Sun

I've been as happy as a cat this week, spoiled by the sun shining in on my back all afternoon at work. I can practically feel the endorphins increase in my brain, especially as it nears going-home time. It's meant to be all rainy and spring-like though by the weekend, just in time for O and I to go to the sauna on Sunday. No sitting out in the sun for us this time.

So, speaking of cats, we got to visit our favourite fluffball last Sunday when we went over to see his owners, Erika and Karl. I had a cozy 20 minutes or so while Coco kept my lap warm as we chatted in their living room. I've certainly missed the nutter. We had a wonderful afternoon and evening just hanging out and having lots of good drink and food. Dinner was nachos which were partly made with Dutch ingredients (jong belegen kaas), but spiced up (literally) with some authentic ingredients that Erika had recently brought back from LA. Then Karl mixed up some tasty margaritas. We were all very happy bunnies.

Saturday was a pretty good day as well. In the afternoon, O and I went to a gallery in the center to see the exhibit Laser 3.14 has going on at the moment. It's a very small space, so there weren't that many works, but what was there took his usual street poetry and displayed it in a different way, or with some art, which wouldn't happen when the poetry is out on the street. The artist himself happened to be there and we had a nice chat with him until he admitted he was absolutely starving and dashed out of there to get some lunch.

I also had to go to the bank to try to request a check in US dollars that I can send off for my Australian work visa. Unfortunately I fucked up and didn't bring the all of the details for the place the money is meant for, so I couldn't complete the application then. Besides extending the time it will take to get the check, it then meant that I had to make extra, and extra-fun, trips to various branches of Rabobank, hoping each time that the person who would help me would know what they were doing enough to get my check request processed correctly. It was not very encouraging when the first reaction was usually a blank look and then asking their colleague "Can we make checks?" We tried on Sunday going to the one branch open on Sundays, the one on the Dam, but after about 10 minutes of two guys clicking around the computer system, they told me they couldn't do it then because the computer system was down. So then I left work early on Monday to go to the Van Baerlestraat. The application was fortunately finally sent off, but I didn't have the most faith in the girl who helped me. I am so regretting screwing things up on the first try.

Looking ahead to when I visit the US, I was starting to look around for any shows I could go to while I'm in Portland, and amazingly I now have a ticket to go to one: Ben Gibbard solo at the Roseland. I'm not a huge Death Cab fan, but him playing solo will likely be quite different and so I thought it'd be worth going to. I think September 2000 was the last time I went to a gig in Portland. Ugh. How can it have been so long? It will be interesting to compare an American/Portland crowd to what I'm used to in Amsterdam. Maybe they actually are as obnoxious there as here and I've just forgotten.