| 16 Jan 2004: Okay, you can have the oyster back. I am in Paris again. Yesterday was my full day of guided tours, first by bus in Brussels, then to Bruge for the afternoon. The former was lame and the latter was great. Brussels is interesting, and parts are very pretty. Bruge (you know, I'm not really sure how to spell it...) was lovely. Small, quaint cobblestone streets, several lovely churchtowers and a gorgeous market square. I climbed the belfry tower and the view was breathtaking. And yes, I felt the burn. Woo! This morning I slept in...ah, wonderous. Ooh, did I mention the beautiful shower at the Brussels hotel? Oh it was perfect and amazing. Anyhoo, caught the noon train back to Paris, arrived back at the button-shower hostel, and did laundry and then went shopping. Holy cow. Talk about mad cow disease. No, I'm not sure what that meant. But people were everywhere and lines were long. It was exhilarating and frustrating at the same time. It's gotten to that dangerous point in the trip, where the end is nigh and so one has to start thinking of it. It's only two full days left til I go back to home and work, but again, that is two entire days! Do you see what I mean here? |
| 19/01/04: I am home now. Boo. Look at me trying to type on a French keyboard! The trip ended better than Friday started. Over the weekend I met some more fun Australians, and I explored more of the city. I took a couple walking tours, went to the currency museum, etc etc. It was SO COLD. Really really cold. I couldn't feel my face for all of Sunday. Got up at 7am today and headed for the airport, which was insane of course. The nine hour flight in coach was just thrilling...mostly I slept. The four hour flight from Dallas felt super cramped and I was anxious and sleepy, and I'd already finished the one book I had with me. I got through about twenty pages of a French student version of the Three Musketeers. But I just kept drifting off to sleep. Now I am at home. It was weird walking in the door, the place looked different. But as I looked around, nothing had actually changed. It was nice, but surreal, to see all my stuff here. Had a lovely, non-button shower, finally took all the stuff out of the suitcase I've been living in for a week. I don't know. It is always nice to return to one's own bed and such, and it will be nice to see family and friends again. But holy cow, it's only been a week! It honestly feels like my trip was a lot longer than a week, though. When you travel, you do so much stuff everyday that each day passes fairly quickly. But in order to remember a few days back, you have to go through the catalog of everything you've been doing, so it seems longer than just a few days. Does that make sense? |
| 01/29/04: So. It's been a week and a half that I've been home. It feels way longer, which means I have forgotten the joy and freedom of being abroad. It means I have succumbed to the banality of a routine life. However, I do have good news, on the "banal life" front: I got a promotion! I am no longer an assistant, I shall now be a funder/closer. This means I have more files, more duties, more stress and more time to be at work. So far (the last three days) it has been pretty good, very busy, but exhilarating. And I shall look forward to receiving overtime pay. Speaking of pay, I received a Form 1099 (from the credit union that holds my car loan) in the mail today, so that I can file my interest income of THREE CENTS. That made me laugh. Not yesterday but the day before, I went on my walk at lunch as usual. The sky was blue and it was balmy, almost warm. So I set out sans hat, coat or gloves. It was lovely. I was reminded of how happy it made me to go walking last summer, basking in the sunshine, singing and dancing on the trails, completely forgetting about work and real life. |
| Places to go, people to see |
| HOME/ABOUT/FIRE 4 SITE PICTURES HERE! JOURNALS: ONE-FIVE/SIX-TEN/ELEVEN-FIFTEEN/SIXTEEN-TWENTY TWENTY-ONE/TWENTY-TWO/TWENTY-THREE/TWENTY-FOUR THE ROAD TRIP/2001 EUROPE TRAVELOGUE 1-7 |
| 02/08/04: Well, the promotion is exciting and everything, but holy cow, it is STRESSFUL. This job never ends. I'm not spending all my time at work, but I never get to leave at 5:15 anymore, either. And somehow the regular eight-hour day is filled to the freaking brim. One day feels like an entire week. Either I'll get better and it, or bored with it, or just have a heart attack and be done with it. I really don't have a life, still, but I am managing to keep working out three or so nights a week, plus my daily walks of two to three miles. I am also broke this month, so no shopping or extraneous spending for me. I think once I get the midmonth paycheck I should be caught up and be able to start scraping away a little for savings. I've been steadily depleting it for awhile now and it makes me nervous. Because I am so broke, from paying off Christmas and then going to Paris and then paying off Paris, I am thinking I may not be able to afford Operation Muscle in May (at TrailBlazers, surely you remember). In addition, I would love to attend the NCCC 10th anniversary celebration in Perry Point in early June. However, I am pretty certain I cannot afford two cross-country long weekends within weeks of each other. Perhaps I cannot afford even one. I think I need to convince myself right now that I can't do either, and then later maybe I'll have more money and can surprise myself with them. I can't wait for another vacation. I can't wait to drive around the country, visiting friends and new places, with no deadlines or needs other than food and shelter. |