Daniel

Color commentary from the forgotten mountains

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Location: The Cave, Kansas, United States

Tuesday, March 14, 2006

invasion of europe

Episode #2

Simple Twists of Fate

Tornadoes tore through Lawrence, Kansas and leveled a good portion of the University. If any of my Jayhawks were hurt, I shall kill 700 for each player bruised... or something like that.

Well, those same storms became a massive snow storm in Minneapolis and that screwed up every airline's scheduled flight times. Normally, this would peeve me. NO one, especially me, wants to be stuck in Salt Lake City any longer than they have to be. Thankfully, the good people at Delta found it in their hearts to redirect me.

Original flight plan. SLC to Cincinnati then on to Frankfurt. Due to bad weather and delays, I know have this plan; SLC to Cincinnati then on to.... (drumroll).... (still drumrolling).... (drummer's getting tired or lazy and missing a step or two).... AMSTERDAM!!!!!

Yes! That's right, I have just won the weather sweepstakes and will be spending my first night in beautiful Amsterdam. Home of a dead Jew name Anne, Stoners, Van Gogh, Rembrandt and Amstel light.

Flight to Cincinnati - Awful. I had to sit next to a man who owns five Red Robins, smelled of Micheal Jordan cologne and couldn't stop telling me about his new home in Florence, Italy and how he was going to climb mountain Everest next week. He did point out that Rob Hall's body was finally pushed off the mountain after gracing the Hillary step for more than four years. Apparently, climbers were tired of looking at his freeze dried remains. (for those of you that don't know Rob Hall - he was the famous Aussie climber that called his wife on the phone from the mountain and then froze to death with 13 others. There was a movie and a book).

Anyway, I was sitting in the last row of the plane, so there was no way to recline or adjust and I had to stay awake for three hours listening to rich boy talk about his lovely life. Thankfully, a weird Cincinnati native was sitting in the row in front of us and he saved me by starting to list off all the attractions, movie theaters, local events and economic and social indicators for the greater Cincinnati area. His weird factoids were a sharp contrast in conversation to the golden boy sitting next to me and I could tell he annoyed the golden boy, so I kept encouraging him to tell us more. Three hours of Cincinnati history. (Did you know that the band, The Who KILLED people there?)

A brief layover in Cincinnati. I have already lost four hours of the day (this post is going to be very, very long).

The flight to AMSTERDAM.. EMPTY! It's me. A flight crew, Jon Kitna, and fifty others. It's a 767, so each of us gets our own center aisle to stretch out in. Dinner service takes five minutes. I have six pillows and countless blankets. The movie is Harry Potter, whom I have come to see as the biggest idiot child of them all. I guess I am magic ignorant, or perhaps it's the American in me, but when does being a magic user and not using magic, make sense??? Fucking English.

I arrive in pain. It's the next day. 9 AM. I get off the plane in Europe and it looks exactly like Japan - It's filled with Asians. They are everywhere. I am beginning to think I went the wrong way. It takes a few seconds before I see ugly white people before I come to my senses.

My first impression of Europe; I am not as turned on as I thought I would be. There are not as many sexy people here as the tour guide said there would be...

My emotional salvation is found in the fact that it takes me no time to get through customs. In fact, the guy with the stamp doesn't ask me a thing, he just takes my passport, stamps it and hands it back, that's it. No one checks my bags, nothing. I just walked straight into Europe without one check. I guess it's the long hair, or they just don't care.

I walk out of the baggage area and suddenly I am surrounded by photographers and bright lights. Which automatically makes me think that I have done something wrong. It turns out that Junior Milosevic is behind me and he's here for his dad.

Yes, Sloban's son. I have a photo of him. Looks just like him. He could have taken me hostage and killed me to make a point the press. It would have been worth it to me cause the next three hours sucked.

I have no idea where I am going. I have no Sancho Ponchi on this one. I have no ambition in Amsterdam other than Anne Frank's house. I'm so tired that by the time I finally get to the Flying Pig hostel in downtown, I can't even speak English well enough to make a point. AND I am talking to stoners who seem to be moving faster than me.

Thankfully, the stoned people in the hostel are nice enough to let me check in early. Somehow I am not in a male housing unit, but rather - a queen bed, all female unit. It's me and 28 other females. Every single one of them - lesbian. That's right all you threesome freaks... Xanadu. They say nothing and I say nothing. In fact, I come in and just pass out.

I am shaken awake by Charolette. It's not her name, it could be, but I don't know, but she's British and all British women are named Charolette. She has the softest voice in the world, it's vocal heroin. For some reason she got me up to tell me where to go to see things and that there is free food downstairs. That's it.

She walks off, I pass out again.

When I do wake up, I shower, with my roommates. Yes, Europe is good. I think we all decided that I just have a big clitoris and swollen labias. (Not all of my roommates, just four of them are there)

So far, this is my impression of Europe.

The women are men. They are all six feet tall and would make great speed skaters if they gave it a try. The men are all women, if they are Dutch. There isn't one masculine male here. They are all rail thin, hairless, child-like and quiet. The males that are men, are foreigners and they are huge.

They love bikes here... A lot.

They love water, but not getting it it. Which you can't.

They love weed. A coffeehouse here is a trick. If you want coffee, you won't make it to the counter to order it before you pass out from the fumes that overwhelm you as you walk in.

Nothing opens here until 1 in the afternoon.

Everyone here smells like soap or cigarettes.

The stoner from your highschool - is either living here or is a rank amateur among this elite group.

I'm still sick, and now I have to figure out a way to Paris to see the Mona Lisa before I am due in Frankfurt on the 17th.

IT's a lot for a first day, eh?