Musical update

I think we've mentioned before how often we hear Bryan Adams on the radio here. So I picked up a free weekly outside the train station today, opened it up, and there was a big article about none other than...Bryan Adams! He's evidently got a concert coming up in Zurich, for which tickets run a mere 80 francs ($67) for seats or 60 francs (a steal at $50) to stand.

Speaking of '80s stars you never thought you'd hear from again, remember Nena of "99 Luftballons" fame? (Which, incidentally, ranks right up there with "Der Kommissar" on the list of great German '80s crossover hits.) Well, she's back with a hit album. Or maybe she remained popular here. Anyway, it's been awhile, but here are the latest top 10 songs according to Radio Basel 1:

1 Daniel Powter - Bad Day
2 Good Charlotte - I Just Wanna Live
3 Mario - Let Me Love You
4 Skye Sweetnam - Tangled Up In Me
5 Nena - Liebe Ist
6 Melanie C - Next Best Superstar
7 Fettes Brot - Emanuela
8 Gwen Stefani feat. Eve - Rich Girl
9 Natasha Bedingfield - Unwritten
10 Natalie Imbruglia - Shiver

On the road again

As much as I generally enjoy traveling, it does get wearying at times so I've really enjoyed staying in Basel the past couple of weeks. All good things must end, however, as Gretchen leaves on Sunday to go to Paris with Lee and his friend Rex (I can't even imagine the stories they'll have), while I also leave on Sunday for several days of meetings in Amsterdam. The forecast for Amsterdam on Sunday is 75 degrees and sunny, which would be ideal since it's a great city for walking along the canals, and the only other times I've been there it's been gray and rainy.

It's a small world after all

I got a pleasant surprise yesterday when I got an email out of the blue from an old high school friend, Annabelle, who I hadn't heard from in years. How cool! The combination of email and Google is a wondrous thing...

'Tis the season

It's starting to be the season for Spargel (white asparagus). For the next month or two, we won't be able to go to a supermarket that won't have bunches of the big, white, phallic stuff for sale or restaurants that have special Spargelkarte (asparagus menus) with every possible variation of asparagus. It doesn't do much for me personally (I never much cared for the boring green asparagus we have at home, either), but people here seem to go crazy for it. One of my colleagues even passed along information about the Badische Spargel-Strasse in Germany, where I guess you pretty much just drive from town to town and eat asparagus. And what fun that must be!

Foreign policy

As always, The Onion gets to the heart of the most critical side effect of the President's diplomatic failures.

Success!

After struggling mightily to find an affordable flight to Barcelona, this afternoon I somehow found a charter flight online and even managed to do it in German (although a German colleague had to look over my shoulder and make sure I entered the correct data once I found the flight). Of course, I got a bit of a shock when the airport tax added another 30% to the price--I'm increasingly convinced it's impossible to find anything here that isn't more expensive than it really needs to be. (Speaking of which, Gretchen may have already posted something about this, but when we were in Italy there was a story on CNN about how supermarket prices in Switzerland are expected to drop because a German discount store is moving in. They interviewed a guy from one of the big supermarket chains here, and he actually claimed with a straight face that he was surprised to learn that groceries sometimes cost twice as much in Switzerland as they do across the border. Which just goes to show that "spin"--is there a German word for that?--isn't a wholly American concept.)

One more time

I can't believe it. Weeks ago, I put away my winter coats, my sweaters, and my turtlenecks. I moved them into our basement storage area to make room for capri pants, t-shirts, and sandals. I hate to admit that I just broke down and dug back into the winter stash. It is so cold and damp out today that I decided to put on a turtleneck before going out for the afternoon. How depressing is that? It's April 27!! "They" predict beautiful weather for the upcoming weekend (perhaps even 80 degrees!) but I'll believe it when I see it. Ugh. Rain, rain, go away.

Trash day

This weekend there was a story in the International Herald Tribune about trash collection in Switzerland. While it's mainly about Zurich, just about all of it applies equally to Basel (instead of Zuri-Sacks, we have Bebbi-Saggs). I could be wrong, but I'd say it takes us at least three weeks, if not more, to produce as much trash as we would produce in a typical week at home. It probably helps that I take paper recycling to work every day...

What is this, Florida?

When did my fair hometown (a.k.a. America's Finest City) become so freakin' corrupt? It sounds like it's on the verge of becoming a Carl Hiaasen novel...

What's my purpose?

Last week I started reading Rick Warren's "The Purpose Driven Life". Has anyone else read it? The idea is that, as part of what's called the "40 Days of Purpose Campaign", you're only supposed to read a short chapter each day (obviously for 40 days). The 40-day "spiritual journey" (as it's called by the author) is supposed to help you figure out your purpose in life. So far I'm really enjoying it. I don't necessarily agree with his perspective on everything, which is probably because he is a Baptist minister and I was raised Lutheran and there are some differences in our approach to life. But nonetheless, it's thought-provoking and it does offer some interesting insight. Stay tuned.

The saga is over

I bet you hadn't realized that our attempt to buy plane tickets to Barcelona had become a saga, had you? After numerous unsuccessful attempts over the past several days to book a cheap fare on Travelocity from Barcelona to Basel, we have concluded that it's not going to happen. Earlier today I talked to someone from the Travelocity office in Germany and he confirmed that the cheap seats on that flight are totally "booked out" (as he said in his non-native English). It was nothing but a big tease from Iberia and Travelocity. Oh well, I guess it just wasn't meant to be. Now we'll have to find someplace else to go for that 3-day holiday weekend in May! I know, I know... woe is me...

Can it be true?

I'm looking out my window and seeing something new and interesting: the sun. Since getting back from Italy, I think we've had one day of sun--otherwise nothing but rain and cold. (I recently heard one of my favorite old Crowded House songs, where the chorus is "Everywhere you go, you always take the weather with you", which seemed fitting since it was raining when we left Basel, raining in Italy, and raining ever since we got back to Basel.) In truth, I shouldn't have much reason to complain--after all, I pretty much sit inside at my desk 12 hours a day and, if anything, am more productive when it's raining because there's no temptation to go for a walk or gaze longingly outside. But I have to say, there's something vaguely depressing about rain for days on end. (Of course as I finish typing this, the dark clouds have moved over again...)

Summer airfares...

...are outrageous!! I've been searching for days to find a reasonable flight to Wisconsin this summer, and I've finally given up (or given in, I guess I should say). You'd think it wouldn't be that hard considering I have lots of flexibility in the days and times that I can travel, and considering I have several airport options as well (Basel, Zurich, even Frankfurt). I spent a long time on the phone with United last week trying to use miles to buy a flight, but unfortunately there were no options there. Despite it costing an arm and a leg, I am very happy that I finally booked a flight today. For 2+ weeks in early August, Kirk will be sole provider for Grady, taking him back to a role he perfected last year when I stayed in Wisconsin for 4 months. It's really strange to think that it'll be a whole year since I've been there. Even though I lived in Washington for 10 years before moving to Basel, I frequently went back to Wisconsin to see family and friends and will always consider it "home". Now I haven't been there since August and I miss it very much. No doubt it will also be a bit of an emotional trip for me knowing I no longer have parents to see Madison and that somebody else is now living in the house where I grew up. Nonetheless, I plan to spend some time there (in Madison) to visit with some of my parents' friends (along with some of my own!). I'll also spend time in suburban Milwaukee, where my sister and her family live, and in Three Lakes, a small town in northern Wisconsin where my family owns a home on a lake and where I spent all my childhood summers. Three Lakes, especially, has a very special place in my heart and I'm really looking forward to spending at least a week there!

My new show

As I've mentioned several times before, we have very limited options for watching TV in English. Unlike so many of the other expats living in Basel, we don't have SKY TV or satellite or whatever it is that allows everybody else to watch BBC and presumably other cool stuff. Other than CNN, MTV is just about my only option because they like to show old episodes of bad reality TV. They're not showing Real World anymore, but now I'm getting sucked into a new show called Making the Band. I just went on the MTV website and discovered that they're already on season 3 in the US. I think I'm watching the first season here in Basel. Don't ask me why I like watching it, but I find it very entertaining. I especially like reading the German subtitles to try and figure out how they translate P. Diddy and his pals. Unfortunately I missed it this afternoon because I was at the gym, and unfortunately I instead watched two other really awful MTV shows which come on just after Making the Band-- Room Raiders and Dismissed. I must be desparate.

An exciting week!

Today may be another one of those gray, rainy, and cold Basel Mondays, but at least this week I have something very exciting to look forward to. Our friend Lee is arriving in Basel on Friday! Lee is a regular Expatter reader and commenter (much appreciated, I might add) who even had his own blog posting last June because of his fabulous experience at a Madonna concert. It's been a while since we've had visitors (I guess since Christmas) and I'm really looking forward to spending time with a friend from home. After a couple days in Basel we're flying up to Paris for a couple days-- just because we can. Unfortunately, Kirk won't be joining us because he has to work, but I don't feel that bad for him because he'll be working in Amsterdam while we're in Paris.

The birthday boy

Today is my nephew Bennett's birthday. He's now 4 and lives just outside Milwaukee. I wish I could be there to celebrate with him. He is such a little character. He's the cutest thing you've ever seen, with blond hair (almost white) and striking blue eyes. No matter how naughty or sassy he gets he can always charm you out of being mad at him. After my Dad died a couple years ago we started having Bennett take over sitting at the head of the dining room table in my parents' house so that it wasn't so strange to have an empty seat at my Dad's place. That was actually quite fitting because in many ways Bennett reminds me of my Dad. Funny, smart, outspoken, the life of the party, friends with everyone, yet a quick-temper at times when not getting his way. Even their baby pictures look similar, especially the blond hair and the mischievous glint in their sparkling blue eyes. Here's a funny Bennett story. Last month while staying with his Grandma Sally he apparently caused the toilet to overflow (presumably by using almost a whole roll of toilet paper-- he's really into toilet paper these days). Grandma Sally walked into the bathroom to see what was wrong, and there was Bennett with an angry look on his face. He looked at his Grandma and said "This is going to be a goddamn problem!" Oh, Bennett, thank you for always making us laugh! Happy Birthday!

Here's Bennett with his older brother and sister at a restaurant in the Alsace during their Christmas visit to Basel.

Schwyzertütsch

Back in the States we may have different accents and occasionally different words across regions, but the actual language itself generally remains the same. We were reminded last night that with Swiss German it's not just that words are pronounced differently (which they are), but that the actual words themselves are different. There was a sign for an upcoming bread market next Saturday starting at 9:00am. I probably don't have this exactly right, but in Hochdeutsche (High German), it would have said something like:

Samstag, 30 April am Neun Uhr am Morgen

Instead, this is what it said in the local dialect:

Samschtig, 30 April am nyyni am Morge

I'm addicted

I learned yesterday on CNN that, according to a recent survey, 62% of UK residents are addicted to checking their email messages. I think the story was referring to people who actually have jobs, and how distracting and unproductive it can be for employees to be checking their email throughout the day, but regardless, I feel like I could definitely be included in that 62% (except for the fact that I'm not a resident of the UK). Our Internet service was down yesterday, and it was only then that I realized how obsessed I am with having access to the Internet. It's not that I'm sitting at the computer all day, but when I'm home I check email quite frequently. It's a good thing yesterday was actually a beautiful, sunny day otherwise not being able to be online would have made me really crabby!

C is for Cookie

I've always been a huge Sesame Street fan (yes, even as an adult) and I find it really interesting that, according to an article in the Washington Post, "Cookie Monster has been stripped of his piles of quickly and loudly consumed chocolate-chip cookies" in an effort to promote more healthy eating among children. His new theme song will be "A Cookie is a Sometime Food". Goodbye "C is for Cookie"...

Such a tease

We have a three-day weekend coming up next month (for "Whit Monday", which I don't really understand), and we'd really like to go out of town. We found an inexpensive flight to Barcelona on Travelocity, but whenever we try to book it online--either from home or from work--we get a system error message. Travelocity customer support insists there's not a problem and that they don't get an error when they do it (then why does it happen both at work and at home?!?). Meanwhile, the price is already getting higher on Travelocity, and the price is almost double on every other site we've checked. ARGH!

(I know, the empathy you must feel for poor us that we may not be able to find a cheap flight to Barcelona...)

Only in Wisconsin

I was intrigued by this unusual headline in today's online version of the Wisconsin State Journal (the Madison paper I check periodically):

"Hopping holstein shuts down cow pie bingo"

The story goes something like this. The town of Westby (a small town outside of Madison) has apparently cancelled the annual cow pie bingo fundraiser at this year's Syttende Mai festival because of insurance reasons. At last year's festival, Baby, a 4-year old Holstein, jumped the fence to escape the bingo grid which apparently "scared some kids". Perhaps cows just aren't meant to play bingo.

What's Grady trying to tell me?

I picked up an interesting flyer today off the bulletin board that hangs outside Centrepoint, the place downtown where I occasionally volunteer. Who know that there were courses in "dog body language"? For 180 CHF (about $160 USD), I could attend two evening classes in May (in English!) called "Workshop Dog Body-Language". The flyer lists the following as reasons to take the class:

1. To understand better the body language of our dogs
2. To avoid problematic situations
3. To make easier the education of the dog
4. To intensify the relationship human being-dog

I realize that, in the opinion of some people, I often treat Grady a bit too much like a person, rather than a dog. But I have to draw the line somewhere... I cannot imagine paying 180 CHF to have someone tell me what Grady is trying to tell me. I can already tell you exactly what his body language means: "When's dinner?" and "Why can't I eat another dinner?"

A good site

For any of you who are making travel plans, I highly recommend the Trip Advisor website. We've used it quite a bit for all of our recent travel plans, and have found the hotel reviews especially helpful. In fact, I think we chose all three of our Italy hotels based on what we read on Trip Advisor. After months of benefiting from other users' reviews, I finally signed up as a "reviewer" today so that we can share our perspective and recommendations as well.

Die Kinder

If there's one thing that's always guaranteed to snap me out of a foul mood (foul weather can put me in a foul mood), it's taking Grady for his noon walk as the sun begins to break out and seeing lots of cute little Swiss kids walking home from school for lunch. There's a whole different sense of independence among little kids here (as compared with the US) and I love it. It reminds me of the old days when I used to walk to my neighborhood elementary school and nobody worried about my safety. Here, in Basel, and I suspect throughout Switzerland, even the kindergartners walk themselves to school. When we first moved here I was a bit astonished to see such little kids coming home by themselves every day at noon, but it makes sense considering how safe it is. The thing I like most about the young school kids is that they all wear these orange reflector vests over their jackets-- kind of like something you would wear to go running at night, or something construction workers would wear while working on the highway. Lunch time in the neighborhood is one of the charming things I will always remember about Basel.

Black smoke

OK, so I know that this election of a new Pope is a big historical event and all, but seriously, how many hours can CNN fill by talking about white smoke and black smoke, and potential candidates, and what the cardinals are eating for lunch, etc? It is all Pope, all the time. Isn't there any other news happening in the world? I know I sound like a curmudgeon, but we have VERY limited TV in English, and the weather is really crappy again today, so I wouldn't mind lounging on the couch and watching a little TV. Here's a novel idea-- maybe I'll read a book instead!

Gnomes to the rescue

Kirk may have laughed at my recent purchase of gnomes for the garden, but it looks like they could come in handy one day. Check out this story I just read:

Grandma Stops Intruder With Garden Gnome
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: April 17, 2005
Filed at 10:55 p.m. ET

LONDON (AP) -- A grandmother stopped an intruder from entering her home by lobbing a heavy garden gnome at him, police said Friday. Jean Collop was woken early on Tuesday morning by the sound of an intruder on the roof of her home in Wadebridge, southwest England.

''I grabbed the first thing that came to hand -- one of my garden gnomes -- and hurled it at him, and hit him,'' she recalled.

''He lay there and I began to scream. I went back into the kitchen and found a rolling pin in case he came down. I didn't want to break another gnome.''

A neighbor alerted police who arrived shortly afterward and arrested the intruder.

He added: ''Our usual advice would be not to get involved, but to contact the police straight away,'' said a spokesman for the Devon and Cornwall Police.

''We do appreciate that in the heat of the moment people react to that situation, and if it results in a happy outcome that's great.''

Remember this?

All this rain in Basel had better stop soon, because I really need to mow the lawn. Our backyard is beginning to look a bit like it did a year ago. Remember this from last May?

The apple incident

It's true what they say-- what goes around, comes around. Or is it what comes around, goes around? I always forget. On my very first day ever in Basel, back in November 2003 when we were here for Kirk's interview, I was fortunate enough to experience the epitome of Swiss-ness within minutes of my arrival. After checking into the hotel, I went next door to the local Coop to buy a snack. Kirk was not with me because we flew on separate flights and he was delayed (don't ask why we flew separately, I don't really remember). I picked up an apple and a croissant and proceeded to the Kasse (check out). When it was my turn to pay, the Kasse woman held up the apple and shook it several times and babbled something in Swiss German that I didn't understand. As I stood there perplexed, people in line behind me started to huff and puff, as if I was causing them this great inconvenience in delaying their check out. After several minutes of this (me, looking perplexed, explaining I don't speak German, and she, shaking the apple at me while customers were huffing and puffing) the Kasse woman finally got up, left her seat, and walked over the produce section. At that point, the man behind me says (in perfect English) "You have to WEIGH the fruit!" And I'm thinking, well, why didn't you say something before to save us all of this hassle? From that point on, I'm sure to explain to any newcomer to Basel how you have to weigh your fruit at the scale in the produce section which gives you a sticker with the price, etc. Yesterday, I was so pleased to be able to help a non-German speaker who faced a similar situation at the new Coop Pronto (a small, convenience store version of Coop) in the Bahnhof (train station). He set an apple on the counter to pay, and the woman babbled something in Swiss German and pointed at the produce section. He obviously didn't understand because instead of going to the scale, he grabbed a plastic bag from the produce section, put the apple in the bag, and set it back on the counter. After watching this for a couple minutes, and observing the man's frustration, I decided to step in, put the apple on the scale, pressed the number 3 (designated for that type of apple), and handed him the sticker. He seemed grateful, and I walked away with a smile on my face. I feel like such a pro at this Basel stuff now.

Der Hund

In just over 2 hours I can finally go to the Hundpension and pick up Grady. That's a good thing because I miss my puppy! The only bad thing about coming back to Basel on Saturday night was that I had to spend a whole Sunday at home without my dog. That may sound strange to some of you, but if you have a dog, you know what I mean. Despite all his neuroses (he has many), he is a good companion for me, especially with Kirk working such long hours. His kennel, like everything else in Switzerland is closed on Sundays, which is very frustrating at times. During the week they close between 11:00 and 2:00 for lunch (again, standard Swiss practice), and since I had my German lesson this morning I have to wait until 2:00 to drive out to Mumpf. I'm hoping I won't discover a bloody tail when I arrive...

Finding us

It's really interesting to see how search engines (Google, Yahoo, etc.) refer others to this blog. For example, over the past few days, people searching for "what shape is pig poop", "clinique bonus time", "nice butt", and "rösti mcdonalds" have been referred here. I'm not sure what this says about us, and I'm not sure I want to know...

Did I just see that?

When we were driving from Orvieto to Todi along Lago di Corbara, we passed a camper along the side of the road where Gretchen saw a woman dressed in a bikini top and high heels, which seemed like an odd ensemble for that particular stretch of road. I made an offhand comment that maybe she was a "lake ho", although I was joking. Sure enough, two minutes later Gretchen spotted another similarly clad woman sitting on a bucket by the side of the road in the middle of nowhere, which got us thinking that maybe they really were lake hos. On the list of things I didn't expect to see in Italy, I would have to say lake hos rank pretty high. (Sorry, no pictures.)

Signs of the times

While we didn't see anything quite like this sign in Brazil (courtesy of caipirissima), we still saw a couple that made us laugh. This was in Siena:



And this might not make sense if you don't speak German, but Gretchen seemed to think that her German teacher would not approve. (It also says a lot about the demographics of tourism in Tuscany--just about every non-Italian tourist we encountered seemed to be a German or English speaker. This was in contrast with Umbria, where we heard much more French, especially in Assisi. The notable exception was our last night in Spoleto when we wished a good evening to the nice older Italian couple seated next to us at dinner and they responded with "Auf wiedersehen".):

Sights

Between meals, we managed to see so many great cities and small towns (mostly the latter) that they almost started to blend together by the end. Some of our favorites included Parma...



...Siena...



...San Gimignano...



...Spoleto...



...Trevi...



...Orvieto...



...and Todi.



(And I'm sure we're leaving some out.)

Mangia

After keeping track of what we ate for the first couple of days, we kept eating so well (and so much) that we completely lost track. A proper meal in Italy seems to consist of a starter, a first course (typically pasta or soup), and a second course (typically meat). When you combine that with copious amounts of wine, coffee, gelato, etc., we both realised our clothes were getting tight after a couple of days and tried to scale back to just a starter and one other course. I'm not sure how much it helped--our clothes still seem to be a bit tight (Gretchen thinks maybe it's the fault of the clothes dryer, which sounds perfectly reasonable to me). This is a food stall in Parma, fruit in Siena, Gretchen eating lunch in Montepulciano, and me with a wild boar.

Castellina in Chianti

By the way, we're not trying to be snobs by calling the first town where we stayed Castellina in Chianti. That is the actual name. I'm not sure if it's an attempt at branding or what (it's not like other towns have names like "Florence in Tuscany" or "Spoleto in Umbria"), but there were several towns like that nearby (Radda in Chianti, Greve in Chianti, etc.)

Pictures, we got pictures

While we may have complained about the lousy weather in Italy last week, the second half of the week really ended up being beautiful. Here's before (looking down from the town of Montalcino) and after (Castellina in Chianti, where we stayed):

Back to Basel

After a long day of driving (almost 10 hours, which included lots of stops along the way) we arrived home in Basel at 8:00 last night. We had originally planned to spend the night along the way, but considering the weather in Spoleto when we left (rain), and the weather along the way (rain almost the whole time), we decided we'd rather enjoy spending the night in our own bed and having a Sunday at home to relax before getting back to our busy lives on Monday. (That's a joke, of course... I keep myself busy, but Kirk's life is the only one who actually returns to a busy life tomorrow). Once we made the decision that we'd be driving straight through to Basel, we stopped in Lugano in southern Switzerland to pick up a cup of coffee and some food for dinner. The strange, yet intriguing, thing about Lugano is that it's in the Italian-speaking part of Switzerland, so it feels very different than Basel. We'll definitely have to go back there for a weekend visit. It seems to have the cleanliness and order of Switzerland mixed with the charm of Italy. And it's right on a big lake which always makes me happy. Overall, we had a wonderful time on our Italian holiday (or vacation as we used to say). It seemed everywhere we went there was another charming town built on a hill, each with its own unique character, delicious food and wine, and, undoubtedly, many beautiful, old churches. We'll be sure to post a few pictures soon.

All good things must end

After finally having several days of beautiful spring weather, it's pouring rain again, which can only mean one thing: it's time to go back to Basel. We leave later this morning for the long drive back...

I don't mean to boar you

Something I never would have imagined myself saying with a straight face: I've eaten wild boar (or cinghiale, as it's known here) in one form or another for four days in a row. And it's been great. Maybe all the wine is making me more adventurous.

And the good news is that after three days of being soaked, the rain finally let up this morning--just in time for us to pick up and relocate to Spoleto for the rest of the week. Time flies...

Rain, rain, go away

I know I said we'd try not to blog much, but we've been chased inside by the weather. This morning we went to Siena, which was wonderful, but after a few hours we were soaked and chilled to the bone. I just checked and the current temperature is 46 with a windchill of 40 (I think around 5 celsius), with a 100% chance of rain tomorrow. We hadn't planned to go to Florence, but we may have to just because there are lots of museums to go into--all of our plans revolved around being outside! Having said that, we're still loving it...

Eating, Part 2

Let's see...we've been in Italy less than 48 hours and have collectively had the following: several plates of antipasti/meats; prosciutto di Parma; pasta fagioli; ravioli with parmesan; eggplant parmigiano; beef carpaccio with parmesan and rucola; panini with Tuscan prusciutto and pecorino cheese; local mushroom soup; bruschetta with tomato, garlic, and basil; pasta with wild boar; pasta with prosciutto and mushrooms; braised beef with polenta; and roast pork loin with sage. (And that doesn't include breakfasts, several bottles of wine, several cones of amazing gelato, or multiple cappucinos.) It will be a wonder if we still fit into our clothes by the time we're finished.

(And we don't intend to keep regularly blogging.)

(And the rain keeps falling...it's like Seattle with better wine and older buildings.)

Let the eating begin

We're arrived at last in Castellina in Chianti! The weather is crappy--chilly and wet--and my nerves are a bit frayed from the drive, but it doesn't matter. Yesterday we drove about 5 hours through a hard rain to Parma. Big thumbs up. It has been recommended by an Italian colleague who used to live there, and it was a really nice city. Best of all, we started with some wonderful gelato, then had a fantastic (and inexpensive) three-course dinner and a good bottle of red wine.

After walking around Parma this morning, we drove another couple of hours south through Florence to Castellina. (Near as I can tell, despite the speed limit being 110kph in Italy, everyone drives either 140kph or 70kph--there's not much in between, which is a bit of a challenge coming from orderly Switzerland!)We stopped along the way for a good lunch in Greve in Chianti, which was odd because everyone around us was speaking German (including some who sounded Swiss German). There's nothing like driving all the way to Tuscany just to hear more German! Now we're on our way out to brave the rain and explore the little town that will be our base for the next few days. We don't plan to blog a whole lot but it's nice to have a computer right across from our room just in case...

Ciao

The car is just about packed, so it's time to shut the computer down and hit the road. This should be an adventure, especially driving in Italy. Back a week from Sunday...

Paris

There's just no two ways about it--Paris rocks. As much as it's a tease to be there for work and not have time to see anything except the walk from the hotel to work through the courtyard of the Palais Royal, even that's enough to make you realise that Paris has a certain je ne sais quoi. Oh, and I'm convinced that there's a law that Parisian women are not allowed to appear in public without an elegantly tied scarf. I swear, every woman I saw was wearing a scarf, no two were tied the same, and none of them looked sloppy.

Deep thoughts

I really don't like bumper stickers, but I saw a clever one today (in English) in Basel. It said "Politicians are like diapers. They need to be changed often and for all the same reasons." These people also had a "HAWAII" sticker on their car. I'm thinking they might not be Swiss.

Viva Italia!

Tomorrow we leave for our first ever Italian holiday! Considering Italy is one our neighbors while we live in Switzerland, it's about time we get down there. Kirk has been to Rome once or twice for meetings (while we were still living in DC), but I really haven't spent anytime there. Actually, I did spend a couple days in Naples when I was 21 during my study abroad semester in Vienna, but it was such an awful experience that I try to forget about it and often deny (aka lie) ever having been to Italy. We will be spending the week exploring Tuscany and Umbria. We're driving down there, and we've been told that having your own car is the best way to travel through the region since so many of the towns are not connected by train. We're planning to stay in Parma (home of Parma ham and Parmesan cheese) tomorrow night on our way down to Castellina in Chianti, where we'll stay for the next 4 nights. We'll use that as our base for exploring Tuscany, and then spend the remainder of the week in Spoleto, which is further south in Umbria. It all looks incredible so I have no doubt we'll have an amazing time. What could be better than good Italian food, lots of wine, and gelato! Kirk has even promised me that he will not be taking his laptop along, so it truly will be vacation for him as well.

It's bonus time

While out shopping yesterday, I noticed a sign at one of my favorite department stores announcing Clinique Bonus Time. At home, I never liked to miss an opportunity to get the free Clinique Bonus, and I could usually justify buying something because eventually I'd run out of my favorite Clinique products. I had never seen Clinique Bonus Time in Basel so I thought I'd stop in and check it out. Usually, at home, you have to spend about $17.50 in order to get the free gift. The sign here said you had to spend 70 CHF in order to get the bonus! That's about $60 US, which is way too much for me to justify buying some new make-up just in case I run out. I'll have to add Clinique products to my ever-growing list of things I'll need to buy next time I visit the States.

Care package

I went to the post office today to pick up a package from the US! What is it about getting a package in the mail that is so exciting? I feel like I'm back in college getting a care package from my parents. The package came from Kirk's aunt and uncle who live in Boise and who, unfortunately, had to cancel their trip to Switzerland at the last minute. Inside the package were three boxes of Girl Scout Cookies (2 Thin Mints and 1 Trefoils) and 16 (yes, 16) tubes of travel size Crest toothpaste! I had asked Aunt Fran to bring me a "couple" travel size tubes of Crest because we're almost out (and we can't buy Crest here), and now we have a supply to last a lifetime! (or at least until one of us goes back to the States again) Thanks Fran and Jim!

Pig poop

Our house stinks like manure today. You would think that we're living on a farm! We actually live just a few minutes from downtown, but our neighborhood also has a few aspects of country life, including local cows, sheep, and many fields and gardens. They must be spreading lots of manure in the field near our house today, or maybe they're planting something, but whatever it is, the rain has really brought out the smell and it's drifting into our house. I can tell you that it's pig manure, not your average cow manure. I know this because a couple weeks ago Grady and I went for a walk through the field with a friend who grew up on a farm in Canada and she said "That's pig manure". Apparently it has a very distinctive smell, and now that I know there's a difference I can say that pig poop is much more pungent than cow poop.

Now Kirk is the one in trouble

Would you believe that today, just a few days after getting MY first speeding ticket, Kirk got one too?? You can imagine my surprise when I saw an envelope from the Basel Kantonspolizei in the mail today. Apparently while I was in Davos skiing in late February Kirk was out cruising around Basel, driving 57 km/h in a 50 km/h zone at 8:54 on a Saturday night. I hope it was a fun drive, because now he has to pay 40 CHF. I guess that's better than my fine (120 CHF) from last week.

I gave it a 5

I just got home from book club, where I learned that I was not alone in my very mediocre assessment of The Madman and the Professor by Simon Winchester. The woman leading the discussion asked everyone to rank it on a scale of 1 to 10. The highest it got was a 6. A few people gave it a 3. I was right in the middle with a 5. In other words, don't rush out and buy it. I think the general conclusion was that it was an interesting story that didn't necessarily need to be stretched into a whole book. One woman summed it up like this: "It should have been an article in the Smithsonian magazine". Next up: The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. This time I will go search the English book stores in Basel right away rather than waiting until the last minute, discovering the book our book club is reading is not available in Switzerland, and asking a friend from the US to buy it and mail it to me!

The days of our lives

Last week, Kirk was working in Frankfurt. Over the weekend, we went skiing in the Alps. Now Kirk is working in Paris. On Friday, we leave for a 10-day holiday in Italy. Other than the fact that I'm not in Paris with Kirk this week, I can't think of any reason to complain about this life of ours, can you?

Tulpen

Check out this beautiful vase of local-grown tulips that's sitting on our dining room table. After months of waiting and watching, the flowers have begun to bloom at our neighborhood Blumen selber pflucken field. I didn't mind coming back early from skiing yesterday because I was anxious to walk up to the field and pick some tulips. Right now daffodils are the only other flowers for sale, but I know it's only a matter of time before others start to bloom.

End of the season

This weekend was our last skiing of the season, and I'm glad that after earlier questioning whether I still enjoyed skiing, in the end I wish I had actually gotten out more this winter. Verbier was beautiful, but the recent warm weather meant that all of the lower runs were closed--meaning the upper runs were crowded--and the snow on the upper runs went from icy in the morning to slush in the afternoon. (Some people were actually skiing in t-shirts.) The high point was probably in the morning when I was just standing there waiting to take a run when a woman lost control, came skiing into me from behind, and stopped by wrapping me in a bear hug--amazingly neither of us fell down and Gretchen didn't seem too jealous.

Anyway, this is Gretchen in a patch of dirty spring snow with the town of Verbier down below, and me in the midst of the crowds:

I look like a lemur

Despite initial misgivings and a not-terribly-comfortable hotel, we had a nice weekend in Verbier (although much too quick--I was back in the office by 1:00pm Sunday afternoon!). The weather was nice and sunny--so much so that I fried my face yesterday. I put on three layers of sunscreen, but it still wasn't enough to keep me from turning beet-red since the sun was so intense while skiing and while sitting outside having an aprés-ski beer. Best of all, because I was putting the sunscreen on while wearing sunglasses, I missed the area just below my temples and just below where my sunglasses touched my cheeks below my eyes. So now I've got white eyes with bands of red around them, not unlike a lemur (yes, I know the colors aren't exactly right). Anyway, it should be loads of fun when my face starts peeling later this week...

I'm an April fool

I vowed not to blog this morning because I've got so much to do before leaving this afternoon, but I had to do one quick post.

Let me say this: I hate April Fools' Day. That's probably because I'm never clever enough to come up with good pranks, but I also don't like the karma of the whole thing--if I play a prank on someone, it's pretty much guaranteed that it will come back around to haunt me. (Thankfully, Gretchen generally shares this view, so our house is a prank-free zone come April 1.)

So this morning, a co-worker received an email--which he promptly forwarded to the rest of our team--with a link to a post on our intranet site that indicated that all employees within certain pay bands would be issued diplomatic license plates for their cars. (This would be a huge deal, as only the big kahunas get such plates.) The site indicated that plates would be distributed in one of the lower-level offices this morning. Despite the professional look of both the email and the web site (which was an identical replica of our intranet), warning bells should have gone off immediately--given the hoops you have to jump through to get license plates here, why would they just hand them out with no paperwork on short notice? But of course I didn't stop to think about that, so when my colleague asked if I wanted to go down with him to check it out, I willingly agreed.

So down we went to the basement level, but no matter how hard we looked, we couldn't find the room. (Why were alarm bells not going off yet? Because I'm an idiot, that's why.) We finally stopped at the security desk on that level, and the officer got out a floor plan and finally found the office in question, which turned out to be...a bathroom. It still didn't hit us immediately, but just as my colleague was starting to ask more questions of the security guard, I said "wait a minute...what day is today?" Bastards! Evidently the woman in HR who handles car questions has been inundated with calls this morning, but I'm not sure how many people were as dumb as us and actually went looking for the office. Stupid April 1.