Networking

Well, the weather has remained beautiful...

At the end of last week I went back to the AWC for the general meeting which was followed by elections. I have been officially voted into office as a member of the board. After a lovely lunch, I spent the afternoon working with the current editor and one of the women who does the layout, after which I took the tram and bus back home.

On Friday Alex was tired so we had a quiet night in. We played darts as Alex now has the dartboad I'd given him for Christmas hung on the garage wall - surrounded by cardboard which he saved from the move as I am historically the *worst* dart player on earth... I actually didn't do too badly! Most of the darts I threw not only hit the board, but I was grouping quite well. Alex, of course, still beat me quite badly - but practice will make me much better over time.

On Saturday I had volunteer duty at the refreshments booth at the American School as the AWC held their Spring Bazaar fundraiser there. I slung hot dogs, chili, nachos and beer! Alex's boss Don was actually the first to tap the keg :) After my shift, Alex and I did a few errands around town and then went for a nice, long bikeride around the town and through some of the dunes. He also found "Ben the Barber" while I was at the school and he now refers to Ben as "my barber" - cute.

Saturday evening was a late, late night for us as we just enjoyed an evening relaxing at home having a nice meal and a few drinks. I had another shift at the Bazaar on Sunday but much later in the day. My presence at the fair resulted in me meeting several more of the AWC members, and me introducing Alex to some of the key players.

I cooked a couple of the meat pies I'd purchased at one of the local shops - yum! We've been trying lots of new things. The local butcher always has some kind of prepared meat dish and we've tried a few. Produce shops have everything - and we had two of the biggest artichokes I'd ever seen on Saturday evening.

Did I mention that your local doctor is literally a block or two away? This is partly because doctors here make housecalls - no kidding. We've registered with the local doctor - but the doctor told me that the Dutch don't see the doctor unless they have a complaint - no annual checkups here.

Today was a very relaxing day for me. I got up and did some light housework and then headed into town to one of my so-far favorite places called Me Gusta for lunch. While I was there two of the AWC members arrived and invited me to join them for lunch - and then to the local garden shop and a tulip farm nearby. I have been buying tulips weekly, but I bought some more today just in time to replace last week's just-wilting bunches.

Flowers, by the way, are the only reasonably priced thing you can buy in this country!!