Sign here

You can let me know if you think the sign posts are dumb. Sometimes I just put things here to amuse myself, so it would probably be in vain. Here are a couple from Germany.

This one kills me. I think there is a certain order of expertise you want in any business that comes to your house to work on anything. Here are the choices:

• Johnson and Sons – this conveys a long history of service passed on through the generations. Mr. Johnson even took the time to teach more than one son huh? Nice.

• Carroll Family Furniture – Nice family business. Add the “Est. 1859” and you’ve got yourself a winner

  Or you could pick this guy out of the yellow pages.

You better hope that Romer Bau shows up also and doesn’t just send the Putz.

Here is one that is either chastising you for not being healthy, or maybe it is just talking about the woman in the picture. I guess it’s probably ok to be a wellness schmuck.

This last one is for my mom. This isn’t a vanity plate. The plates in Germany, I think, are coded by region and number. I guess you’re just lucky in this case if you have the correct name.

  

Nice car mom.

Weighing on my mind

Let’s take a little walk down memory lane. It was only a few posts ago that I detailed the amount of luggage and how much we were carrying around, the whole scoop. I can’t even count the number of airports and flights that this hasn’t been an issue. Plop the million pound bag on the conveyor, spread papers and passports on the counter until everyone is duly impressed, pick up everything and move into the next line. Well apparently working the Ryan Air counter in Barcelona is very boring and since they are the new owners of the European cup they are also a little power hungry. I really don’t remember the counter “lady’s” name, so I’m just going to refer to her as “B”. I’m not sure if it was the Barcelona altitude, poor scale calibration, or a secret “Screw them” button that was in action, but all of a sudden our packs weighed 3-5 kilos more than they ever have. “B” also suddenly became the only Ryan Air employee to ever look at the scale. For those of you that aren’t familiar with Ryan Air, it is a discount airline in Europe that is known for its low fares and high fees for everything else. Overweight luggage is probably a line item on their P & L statement because every kilogram over the limit is €15. Now…let’s make a long story a little longer. The 15k pack became a 19k pack. There goes €60. The 14k pack became a 17k pack. €45 more. You get the picture. At this point we were directed to step out of line and check our bags on their other scales presumably to prove some sort of point. A British couple was watching this whole debacle and became quite amused that every scale we put our luggage on showed a different #. They even offered to act as witnesses. At this point I really will shorten the story as we returned to talk to “B”, who had hoped we had just gone away. She called over her supervisor, Mrs. BigB who didn’t have any interest in the scale story. We eventually settled on a €30 “Get out of Barcelona” fee, paid them and ran to the gate. I’m adding Southwest airlines to the things that I miss.

Orion Gazette – hope they don’t mind

For those of you who rely on this blog as an update on my dad I will not disappoint. I talked with both of them last night and 99% of things seem to be fine. My mother is dealing with the nightmare of insurance agencies and co-pays and even words relating to insurance I have no idea what they mean. Donut holes? Either she’s opening up a Dunkin Donuts franchise to pay for his medicine or I’m out of the loop. Dad himself seems fine. We are sill waiting for the chemo free rotation to roll around where his body doesn’t get hit with the offending chemicals. This upcoming Wednesday will be two weeks and 1 day after the last chemo round. It’s my theory that this is when the healing starts. Hope along with me. More from Sweden later. I have a couple of my funny sign pictures that I’ve been saving.

Hasselhoff would be proud

Today we are spending a single day in Germany as a layover adventure on our way to our final home exchange in Sweden. We arrived in a small airport outside of Frankfurt and took a limo to a small town nearby. Oh wait…it wasn’t a limo, it was just a cab with limo pricing. The price was well worth it as we arrived in a lush valley overlooking the Mosel river. Funny thing is that they also tucked a small town in this alley also. I’ve only spent a few hours here and definitely have to remember where this is….it’s very quaint. Heck…you guys remember it for me. Traben, Germany. We had yet another quiet meal at a small pub tucked in an alley and funnier yet I place the meal on the top ten list for the trip. Who knew? The highlight of the night was responding to screaming and crying from Sam, who had disappeared around the corner to play near a fountain he had discovered. Of course he had fallen into the fountain. I hope he scooped up enough coins to make it worthwhile. I have at least one picture of the offending fountain…pre Sam swim.

A little Spain for your brain…

Well we jumped off the grid there for a while, sorry. I really had no idea how hard it would be to get internet service in various places. I think I left off that we were in Barcelona and headed to Madrid. It was in Madrid where civilization took a right turn. We were visiting Madrid to visit friends of the family and we had a great time. I will let www.homeroamers.com tell the story because it is yet another one that is best told in Jen’s words.

While visiting Madrid we had a great opportunity to spend a couple of days in the foothills of Madrid. We didn’t spend a lot of time in the area, but we definitely enjoyed living a brief and authentic time in a Spanish village. We had tapas at the local bar, spied the local castle, and generally tried to drink in the experience, and on occasion, a couple of cervezas.

I did manage to get off a couple of e-mails by stealing some wireless signal from an alley downtown, holding my iTouch above my head and spinning slowly in a clockwise circle. Curiously no one in Madrid thought this was funny. Here are a few pictures from out time there while I try to remember more interesting tidbits.

Pack mules

Just a short post before we depart for Madrid. I think we’ve complained about lugging our, well, luggage through the airports and on trains, but we’ve never quite outlined what this really means. The best way I can do that is by showing you a picture. This picture is EVERY single bit of stuff we have with us. Since this is my blog I’ll get in my complaint about who carries what. 5 bags….3 of them are mine. I think mine weighs the most, but both Jen and I drag about 32 lbs. per pack. Sara’s pack is about 25 lbs. and the Sam pack is probably 15. Add in the APC backpack with my computer and we are at about 110 pounds.

Take a look. I get to carry the black pack, the red pack, and the small blue back pack. Jen gets the pink one, Sara gets the blue and Sam just has to pay enough attention to stay with us.

Eiffel, Eiffel everywhere

Sam has a gift…well actually he has many gifts. For some reason people seem compelled to give Sam things. I know he is a cute kid, but c’mon. Sara bought Sam a little Eiffel tower souvenir at the base of the actual Eiffel tower They were being sold by vendors that would get run off about once an hour by the Paris police. Apparently it isn’t quite legal to sell these little trinkets. As we were leaving the tower one of the police officers stopped us…I thought, uh oh..what obscure Parisian law did  break? Was it the socks with the sandals? Was I too polite? Did I forget to cut the line? No…he walked back over with a handful of confiscated souvenir Eiffel tower trinkets and dumped them into Sam’s outstretched hands. Sam was amazed! We all were amazed! An outpouring of international friendship from the French police of all people. Now that story is funny / interesting enough except that when we hit the port in Le Havre we were browsing the post cards and other junk when the owner called Sam over…oh boy, here we go again. What did he hand him? Of course….the same Eiffel tower trinket we already had a suitcase full of. Sam, being the ever enigmatic child, decided that he was going to award this Eiffel tower to the “Employee of the month” on the cruise ship. This also makes for a fun story for later. I think I’ll take Sam for a walk in front of the bank…maybe they will hand him some gifts from the vault.

Oh yeah, and we saw a naked guy on a bike.

Wow…where to start? We are in the midst of a flurry of travel as I mapped previously. I finally got the chance to connect the computer here in Barcelona to update you. I also got the chance to talk to my mom and dad and check in. Seems that everything is almost all good…dad is having a little trouble getting his clotting measurement where they need it to be, but it mostly just means a bunch of finger sticks and repeated tests. I think my mom gets more worked up about it than dad.

Here’s the update so far. You read the post that Le Havre sucked, but I can’t type it enough. I can’t, for the life of me, figure out why it is a stop on ANY cruise itinerary. This statement sums it up...from the UNESCO web page. “Le Havre is an outstanding post-war example of urban planning and architecture based on the unity of methodology and system of prefabrication, the systematic use of a modular grid and the innovative exploitation of the potential of concrete".” Potential of concrete? Super boring and Soviet era buildings for blocks. I’ll find the single picture I took in Le Havre and post it for ya.

Guernsey – channel islands was a bit different and we enjoyed it, but it was a very short visit, not enough to get the full look. I’m not sure I would make it a priority however.

Barcelona, after a one day visit, is pretty nice. Beautiful architecture and great weather made for a fun day. We did our usual bus tour to make sure we made it to all the “sights”

I’ll save my humorous stories for later and throw some pictures at you. Kids are holding up well…a little high strung. We arrived at 1:00 a.m. after a 1:30 bus ride here in Barcelona, so I’ll catch them a break….a very small break.

The title came last. On our way to the beach today here comes old naked man on a bike. What more can you even say about that?

In England. Can't type on my iPod

Cruise went well. Europe has their share of fat cruisers. We are in a "Yotel" in Gatwick waiting to fly to Barcelona. Look up the "Yotel", it's interesting. Can't type more on this pod, it's rough blogging.

How much? Really?

Gotta type quick. .75 cents a minute.

Le Havre sucked. We made it through Rotterdam fine, luggin 500 lbs of luggage. Cruise is interesting. NCL Jade. Guernsey tomorrow. If there is anything important e-mail me. Ship phone is 732-335-3280.

Everyone is good. Eating to our hearts content. Hamburgers and ice cubes are rampant. That's you $2.25 worth.

Jon

Trying to make a living and doing the best I can…

This is going to sound silly, but it’s vacation time. I think that a lot of people following this adventure we are on, think we are on one big vacation. In a sense we are, but in a lot of ways we aren’t. I put in my 40+ hours a week tackling the everyday problems of call center math. Sara logs a bunch of time trying to finish the eighth grade, and Jen runs the show….which is more daunting than anything I do. I’m REALLY looking forward to being on the cruise ship for a few days. It was really cheap and an easy way to get from A to S. As "at home” as we feel here and in Norway, there is always a nagging feeling in the back of your brain that says “Don’t break anything” “Be very careful”. It’s not like you don’t do these things in a hotel or cruise ship, but if you break something you don’t have a personal connection to Norwegian Cruise lines. Anyhow…I think I’ll be able to update the blog as we travel this week. I’ll make an effort. Here is the plan.

Thanks

Thank you everyone for sending my father best wishes on is first day AC. My mom printed the post from yesterday and I have no doubt that it lifted his spirits even more to know that everyone was rooting for him. You guys are the best.

As most of you know by now, if you read this blog long enough eventually I get philosophical or introspective enough to write a big long diatribe about what’s going wrong in the world, or what I think is strange, or even about hamburgers at some point. Wait no longer. Today is one of those days.

Today all it took to get me thinking was returning one of the rental bikes. I got up early enough that I decided to ride one of the bikes back to the shop and walk home, therefore making it logistically easy to return the other bikes. Trust me…I have it all diagramed out in my head. This is one of the reasons I need early morning walks. On the 2’ish kilometer walk back from the shop some things occurred to me. I will now share them with you.

It requires another story to kick off this thought process listed below, so you are going to have to bear with me. I think I’m screwing up some rule of paragraphs trying to put this all together. Sorry. Last night Jen and I were talking about how funny Sam is. He’s a typical 5 year old goofball, nutty, brat at times and then he gets these “moments”. Jen was talking about how she had cleaned the bathroom here and Sam overheard her. He doesn’t like the bathroom here, not for any other reason than it is dark and downstairs. When he heard that Jen cleaned the bathroom he turned around on the stairs and said “Thank you for cleaning the bathroom mommy”. What 5 year old says that? What 5 year old sincerely means it? Later that night Jen was explaining how he came to be 5 years old and how she carried him around in her tummy for an eternity and helped him live and grow. I guess Sam was on a kick for the day because he listened to this, thought about it for a second, and said “Thank you for helping me live mommy”. I have a ton of thoughts that follow that statement about what I’ll miss, what a great time we are having, who the important people in my life are…..but you know what? It sums it up.

To my mom and my dad, to my wife and kids, to my brother and his family and the rest of my friends and family. Everyone should turn around and say the same thing to the people that mean the most to you.

“Thanks for helping me live”

Love, Jon