Rolling Thoughts

A few shy of a full deck

The stupidity of people will never cease to amaze me.

Today at work I stopped by the Operon labs to talk to my friend Laura. While there I met the service rep for our liquid handlers. This guy is dummer than dog shit. No, that's not fair. That gives a bad name to dogs.

I watched him unplug a line of presurized Tri-chloro-acetic acid disolved in DCM. This is one of the nastiest chemicals I've ever worked with. He managed to coat his hands with the stuff and he wasn't wearing protective gloves. I suggested to him that he should wash his hands and get some gloves. He looked a little surprised at the idea. His skin must have been burning like hell by this time.

Then I saw a work order that he had completed 2 weeks ago. He replaced 10,000 dollers worth of parts on one instrument. I know this problem ... it's usually caused by the USB cable being crimped and the shielding damages. $10. Gotta love it. At least the instruments are on service contract.

I sense a Darwin Award in the making ...

Home

One more step ...

Spent the afternoon peering into corners of my new house with an inspector. The good news is that there is nothing really wrong. Just some minor stuff to deal with and mostly things I could actually do if needed. I'm not gonna tell the sellers that though ;-)

Now I've just got to get the rest of my financial info together for the bank loan. Got to try a little trick with my credit card company to see if I can get my credit score up by 11 points. If I can I can get a 5 year fixed loan instead of a 30. That'll drop my interest rate and save me about $150 per month. Not bad. Cross your fingers.

We're getting more snow too. It was actually pretty bad tonight when I was coming home and they're expecting 10 more inches tonight. I might not be able to make it to work in the morning. Well, we'll see.

How do you spell ...

Got a call from my mom. dad got through the surgery ok. A little out of it and wants to rest. Figure that's ok.

Haven't talked to mom in a while. Maybe I'll call again soon.

Sleepless

Cant sleep these days

Probably not too surprising given that A) I've moved across an ocean. B) I'm in a new job. C) I just bought a house.

Doesn't help that I found out my father is undergoing emergency surgery this morning. Nothing serious really, an outpatient deal. But he will be under a general anethetic.

So it's 0308 in the morning and I have to get up at 0530 today. I'm going to try to get back to sleep for another hour or two, but I have a definite feeling that it's going to be a long, long day.

Housing

Oh boy ....

I saw a lot of houses today. I passed on the one I saw last weekend that I liked. It wasn't quite perfect for what I want. But I saw one today that I really liked and fits my needs very nicely. It's on the upper end of my affordability scale but in perfect condition AND the layout is exactly what I want.

I talked it over with my Realtor and decided to put an offer in. We filled out the paperwork and called my loan broker to let him know. Now I'm just waiting to hear from the owner to see if my offer is ok.

Cross-fingers time. I'm really looking forward to the housewarming party.

Music

Cool

Went out tonight to this little wine shop. Got a nice surprise that there was a guitarist there that was taking requests. Called out "Want to make love to you tonight" and "Cats in the Cradle" and he did a great job. I think I've found another great place to hang out on Fridays and Saturdays.

Bloody Hell!!!

Work, Life. Shit. Where to start.

Work is going well. Things can only go up from here when it comes to improvements. All I can say is that I'd have quit if I was a tech in the labs. The process is insane!

Other than that? Well a soap opera is being written. Stay tuned. :-(

How in the hell do I do I this to myself?

Work

First day ...

Today was my first day at the new job. Of course today was also the "Day After the Storm" and the roads were still iffy. I was lucky enough to only have to dig my car out from a few feet of snow. Only 1/3 of the staff showed up today.

Those of us that did got free pizza for lunch and some other work related bonuses. Not bad for my first day :-)

Web Site

I updated my site a bit last night. I added some info to my "About Me" section and included my resume.

More snow

It's now being called the blizzard of the century.

The weatherman is now saying that we'll get 18 inches or more before it's over.

If these people had chains or even a decent set of snow tires there wouldn't be a problem. But no one here has either.

So I'm stuck indoors until they plow the roads. Even the Barnes & Noble across the street is closed because the staff can't make it in :-(

At least I've got cheerios and cold pizza ... not to mention a can of peanuts I ventured out today to buy. The cashere at Target thought I was nuts myself :-)

Snow

THESE PEOPLE ARE NUTS!!!!

It's been snowing all night. So what!?! We've got about 6 inches overnight ... 15cm to those of you in Europe. But everything is bloody closed! The only people I've seen driving are the local snow plows. Everyone else is huddling indoors.

Pansies.

It's 6:30 am and I can't sleep. So I'm going to rant about one of my favorite subjects: Politics.

I call my self a social libertarian. Raise your hand if you know what that means. Hmm ... ok, no one.
The libertarian part is easy. They've been around for a while. A libertarian is someone who believes in a very minimalist government with little or no interaction with the people. Basically one step above anarchy. These are the folks who think that Congress should meet for 2 weeks a year to discuss their golf scores and then go back to their districts to sit in tiny offices and count the ceiling tiles. Who believe that the military should be a defense-only force designed to protect us against those rampaging Canucks. And my favorite; take care of yourself. This all would naturally mean a much reduced tax base and many estimate that simply collecting the custom tariffs on goods coming into the country would pay for all of the government (so far we have a judicial system, a military, a post office, and a few offices in Washington).

If you think that sounds like a conservative republican (CR from now on), think again. CR's like to be re-elected too and that usually means bringing federal dollars home to their districts. Did you know that the Globemaster combat airlift plane is built in a CR district? The military is getting 300 of the damn things that they didn't want (It's slow, has a low capacity, and gulps fuel) because the representative from that district managed to get it into the appropriations bill. That's a double whammy to the Libers. More federal spending AND a bigger military capability for overseas deployment.
The new department of homeland security is also a stick in the eye to libers. One of the basic tenants of libertarianism is that you mind your own business. If you think your neighbor is dealing drugs or conspiring to blow up a building call some friends, do some investigation, and if warranted make a citizens arrest. Take responsibility for your life. Don't be a target.

Now on the other hand, I firmly believe that there are some issues that individuals and small groups CANNOT take care of on their own. Social security, Medicare, federal interstates, etc.) How would a group of citizens in Ohio work with people in California to coordinate building an interstate highway to move citrus products? It probably wouldn't happen and if it did it would gerrymander all over the place. Look at a typical inter-county road map and you'll see what I mean.
So this is where the social in social libertarian comes from. I think the government should oversee a country-wide health plan that actually takes care of the people with preventative and if necessary corrective medical care. I think the government should provide a vehicle for a 'safety' net in case of economic disaster (remember the crash in 29? no probably not, neither do I but I read the books), make sure that corporations are destroying the environment unchecked, fund a space program and other 'basic' research opportunities.
Most people don't know it but the Federal Universities (Land grant colleges) do the vast majority of the basic research that leads to you getting nifty new products and medications. It's not companies that figure out some bit of obscura for someone’s PhD dissertation that just happens to be the key to a new pain killer. It's the Universities. But that knowledge is PUBLICALLY available and companies can make use of it. The basic research that went into the space program in the 60s alone brought forth a plethora of new products for the public (let's forget desiccated ice cream though).

So now someone is saying "That really sounds like a Liberal Democrat" Not so. LD's are just as bad as CR's when it comes to getting reelected. They also believe in getting in your face. I don't like social programs. They don't work well enough. Let me be clear, they do work I just think that small groups of people at the local level can do so much more. Wouldn't it be easier to get a group of 100 people together and walk down to the local realtor office and say "My friend Harv should get the same deal as we do on a home loan even though he's black and we're white. Don't discriminate against him or we'll force you out of business." You can bet that the realtor is gonna be very courteous to Harv. Instead every realtor office in the nation has a document hanging on the wall (typically in English & Spanish) that spells out a federal regulation saying the same thing. Only IT DOESN'T WORK!!! People still get the shaft and there's nothing they can do about it.
Same thing about equal rights. I'm a fervent supporter of equal rights. Especially in education. But instead of whining about how unfair it is that your local school doesn't have the same funding as the wealthy school across town (most schools are funded by local property taxes so a schools funding is directly tied to the local affluence level) DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT! Spend a few hours a week volunteering to help clean the halls so they don't have to hire a custodian. Volunteer to sit in the library so a librarian isn't needed. If you have a science education lead a few classes each week so the kids get a better exposure to science. Give the kids the best education they can get so they can go to University prepared and be competitive with the rich kids across town. Lead some poetry readings ... painting classes, etc. Believe me that the Universities will fall over themselves to take anyone who does well on the SAT's and can speak clearly and coherently in an interview.

Ok, I've ranted for an hour and managed to chew my coffee enough to not be grumpy.

Lebensraum

Cool

I went house hunting today. Saw about 10 units, went into 7 of them.
Found one that is great! 3br 3.5 bath. Really nice interior archetecture, big master br.

I'm going to talk to the mortgage broker on Monday and if it goes well put an offer down on Tuesday. Eeak.

Had a nasty scene with the first realtor I talked to. The guy tried to screw me and get me to pay him an up-front "retainer" fee. Thankfully I have a long-time friend who is a Realtor in CA. He said that was BS and that a good realtor does their work for the commission at the close of sale. So I told this guy to take a hike and had my company black-ball him for future relocations. The new guy is much cooler, even going so far as to steer me away from higher priced units (and hence a higher commission) because the unit had hidden problems.

Cross your fingers for me :-)

Ides of Feb +1

Hallmark Holliday

It's shouldn't be shocking to anyone that I don't like the hoopla surrounding the 14th of Feb. I was one of those guys in college that wore black to protest. ..what was funny was that most of the women I dated felt the same way. :-)

Its not that I don't like romance and everything. Its that I don't like it when an industry tells me that TODAY is the day I must express that romance and love. Bah. I'd rather not limit myself to one day a year to show someone that they are special to me.

Sometime I'll divulge the details of the only VD date I ever had that I enjoyed. But not today ... I'll give a teaser though; it involved lots of 9mm sized items.

Home(?) again?

What is home?

I spent most of last night --my last night in Germany-- thinking about the definition of home.

I also spent a good deal of time lamenting the things I didn't do while living in Germany. When I was leaving Koeln to go to Dusseldorf for a last evening with my friend I noticed so many things that I had passed 50 times already, but they weren't interesting until it was too late. But after awhile I realized something pretty important. It's something that has been floating around the back of my mind for a few weeks -- morning of January 19th to be precise.

Frienships are a huge part of my life. Let me reiterate that ... HUGE!!!
When I think of my life up to now I have a briliant montge of events and places. The sparkling jewels that stand out in my mind are the friendships I've made over the years.

I was so busy beating myself up last night for not doing trivial things that I had momentarily forgotten all the wonderful friendships I had cultivated ... and I hope maintain just as strong. Gitte, Ralph, Cemal, Stef, Steph, Stephi (yes, 3), Lizzy, the Huntertwins, Gabriel, Dieter, Thomas, Pat, etc, etc, etc. I can't name them all. Good people all. So when I think of the last 18 months, it's not the things I did or didn't do. It's the friendships that I've made that are important.

Back to home. What is that? I spoke with several people on the plane and more since I've cleared customs. Everyone asks "Are you glad to be home?" The problem is that I don't know where that is! Is it Fresno where I went to High School? Davis where I did my University and grew up? Berkeley/Alameda where my career started? Cologne? Now Maryland? I don't have any real attachments or roots to any of these places. So what is home?

I've got some ideas, but please forgive me. They're gonna be a work in progress.
Home is:
Where you keep your books.
Where you hold a loved one.
Where you cook dinner for a special friend.
Where your soul resides.

I've got a book in my pocket. I gave my friend a hug this morning in Dussel. I cooked dinner in Sac last month. My soul did a good thing on Monday.

Final Countdown

Less than 24 hours

It's down to the last few hours. Litterally. My apartment is empty. I just did the final vacuuming. My bags are packed. The only think left to do is post this and turn off my computer.

Tommorow morning (bright & early) I get to trudge out to Dussel Flughafen and use my one-way ticket.

It's going to be hard to leave because I really love it here in Cologne. Lot's of friends, wonderful cosmopolitan city, great things to do. But we must eat and that requires some sort of financial backing. So new job here I come.

Time to POST. C-ya next now.

Movers

If you ever are in a position of moving follow my advice:

Hire a moving company. Carve that in stone and put it under your pillow to absorb through osmosis.
It is REALLY worth it. I'm sitting in my nice 75m2 (800 ft2) apartment watching these 4 guys litterally pack my stuff and load it onto a truck while I'm sitting here updating my blog. It isn't something I would have ever considered for myself if the company wasn't paying the bill. But now that I've seen how it is in person I will never move my stuff alone again!

In the past I've always packed my own stuff and even been so cheap (ok, honestly I wasn't being cheap I just didn't have the money) as to use my car and not a rental truck (Thank you Pat for the help).
I suppose that if I've got 10-20 friends nearby to help me I would consider doing the work without a company.

But now that I'm actually accumulating some quality stuff (and about 8K in books) I don't ever want to deal with lifting it up/down stairs again! These guys are simply amazing to watch.

They didn't even blink an eye when I said that I needed to FedEx my computer and monitor and I didn't have boxes for them. They simply MADE a box to suit. They aren't even getting the money to ship it. As Drake says, it's rewarding to watch professionals in action.

The Devil's in the ...

Now I remember why I hate moving.

Today was supposed to be a nice relaxing day spent at the Sauna reading books, sipping drinks, scalding in 90C/95%, and just generally letting all the stress and aches run out of my body.

BUT ... the movers called and cancelled for today. I had to go TO the beshiramt (I mangled that spelling BADLY, but it's the town hall) to de-register. Ironic, but I got the same guy who helped me last Monday with my tax info. He was bemused that I was leaving the country after having to pay a 20 Euro fine to register my new address last week. It is a little funny. Then I went to the bank to cancel my automatic rent payment and inquire about terminating my account there. Basically I have to wait until I've got everything set in the US before I can do so. Almost a wasted trip. Then a frustrating 45 minutes dealing with the 3 branches of the local Telecom system that I have business with (My phone, DSL, Mobile). This time I have to fax them a letter saying that I'm moving to the US and that I will gladly pay the next 3 months anyways because I didn't tell them last year I was leaving. At least the company will cover that cost. Suddenly my whole day was gone and the sauna a fading memory. :-(

I did take the opportunity to make a digital record of all my books for the moving insurance. I'm guestimating that I have almost $9000 in books right now. It's the 8 feet of reference & collectable hard-covers that really do it. In addition I have 52 FEET of regular books! Now I know where all my cash has gone in the last couple of years.

Tonight my landlord and his wife (Clemens & Magdalena from my party pictures) are coming over for dinner. Should be good. Making burritos.

I also have to collect all the info I'll need for this weekend. Phone numbers, addresses, tax info! for the loan, remember to mail my taxes tomorrow, and tear down my desktop for shipment tomorrow. It'll just be Misty and I after that. Poor Aggie, this is the second time my baby has had to suffer through a cross-atlantic move in FedEx plane. At least I kept all the US specific power cords.

The good side to running my ass ragged this week is that I'll actually sleep on the bloody plane. But with my luck the DC-10 is gonna be one of the few that was called up by the Pentagon for the MAC deployment this week.

Time to go cook the beans.

Contact! Action Forward!!

Out of the woodwork they come ...

All in all it's been a cool weekend. Mostly spent with friends, connecting with old friends, etc.

Got an e-mail from a friend of mine in Niger (Not to be confused with Nigeria). We might get lucky on the timing and actually be within a few hours of each other in the next months and have a chance for coffee. And in 4 days I'll actually be living in the same time zone with my friend Allison for the first time since 1997. We WILL make time for a coffee even if I have to drive all the way :-)

This next week is going to be a whirl-wind of activity. Movers, moving, taking care of the nagging little details. Buying a house! Ye-ouch!! Oh yeah, the new job. Gonna need a vacation. Maybe the new boss will be obliging. ;-)

A good note is that a colleague of mine wants to purchase my washer and drier. I was getting nervous about this, but it seems to have worked out. Cool. Good luck to him.

Yeah!!!

I've got cool friends!

Last night (ok, early this morning really) was my moving away party. It was great! About 30 people showed up from around Germany, including friends from before my move. Go to my Gallery to see the pictures. (Venus sure is coming in handy)

We managed to clean out the kitchen of food and empty 30 L of Kolsch, 4 Liters cola, and uncounted pints of Guinness. The last people wandered out in search of food at 4am. Thank you everyone (Andrew, Frank, Debbie, & John) at the Harp. Was really cool.

My colleagues are nuts! They got me an absolutely WONDERFUL going away present. A massive gift certificate for Amazon.com. I simply can't think of a more perfect present. THANK YOU ALL!! Check out my "Books" page to see what I'm getting.

It was great last night.

Check please?

My timing sucks

That's all I have to say. Why is it that everytime I'm just shy of moving somewhere (typically LONG distances) I find another reason to stay put?

Ezekial. The Martian. Den C. Now C.

My brain is wired wierd. ... although that isn't much of a surprise to anyone who really knows me. Hell, it's not a surprise to me. I even allude to it on my CV. I just see the world different than 95% of the other folks out there.

Have YOU ever wondered why a red light means stop your car and a red dot mean "ready to fire?" 47/50 0.354 in the red baby.

I'm outta here.

The end is near

6 Days ...

I think I know how inmates feel when their sentence is about to be complete. I've got less than a week before I move. The last days of my time here are even scheduled. Moday: Close out DSL. Tuesday: Cancel phone and Deregester address. Etc.

Tomorrow is my last day at work. Probably going to spend most of it cleaning my desk and packing the last box.

Horror-scope

Sag entry for today:
"Keep others honest by example. If you can share, so can they. Learning never ends."

Not exactly a stunning revelation for me, but timely in a way.

Party: Take 2

Most excellent news! I heard from my friend Ralph last night. He's going to be able to make the party!

This is sweet because he and I were able to meet up when I flew to Germany in the first place! Somehow he talked his way into the Terminal in New Jersey and we were able to have a beer while I was waiting for my connection. Man ... that was a long time ago. Lot's of changes in my life.

So, 18 months and some days later we will meet again and have a brew.

More excellent news is that my loan for a house has been pre-approved. I've been looking over the internet MLS listings and there are some good looking places in my price range. I plan on spending a big chunk of Presidents Day weekend looking them over and if I'm really lucky, find a place. This segues back to the subject at hand.
I just heard from a friend that he is looking to vacation in DC around the time I'm planning on throwing the house-warming party. It'll be most excellent if the dates match up and he can make it. He'll be tied for the distance award with my friends Pete & Lisa (from CA) and Stef (from Germany). Hell, I've got so many people already planning trips to visit that weekend that I'm going to HAVE to throw some sort of party no matter what!

?

Death. Disease. Famine. Pestilance.

When pain comes, what cause?
When heart is assunder, what cause?
When friendship whithers, what cause?
When trust is betrayed, what cause?

Can the spirit cope? Can the life go on?
Who decides when the experiment is worth continuing?

Do we live in a glass ball? Do we put others in a chamber to see how they react to stimulous?

Answers: Those closest to us. Yes. The One. No. No.
Deal. You bust. I clean up.

What am I?

snow

Don't ever ride a bike with street tires on the snow.

I learned this today.

Thankfully I figured this out when I was only crawling along the bike lane. When I did try to turn it was a simple handle-bar pull, not a full on tilting turn. I would have fallen on my ass if I tried that. As it was, my rim rotated laterally, but the direction of travel stayed the same. Whoops. Wasn't anything like hydroplaning though.

Would have been more fun if I wasn't headed for a t-bone with a road full of morning commuters. :-(

Must remember to get a spare set of rims so I can keep a set of studs ready for inclement weather.

Closing of a Chapter

I believe the litterary term is a Coda.
I've finished a chapter in my life today.

Not that anyone who would read this knows what I'm talking about, but it's true non-the-less.
Today is the end of a segment of my life long agonized over. Truth be told, I should have done this a long time ago. I just didn't see it and a part of me never wanted to accept the reality. It's too bad that it took so long to realize as I passed up other opportunities that came by.

Lessons learned? Trust your instincts, not your heart. Follow your best friend's advice when your brain is twisted into a pretzle. Don't let anyone/thing take you down a one-way street. Treat people with respect even when they don't deserve it. When it's over you'll be standing tall and they'll be left in pain. More importantly, you'll be free.

I've got a bridge to give away. Great view. Very historical. Anyone want it?

Gripes and Pet peves

I should probably make this it's own catagory. But I've been told I whine a lot, so I'll try to make it only a periodical entry.

One of my big pet peeves is e-mail etiquite. Most people I know have trouble writing a simple letter (me too actually) and sticking it in the post. A lot of time and trouble.
So I use e-mail more often. But e-mail is an intermediary between an actuall conversation and a written letter.
So when I ask someone a simply question via e-mail it's like I'm calling them on the phone and asking. A response ... even "I don't know. I'll get back to you." is appropriate. Polite even.
Unfortunately a lot of people I know simply ignore questions and never answer them.
Well, I can't fix the world, but I can emphasize the relationships in my life where people do the right thing.

Coffee time.

Neat-o!

Smart-cards. They're cool. If you've never seen one, they are small memory chips that are loaded using RF energy at very, very low power levels. Plus they don't require a continuous charge to retain the information.

Here in Europe they are used to hold you account number/Pin/phone numbers on your cell phone. So you can pop you chip into someone elses phone and use your account. They're also embedded on you ATM card enabling you to 'load' some cash onto your card and use it in remote locations where the teller machine can't easily connect to the bank to verify you have the cash ... like on the subway.

I'm looking for ways of moving small amounts of information around a laboratory that would be exceedingly expensive to network ... not to mention technically daunting due to the age of the computers in question. After doing a little checking I found that there is a 4Kb version of the smart chip available. A high end RS232 non-contact chip reader/encoder costs btwn 200-300 USD and the chips themselves for less than a cup of coffee. These things can move the info from station to station in the lab no sweat. And they have the added advantage that each technician can have an encoded card that is linked to them. No more logging in to each terminal to do a task. Simply lay your card down to activate the program and enable all functions they have rights too.

Our current system sometimes has the technicians logging in several hundred times a day to do the same task over and over again.

I'll have to see about getting a prototype unit in to play with. I love my toys.

Exhaustion

It's been a thoroughly exhausting day. About a half hour of sleep last night. Busy morning working my way through getting a replacement Lohnsteuerkarte (had to pay a 20 Euro fine for not changing my address in time), rushing to work, and then rushing home to meet the moving company.

Good news is that they can come on Monday & Tuesday to pack everything up. Then Wednesday to load. I don't have to do anything except make sure there is no 5 finger discounts going on. Venus will help with that I'm sure.

Bad news is that the guy hired to replace me started today. Usually this would be good. But I only have 6 working days before I fly. To really train him would take a month minimum and I'd be cutting lots of corners. So I'm afraid he's going to have to learn on the job. Schade.

Party!

I spoke with the owner of the Harp Pub on Saturday about my party this Friday. Thankfully he said it was ok 'cause I sent out all the invitations & directions the day before Thanks Andrew!
I originally guessed that 30 people will show, so Andrew suggested a 10L & a 20L keg of Kolsch to ensure coldness throughout the evening. But I've been getting more RSVP's and I think that'll be a low-ball number. Eeak. Might have to lay in some emergency supplies.

Must remember to get a couple of disposable cameras and keep Venus handy. I can use all the blackmail photos of my co-workers that I can get!! Keep an eye out on the Gallery pages to see my friends do silly things :-)~

Coffee Dreams at 2:22

It's been years since I drank coffee in the evening. Now I know why.
When I was a student (way back in the bygone days) I used to be able to drink coffee at 10pm and still go right to sleep. My friends thought I was a mutant. Well, I guess that allele just died out in the last 6 years.

So now I'm sitting up fiddling with my site. Probably not the best way to prepare for facing off with the Finanzamt in der Morgen. For some reason they didn't send me my Lohnsteuerkarte for 2003 (most likely because I didn't register my new address with them) and now I must go into the office in person and show them my passport, residence permit, underwear style, and swear fealty to the gods of bureacracy. Then they might deign to give me my card so I can pay taxes this year . . . 10 days before I move back to the US :-)

At least it gets me out of a day of work.

Also, the moving company is coming over tomorrow to check out my things and determine the best way to break it all. Since the company is picking up the tab, I might purchase some more antique furnature before moving. There is a beautiful 100 year old table I've been eying that would be perfect for a writing desk. It even has these nifty expandable leaves.

Toys

I have a horrible memory. It's nearly impossible for me to remember details of things unless I've made a 'memory' tag to link them. Kinda like a hyperlink, which is scary in and of itself.

I now have 4 electronic devices that I've named just to keep track of them.
My desktop is Aggie (for obvious reasons)
My laptop is Misty (short for Mistopholese)
My Palm is Lucy (Lucifer)
My DigiCam is Venus (Thank you zk3)

I should probably name my cell phone, but it's about to be labotomized anyway.

How to cope?

I'm spinning my wheels. I've also been here before. It doesn't get easier the second time.

In a little under 11 days I'm going to board a KLM flight out of Amsterdam and fly to the US on a one way ticket. 18 months ago is was a one way ticket from SFO to Cologne.

Now --as then-- I am struggling with saying goodbye to close friends. Relationships are the hardest. You aren't ending it, it's being cut off by forces beyond both of your control. You haven't stopped feeling for someone, it's just not possible to be there anymore.

Once in the past I tried to maintain a relationship with a woman who moved back to Europe after we met. The pain from that is still with me. And even worse, we aren't friends anymore.

Now I look through the next 11 days and know that I'm saying goodbye every minute and it's not enough. On the 12th day there will be pain on both sides.

I hope this time the friendship lasts.

Take 2

Hmmmm ... seem to be having trouble with page widths. Will play some more to explore this setting. Might have to get a new template. mmm

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