Birthday Weekend

On Thursday, I celebrated my 40th birthday. Birthdays are a big deal in NL, so when I got to work I found my office had been decorated for the occasion. Everyone who walked by noticed the flags and streamers and wished me a happy birthday and gave me the standard three kiss greeting. I brought home-made American cookies and brownies to share at tea time. These were very popular.

For dinner that evening, Dennis and I went to the restaurant just down the street from the house. They serve typical Dutch food, but it’s usually pretty good stuff. For dessert, we got the Crepes Suzette with a huge sparkler on top instead of candles. I was one of three people in the restaurant that evening getting fireworks on my dessert. The 5th must be a popular birthday!

The fireworks reminded me I spent my last birthday here in the Netherlands also. I was here for business meetings and then Dennis joined me for house hunting. I remember that I was completely jet-lagged and was struggling to stay awake during dinner with the group. I had never seen a sparkler as big as the one they put on my dessert. I can hardly believe that it was a year ago!

My cat gave me a lovely birthday present by pooping on the dining room floor. I think he’s still mad because we left him for a week. We hired the neighbor girl to feed him and I’m sure she spent some time petting him, but he was still angry. At least we didn’t have to send him to the kennel again after he got so sick there the last time! The cat continued his naughtiness last night by breaking into his food container. I really don’t know how much food he got, but he wasn’t hungry for breakfast this morning. And naturally, he just puked because he must have known I was writing about him. What a brat!

For this weekend, the weather forecast was for a sunny Sunday. Dennis and I decided to drive over to another town and walk along the lake shore. We wanted to start exploring a bit more by car and also get out for a hike. The sun was out early this morning, but just as we were leaving, it started to rain. We decided the weather would change four times before we got to our destination anyway, so we left. Driving was a pleasure with very few cars on the road. We went across the lake to the recently created Flevoland. Flevoland was reclaimed from the lake about 50 years ago. We had biked there before, but always avoided the cities. Today, we drove through the cities. The architecture was very modern – as you would expect from a city so young. There was a building that looked like a spaceship, and another that looked like it was tipped sideways. Crazy!

We finally made it to our start point for the hike and the sun was shining again. It was cold, but it IS February after all. We walked for about 20 minutes when it started raining. Another 10 minutes and the rain turned to snow. We turned around, deciding that it was a bit too miserable for hiking. We stopped for tea at a coffee shop along the beach and we laughed as the snow fell harder and harder. Once we were warm and dry again, we headed back to the car. The snow was almost done by then, but it was colder. Yuck! We’ll have to try another hike next week and hope for better weather!