The Northlander

The second time I passed this parked train I got the camera out and open fast enough to take a picture. The giant Air Canada advertisement painted on the side catches my attention. A quick glance to Google tells me that the train used to be one that runs between Toronto and Cochrine, Ontario.

Where's Cochrine? Well, have you ever imagined seeing vast forested wilderness with nobody anywhere near? No roads or phones or settlements. Well you could jump off at that place long before the train reaches Cochrine.

And now this train is sitting just outside Amsterdam's Cental Station. I wonder what it thinks of the change? Wilderness to urban. Lifeline to waiting for repair/repaint. I hope it gets to bring me a few more smiles before it goes back to work.

It's A Book... sort of

Done! After a lot of (rather) hard work, I'm done the training materials for next week's course in Denmark. The writing has gotten done, but barely in time. The editing took far longer than planned. The plane tickets almost didn't happen, but have now been finalized. And at the very last minute even the colour printer didn't want to cooperate! But it's done!

This 72-page handout is really only Chapters 7 & 8 for the textbook I'm writing. So it's not really "done". But it's nice to have something shiny and physical to show for months of effort. So nice!

Spring Smell

Can you smell it? That's spring! All along the walk to work the street is suddenly lined with yellow flowers. And the air is thick with the smell of yellow. With a hint of wet green too. All the riches of spring.

So this means no more snow, right?

Dahab Egypt

It's been 4 days of diving in Sharm el Sheikh and now a fifth day in Dahab. Wonderful!

I wasn't happy with the one hour drive through the desert this morning, nor the 6am pickup for yesterday's wreck diving. But once I'm in the water all the logistical problems disolve into the Red Sea and the world seems beautiful. La vita es bela!

Tonight the desert highway is particularly beautiful! The full moon is casting a pallet of greys over the mountains. Bare rock seems to have awakened to some type of soft life. Shadows shift as does the jagged horizon between the earth and sky. The beauty of the wilderness is so clear at night.

Tomorrow we've got one more dive; a night dive. Then we'll get to enjoy the moonlight on coral. I can't wait! But first, my first full night's sleep in a week.

Three words!

It's a poor photo. Sorry. But would you believe that the text along the bottom of that sign is 3 words? The first is the doozie. Ever wonder why Dutch is hard to learn? They use letters like there's a sale, during a riot, then pronounce it as *cough*. Huh?

Amsterdam at 2am

I had drinks tonight with my friend then started walking home. I stopped in at a place and met an effeminent African-French tourist and a man of unknown origin and name (aka Mr. Thatsnotimportant). Quite possibly some kind of cult/terrorist recruiter. As I walked home from the experience I thought," Damn I missed this place!"

I missed my long walk home, the beautiful buildings and the freaky people all around. What ever you think, it's ok to talk about here.

There's a lot I didn't say in the US. There were unfair dichotomies in Brazil that frightened me. But in Amsterdam it's all good.

On the way home, I met this couple. The site said it all to me. Amsterdam at midnight is pretty cool, but Amsterdam at 2am is cooler.

I'm glad to be, a few paces from, home.

Too Funny!

Too funny! The hardware store next to my home left a wooden pallet leaning against a wall where it was discovered by a roving gang of boys (aged 6-8). The oldest boy spotted a weak board and with one kick put his foot through it. His friend, highly impressed, tried also but the other boards were solid. Suddenly all four swarmed! Two to a board they kicked and bounced and attacked. After only a minute the pallet was a deceased, former pallet.

But the part that made me laugh out loud (really quite loud) was when some adults came walking wast. The youngest spun round, took two steps away, and started throwing his tennisball into the air.

*looks nonchalant* "It wasn't me"

Feijoada

Joao (John) my coworker took me out for feijoada. Which is really just pork and beans. Well, really, it's more like pig and beans. The whole darn animal was swimming around in the beans and broth. Delicious, except for the parts that weren't fully shaved.

Normalicy

When life gets out of alignment sometimes the little details fall aside. And so in turn, a simple little thing, like polishing your shoes before the big meeting, can be therapy.

Blogging about it is just weird though.

This Isn't Brazil!

As I travelled to the airport this morning I thought," Each journey of a thousand miles begins...

...with a train ride." Little did I know it would be more than one. Instead of being on the plane I'm on a train to Rotterdam, to get a visa to enter Brazil. Who knew?!? Apparently this trip will require ~8 train rides before the plane.

Update:
Visa by Monday. *fingers crossed* Flying Tuesday. *probably* I get to spend a weekend at home (first in a while) and I still get my full week trip to Sao Paulo. :-)

Oh what a beautiful morning!

A white Christmas in Holland? December 21st will do. Yesterday I awoke to trees covered in ice. Last night a true and proper snowfall blanketted everything else. Isn't it beautiful?

And today is the last work day. Five-day weekend!

Let's just hope the fools at the cable company don't go on vacation before turning my service back on.

Join Me

If you're reading this within an hour or two of the post time (GMT+1) then you're joining me live from the Maralyn Manson concert in Den Bosch NL.

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Update: Wow! Great concert! And I've now rotated the pic properly. Alas, the train got me home between 2 and 3am. So everything today has gone a little slowly.

Monday

It took me a while to wake up this morning. Eventually I started planning my work day; what needs doing, who needs to be emailed, etc.. And I began to wonder if I should work from home. I could get more done, fewer distractions... But wait. *blinks* I seem to be on the train already. Good thing too, because I was about to decide not to go.

The Bus

It's been a strange night. A very strange night. And yet, at the end of it all, I am transfixed upon a Rubick's Cube. I could once solve this puzzle in the time this guy takes to solve it and mix it again. He could have been a hero... just 2 decades ago.

Kind of bored

I've had my new phone for a while now. A lot of the photos I've taken with it have been posted here. But this is the first attempt posting directly from the phone. Taking a theme I've learned from fellow bloggers I offer you... my shoe pic.