Krees goes Dutch!

Autumn rolls around

The kids are back in school and the temps are starting to drop. I was talking with someone the other day about how much longer Charles and I would live here. I mentioned that our contract was extended until at least May of next year, at which time we'll find out whether or not there's another project for us. My acquaintance mentioned that we would get another Dutch spring, which is nice. He then tried to tell me that autumn in the Netherlands is also nice.

My humble opinion? He's wrong. Fall in the Netherlands is one thing: a depressing harbinger of Dutch winter, which itself is dark and useless. It doesn't even usually bother to get cold enough to be called proper winter.

Even if I agreed with this person that fall in the Netherlands is nice, it would still have nothing on autumn in Michigan. The leaves in peak color, the air, the light, the football, the cider mills.

Charles and I combined two of our favorite things from home last Saturday: Michigan football on the Slingbox/Replay combo (thanks again, Erik & Julie!) and doughnuts. HOMEMADE CIDER DOUGHNUTS. I didn't get my hopes up because, really, we don't have that much experience with our deep fryer. But the result? TASTY TASTY DOUGHNUTS.

Did I mention the tasty? You are jealous.

"Going Dutch: How I Learned to Love the European Welfare State"

I recently read an essay in the New York Times: "Going Dutch: How I Learned to Love the European Welfare State" by Russell Shorto. It's a lengthy read (20 minutes?), but as a professional writer, Mr. Shorto does a much better job than I can of addressing and summing up most of my conflicted opinions about living here.

Topics run the gamut from conflicting views (Dutch vs. American) on socialized health care to public housing to individuality to professional ambition to cling wrap.

Want to know what I think about living here? Want to know whether I want to stay here or return to the U.S.? Read Mr. Shorto's wonderful essay and let's chat over a cup of coffee. Even if it's on a Sunday.

Hail to the Victors!

Now that we're a relatively safe distance from Michigan's 2008 football season (boo! hiss!) and starting to see headlines about the next one (the other "change we need"?), it seems safe to revisit our old friends back in the Big House.

Somehow we've gotten Aldus completely hooked on "The Victors." Not only do we watch or listen to the following video on youtube ... oh ... some 50 GAZILLION TIMES A DAY because Aldus is continually begging "Hail?" and "Again?", but we also know all the words. Did you know there are whole sections that they don't sing in the stadium?

Update from after Paris

Yes, I've been lax about posting lately. There was the visit from my family for Thanksgiving (good!), the trip to Palermo with the Yuns over Christmas (good!), and since the New Year I've been busy busy busy preparing for this trip for Paris - far more so for the e-VLBI demonstration we gave at the opening ceremony for the International Year of Astronomy last week than for the couple days of sightseeing we got this weekend.

Charles spent Thursday and Friday last week, then Monday and Tuesday this week, chaperoning Aldus around Paris, entertaining him at the Louvre and elsewhere, and trying to break him of his new habit of NOT giving kisses to pretty foreign girls who request them. His flirtation with a handful of French girls at a cafe Monday seems to be a step in the right direction.

There are two main reasons I feel particularly compelled to [begin a] post today rather than wait for...say...another six weeks or so as has become habit.

1. INAUGURATION. I can't wait to get out of this IAU Symposium this afternoon (don't tell my boss!) to go find a place where we can watch Obama sworn in. Yes, I will likely find myself crying in public, but I think people will understand. [Addendum: Charles and I both missed the swearing-in but met up to catch the speech. Unfortunately for us it was being dubbed over in French and was difficult to hear the original audio over the French. I cried anyway. And somehow managed to make Charles a little teary-eyed as well.]

2. I suppose I should make some sort of more formal announcement to those we haven't told already: Aldus will be getting a little brother or sister in June. Woo hoo! I will admit I was feeling quite shell-shocked when I found out at the end of October that I was pregnant, but most of that stemmed from first-trimester exhaustion and trying to keep up with Aldus. Now that my energy and appetite are back, the thought of trying to keep up with a newborn and a two year-old seems much more manageable. And in the past few days I've started to feel the baby move! Every woman who wants it should be able to get that feeling. There's nothing like it.

2009 is going to be a big year.

Have yourself a merry little Christmas

It's no surprise that I've been a bit homesick while here in the Netherlands, particularly during the holidays when I'd like to be setting up a tree in our own house, hanging our own stockings, enjoying a Michigan snowfall and making plans to spend New Year's Eve with The Usual Suspects in Ann Arbor. You know, as opposed to dealing wiht a turkey skinned by the Dutch butcher, trying to find flights that don't land us in Palermo at 11pm on Christmas Eve or listening to the local teenagers set off New Year's fireworks THREE WEEKS EARLY and 15 FEET FROM MY DOG AND I. (Rotten Dutch kids. Don't you have some cheese sandwiches to eat or something? Bah humbug!)

So I get a little teary-eyed listening to Ella sing this one in particular, and I hope you'll indulge me.

Have yourself a merry little Christmas
Let your heart be light
Next year all our troubles will be out of sight

Have yourself a merry little Christmas
Make the yule-tide gay
Next year all our troubles will be miles away

Once again as in olden days
Happy golden days of yore
Faithful friends who are dear to us
Will be near to us once more

Someday soon, we all will be together
If the fates allow
Until then, well have to muddle through somehow
So have yourself a merry little Christmas now.

(And no, Mom, this doesn't mean that we necessarily will have moved back to the States by Christmas next year. It's just a song. Did I say "Bah humbug"?)

'Tis the Season

I try not to bust out the Christmas music too early in the year, but now that we're past Thanksgiving and into December I think it's acceptable. My favorite holiday listening pleasures in recent years have included Ella [Fitzgerald] Wishes You a Swinging Christmas and Starbucks High-Fidelity Holiday.  Charles got me the latter several years ago because it has a great Cocteau Twins version of "Winter Wonderland", but I also love Keb' Mo's "Jingle Bell Jamboree", Dean Martin's "Baby It's Cold Outside" and Robbie Robertson's "Christmas Must Be Tonight." That last one always brings tears to my eyes. I have no idea why.

But I think one of my all-time Christmas favorites has to be the Pogues' and Kirsty MacColl's "Fairytale of New York (Christmas in the Drunk Tank)". It's not the most uplifting of Christmas tunes, but it's one hell of a great song. RIP Kirsty.

TURKEY EMERGENCY!

The good news is: we were able to order a turkey for Thanksgiving this year. We'll be serving dinner on Saturday for my parents who are visiting and coworker-friends who have to work today.

The bad news is: we picked up the turkey today, and the butcher removed the skin! Do we skip the brining? Do we cover it in butter or olive oil and keep it covered in foil? HELP! I'd try to call Lynn Rosetto-Kasper today, but I can't call her 1-800 number from here. (1-800-537-5252 if anyone wants to call for us!)

More reasons to come on "home"

Charles and I are always thinking ahead to what we'll do when our current project and contracts are up. Time and again we go through all the pros and cons of staying, and all the pros and cons of going. Believe me when I say the lists on both sides of the equation are long.

One thing is certain: I am much more hopeful about the near-future state of the U.S. than I was a week ago. Words cannot describe my relief at Barack Obama's election.

And oddly enough, I discovered something that made me a little extra homesick today. Anybody want to buy a lovely little starter home in Ann Arbor and hold onto it for us for a little while?

Jonesing for Halloween

The Dutch don't really celebrate Halloween. Sure, I think the college kids use it as a good excuse for another party, but for the three Halloween's we've lived here  we haven't had any trick-or-treaters. (Which is one of the reasons I was a little perplexed to see this item in the news.)

Anyway, Halloween was one of my favorite holidays growing up. It wasn't just the candy, although I did love me some Snickers. And my brother and I would always compare how good our hauls were each year by the number of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups we'd scored. But I really everything else that went with it - pumpkin picking at Evatt's Farm, pumpkin carving, planning out a costume and dressing up for the parade at school. The anticipation and planning were almost as much fun as the trick-or-treating itself. I even loved the Palmquist family tradition (or so I remember it) of eating Kraft macaroni and cheese (with a little ketchup!) and hot dogs for dinner before heading out into the dark neighborhood.

Freddy Kruger and Michael Meyers I can still do without, thank you very much, although I'm willing to give The Exorcist another try.

Aldus is probably too early to do anything costume-wise here, but I did my little part to celebrate by carving what may be the world's smallest jack-o-lantern and putting it in the window all evening.

We'll wait to buy any candy for Saint Martin's Day in a couple weeks.

I left my heart...in autumnal America

Winter seems to have come to Drenthe. Zero degree overnight temps, hard frost in the mornings and dog walks in the cold darkness at six in the evening. It's not my favorite time of year here.

They say it's going to be a cold winter. I hope that means we at least get a little snow to make it worthwhile. Or that the Elfstedentocht might actually happen. I'd like that.

At least we've had more color changes in the trees than I remember from the previous two years. The proliferation of oaks and lack of maples here mans that the autumn leaves tend more toward brown than the flaming yellows, oranges and reds that lit up my favorite season back in Michigan. I hope someone out there eats a fresh, hot donut (or seven) for me!

NASA image courtesy the MODIS Rapid Response Team at NASA GSFC.

Dutch vs. American workdays

There will be some construction work at our office next week requiring the use of the majority of our parking lot. Staff have been asked to park their cars at a lot a half-kilometer away, and a small shuttle bus has been hired to drive us to and from the office. This shuttle will be available from 8-9:30 am and 3:30-5:00pm.

It is expected that one will leave the office by 5pm. (Or maybe that's when the shuttle bus company requires its driver to clock out!)

Can you imagine if the Google shuttle bus only ran during these hours? If most Americans were expected to do their work between the hours of 8:15 and 4:45, plus take a scheduled mid-morning coffee break and (more-or-less) required 30 minute lunch break, nothing would be accomplished!

Then again, maybe we'd be a little better at actually working at the office and keeping personal time free from work. Maybe these crazy Dutch are on to something...

Pondering parenthood & Judge(ment) Dredd

I've been thinking a lot lately about whether or not I want to stay here for another project cycle or try to return to the States. Of course one of the biggest factors is whether I'd prefer to raise Aldus here or there, and one of the biggest factors within that is the parenting environment in the U.S.

It struck me long before I even became a parent that the climate of judgment of other parents' choices and parenting abilities is so very nasty there. Worse than that, it's not even constructive. Parents are paranoid of making mistakes, not because it's in the interests of their children, but because other parents will think ill of them. Everyone's got an opinion about how to feed a child, discipline a child, teach a child - as though there's only one right way to do any of these things and theirs is it! Maybe it's the same over here and we're simply insulated from it by not being fully immersed in Dutch media or social circles with other parents. But I doubt it.

I've also been trying to come to terms with the fact that I don't want to join the baby-education rat race (membership required for any of the NYTimes articles linked here) manifested in Baby Einstein, Junior Kumon, etc. For the most part I really feel like kids need to be kids. There's no need to start strapping headphones on your belly to make your child a genius before it's even made its grand entrance into the world. (Though maybe I'm the one being judgmental now.)

But I also worry that kids going through the American school system don't understand that the U.S. is rapidly losing ground in the global market ("Why Nihao, China! Didn't see you there!"), or the lengths that kids in foreign countries (and their parents!) go to to be competitive. 

What's a hopeful parent to do? How do you find the balance?

The Urge to Merge: YES!

YES! Thank you, New York Times Magazine. Someone with a much larger audience than I presents what you're supposed to do when entering a merge point on the highway. (Emphasis mine.)

Then everybody begins to slow, not too much, all in concert. All cars remain in their lanes, using all the real estate... People in the narrowing left lanes refrain from shooting ahead, while people in the right through lanes...leave big spaces in front of their cars for the merging that is about to commence... Finally, at clearly marked or somehow mutually agreed upon places, everybody starts conducting beautiful “zipper merges.” That’s the technical term — one-two, one-two or one-two-three, one-two-three — as indicated by the roadway configuration. The process has now worked at its ideal efficiency/equitability ratio...

I reiterate: fill all available real estate and then zipper! Now don't you feel better?

What else do I love?

1. 24hour customer service. Free!
2. banks open on Saturdays -- and some on Sundays
3. Zingerman's bread
4. bacon and breakfast sausage
5. Zingerman's Bacon Farm Bread
6. baby changing tables in public restrooms wherever you go
7. mothers' lounges and ladies' lounges in department stores
8. Meijer's
9. tasty, tasty proper coffee with turbinado sugar and cream

Temple of Consumerism

Kate had a post about exploring her suburban surroundings the other day, and she referred to the nearby "temple of consumerism." The sheer power of marketing and consumption in the U.S. is something that I've been really glad to be away from the past year and a half. Don't get me wrong: I enjoy shopping. I have frequented said temple of consumerism (read: mall, or "collection" to the truly devoted) and have been excited to worship there on occasion. I'm also a regular visitor to the Mighty Goods blog to see what's hip and interesting on the market these days.

But I'm also sort of proud at how moving here has changed our consumer-oriented lifestyle. If it's not something I want to pay to ship back to the U.S. or deal with reselling or throwing away if we do return, then I won't buy it. It's been liberating. (Let's just not talk about how I've let my appearance go down the pooper.)

Even though I've both indulged and scoffed at all the gross consumerism in the U.S., I found myself completely horrified by one of the recent items posted on Mighty Goods: the Cup-a-Cake Saver. SERIOUSLY. $3 for a piece of plastic to protect a single cupcake. Who buys this sh!t? Who travels regularly with cupcakes one at a time?

Actually, their whole Perfect Picnic Guide is kind of a joke to me. Like living in Europe and riding rustic bicycles to cafes and bakeries and cheese shops, it seems that picnicking frequently enough to warrant buying all this crap is merely a fantasy fed by marketing.

Am I nuts?