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Amsterdam
Jul. 18th, 2026 04:05 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
aomeNow that it's more than three months since our trip.... :-P
Our stay in Amsterdam was short by design. Of prominent importance to me was to visit Keukenhof, which I had not seen since April 1988. At that time, my Oma had been battling stomach cancer, and I begged my dad to take me along when he went to visit her. And since it happened to be spring, he took me to Keukenhof, which I still remember, and still have a treasured poster of in my room. Although we'd been to Holland twice (2011 and 2015) it had been summertime both times, and Keukenhof, being a tulip-and-related-bulb garden, is only open about 7 weeks in the spring.
Anyway, we didn't feel like taking extra time to do other touristy stuff in Amsterdam, so we just made the stop long enough to visit Keukenhof and hopefully visit a few of my family members. Unfortunately, as I am the youngest cousin (by quite a lot), everyone else is now in or approaching their 70s and are all battling their own health issues these days, so only my cousin Esther (my aunt's daughter) was free for lunch, although we did FaceTime my cousin Sjouk (my uncle's second-oldest) during the meal, to say hi. That was a bit disappointing, but I enjoyed the limited chances to visit that I did get.
Keukenhof - which we spent, like, at least five hours at - was amazing. Everyone knew how much that visit meant to me, and pretty much let me do whatever I wanted, lol. So we walked around a lot, took nine million zillion photos, stopped for a snack and a hot beverage as it was pretty chilly that day, did a little souvenir shopping, discovered to our disappointment that they no longer sell the posters like I still owned, and finally took the bus back. (We had combo-tickets - bus to/from Amsterdam + entry.) I admit I was kind of gobsmacked at how much busier it was in 2026 than it had been in 1988; I suppose I shouldn't have been. The world has gotten a lot smaller since 1988. But still - it was challenging at times to get photos that didn't have a bunch of people in the background, and that was kind of frustrating. But I'm still so SO glad that I got to go. <3
We'd arrived on Thursday evening, had a delicious (but pricey) late dinner at a super-nice Italian place down the street from our hotel. Spent Fri at Keukenhof. Had lunch with Esther on Sat, then wandered around the area near our hotel and did some shopping - bought some books and a few tchotchkes. We continued our habit on this trip on both Fri and Sat of having a drink somewhere and just sitting down to people-watch and enjoy. Friday that involved hanging out at the pub down the street that had the same name as my maiden name - I mean, of course we HAD to go! :-D
Sunday we flew home. Our trip home was delightfully uneventful.
Monday morning I was back at work, jet lagged and no idea what time it was or what day it was, lol. MiniPlu worked from home (our home) for a few days before driving back up to Boston, so it was nice to have a little extra time with her.
And that - finally - was our Spring Break trip to Europe.
Our stay in Amsterdam was short by design. Of prominent importance to me was to visit Keukenhof, which I had not seen since April 1988. At that time, my Oma had been battling stomach cancer, and I begged my dad to take me along when he went to visit her. And since it happened to be spring, he took me to Keukenhof, which I still remember, and still have a treasured poster of in my room. Although we'd been to Holland twice (2011 and 2015) it had been summertime both times, and Keukenhof, being a tulip-and-related-bulb garden, is only open about 7 weeks in the spring.
Anyway, we didn't feel like taking extra time to do other touristy stuff in Amsterdam, so we just made the stop long enough to visit Keukenhof and hopefully visit a few of my family members. Unfortunately, as I am the youngest cousin (by quite a lot), everyone else is now in or approaching their 70s and are all battling their own health issues these days, so only my cousin Esther (my aunt's daughter) was free for lunch, although we did FaceTime my cousin Sjouk (my uncle's second-oldest) during the meal, to say hi. That was a bit disappointing, but I enjoyed the limited chances to visit that I did get.
Keukenhof - which we spent, like, at least five hours at - was amazing. Everyone knew how much that visit meant to me, and pretty much let me do whatever I wanted, lol. So we walked around a lot, took nine million zillion photos, stopped for a snack and a hot beverage as it was pretty chilly that day, did a little souvenir shopping, discovered to our disappointment that they no longer sell the posters like I still owned, and finally took the bus back. (We had combo-tickets - bus to/from Amsterdam + entry.) I admit I was kind of gobsmacked at how much busier it was in 2026 than it had been in 1988; I suppose I shouldn't have been. The world has gotten a lot smaller since 1988. But still - it was challenging at times to get photos that didn't have a bunch of people in the background, and that was kind of frustrating. But I'm still so SO glad that I got to go. <3
We'd arrived on Thursday evening, had a delicious (but pricey) late dinner at a super-nice Italian place down the street from our hotel. Spent Fri at Keukenhof. Had lunch with Esther on Sat, then wandered around the area near our hotel and did some shopping - bought some books and a few tchotchkes. We continued our habit on this trip on both Fri and Sat of having a drink somewhere and just sitting down to people-watch and enjoy. Friday that involved hanging out at the pub down the street that had the same name as my maiden name - I mean, of course we HAD to go! :-D
Sunday we flew home. Our trip home was delightfully uneventful.
Monday morning I was back at work, jet lagged and no idea what time it was or what day it was, lol. MiniPlu worked from home (our home) for a few days before driving back up to Boston, so it was nice to have a little extra time with her.
And that - finally - was our Spring Break trip to Europe.
Another giant update
Jul. 18th, 2026 03:40 pmaomeSchool finally ended on June 23; the last few weeks went smoothly enough but still felt interminable, especially as most kids were D-O-N-E with school while it was still May. :-P My predecessor finally announced her plans to retire on the second-to-last day of school, but they still have not posted her job, so I cannot do anything but sit around anxiously, and make some tentative curriculum plans. There is no other really likely job I can apply for; the next closest one is 40 minutes away - doable, but not ideal.
I had pulled all of Kimee's personal items that she wanted to keep from the library, ( and drove them to her house )
As for my summer: I had envisioned having giant swaths of time every day to a) go through my dad's stuff b) work on LAST summer's scrap quilt (which I had barely done anything on), paint the downstairs bathroom, etc. Instead, many days have been taken up by various appointments - mine, Two's, my FIL's - doing stuff for various people around the house, and occasionally having time of my own. In the past week or so I've committed to putting more time in on the quilt, but not the other tasks.
Appointments: ( ALLLLL the appointments )
Passed my mom's birthday and mine (what I have jokingly called the "early bird senior discount" age - 55) - and was dismayed to find that I missed her more for those days than I did last year. Isn't the first year without a loved one supposed to be the hardest? But no, I missed her much more this year (and the approach to Mother's Day was hard, too). I had an enjoyable birthday - brunch at a new-to-us diner that had delicious GF offerings (GF French toast with pecans, berries, and cinnamon butter? Yes, please!), then Will and I went to see the new Minions and Monsters movie, which was absolute fluff, but fun fluff. It was 107F/41.6C outside with a heat index of 113F/45C that day so thank God for air conditioned movie theaters (and our house).
Speaking of my mom, three days ago, I learned that my mom's best friend, an absolute angel of a woman named Ariel, who was ABSOLUTELY integral to my mom's well-being, and a huge comfort as she was dying, was facing lung cancer. And that just hit like a sledgehammer. I am once again 3000 miles away but unlike with my mom, I am not the key person here, so I feel much more helpless.
And speaking of birthdays, MiniPlu turned 24 (!!!) on July 13th. ( General update )
Meanwhile, Two went up *this* weekend to visit his sister, went to see the touring version of The Great Gatsby Musical with her last night, and is having his first date with a boy he's been messaging for nearly a year (yes, the boy lives in the Boston area). We'll see how that goes.
We just bought Two a ( replacement car )
We've had some of the Canadian wildfire smoke this week, although nothing near as bad as the upper midwest/Great Lakes states.
How are you all?
I had pulled all of Kimee's personal items that she wanted to keep from the library, ( and drove them to her house )
As for my summer: I had envisioned having giant swaths of time every day to a) go through my dad's stuff b) work on LAST summer's scrap quilt (which I had barely done anything on), paint the downstairs bathroom, etc. Instead, many days have been taken up by various appointments - mine, Two's, my FIL's - doing stuff for various people around the house, and occasionally having time of my own. In the past week or so I've committed to putting more time in on the quilt, but not the other tasks.
Appointments: ( ALLLLL the appointments )
Passed my mom's birthday and mine (what I have jokingly called the "early bird senior discount" age - 55) - and was dismayed to find that I missed her more for those days than I did last year. Isn't the first year without a loved one supposed to be the hardest? But no, I missed her much more this year (and the approach to Mother's Day was hard, too). I had an enjoyable birthday - brunch at a new-to-us diner that had delicious GF offerings (GF French toast with pecans, berries, and cinnamon butter? Yes, please!), then Will and I went to see the new Minions and Monsters movie, which was absolute fluff, but fun fluff. It was 107F/41.6C outside with a heat index of 113F/45C that day so thank God for air conditioned movie theaters (and our house).
Speaking of my mom, three days ago, I learned that my mom's best friend, an absolute angel of a woman named Ariel, who was ABSOLUTELY integral to my mom's well-being, and a huge comfort as she was dying, was facing lung cancer. And that just hit like a sledgehammer. I am once again 3000 miles away but unlike with my mom, I am not the key person here, so I feel much more helpless.
And speaking of birthdays, MiniPlu turned 24 (!!!) on July 13th. ( General update )
Meanwhile, Two went up *this* weekend to visit his sister, went to see the touring version of The Great Gatsby Musical with her last night, and is having his first date with a boy he's been messaging for nearly a year (yes, the boy lives in the Boston area). We'll see how that goes.
We just bought Two a ( replacement car )
We've had some of the Canadian wildfire smoke this week, although nothing near as bad as the upper midwest/Great Lakes states.
How are you all?
July AMA: Horror Movies
Jul. 18th, 2026 05:46 amrogueslayer452Asked by merricatb: What're your top 5 fave horror movies?
Now, since horror is among my favorite genres, I had to think really long about this because as someone who has watched plenty of horror movies that I love and consider my favorite it's extremely difficult to choose only five. So, I kinda sorta modified my answer where I give categories.
( My favorite scary movies. )
merricatb: What're your top 5 fave horror movies?Now, since horror is among my favorite genres, I had to think really long about this because as someone who has watched plenty of horror movies that I love and consider my favorite it's extremely difficult to choose only five. So, I kinda sorta modified my answer where I give categories.
( My favorite scary movies. )
July AMA: Road Trips
Jul. 15th, 2026 06:39 pmrogueslayer452Asked by author_by_night: Have you ever been on a summer road trip? If not, would you ever want to go on a road trip?
I've definitely been on summer road trips, mainly when I was younger. One big one that I remember (that we have home video of) is traveling across the country to visit my aunts and uncles. It took quite a long time to get there, perhaps a week? Aside from that, I've gone on some road trips since then that aren't as long, not always during the summer. I think the last one was to Los Angeles, which took roughly the whole day to get there.
Road trips are interesting because it really depends on who you're traveling with and how things are planned out, and how one can handle sitting in a moving vehicle for hours at a time if you didn't bring something with you to keep you entertained. It can be merely exhausting just sitting for hours at a time, and, because I live in America, while there are some interesting sights to see especially once you get to places you're unfamiliar with there are also prolonged periods of time where it's just a long stretch of road with nothing to see, that you'll be relieved once you see something like a rural area or a field and other pieces of nature and not just road and other vehicles. Plus there is also something really special about rest stops, those areas in the middle of nowhere.
author_by_night: Have you ever been on a summer road trip? If not, would you ever want to go on a road trip?I've definitely been on summer road trips, mainly when I was younger. One big one that I remember (that we have home video of) is traveling across the country to visit my aunts and uncles. It took quite a long time to get there, perhaps a week? Aside from that, I've gone on some road trips since then that aren't as long, not always during the summer. I think the last one was to Los Angeles, which took roughly the whole day to get there.
Road trips are interesting because it really depends on who you're traveling with and how things are planned out, and how one can handle sitting in a moving vehicle for hours at a time if you didn't bring something with you to keep you entertained. It can be merely exhausting just sitting for hours at a time, and, because I live in America, while there are some interesting sights to see especially once you get to places you're unfamiliar with there are also prolonged periods of time where it's just a long stretch of road with nothing to see, that you'll be relieved once you see something like a rural area or a field and other pieces of nature and not just road and other vehicles. Plus there is also something really special about rest stops, those areas in the middle of nowhere.
