Hi, my name's David

And I'm a procrastinator. Many, many years ago Rita gave me a pretty nice woodworking bench. It has sat in the basement in its box ever since, waiting patiently for me to assemble it. It even went into storage--in the box--during our time in Belgium. I finally put it together this morning. It took about 30 minutes.

Not exactly nonaggression

Let me start by saying that Belgian drivers have plenty of flaws. I liked driving there in some ways, but not in others. They tend to tailgate a lot, even at crazy high speeds. But in general I feel more pressure on the roads here in the Balto-Wash Corridor. I was thinking that, even with the tailgating there, the style of driving here was more aggressive. But I've decided that that's not exactly it. Corridorians are not so much aggressive as competitive. It's like a big contest in which you lose points for letting someone in front of you or being passed or leaving a hole unfilled. Relax, people. I'm driving this slow because there's a line of cars in front of me that stretches to the Capitol steps. Getting ahead of me gains you nothing. Well, I mean except points in this game I'm obviously losing.

Bike vs. electric car

I've been watching lots of Tour de France coverage. Have you seen the ad in which Lance Armstrong is doing a training ride behind the Nissan Leaf electric car? He says that for the first time ever he doesn't have to smell exhaust. Sounds great. Except…any professional on a training ride would need at least two Nissan Leafs (Leaves?), whose range is about 100 miles (160 km). For a professional in training 100 miles is a warmup. Nice try, Nissan advertising dudes.

Strangers in our own land

Coming home after several years overseas is, in some ways, like going to a foreign country. While a lot is familiar, other things have changed. For example, do you realize how busy TV is anymore? It seems like no matter what the program, there is so much going on on the screen that you can barely watch the show: ads, web links, promos for upcoming shows, stats, more ads. I guess it's that multitasking thing I keep reading about.

Signing off from Belgium

I feel like I should post once more from Belgium, and tonight is my last chance. Tomorrow afternoon we move to the fancy Sheraton at the airport. Fancy hotel means of course that you have to pay for everything, including wireless, and we're too cheap to do that, so this is it. It's hard to believe that our 3 and almost-a-half years are over and that this is our last night in the Mons area. We knew this day would come, but not that it would come so quickly. While we're naturally sad about leaving all that we've become so accustomed to here, we're trying to approach it as another phase in our big adventure. We worked in such proximity to each other that we have actually been sharing a desk for the past few days. And we're still married. So that bodes well for the the next phase of our life. We'll see what that holds for us. It will include lots more friends and family, that's for sure. We look forward to that.

Talk to you on the other side.

Those French!

As many of you know, today is French National Day. The French contingent at SHAPE celebrated by offering a glass of champagne to everyone who passed through the cafeteria.

Organist humor

We went to an organ concert at the collegiate church of St. Waudru Sunday evening. The organist announced that if we heard trumpets in any of the pieces, we could rest assured that they had not added any new pipes to the organ. It would just be the sound of vuvuzelas outside the church as people got warmed up for the World Cup finals. And we all went, "Hahahahaha!"

The Cup final was a big deal. Even though it's been years since Belgium made it to the tournament, there are lots of folks of Spanish extraction here, and it is truly a big worldwide event (outside North America). Oh, and they still kinda remember the Dutch as their former overlords. Several big screen TVs on the Grand'Place, crowds so think you couldn't get through, and lots of horn honkin' and vuvuzela blowin' when it was all over. We felt very close to the action at our hotel just yards from the action.

In transition again

Despite a not very promising start, the movers finished up today, and we are now back where we started: in the Infotel in downtown Mons. The temps have dropped to the mid 80s outside, but not in our unairconditioned 3rd floor room. I can see by the clock in the belfry that it's 10:20 pm.

I mentioned the movers. On day 1 of a 2-day move, the packout crew arrived at 9 am. One guy. At 1 pm two more showed up. The next day, two guys arrived. Just after noon, a second pair came with the truck. They loaded seven crates in about 5 hours. I sent them away with a eight-pack of Jupe, which is what we call Jupiler, the local favorite pilsner. It's brewed by AB-Inbev, the folks who bought Anheuser Busch. Even the driver had one. I wasn't wild about the idea, but he did. I even said, "Yours will be for tonight at home." He said, "Aw, just one." I've drunk beer on a hot sweaty job before. In the heat, it feels like it's not even affecting you. And you don't have to pee.

David