again i have been sadly remiss in writing. i apologize to anyone who is feeling neglected.

we have been busy. 2 weekends ago i visited michiko in paris. it was a great trip. we really just walked around and talked. it had been maybe 5 years since i last saw her. we walked around in the rain a bit on saturday night, and both of us were sick the following week. as a result, she won’t have time to come visit me here in maastricht. too bad, as i really love getting visitors.

matt’s colleague kinga stayed with us for a few days. she is hopping spare rooms and sofas for a while. she left last friday, and then jane and jonathan were here saturday night. we were all planning to run in the vise marathon, but we didn’t. we were going to do the 5k, but in the morning, for various reasons, none of us felt like it. hell, a 5k can be done anytime. who needs a marathon to plan it? 🙂 sunday we had kung fu grilling maastricht 6.

today i have an appointment to have some maintenance done on my dreads. before that, who knows? i was supposed to be in a lesson right now, but my student cancelled. yay! free time. after the appointment, i have another lesson, then a potluck.

tomorrow dick and i are going to go to the spa. yay! he’s down for a visit tonight, because one of his other friends here in town is having her thesis party tonight. afterwards, he’s crashing at our place. i like going to the spa. could go every week, happily enough. would prefer it with the option of getting a full massage. 🙂 of course!

and this weekend is the kunsttour (art crawl, basically) here in town. it’s always good, and i’m looking forward to it. and …

next week mel arrives for a 2 week visit! yay! i can’t wait!

hi! well, erik… i guess i respond to nudges! here i am. funny, i was thinking about lj yesterday for the first time in ages. i’ve been busy.

tomorrow we go to MN for molly and kenny’s wedding. don’t anyone get excited: we won’t be there long enough to do anything. except start up my bike and zoom around as much as humanly possible. yay!

we’ve been travelling, almost incessantly. spent last weekend in delft with dick, the weekend before in scheveningen. this weekend minnesota. weekend after um… i can’t remember. always something. i’m planning 2 visits to paris. 1st visit beginning of may to see michi, who will be there. 2nd visit end of may with mel, who is coming for a 2 week visit! yay again! we’re going to rome for a week in june. yay again! lots of travel. we’re broke. ugh. but having a great time.

we may be moving soon. it’s hard to tell. making it difficult to decide whether to ship my bike over here now or wait a couple of weeks. weeks drag into months… you know how that goes!

later!

oh yeah… new hair. i’ll do photo soon!

matt and i will also be coming to minnesota for the funeral. it will be good to be with all of you right now. we will be getting in tomorrow afternoon around 4:30, and leaving sunday evening. as usual, i can be reached by sms or calling my u.s. mobile: 651-329-9878. matt will also have his with him, but it will of course be long distance to europe: +31 63 011 6747.

oh yes… two entries in one evening! i am on a roll!

here are some of our schedule things that people may like to know. BY THE WAY, WE LOVE VISITORS! COME VISIT US!

my mom will be here march 15 through march 28. we are going to paris march 16-19, if anyone else will be there and wants to get together.

dick is moving to utrecht at the beginning of april, so if anyone has cool events in utrecht we should attend, we will therefore have a place to stay! (hi dick! see how i just assume my welcome! there has to be SOME upside to your departure.)

matt and i are going to molly and kenny’s wedding april 20-24. thus, we will be in minnesota.

mel will be here may 24 through june 7. we will unfortunately not be attending wave gotik treffen in leipzig because there are many events in leipzig this year at the same time and we weren’t able to find hotel rooms. dwain will i think be joining us for the second week of mel’s visit. we haven’t decided what we’ll be doing, since wgt is off (oh, sadness!), so if anyone sees any cool events in the benelux region that we should try to attend, please keep us posted.

so far, that’s all our plans. so, for those people who said they’d like to plan visits or trips this year that they want us to join them for, now you know a little bit of when works (or doesn’t) for us. now, get off your asses and get your tickets!

excuse me, i must now eat lasagne and go party!

hi there! i know, i know… it’s been a long time. i’ve been busy. extremely. but here we are, waiting for evening and the first of our activities for carnaval. we’re going to luigi and maria’s for a party. matt is working on his latest, warmer, version of his cyborg/robot costume, and i’ve simply re-outfitted my masquerade/halloween costume for cold weather. this includes layers of long sleeved gowns under the other stuff, including my flamenco skirt, which i noticed while digging for the other things in the attic. what a find! it’s perfect.

last night, non-carnaval, we went to backstage for the first time in months, to get in a little GOOD music before we’re subjected to the hell that is carnaval music. ugh. thank goodness, it was a good night. very little shit neo-folk. i think i’ve come up with the explanation for why the cyber-fairies seem to love neo-folk… too many science fiction tv and movies! all the sexy weird aliens on tv come from primitive cultures who listen to strange music. anyway, it’s a theory.

many of our friends have escaped carnaval by leaving maastricht. i really don’t blame them. i don’t hate the costumes and insanity, but i do really hate the shit-stupid music that honks and toots its way around the city, blasting also from every bar, including the usually good ones. what is up with the music? i don’t think it’s technically necessary, and it’s really really awful. only good for waving shitty cheap pilsjes in the air and swaying. ugh.

that’s all for now. wish me luck not killing unsuspecting revellers!

yay! i am pretty much packed and ready to go. i am meeting annemette at the train station a little past 2 tomorrow afternoon. we will be at schiphol by 5:15, fly out at 8:00, then in antalya around 10pm. i can’t wait. relax, exercise, eat… basically take it easy. fantastic. no worries… i won’t be handling any live or dead birds.

tonight we are going to try a tango lesson. there’s a tango club here that charges only 2 euros for lessons on monday nights. a bunch of people are going after aikido tonight, and i will join them. hopefully matt will make it back from paris in time (he had a meeting today). i’m pretty excited. i’ve always wanted to learn tango, but in general i’m pretty bad at learning dances. i can dance, if there’s no rule to it! 🙂 dances that require the remembering of steps are difficult. but at least i expect it will be easier than flamenco, and i loved doing that. i’ve tried a bit of swing and salsa, and depending on my partner, enjoyed them. but i’m not good at them, either. anyway, it’s kind of exciting to try.

we had a busy weekend. we hung out with dick on friday night, watching videos. jane and jonathan came down from amsterdam on saturday, to go to dinner at mark’s, out in smeermaas. we had a crazy 5 person party: me, matt, mark, jane and jonathan. loud music, dancing, lots of drinking and eating. we were pretty silly. we got home sometime in the wee hours, and they spent the night. the next day, mark came over for breakfast with all of us. then j & j left, and matt and i joined annemette and steen for a hike in the countryside. then fondue at zorica and maarten’s, also joined by mirza and laia. it was good to see so many people all at once like that. it reminds us that we do actually have friends here. we know it, but sometimes it feels otherwise.

today i had 3 lessons: with astrid, yoriko and a new one: eduardo, the younger brother of another student, fernando. it was a fantastic day, actually. astrid is great fun, yoriko is really sweet, and eduardo was quite a surprise: very articulate and energetic. a cool kid. all in all, i’m feeling pretty good about life today. 🙂

fortunately, daylight is longer and longer lately. when it’s winter here, it’s really dark. i mind the dark much less than i mind the cold, but our apartment isn’t very well insulated, and so mostly it’s both cold and dark around here. not loving it. i spend way more time than i like bundled up. i hate having to wear pajamas, but it’s too cold not to.

yesterday we went to our first dutch lesson in weeks. i ran into our teacher on the street last week, and was so out of it that i couldn’t think of ANYthing to say. not so, yesterday. i didn’t shut up. also, i may be getting 2 lessons per week, depending on schedule. matt has to keep our wednesday evening time, but annemette can’t anymore, so i may join up with both of them and take twice the lessons. good for me. my dutch seems to be getting worse.

i have 3 new students, which is both good and bad. good for me trying to save up money to ship the motorcycle and save up for visits from friends, but bad for my disappearing free time. fortunately, they’re all 1 lesson/week students. it’s easier. and who knows: they may go to twice per week later. one of my older students has, recently. again, good for finances!

well, i just wanted to try to get into the habit of updating this occasionally again. later!

hi there!

matt and i are back in maastricht. i swear it’s colder here than minnesota was the past week. we’ve been sleeping like crazy. way more than jet lag can account for. maybe we partied too much those past couple of days in minnesota. or maybe we’re just a tiny bit sick and our bodies are trying to get better before it gets worse. or maybe just a combination of both.

it sounds like most of the people who have any intention of coming to visit europe have decided to come this spring and summer, so matt and i have to save up our money. with so many visitors, we’ll be doing a lot of travelling around with them. i may need to take on more students. also to (finally) bring over my beautiful motorcycle, which is still in matt’s dad’s garage in minnesota, but will soon be legally ship-able. yay!

anyway, i suppose my life will be pretty uninteresting for the next while as i try to save money and thus don’t do much. except for go to turkey in a couple of weeks. but that was paid for months ago.

now i’m going to (yay! for the first time in months!) read some of other peoples’ posts!!!

later!

well, it has been an action-packed several weeks!

we have been busy busy busy. first we were in prague, then we helped some friends put flooring in their new apartment, then thanksgiving at our place (i cooked a turkey for the first time ever… easier than i expected!), then a weekend in amsterdam, and now today we are going for 9 days to london. woo-hoo!!

actually, i should get offline and finish up my packing.

for those of you in minnesota: we will be in the twin cities for new year’s! who’s having parties? and… in some ways even more important… does anyone know anyone who won’t be there and needs a house/apartment sitter? then we could avoid living at matt’s family’s place, which can be very stressful.

well, i will try to use an internet cafe sometime in the next week while in london. if anyone will also be there (stranger things have happened), you can reach me on my netherlands mobile: 31 65 085 7451. actually, it may be better to call matt on his: 31 63 011 6747. we will be staying at the thistle city barbican hotel. if you google it, it’s the first listing. we will be under “feigal,” of course. and we will be there tonight through sunday the 11th.

and very exciting: we are taking the chunnel. ok… it’s exciting to me, anyway.

toodles!

well, anyone who needs to can read matt’s post of why we’re here in prague. i will speak of other things. let’s see: i continue to be really recognizable, and so the vendors at the markets know me now. i have been to the same art stands every day trying to decide what paintings and drawings i want, and what prints. they were all very pleased to finally sell me a few today, and one is holding things for me until tomorrow, although i told him i could buy it right then, but might come back for more tomorrow. (he’s right, better selling strategy; i might not go back tomorrow, but now i certainly will, and thus am more likely to buy more.) i asked if he needed a name or what, and he said he hardly thought he wouldn’t recognize me again. 🙂

it’s been foggy and chilly while we’ve been here, but yesterday was bright and sparkling, and i made a photo day of it. unfortunately, one of matt’s colleagues decided to skip part of her conference and play hookie with me. she wasn’t really welcome, but i didn’t think she’d be with me that long, so i agreed. big mistake. i finally had to make it very clear that i had things to do that were difficult with her around, and put her back on the metro. ugh. she thanked me for the extensive “insider” tour of prague. yeah, right… the city has changed LOADS since we were here, and i never remember any of the interesting facts and legends. my tours, in any city, include where i’ve been and why they’re interesting to ME.

self-centered. again.

what else? dunno. went postcard crazy, but don’t have full addresses for all of you, and may not finish my way through the address book. what does this mean? ummmm… anyone after N in the address book may not get one. sorry nathan. 🙂 but i think of you!

i love to sleep. today i slept until noon. 🙂 oh, pure joy. poor matt.

must go terrorize the boy some more. smooches!