Out of the nest

I started this yesterday afternoon (Thursday), but unfortunately I didn't get to finish it then, so start here and it will end down the bottom. Like a lot of things.

I am not in Elsendorp right now, I am in Almere (about 2 hours North, in the polder - super flat with wind turbines. Google Maps it). It feels good not to be home. I get a little cabin fever in Elsendorp, and I feel a bit deprived of social interaction...There's people here, and they are not from Brabant.
Now don't get me wrong, the countryside is great, the town my mum lives is cute and all that. But it ain't happenin', as the young folk call it these days. It smells of piggies or cowsies a lot of the time. There's lots of flies. And the people there talk funny. I'm sorry to be judgemental, but Brabants is not Dutch, it's Brabants, a dialect. And it's not my way of talking (I didn't grow up here, I grew up amongst the tulip fields up north). I cannot follow Brabanders all the time, and for some reason they don't differentiate between 'he' and 'she' when they talk about people, so it can be hard to figure out who exactly they're talking about. "My daughter can't start his car, he just called me." Now that's just weird. As most of you know, I'm all about the correct use of language and this ambiguity bugs me. I will correct you if you say something wrong. My poor husband always cops it. He sometimes calls the shed the 'garage' and it's just not a garage. We don't have a garage, which is an indoor place to park a car. We have a car port, and a shed. The car does not fit in the shed. Besides I wouldn't want our poor car (TOBy, it's called, as the first 3 letters of its licence plate are TOB) (note the correct use of it's and its!!) parked in the shed, as it's dark and full of spiders there.

(By the way, please let me know if I make any typos in my blog - I hate being a hypocrite.)

Now where was I trying to go with this? Oh yes, they speak Dutch in Almere. It's nice. I don't know much about this place, otherwise. I have found a Greek eatery with nice small dishes (fried potatoes with Parmasan and garlic, though I was under the impression Parmasan was from Parma in Italy, but it tastes nice all the same) with free wifi. I love free wifi. I have an iPod touch, which I wish was an iPhone 4, but it's not. So I only have access to the web via my iPod when there is wifi around. I must admit I am a big fan of the internets/ interwebs/the net/Googletown or as the old folk know it: the World Wide Web (that's where the www comes from, yes!) I am borderline Gen X/Y so I like my information now, right now, please. I like a bit of Facebook here and there too, but not so much the Twittering/Tweeters. I never got Twitter. Just update your Facebook, no?

Anyway, so I am in Almere, eating potatoes with garlic and cheese, drinking OJ, webbing away, and I'm enjoying the sun. The sun, ladies and gentlemen, has arrived. It's been tremendously splendid weather here. I am feeling my neck getting burnt as we speak. Oh, you might wonder why I am in Almere. It's because Mum secretly wanted a driver. She didn't say that, she said she'd like to drop by my aunt (her sister and my godmother) after the interview she needs to take, who lives very close-by here and I haven't seen her yet since I got to the NL. Mum needed to do the interview for a magazine she and my aunty are working on. Mum has not yet told my aunty we're dropping by, and it might not even be convenient for her if we do. I know she's pretty busy and I have a feeling we won't get to drop by. In which case, we just drove here for the interview. So, go figure. I know my Mum enjoys it when she doesn't have to drive. Driving here is exhausting. Dutch drivers are very uptight and pushy. And rude! I miss Australian traffic, and my car. Oh, my lovely TOBy. We only got TOBy last year, he's a beautiful black Citröen C4 from 2005, panoramic glass roof, cream leather duo tone interior, heated electric seats, automatic everything, senses everything, TOBy is the bomb. It even has fold-away storage compartments in the boot. For someone obsessed with organisation, neatly labelled boxes and storage, that is a selling point.

Mum's car is a truck (almost). It has lots and lots of space and even overhead compartments like in an airplane! It's a Renault Kangoo, and the most basic model at that. It does not feel like a sexy drive. When I get out of it, people look and assume I left my kids at home. When Ash and I were looking for a new car last year, I wanted a car that said 'we do not have children' (for obvious reasons) and we even contemplated getting a convertible. TOBy does the job well, though, with his lovely clean cream coloured interior. No dog for us any time soon, either, though we do like dogs and would sooner get a dog than have kids. But we work too much and travel too much to have one right now. One day.

(That's where I got to yesterday, the following is written today, Friday)
So, after that speculation I wrote before on driving to Almere just for the interview: I was right. My aunty was not able to have us over, so I drove to Almere to spend an hour eating fried potatoes and to write my blog, which to be honest, is quite a long way to drive for something you can do at home. To make matters worse, by the time we were ready to drive back, peak hour had hit and it took us 3 hours to get home, and we spent a lot of that time sitting in traffic jams. And that after what I wrote about Dutch traffic yesterday! I got very, very cranky. I do not enjoy driving a manual car in a traffic jam, my legs gets sore from all the pedalling, it feels cumbersome and exhausting. I do not understand why the Dutch are so hell-bent on manual cars - stick shifts are just so backward! They are under the impression here that a manual car is 'cool' and automatic cars are for old people. But I agree with most of Australia that an automatic car is simply comfortable and manual cars are for rev-heads and people who can't afford an automatic car. Why the hell do you need to change gears unless you're a rally driver or drive a race car? I'm sure most Europeans will disagree with me here, though.

Anyhow, with all the god awful traffic jams yesterday I missed out on my Zumba class, too, which didn't help my mood. I don't particularly love that class, but I do enjoy the exercise. We got home around 7 pm, ate some soup, lit the fire, and relaxed a little. I watched a bit of my favourite Aussie comedian Adam Hills online (yay for the internet!) and that cheered me up a lot. He's so funny and kind and he's never crude or offensive like some other comedians.

This morning was busy. The real estate guy was visiting this afternoon and the house still looked like a bomb had gone off, so Netty (a friend of Mum's who helps her with the housekeeping (and god knows Mum needs it)) and I frantically stuffed stuff in boxes and tried to tidy lots of stuff by hiding it in the garage. He was a nice guy and told us that we were doing exactly the right thing by de-cluttering the place and freshening it up with a bit of paint, and not to worry to much. No need for anything radical, he said. He's coming back in a few weeks to take the photos. We need those weeks!

But I am leaving for Amsterdam tomorrow, which I am looking forward to. I've got quite a few friends to catch up with, including a friend from Australia (Hi Phiroze, looking forward to Tuesday!And thank you for reading my blog!), who has been based in Amsterdam for almost two years, but travels 333 days of the year for work so here's never actually here, but he just happens to be around next week. Amazing! Of course my dear friend Emily lives in Amsterdam too, I look forward to spending some time with her, and my friend Renée works in Amsterdam so she's coming for a sleepover on Wednesday. There's lots of fun to be had! And no boxes to be packed or repacked or unpacked or sorted. Yay! I might tidy my sister's place as a thank you and fold her socks. Yes, I fold socks. And very well, too.

I am taking the laptop and my sister's place has wifi (woo!) so you will be able to come with me. See you there!