fight that spilled into the street in front of the torch. I guess the protests in other parts of the city were much more severe, but it's hard for me to judge how much of that was true and how much was blown out of proportion by the media.

After the torch passed, we scampered back to the Metro so we could get home at a decent time. We grabbed lunch at a brasserie near the hotel and then scampered out of town. On the way home, the Younger (who had been fine the whole time in Paris) threw up again about half way home. Poor guy. I hope he hasn't developed car sickness because of this.

We drove home and unloaded our luggage, then I took the car back to the airport and returned by train. It was quite an ordeal, but we all thought it was worth the trouble. We'll take the train (and plan ahead better) next time, but we'd like to spend a week in Paris on some future trip.

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I feel like I'm starting to pull out of my funk, but work is not helping. People keep having expectations that I am not prepared to meet. I'm trying to tease out if these things are really part of my job, and if they're actually important (since I'm sure some of them are not.) It seems I'll have to find my own way a bit, since I can't seem to get anyone to agree on what is and is not "really important." I certainly can't ask anyone who has asked me to do something, since the answer is inevitably, "why, my request..." I'll get the hang of this too, but right now, it's really unsettling to not be sure where to look.

You might think that "keep left" would be more appropriate title for a trip to London than a trip to Paris, but the whole way down there, our TomTom kept telling us to "keep left." It seems that the style of the directions varies depending on which country you are in, since in the Netherlands, it doesn't bother to tell you to "keep left" when you're staying on the same freeway while another one splits off to the right, but in France, it told us every time. I suppose there's some French joke to be made here, but having just been there, I'll let it pass.

Our trip got off on the wrong foot as the Younger threw-up just before we left. He seemed ok otherwise, so we started off anyway, but I kept asking myself how sick does your child have to be before you cancel vacation plans?

We missed our bus to the station by minutes, but we weren't really in a rush, so it wasn't a big deal. It was raining though, and the next bus wasn't for 30 minutes. As I was calling for a taxi, a mom from the kids' school pulled up and offered us a ride to the station. This was, coincidently, the same mom that was watching our dog for the weekend, so now we owe her double.

The Younger threw up again on the platform just before our train arrived. Poor kid. We got to the airport (where we were renting the car) without any further problems, but we seemed to have arrived just as a plane unloaded, since the lines were fairly long, but moved quickly. Soon, we had ourselves a Fiat Punto for the weekend, complete with full liability coverage. I don't usually go for the extra coverages, but given that we don't currently have auto insurance (since we have no car) I didn't know what our status would be, and it seemed better to be safe then sorry.

The drive down was supposed to be 4:30, but with the Younger sick 2-3 times before we reached the Belgian border, it ended up taking close to 6 hours. He finally fell asleep (probably the best thing he could have done) and we made better time until we hit the traffic jam going into Paris.

Our hotel was an Apart'Hotel, meaning it had a kitchenette so you could live out of it for an extended time if necessary. The place was not fancy (I'd say adequate) but it was relatively inexpensive for being in Paris proper, and we were all happy with it, except that the hi-speed internet was broken on our floor. Thus no blog updates until now.

We arrived late enough in the day that it was all we could manage to find dinner and get our kids to bed. M hadn't spoken French in about 18 years, and was initially reluctant to do it again, but quickly had the woman at the front desk rambling on about local places to eat and why our internet couldn't be fixed until Monday. I think she really enjoyed being able to have entire interactions in French. At least I hope she did. I wish more and more that I knew another language. I'm not sure I'll ever get there with Dutch, since they aren't as willing to put up with your practicing as the French are (or maybe they're just more willing to show they can speak English.)

We ended up having dinner at a little Asian restaurant just down the street. It wasn't great, but it filled us up. The Younger was eating pretty well by this time (I think the extended nap in the car helped a lot) and we all went to bed pretty early.

I'll break off here, since it's pretty late for me and I need to get up early tomorrow for work. I'll continue more soon.