The book I read that said that there are, on average, 23 cloudless days in the netherlands in a YEAR was not joking. Winter is pretty grey, cold, and miserable. Yesterday it snowed for the first time, only an inch of slushy stuff that was gone by noon, but still enough for me to wipe …
Monthly Archive: December 2004
Dec
29
Dec
29
Gift from the Royal Dutch Post
Ann, as usual, prepared this years Christmas cards. She is always very good about keeping track of everyone’s address and sending them each a hand-written Christmas card. However, since this is a very industrial process involving a long assembly line of card writing, postage stamping, envelope licking and trying to get her husband to just …
Dec
26
Christmas 2004
Merry Christmas to all! Our first Christmas in the Netherlands, our second in Europe (we were in London for Christmas 2000), and only my second Christmas overall away from my family (which, when I say it out loud, makes me feel equal parts mamma’s boy and nostalgic). Neither Ann nor I are religious, but for …
Dec
21
CNN’s Top 10 Stories of 2004
CNN has just published its list of the top 10 events of 2004. Here’s my brief opinion on them: 1. Election 2004 – I still feel like someone ripped out my heart and beat me over the head with it. At the same time I want to say “I’m not surprised” (since I did predict …
Dec
21
Dutch Fashion Update #1
For those who missed our first post about this topic, here are some more examples that we found at the Kerstmarkt. Now those are some serious boots.
Dec
20
Kerstmarkt
Today was one of the 5 cloudless days in the Netherlands, and Ann and I took a stroll through the Kerstmarkt (Christmas Market) which had been set up on the main shopping street in the middle of town. Every year, for three days they fill up the already congested Main St. with all sorts …
Dec
17
Early Retirement
I had to go to Rotterdam yesterday to my MBA school to take care of some financial matters. It seems that Sallie Mae, after telling both me AND the school that it would be a cold day in hell before they made out educational checks to a student, sent $30,000 in checks to the Rotterdam …
Dec
16
Robbed Twice
New back wheel, chain, plus labor involved to put them both on shoddily (so I had to take it back to the shop after riding on it for two seconds): 96 Euros. New lock because now apparently I need to lock BOTH the front and back tires: 12 Euros. New clip on lights (because someone …
Dec
12
Goddamn Immigrants
Some asshole stole the back wheel off my bike yesterday. I came back from my first indoor frisbee tournament, and when I got to my bike I saw that it was curiously low to the ground in the back. It took me a few seconds, but I eventually realized that the back wheel was gone. …
Dec
09
Computer “Exercises”
So, I was speaking with my friend Esther the other day when all of a sudden she was locked out of her computer. This program hijacked her computer, put up pictures of people doing strange things, and wouldn’t let her close it or do anything else. “What’s that?” “Oh, that’s my little thingee that tells …