Arborific

There’s a bit of a rivalry between East Lansing and Ann Arbor. I don’t know all of its nuances, but from what I can tell, U of M is the turtle neck-wearing elitist and MSU is the down-to-earth, good old boy. After visiting Ann Arbor a few times now, I can say I really like the city. It has a very vibrant downtown area and the city is brimming with entrepreneurs and high-tech companies. It’s like a tiny slice of Boston or New York was transplanted into Michigan.

Since Julie had a flight to Jacksonville early this morning and the weather reports were calling for several inches of snow, we decided to stay in a hotel between Ann Arbor and the airport instead of waking up at 3am to drive from Lansing.

While I was at work, Julie found a cool tile factory called Motawi that makes artsy tile. She got a tile that will be a centerpiece in our kitchen.

After work, we ate at Zingerman’s deli. I had never heard of it, but, apparently it is well known and is one of Jeffry Steingarten’s (the cranky critic on Iron Chef, food columnist) favorite restaurants. It’s basically a super-gourmet deli. The staff are extremely friendly and let you sample anything. We tried some cheeses straight out of France and some chocolate-covered bacon. I had the best Reuben ever. The corn beef and sauerkraut had delicate tastes and simply melted in my mouth. The cakes we had for dessert, however, were just OK. It was a great experience, but definitely not cheap, as far as delis go.

At the hotel, I enjoyed the whirlpool and then digging my car out of 10 inches of snow. Julie enjoyed being stuck on in her plane on the TARMAC for 2 hours this morning. Now she’s in sunny Jacksonville. Lucky!

The More, the Merrier!

Julie and I successfully hosted six, count ‘em, SIX guests in our new house this weekend - friends from Chi-town.  We had a merry time discussing deep philosophical issues, playing Croquet (which I believe is the next Kickball or Bocce), grilling, eating MSU Dairy Store ice cream, and touring The D.  One from our group of friends works with a guy from Iraq whose family moved to Dearborn, home of the largest concentration of Arabs in North America.  After seeing downtown Detroit (didn’t take long) we headed to Arab central.  An iPhone and my yesterday’s-tech cell phone guided us to Arab Kabob.  I felt a bit out of place being in a group of the only white people in the cozy diner where all of the signs were written in Arabic and an Arabic soccer channel played on the TV.  Our choices on the menu were chicken or “meat” kabob, tekka, and chicken hearts or livers.  I went with the “meat tekka” and enjoyed it thoroughly.  In Arabic, their word for “meat” is the same for “beef” so what I had was cubed beef served with salad, rice, pickled turnips, and plenty of bread.   I also realized that I’ve only bought one album printed in 2007.  I’m falling way behind!  Time to start exploring artists again, now that I have plenty of solitary downtime with Julie at class in the evenings :( 

West to Holland

In my last post, I was praising the wonderful Michigan Flyer bus for its offerings of great comfort while taking me to the Detroit Airport. Getting to the airport was a breeze. However, getting home proved to be a bit difficult. My plane was scheduled to arrive in Detroit at 7:30pm on Sunday and I was to catch the last bus back to Lansing at 9:20. However, with the edge of a hurricane over Virginia and a storm system over Detroit, my plane didn’t leave Washington DC until 7:30. At that point, I figured I’d have just enough time to get off the plane and run to the bus. When the plane landed and we were approaching the gate at 9:15, I had high hopes. I called the bus company and had them wait an extra 5 minutes for me. But then, as we were nearing the terminal, the plane turned around and parked a few hundred feet away. The pilot told us that because lightning had been sighted, the ground crews weren’t allowed to get to our plane and let us off! We waited until 9:20 and finally got into the gate. By then it was too late. The bus company refused to wait any longer and I was left to find my own way home.

I started asking all kinds of people at the airport if they were headed for Lansing so I could hitch a ride. Unfortunately, either nobody ever goes to Lansing, or no one was willing to give a strange guy at the airport a ride home. I got online and looked at how much a rental car was ($90) and headed for the rental agency. A taxi driver approached me and asked if I needed a ride. I said, “yeah, how much to get to Lansing?” He said it would be $230. I kindly refused and he said, “well how much would you be willing to pay,” and I said, “well, I can rent a car for $90,” and the driver quickly motioned to the rental bus stop and moved on to another potential customer. I ended up renting a Saturn Ion and began the long drive home. The next day after work, I dropped the rental car off at the Lansing airport and took a couple of buses back to East Lansing to get my car. What an ordeal! I still can’t believe that the bus wouldn’t wait maybe 10 or 15 minutes.

Next weekend I will take my last flight out of the Detroit airport, for at least a while. I’ll take the bus because I won’t have to worry about flying back into Detroit. I’m flying into Reagan and we will pack up and drive a U-Haul back to Lansing! This Sunday, Julie is flying into Detroit and on Monday we are closing on the house! I’m so ready to move out of my smelly, dirty bachelor pad. I’m still convinced it was worth the cheap rent, though

Today was my first Saturday spent in Lansing. Every other weekend I’ve spent in Illinois or back in Virginia. This was the first weekend in a long time, too, where I’ve been able to sleep in and not do anything when I wake up. It was refreshing. Every other weekend I’ve had some kind of engagement or work to do. This afternoon, I went to my parents’ old friends’ son’s graduation party. Yeah, it was awkward with no one there that I knew, except the family. I made some conversation with an older couple, and it was still enjoyable to chat a bit with some friends. I had a roasted pork dinner, too. My hopes weren’t high for it because I had heard earlier (when I had visited the family a few weeks ago) that the pig was going to be cooked with gas. Roasting a pig with GAS?! Yikes! What’s the point? Well, I tried it and it was OK. It was certainly tender and juicy, but it was missing the flavor. Sure, you can slop on some BBQ sauce, but the meat should stand on its own. Instead, it was bland and the crisped skin tasted like burning, not the good, wood flavor of real BBQ. Plus, with all the special breeding they do with pigs now days to make it more lean, there’s no good pork flavor, either.

After the party, I thought about what to do next. Nothing came to mind, so I pulled out my US road atlas and looked to Western Michigan. I would take a road trip to Holland! I drove a little over an hour and reached Zeeland township and then headed into downtown Holland. Being in Dutch country, I half expected to see a plethora of windmills and tulips, but I was disappointed. However, downtown Holland is very nice. They have a lively shopping district reminiscent (to me) of Annapolis or Fredericksburg. Lining Lake Macatawa were several glorious mansions. Detroit, Flint, and Lansing neighborhoods may be suffering, but Holland is doing very well. I passed by the H. J. Heinz plant, and I was sure I could smell Ketchup in the air. On my map, I had seen a marker for Saugatuck State Park, but there was nothing on the map showing me how to get there. I decided to wing it, because I wanted to see the beaches of Lake Michigan. I had been to the beaches of Ogden Dunes in Gary, Indiana, but I was disappointed by the fact that my view was spoiled by the surrounding steel mills (still worth seeing, though - a nice break from my trip back to Lansing from Champaign a couple weeks ago).

Getting to the beaches in Indiana was difficult because most of the shoreline was occupied by private developments and access was obtained via a confusing mess of roads. This adventure was equally difficult. I followed the afternoon sun west as far as I could and headed south when forced to a dead end. Eventually, I reached the park entrance and parked near the Felt Mansion. The mansion was built by the man who patented the comptometer, an early adding machine. I wandered around the grounds for a bit, trying to figure out how to get to the beach. I followed a dirt trail past an abandoned building and saw several people walking toward me wearing beach clothing. I knew I was on the right track. I followed the path over some large, wooded sand dunes. On the other side, I came to the lake shore. It was very pretty - white sand, calm water, and hardly any people. In the summer, this would rival the Gulf Coast! I waded in the water, walked along the shore, and took some pictures with my Nikon FG20 inherited from my dad. As I walked through the sand, it squeaked! I remembered that the dunes were “singing sand dunes.” Sweet! I headed back to my car and headed back to Holland.

On my way into Holland, i had seen a couple of guys selling BBQ Chicken next to a gas station. They had a couple of large, barrel grills set up next to a wooden shack. Hungry, I decided to give it a whirl. I bought a bottle of Faygo “Rock & Rye” pop at the gas station and headed over to the BBQ shack. I bought a quarter chicken dinner and talked to the owner. He says he was selling Texas style BBQ chicken. I asked him what kind of wood he used and he says he uses mesquite and brings up bundles of the wood from Texas every year. With my food, I headed to a park in Holland I had passed back in Holland. I sat at a picnic table overlooking Lake Macatawa and ate. The chicken was pretty good, but what caught my attention was the sauce. It was almost like sweet and sour sauce and was very tangy. It was different, but good. The chicken hadn’t acquired much smoke flavor, but it was good. With mesquite, I don’t think you want too much of the smoke, since it tends to turn acrid. I then headed home on a full stomach.

On my way home, I was listening to Sufjan Steven’s Michigan album. I heard these lyrics:
I always knew you
In your mothers arms
I have called your name
I have an idea
Placed in your mind
To be a better man
Ive made a crown for you
Put it in your room
And when the bride groom comes
There will be noise
There will be glad
And a perfect bed

I thought about the recent passing of Dave Cho, a pastor at my “old” church and the recent illness of my grandfather. I also thought about how anxious I am to see my wife and move into our new house. I thought about how exciting it will be to finally see Jesus! I thought about our current situation as humans on earth, and how everyone (including God) is anxiously awaiting the day when we finally meet God and how much rejoicing there will be. I thought about how excited I used to get at concerts, finally seeing great artists in person and the feeling I would get of pure joy and excitement. I thought about all the weekends when I see Julie at the airport after being gone for a week and how absolutely wonderful it is to see her after being so long apart. I thought about our engagement and the excitement I had about being married and sharing a home together. I really hadn’t thought about God that way in a long time. It really will be more amazing than all of those experiences combined. I’m so excited! It’ll be the greatest homecoming ever! It’s going to be flippin’ sweet!

Traveling in Style

Ohhhhh yeah!

I just boarded the Michigan Flyer bus, a shuttle service running from East Lansing to the Detroit airport. Somehow, they’ve managed to offer free wireless internet on a moving bus. I think it must be a satellite uplink or that Verizon data service. Either way, it’s awesome! They also have outlets in every other row to plug your laptop into. It’s $25 each way, and it’s a bit more costly than driving yourself, but I’d much rather sit and veg on my laptop rather than fight Detroit construction and traffic and then pay $8/day for parking. The seats even lean back!

I’m headed to the airport to fly back to Virginia for the weekend. I’ll help get some packing done and spend some quality time with Julie. She took a group of choir students on a field trip to King’s Dominion, so I’m sure she’ll be exhausted today.

A week from Monday we close on the house! I’ll move the air mattress that I’m sleeping on and my suitcases over to the house that day. Then, a week later, I’m flying to Virginia, grabbing a Uhaul, and trucking our junk up to Lansing!

Eurotrip

I decided to post my daily journal entries from my trip to Europe on the dates they were actually recorded. So, here is a list of entries that will be updated as I add entries and pictures:

• March 31st - Munich and Bavaria
• April 1st - Die Koenigsschloesser

Eurotrip, April 1st: Die Königsschlösser

We awoke from a deep sleep at 7am. The view from our window was great, as it opened up to the Alps and the quiet city of Füβen. The Röcks served us a great breakfast of bread, meat, cheese, and soft boiled eggs. The bread included hard kaiser rolls and hearty, brown bread, almost like rye, only not as rye-ey. The meat was sliced salami and ham. We ate in a small alcove, seated in a booth around a round table. Leading right up to the table was a door to the kitchen, and every so often, Mrs. Röck would peek in and ask how we were doing. She told us about her relatives (cousins?) who work at a famous hotel in Munich, “a very well know hotel”.

We left the Röcks and headed for the train station where we stored our bags in a locker. From there, we hiked to the King’s palaces, Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau. The town of Füβen and the castles looked like they were right next to eachother on the map, but it was a good 2 mile hike. We finally reached the ticket office and got our “Königstickets.”

In 1999, I had visited only Neuschwanstein. This time, we were able to see both castles. It was definitely worth it. Hohenschwangau was very pretty and we had a good tour guide. There were many murals on the walls of battles, feasting, and the legend of the swan knight, who searched for the holy grail. Richard Wagner later wrote an opera, Lohengrin based on the story. In fact, Wagner hung out with the royal family, but left when he got sick of King Ludwig always asking him to play his operas on the piano. Hohenschwangau was built on the ruins of a ruined knights’ castle, so homage to the knights was the theme of the castle.

After the Hohenschwangau tour, we hiked up the hill to Neuschwanstein. We grabbed some bratwursts, ate, and walked to the Marienbrücke (Mary’s bridge). This bridge spans a gorge with a waterfall and overlooks Neuschwanstein. It was a nice view, but at the price of standing at precarious heights. We toured the castle. Some things I remembered from my ‘99 trip, but I saw some “new” things like the amazing throne room. It was all marble with brass chandeliers, studded with gem stones. Too bad photos weren’t allowed. Over all, the tour of Neuschwanstein wasn’t as good as Hohenschwangau, but still interesting.

After seeing the castles, we took a bus back to the train station in Füβen and took a faster regional train back to Munich. From Munich we took another regional train to Salzburg. On this train ride I called up a B & B (Zimmer) just outside of Salzburg. I used my German SIM card in my cell phone. Just as I was confirming my name with the owner, the card ran out of minutes. I found that there is no way to add more minutes, except by buying a “refill” card at a shop and type the number from the card into a 1-800 service. You’d think in 2007 they’d be able to take a credit card order over the phone! We traveled to Salzburg unsure of our hotel accommodations. We arrived at the train station in Salzburg at 8:00pm and went out to the bus terminal. I quickly bought a ticket because our bus, #1, was about to leave. We hopped on the bus, punched our Einzelkarten (single fare tickets), and the bus was off. Our original plan was to get off at Makartplatz and connect to bus #27 to Moosstrasse, a suburban area southwest of the city center. However, either we missed the stop or had taken the wrong bus, because after several minutes, the bus came to a complete stop in a suburban neighborhood far from where we wanted to be. I asked the driver if he was going to Makartplatz. He said, “yes, but I have to wait here for 20 minutes.” So wait we did, with no practical way to call our hotel. The bus resumed its route and we connected with bus 21 and down the Moosstrasse. I was confused as to which stop to get off at, since the computerized stop announcements (”nächste hält, ____” - (next stop, ___) were out of sync with where we actually were. So, I asked a guy and he told me when we had reached the Gsengerweg stop.

We looked around for 69-A Moosstrasse. To our aggravation, we saw house #69, then #11, #12… It was wonderful how they seemed to pick random house numbers on this street. We went back to #69. A sign on the doors said, “go around back for the inn.” Eventually, we found a house labelled 69-A, nowhere near Moosstrasse. A light was on behind a curtain in what I guess was the living room, so we rang the doorbell…and nobody answered. Now what?!

We knew the street we were on was dotted with B&B-style hotels, so we went across the street #96 Moosstrasse to Pension Frauenschuh (a Pension is a like a hotel where the family lives on the premises. Frauenschuh = lady’s shoe or slipper). Julie thought she had seen this hotel in the guide book and that it was good and cheap. As we approached the hotel, we saw a man getting ready to leave. I hailed him with a “guten Abend!” and he waved and walked back into the lobby. We met him at the front desk. I asked to reserve a double room. I used my German, but when I didn’t understand his responses, I gave up in tired exasperation and asked if he spoke English. We finished the reservation in English, although I think he thought I was mad at him and was a little brusque. I never asked how much the room would cost, but when we entered our room, I started to worry. Everything was brand-new and clean, the room had a TV (not common), and the hotel featured a sauna. We slept soundly. We had made it to Salzburg!

Eurotrip, March 31st: Munich and Bavaria

A few months ago, back in November, we had been watching alot of Globe Trekker, an off-the-beaten-path travel show geared towards backpackers. Julie and I decided we should visit Europe. We found tickets on kayak.com for only $375 round-trip to Munich during Julie’s spring break in April. So we bought the tickets and a Rick Steves guide to Germany and Austria. For many days I planned our trip, from train schedule to sights to hotels. Rick suggested that reservations for hotels and trains aren’t really necessary in advance, so I took a leap of faith and refrained from booking our entire vacation online.

Friday the 30th finally came. I got home from work early and Julie got home at her normal time at 3:30. Our taxi arrived at 3:45 and we were off to Dulles airport. We waited in line for an hour to get our tickets at the full service counter, even though we only had carry-on baggage. We had managed to pack a week’s worth into these small bags — very tightly packed!

We boarded the 767 just in time, despite getting there 2 hours ahead of time. They served us dinner as we cruised over the East Coast and we watched Casino Royale on our tiny LCD TV’s. Our flight left at 6:30pm and was scheduled to arrive in Zurich, Switzerland at 8:15am CET, so I had figured that we could get plenty of sleep on the plane and be ready for our first day in Germany. We tried to sleep the remaining 5 hours of our flight, however, a giggling teenager, a crying baby, and uncomfortable seats conspired against us. We landed in Zurich, and to our surprise, did not have to go through customs or passport control. The airport was very clean, modern, and quiet. However, the customer service reps in Virginia couldn’t give us our tickets for our flight to Munich. We had ordered the tickets through Orbitz and it scheduled us on a United flight to Zurich and a Lufthansa flight to Munich. Even though they’re part of the “Star Alliance”, they couldn’t print tickets for us. So, we had to wait in line to get our tickets in Zurich. Luckily, our flight to Munich was delayed, so I bought some Swiss franks and I bought a couple of boxes of swiss chocolates. My first trial in speaking German was when I told the woman at the currency exchange booth, “ich moechte Euros kaufen” (I’d like to buy Euros). She rattled off something, and I said “sprechen Sie Englisch?” She told me I’d have to buy franks and then use those franks to buy Euros. I forgot that Switzerland isn’t on the Euro! Later, when we boarded our plane, I totally understood the ticket desk worker when she asked, “are those carry-on bags?” One for one, not bad! On our flight to Munich, the stewardess served us little sugar-coated waffles. Yum!

From the airport in Munich, we hopped on the S-Bahn (tram/subway) toward Marienplatz, the city center. I bought a Schoenes Wochenende ticket, which, for 33 Euros, covered our S-Bahn and train travel for the entire day. Normally, you’d pay 17 Euros just for the S-Bahn! Along the way to the city center we picked up some drunk and noisy soccer fans — at 11am. It was funny seeing the German version of young, tough sports fanatics. One of the guys left everyone a present and stank up the car, forcing us to find new seats

We hurried out of the Marienplatz station up to the Glockenspiel (musical clock) at the Neues Rathaus (new town hall). At first, we thought we had missed the show. Then, all of a sudden, the large wooden figurines began to dance as the bells played. The knights jousted and everyone cheered. We tourists oohed and ahhed, while the locals mocked us, sarcastically saying, “ooooh, der Glockenspiel!” Unfortunately, I found out at that moment that my camera was hosed! Somehow, the CCD sees everything with a red tint, so my pictures of the Glockenspiel featured a pink sky and areas of pink blotched on the clock tower. Luckily, we had also brought along Julie’s pocket camera. Not very easy to hold steady and not alot of whiz-bang features, but enough to capture the memories.

We then headed to the Viktualienmarkt (munchie market) for lunch. It wasn’t as cool as I thought it would be, just a bunch of ho-hum cafes in a large warehouse. But we did find Der Pschorr, a beer hall that seemed to be popular with the locals. Julie had Wienerschnitzel and I had Zwiebelrostbraten. The waiter could tell I wasn’t a German speaker, so he spoke in English while I practiced saying things in German.

From the market we headed to the Rezidenz, where the royal Wittelsbachs lived. It was very interesting, but a little too much information, especially considering how tired we were. We were given hand-held “phones” that would tell you about every item in the palace, including what material each chair was made from. The Residenz had some neat areas, like the family portrait gallery, but much of it was in poor condition since it had been bombed in World War 2. We stopped at the supermarket for snacks and water at Marienplatz, then took the S-Bahn to the Hauptbahnhof (main train station). We had coffee at Coffee Fellows and I bought a Vodafon SIM card for my phone so I could make cheap(er) local calls in Europe. Normally, Cingular charges $2/min for any calls made overseas. After drinking my chilled cappuccino and Julie had her tea, we got on our regional train to Füssen, a town near the southern border of Germany at the foot of the Alps. The train ride was quite scenic. We passed numerous farms and villages. I think they mostly grow wheat and hay in the area. A lot of green, grassy fields. After 2 hours of slow riding, came to Füssen. The previous day, back in Virginia, I had made reservations by phone with the Roecks, an elderly couple who rent out rooms in their apartment. Just as Rick Steves’ guidebook said, they were very sweet. Mrs. Roeck kept commenting how tall we were (”du bist so gross!”). They really appreciated that I could speak some German. Our room had two twin beds combined to make a “queen” bed. The bathroom had a sloped ceiling that went well below my neckline. While standing at the sink, I had to stick my head in the skylight and while showering… well, I had to do some crouching. We crashed at 10:00pm. We were beat!

Neat Traffic Tool

Those of you in the DC area know that our fair metropolitan area is ranked #3 in the nation for worst traffic congestion.

Today I found a nice web site: TrafficCast’s Driving Directions. It takes into account typical slowdowns at certain times of the day.

Tonight, Julie and I are seeing Mahler’s Symphony of a Thousand at the Kennedy Center (scored some free tickets!). So, I put in my address, the KC’s address, and set it for 5:00. If I take their preferred route (267 to I-495 N to the George Washington Parkway) it should take 45 minutes. It even calculates what your speed will be on each segment. For instance, it calculates my average speed on 267 will be 32mph (probably because it thinks I’ll have to stop at the toll booth) and my average speed on the GW Parkway will be 39mph.

Back When Goin’ Way Out West Meant Going to Kayntuck

Right now I’m waiting for Julie’s flight back from Hawaii to get closer so I can leave to pick her up from Dulles International Airport. She’s travelling at 518mph at 25,000ft over Indiana and her flight is running 7 minutes early. Gotta love Apple’s flight tracking widget! After that, I’ll be picking up my old roommate, Goose, from Reagan National Airport.

Our trip to Illinois was good…

Buford Pusser

Well I’ll be!

I just got back from Illinois/Tennessee. What a trip!

I’ll tell you more about it later, but I just found something interesting…