Legends of the Sun Pig

For our wedding anniversary this year we didn’t do much special on or around the day. On the Friday after the day itself, I walked to Amsterdam to meet up with Abi after work. We wandered around town a bit and had a (very good) burger at the Burger Bar on the Warmoesstraat. But it wasn’t a “big fancy” dinner out. So on Friday 31st July, just a day after I’d got back from my “back-to-school” trip to Edinburgh, we took off on a quick overnight trip, just the two of us.

It was the first time we’ve left Alex and Fiona on their own overnight.

We’ve left them alone while we’ve been shopping, at work, or out to dinner & a movie before, but this was the first actual overnight, where they had to sort out their own dinner, their own bedtime, and their own getting up the next morning. To make it easier, because it was a Saturday morning in the middle of their summer holiday, they didn’t have to get up the next morning at all. But still, it was a first.

Their reaction: “Fine, whatever. Why are you still here?”

OK.

We didn’t go very far. We got a last-minute deal on a room at the Van Der Valk Hotel De Bilt, just East of Utrecht. After I finished work, we threw some clothes into an overnight bag, and it took us about 50 minutes to drive there. We settled into the lovely room, freshened up a bit, and had a lovely meal in the restaurant downstairs. It was dark by the time we were done eating, but we still wanted to take a stroll around the area. We walked along the old Amersfoortseweg for a ways, then crossed over the A28 to Zeist, where we walked back past the enormous Vollenhove flats.

Along the way we saw what looked like a wooden aquaduct running over the top of a road sign gantry, but with no connecting waterway. We concluded that it must be a wildlife crossing. The next day we drove through several much larger wildlife crossings, and learned that the Dutch term for these is ecoduct, which is awesome.

The next morning we got up at a leisurely pace, and set out to see what the surroundings looked like in daylight. We had noticed on the map that we were near to a sculpture garden, and we found it. It’s actually the Provinciaal JitsArt Museum, Beelden op Beerschoten, a permanent exhibit of works by Dutch artist Jits Bakker. The works on display here are stone and bronze sculptures. They’re fabulously dynamic – I loved them.

The sculpture garden is in the middle of a larger nature area, and we walked around there for a bit more before returning to our car and driving on to the Great Pyramid of Austerlitz.

Yes, pyramid. In the Netherlands.

It’s a Napoleon thing.

It used to have fabulous views as far as the eye can see. Now it’s just mostly trees. (And a car park, an exhibit, a snack bar, a café, and a small amusement park for the younger kids.)

We drove on to Utrecht. We parked at Hoog Catharijne and walked into the old city centre. I had my eye on some shoes, which is not a statement you’ll often hear me make. But Converse had released the Chuck Taylor II sneakers earlier that week — the first redesign of the classic All Star shoe since, like, ever — and damn, I was excited.

We found them on sale at the Snipes store on the Lange Elisabethstraat. I’ve been wearing All Stars since 2003, but the pair I bought last year betrayed me. I have only worn them occasionally since then, and never for long stretches. I bought a superbly comfortable pair of British Knights to replace them as my main sneakers.

I’d done my background reading on the new Chucks, and I examined all the new features on the pair I tried on in the store. Although the overall shape of the shoe is pretty much the same, the construction feels much better. The lining is thicker, and feels luxurious. The elastic straps attached to the tongue should keep it in position, and stop it from wrinkling as it gets worn in. The soles are not completely flat and unyielding! They actually have some arch support! The All Star logo ankle logo is now an embroidered patch rather than a printed circle of rubber. They wanted to keep the shoe exactly the same, but give every aspect of it an upgrade.

And they’re comfortable. Oh yes.

I bought a pair of black high-tops. They come with two pairs of laces, black (pre-installed), and white if you want to swap them to get closer to the old look. (I think I’m going to change mine.) My main question about them is how they will hold up over time. The old Chucks acquire a familiar scuffed and weathered look after they’ve been kicking around for a few months. I’m curious to see how the new ones age after wearing.

We walked around Utrecht for another hour or two, and finally settled ourselves down at the Winkel van Sinkel for some drinks and early evening snacks.

On the way back home, we stopped off at McDonalds and brought some food in for Alex and Fiona. They were fine, of course.

The RSS feed of podcasts published by 99% Invisible only goes back 100 episodes. I started listening to 99PI back in April on my last marathon walk, which was around episode 161: Show of Force. So to go back beyond episode 61 I manually download them and load them into Downcast (my current podcast app of choice).

Or I use the web archive to go back the each episode’s permalink, and play it directly from there. That’s what I did on Thursday 23rd July. I had a week of time off at home after our two weeks away, and I used most of it to reorganize my office (again). The stacked-plastic-box filing solution I had been using to replace my old steel filing cabinet wasn’t pleasing me, and the giant bookcases had been feeling oppressive. I cut one of the bookcases down into two parts so that I’ve got some wall space to hang things up, and I made an Ikea run to acquire a couple of under- and near-desk filing space. It makes a big difference, and even now, almost a month later, the clutter equilibrium on my desk is at a much lower level than before.

But the maintenance work left me feeling tired and depressed, so I went out for a walk in het Twiske on the Thursday evening. Listened to the (short! 4-5 minute long) first episodes of 99% Invisible, and enjoyed the golden hour around the setting sun.

Early (for us) on the morning of Saturday 18th July, we did a final packing-up run, filled up the car, and drove back North to Dublin. Going through security, the scanner operator commented on the unusual quantity of MacBooks in my carry-on (four), and proceeded to tell me about the two gentlemen from the previous day who were travelling with a 12kg gold brick. o.O

Travel back was uneventful for the humans, but quite exciting for my checked-in suitcase, which took a detour via Bucharest.

Thursday 16th July was a rainy day, and we all stayed indoors. (I think that might have been the day we showed Alex and Fiona Monty Python and the Holy Grail for the first time.) On Friday 17th all of us (including Alex! We didn’t give him the choice of stying home this time) drove to Cork, where we met up with all of Rowan’s family (her dad Myles had taken the afternoon off work so we could all get together).

Cork top tip: don’t take your car into the city centre. Just don’t.

We met up in the city centre, and had some refreshments in a crêpes café by the river on South Mall St. We walked to Elizabeth Fort, which is a neat tourist attraction in the making, with great views out over the city centre. A little further on we saw Saint Fin Barre’s Cathedral, which looks like a neo-gothic rocketship. After the sightseeing we split up into various car groups and drove out to the Awesome Walls indoor climbing centre, where we sat around chatting, had some food, and climbed a bit.

Because we had a two-hour drive back to the cottage (and had to be up early the naxt day to catch a flight), we called it a day at about 20:30. About five minutes before we left, the conversation turned towards role-playing, and we discovered that Myles and Sam, just like us, were Amber RPG fans from way back when. Yet another thing we had in common. We had a great time hanging out with them, and I hope we can meet up again some time. (Living in different countries can be a bit of a barrier to socialising.)

On Wednesday 15th Abi and I drove from the cottage South to the tip of the Hook Peninsula. We parked near the harbour in Slade, and walked along the South-eastern coastal path to the Hook Lighthouse. We had set out in mid-afternoon, and it was just about 18:00 by the time we got to the lighthouse, so we didn’t have time to go in and look around. We just skirted around the sea wall, and walked back up the main road to Slade again. Beautiful day.

At Worldcon last year Fiona made friends with two other girls of her age. They bonded over Minecraft. Unfortunately the three girls all live in different countries. But our holiday to Ireland this year brough Fiona close enough to meet up with Rowan, who lives in Cork. Fiona had been excited about this FOR MONTHS ever since Minecon 2015 was announced back in February, and we started planning our summer holiday around it.

We met up with Rowan, her brother Oscar, and her mum Sam in Tramore on the Tuesday 14th July. (Alex stayed home at the cottage.) I think that both sets of parents were a little apprehensive about meeting again, and how the girls would get on after a year of not being very much in touch. Right from the moment we met up on the windy and rainy Tramore promenade, though, it was like they had never been apart. We had some lunch at Misty’s diner on Strand Road while the worst of the rain passed, went for a long walk along the beach (watching the surfers, picking up rocks), and then let the kids indulge in a bunch of rides at the amusement park. Just before we split up to head home later in the afternoon, the kids had some great fun trying to avoid getting soaked by the waves as they crashed into the concrete ramp from the promenade to the beach.

In fact, we all had so much fun together (adults, too!) that we decided to meet up again later on in the week. Huge success.