The last few days

O and I have had a busy week, we were out every evening from Wednesday through Saturday. But we had some good times and met some new people:

Wednesday: A meeting of our book club group, started by L. A couple non-usual attendees were there, so that was good. More people hadn't read the book (Jpod by Douglas Coupland) than had read it, but the book discussion doesn't usually last long anyway.

Thursday: We went to see Cold War Kids and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah at Paradiso. A colleague of mine joined us because I knew she was a Clap Your Hands fan. It was her first time to Paradiso (she's only lived in Amsterdam a few months) and I think she was appropriately impressed with the venue. And she liked the bands. About halfway through Cold War Kids' set, I happened to turn to my left and saw that someone I know had been standing next to me the whole time. It made me happy to run into someone at a show.

Friday: We went out to In De Wildeman, the great beer place that O goes to often, to meet with an American guy, Tim, who I only knew through email. He had found my site and asked for recommendations on what to see while on a short visit to Amsterdam. We wrote a bit and he offered to buy me a beer when he visited. So O and I met up with him and his friend Matt. We had a great time chatting with them and I think they enjoyed the bar. And I ran into someone who used to work at my company. Amsterdam can feel so small sometimes...

Saturday: An American friend had a party featuring American booze and food and Twister. There was Sam Adams beer, a few American whiskies, Hershey's chocolate, mini peanut butter cups, pumpkin pie, and homemade guacamole. It wasn't all American though. A Brazilian girl made her great caipirinhas by the pitcher, a Dutch group brough a crate of Grolsch, and there were spicy Turkish pizzas later on, so it was actually rather international. And there was the Twister, which I joined in once and did ok in til I fell over backwards.

So now we have a couple of days break until we leave on Tuesday for Berlin. I'm very much looking forward to the Decemberists show, and then getting to see them again a week later in Amsterdam. In other exciting news for the week, the shops on the Bos en Lommerplein are meant to finally open again on the 15th. It's been just over 7 months since the plein was abruptly shut down because structural problems were found. I am so looking forward to being able to go to our larger grocery stores again and having more selection of food. I'm curious though to see which shops remain shut, meaning they had to fold after being closed for so long.