The Belgian Post Office, and most likely a bunch of other offices, went on strike yesterday. I didn't hear any news coverage of it, but they most certainly had an announced reason for the strike. The real reason, though, was that Monday is a holiday, so they were tyring to grab a 4-day weekend. It's not Memorial Day for the Europeans but Whitmonday--Pentacost Monday. It's a big weekend for us, too: Sarah arrives Sunday morning; then Sunday evening we're going to see the Ranchhands, widely considered to have the best drummer in all of country music (our nephew Emmett). We also have a choice of city fairs to attend.
Language note for the Francophones: ducasse is the northern French word for the annual celebration of the local patron saint's day, which quickly devolves into the decidedly unsaintly. I didn't know where it came from. But you know who does know? Google knows! Ducasse is a corruption of dédicace. Google also tells us that the Occitan word is voto, from fête votive.
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