bike beats tram

Hi Team! Well, I'm back in trusty Elsendorp, which can be trusted to be totally uneventful. Luckily, you still have a few days of Amsterdam left in my report of the last few days, so please breathe easy.

When I last wrote I was going to do some work on my job application, which I did, after which I met Phizz for some lunch and we drove to Den Haag to pick up his visa for Saudi Arabia. No crazy antics in Den Haag this time. Sometimes we can behave.
Back in Amsterdam, however, we had some time to kill before meeting my cousin and her beau and some friends for a movie at Pluk de Nacht ('Seize the night)', a temporary outdoor cinema which shows free movies. What better to kill time to before watching a movie, then watching a movie, right? So we enjoyed some lovely sushi at Tomo and watched Super 8. It was quite fun, however it does get a bit Disney towards the end. Still, enjoyable, non-the-less.

Then, miraculously it turned into quite a dry and pleasant evening, which resulted in a massive turnout for the Pluk de Nacht movie that night, because up until then it had pretty much rained every single night. Not Friday, however, so we were very lucky. We were not lucky enough to get to have deck chairs which had already all been given out, but we did get a blanket or two. We settled quite comfortably left centre screen, and watched a quite in-your-face and slightly unnerving Australian short film called Crossbow, which prompted me to assure our company that that's not how life is in all Australian suburbs.
After that we watched quite a lovely French film called Les Emotives Anonymes (Romantics Anonymous) which we all thoroughly enjoyed. It was fun watching it with such a bog crowd, people really got into the movie and cheered and sighed at all the good moments. The closing credits rolled to Angus & Julia Stone's song Big Jet Plane (hear it here) which I love and really enjoyed hearing there.

Saturday started very nice and cruisy, another cappuccino or two from Sander at SOK Espresso Lab, who is very pleasant company and we shared a a giggle when a costumer ordered a 'large espresso'. Sander tried to clarify: 'Do you mean a large cappuccino?' ' No, a large espresso, please.' 'A double espresso?' 'No, a laaaaaarrge espresso' combined with a puzzled look, as if that's a normal thing to order. Eventually Sander made him a double espresso, which the customer asked to be turned into a cappuccino after all. Ooookay, then. We should have referred him to the nearest McDonald's. But a customer is a customer, and he got his coffee in the end. Hope he enjoyed it.

Then I met Phizz for lunch at Buffet van Odette, a little gem of a place I was recommended to visit by Sander's colleague when Sverre was in town a few weeks ago. Unfortunately, it's so much of a gem that recently it's been packed to the rafters every time I visit and they seem to be unable to cope with their own popularity. It is fantastic that they are doing so well, but it took over 45 minutes for our lunch to arrive. Luckily I wasn't too hungry and was in brilliant company, we weren't too fussed about the long wait. But there were a few customers who were, understandably. They are moving to a bigger premises soon, but until then I think I will only visit it on weekdays. The lunch was delectable, though, all organic and tasty.

Considering the weather was rather crappy, the afternoon that followed was quite wet and we didn't do too much, I visited one of my favourite little design shops to buy Renée some birthday presents, then picked up my gear from Stella's place and trammed it to Phizz's. We then took a tram back into town to spend the remainder of the wet evening comfortably entertained in the cinema, first we watched Larry Crowne at Pathé City, then we took a taxi to Pathé de Munt. Now, you must know that my dear friend Phizz is a bit of a movie junkie and has a monthly unlimited movie pass. Phizz likes movies. And he likes my company. And I like movies. And I like his company. So, movies together is one of our things. One of many. Another thing we do all the time is say something that the other was just about to say. It's funny and amazing the amount of times we say exactly the same thing. Often the whole conversation is unnecessary because we basically already know what the other is going to say and often it would just be easier to just say 'Ok, good idea' before the other has opened their mouth.
Anyway, so Saturday was movie night, after Larry Crowne we watched Captain America, which was so bad it was funny. And then it was late and bedtime.

Sunday was crazy but fun. I nearly saw all my favourite Dutch people in one day. In the morning I was meeting my cousin and her beau again for coffee at Screaming Beans. Do I still need to write what Screaming Beans is? You're all familiar with that place by now, aren't you? So there we are, the three of us had just ordered coffee when in walks my sister's boyfriend. I said 'Hey, what are you doing here?' And he replied 'I could ask you the same question!' I told him that I was having coffee with my cousin and he told me he was having coffee with my sister. And another friend of hers was there too. So the six of us ended up having coffee together, which was lots of fun. Halfway through I got a text from Emily saying she was having coffee near her place that afternoon and whether I'd like to join her. Of course I did. But I was also going to Utrecht to visit Renée for her birthday. And after I had already agreed to meet Emily I realised I had left Renée's present at Phizz's because I was intending to go back there before going to Utrecht, I wanted to say goodbye to him before he went to Saudi later that day and I would go back to Elsendorp the day after.

So I had to leave coffee early, walk to my sister's where I had left my bike and race to Phizz's to pick up the present and give him a gick hug to say goodbye. That's when my public transport drama started. In hindsight, it would have been better had I just ridden my bike to meet Emily, and taken my bike everywhere that day. But as I didn't know how to ride from Phizz's place to where Emily was, I decided to take the tram. Which I missed by one minute. I ended up being almost half an hour late, but Emily and I still had a nice little chat and some lunch. After which I missed my tram to the train station by one lousy minute, too. So I walked to the train station, where I missed my train by one lousy minute!

I decided I was not going to miss that bus I had to catch in Utrecht, so I raced out of the train to the bus terminal, where I easily caught the bus. I felt quite pleased with myself, until I hopped off the bus and checked out with my public transport chipcard, and noticed it suddenly had a lot less money on it. Then I realised that with my rush to catch the bus, I had forgotten to check out at the train station. Aaaaargh!

However, that didn't wreck any of the fun I had at Renée's that afternoon, I had two types of cake, and plenty of great conversation. In the end I didn't end up leaving until 9.30 and joined one of Renée's friends back to the station. Luckily I found out that when I checked in again at the station, it instead checked me out of the first trip, and thus put all my money back on the card. However, you can't check in again until 15 minutes after checking out, so I missed my train back to Amsterdam! Of course!
All in all still a fabulous way to spend a sunday.

Monday I enjoyed another coffee and some breakfast at Screaming Beans, mostly because the SOK Espresso Lab is closed on Mondays and also because there's no food in Phizz's house so I wanted to eat breakfast, which is very nice at Screaming Beans.

Then I took a train to Almere, where my friend Mel lives, and I spent a lovely afternoon with her, marvelling over the sudden lovely weather and enjoying watching her little boy have water fights out in the court with his friends. Mum came to pick me up on her way to Lelystad, where were would enjoy a dinner at my aunty and uncle's place, and Stella came to join us there too.

It became a very late night, as we left quite late and then had to drop Stella off in Amsterdam, and then drive back to Elsendorp. It was 1 am when I got to bed, but I couldn't sleep until 3 am. I was lying awake worrying about things, and one of those things was the fact that I wasn't sleeping. I really wanted to sleep because I had set Tuesday aside for working on my job application, and I wanted to be bright and sharp for that, as it had to be submitted by Tuesday night. However, I was wiped out all of Tuesday morning, couldn't quite sleep in like I had planned, either and when Mum came home for lunch, I was a useless heap of yawns and sighs. So I had a one hour snooze after lunch, and then an espresso. That worked. I worked on my application all afternoon, and got some great feedback from my sister and Phizz and submitted it feeling happy with it.

And today was a nice a quiet day, though I didn't get to sleep until well after 2 am again last night, despite my best efforts of trying. Don't know what it is, but I'm so tired of it! Literally! Today I am having an early one, for sure. I did some washing today, some shopping, some list-writing, and a lot of thinking. Oh, and of course some blogging!