Tomorrow morning we're all going to the airport. Kathy is heading home with the kids while I take a short hop back up to Frankfurt for a couple days - we've got a customer visiting our facility in Hanau. I fly home this Thursday.
Kathy packed roughly 800 pounds of stuff into our luggage while I was out of town in Denmark & Sweden this week. All I have to do is pack my clothes tonight and we're ready to head out at the crack of dawn, dump our baggage, return our cars to Hertz, and go.
I believe the kids think they're going to end up trick or treating Saturday night (which wouldn't be a horrible way to keep them up late enough to start the process of re-setting their internal clocks) but we'll see what happens. After ten plus hours in airplanes and fifteen or sixteen hours of total travel time we'll see how chipper they are. I have to say she's pretty amazing, able & willing to travel with a half ton of baggage plus three young boys from continent to continent. All hail Kathy!!! Someone please arrange some nights out when she gets back - she's been with the boys nearly constantly for 2 1/2 months and seems to be having some girlfriend withdrawal.
It feels simultaneously as if we have been gone for ages and as if we've blinked our eyes and the time was gone. It's been a great experience but we're all looking forward to seeing home again. I could really go for a Jack's frozen pizza and a liter of mountain dew... and a car that isn't a Fiat or Renault... and a Coke that tastes like a real Coke... and cable TV in english... and my Martin... and a Chipotle... and a decent steak... Uh, and you too of course! :) Seriously though we really do miss everyone a lot and can't wait to see you again.
Friday, October 30, 2009
Monday, October 19, 2009
Long overdue update (Jim update)
It's October 20 today and we've made a grand total of zero blog updates since arriving in Switzerland. That's primarily due to the fact that we have no wirelss internet at our house in Chayre.
It's a very different environment here as we're in a 'holiday house' or chalet kind of thing right on the lake. Since it's pretty much off season all of other holiday houses, campers, and cabins near us are empty. So it's very quiet, we really haven't met anyone socially, but the boys can be noisy as hell outside without bothering anybody. After a month in an apartment being told "Stop jumping! Our floor is somebody else's ceiling!" or "Shhhh!", it's nice to be able to let the monkeys act like monkeys.
Anyway, our place is a log cabin/chalet built in the early 70's judging by the tile and cooking utensils and hasn't been updated since. It kind of has that cabin smell, if you know what I mean. It's right on the lake as I said and the boys were able to splash around the day we arrived before the temperature plunged by 30 degrees.
Work has been busy but we've had a good time on the weekends. Kathy's childhood friend Christine came to visit a couple weeks ago and she's always good yucks. They went to see cheese being made in Gruyere' (yeah, those chicks are WILD!) and we went to the mountains near Interlaken and Lauterbrunnen two weekends in a row.
The scenery really is eye boggling and there's one spot where you can actually see a waterfall inside of a mountain. I think it was Rick Steves who described it as "God's band saw cutting through the mountain at 5000 gallons per second". The energy of twelve hundred tons of water falling past you every minute makes you feel fairly inconsequential on the big scheme of things. Everything was wet and slipping and despite the hand rails we made a point of scaring the crap out of the kids by telling them the true story of how a 13 year old boy died there a few years ago. Apparently he was climbing around somehow, slipped, and that was that. For the first time ever, our kids held onto our hands without griping so it apparently was effective.
This weekend we plan to drive up to Fribourg as there is some kind of kid friendly town activity on Saturday night. We're going to meet a colleague who lives there and has kids similar in age to our younger ones. I think the plan is to have fondue (melted cheese) along with raclette (uh, more melted cheese but slightly denser). That's kind of the swiss diet. From what I've read, nobody poops here. Ever.
Kathy flies home with the kids on Halloween (10/31) while I head back to Hanau, Germany to work for a few more days and come home 11/5. It's been great, work-wise and family-wise, but I think we're all about ready to head home.
P.S. Bob Snyder and Mike Davitt, our friends Brooke and Jason are moving back to Minnesota from Boston on 10/25 and will be staying at our place for a few weeks as they get settled and find a spot of their own. So if you see a big shaggy looking guy with a beard lurking around our place, please do not shoot him. Do not. Patty and Kathy S, you don't shoot him either. Unless of course he doesn't answer to the name 'Jason' - in that case it's a burgler, so plug him. Thanks!
It's a very different environment here as we're in a 'holiday house' or chalet kind of thing right on the lake. Since it's pretty much off season all of other holiday houses, campers, and cabins near us are empty. So it's very quiet, we really haven't met anyone socially, but the boys can be noisy as hell outside without bothering anybody. After a month in an apartment being told "Stop jumping! Our floor is somebody else's ceiling!" or "Shhhh!", it's nice to be able to let the monkeys act like monkeys.
Anyway, our place is a log cabin/chalet built in the early 70's judging by the tile and cooking utensils and hasn't been updated since. It kind of has that cabin smell, if you know what I mean. It's right on the lake as I said and the boys were able to splash around the day we arrived before the temperature plunged by 30 degrees.
Work has been busy but we've had a good time on the weekends. Kathy's childhood friend Christine came to visit a couple weeks ago and she's always good yucks. They went to see cheese being made in Gruyere' (yeah, those chicks are WILD!) and we went to the mountains near Interlaken and Lauterbrunnen two weekends in a row.
The scenery really is eye boggling and there's one spot where you can actually see a waterfall inside of a mountain. I think it was Rick Steves who described it as "God's band saw cutting through the mountain at 5000 gallons per second". The energy of twelve hundred tons of water falling past you every minute makes you feel fairly inconsequential on the big scheme of things. Everything was wet and slipping and despite the hand rails we made a point of scaring the crap out of the kids by telling them the true story of how a 13 year old boy died there a few years ago. Apparently he was climbing around somehow, slipped, and that was that. For the first time ever, our kids held onto our hands without griping so it apparently was effective.
This weekend we plan to drive up to Fribourg as there is some kind of kid friendly town activity on Saturday night. We're going to meet a colleague who lives there and has kids similar in age to our younger ones. I think the plan is to have fondue (melted cheese) along with raclette (uh, more melted cheese but slightly denser). That's kind of the swiss diet. From what I've read, nobody poops here. Ever.
Kathy flies home with the kids on Halloween (10/31) while I head back to Hanau, Germany to work for a few more days and come home 11/5. It's been great, work-wise and family-wise, but I think we're all about ready to head home.
P.S. Bob Snyder and Mike Davitt, our friends Brooke and Jason are moving back to Minnesota from Boston on 10/25 and will be staying at our place for a few weeks as they get settled and find a spot of their own. So if you see a big shaggy looking guy with a beard lurking around our place, please do not shoot him. Do not. Patty and Kathy S, you don't shoot him either. Unless of course he doesn't answer to the name 'Jason' - in that case it's a burgler, so plug him. Thanks!
Thursday, October 1, 2009
2nd to last night in Hochstadt (Jim update)
It's Thursday night and we're counting down to our departure for Switzerland on Saturday. It's amazing how quickly the month went. We've really gotten into the groove of this nice little town and now we have to leave. Last night, we went out for dinner with another couple we met, Michael and Stephanie Schoeneman and had a blast. They took us to a great place we hadn't been in yet, called the Babelgass on the little main street of town. I had just spent four hours humping four very heavy pieces of luggage around the Frankfurt Airport train station (long story) so I was REALLY ready for a beer. The best part was that the bar was in a sort of courtyard with a play area so the kids weren't forced to sit still while the adults made boring grown up conversation. Anyway, we had good fun talking with the Schoenemanns and made it home near midnight. Tomorrow I turn in one of our cars at Hertz, we pack, we enjoy one last night drinking a little bit of Ingo's beer, and we hop a train at 8:00 a.m. Saturday.
P.S. Bob Snyder, if you read this, could you do me a favor and look at my front yard? I saw some mole hills when I was home and I hope they're not tearing the hell out of it. Thanks!
P.S. Bob Snyder, if you read this, could you do me a favor and look at my front yard? I saw some mole hills when I was home and I hope they're not tearing the hell out of it. Thanks!
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