a surge of productivity

the first leg of the trip starts in the netherlands. since it is the fastest approaching part of the journey, you would think that it would have been planned first. apparently that's not how i process things. all attempts thus far to plan the netherlands, have been thwarted. i am trying to plan it with my good friend nikki but to no avail. be it a 2 hour skype call to our girls in england or an episode of the bachelor, nikki and i have not been able to get in touch with our organizational functioning. 

my goal this week is to tap into planning mode and create a new and thorough spreadsheet. this shouldn't be too difficult because i am surprisingly organized with this trip. and once i reach into my traveler's brain, i can't stop the productivity that surges from it. that's why i am writing this post at 2am. i came home from a failed planning meeting at nikki's house tonight and dove into the new spreadsheet - detailing the dates, locations, and sleeping arrangements. before i knew it, 3 hours had passed. it felt like maybe 30 minutes. i love the feeling of productivity! it's been so elusive recently. let's hope it sticks around for a few days; after all, i only have 22 days until departure.

29 days and counting

my backpack and i will be boarding a plane to europe in exactly 29 days. woah. im mostly excited with a little bit of anxiety mixed in (but only a little). i have been planning for months without ceasing. thank goodness i havent had a job for those months otherwise i would have been money-ahead, and who needs more money when youre traveling? that being said, it is my hope that i will adequately couple logic and frugality with flexibility and a strong sense of adventure. i believe that these are some important factors in maintaining a functioning budget while on my travels. i think they will also help me gain as much from this amazing experience as possible. i hope that i can come back from the netherlands, england, scotland, spain, france, switzerland, austria, czech republic, germany, and ireland (maybe belgium too); knowing more about how the world outside of the states operates and, more importantly, knowing more about myself.

to do or not to do?

today i was researching tickets for europe and i came across a site that, when i was waiting for results from a search, listed several random things to do while traveling. i thought some of them were funny, some of them were ridiculous, and some of them were attainable. here are some of the options: invent blisterless clogs, stomp grapes, get lost, split your lederhosen, mistakenly use a bidet, drink glowing green liquid, listen to strange music, pretend to understand a language, look up someone's kilt by mistake. i wonder which of these will be fulfilled while on my journey...

batten down the hatches

history was made today. calvin college cancelled classes for the first time since 1978, so the story goes. it was a time of rejoicing in the land of reformers. the reason for this jubilation is the blizzard many are fondly naming "snowpocalypse." i have never witnessed such an insane amount of snowfall! people were stocking up on the necessities in preparation for said snowpocalypse. i heard meijer was chaos. everything became real to me when i got into my 4-wheel drive blazer this morning and easily cut through the snow that threatened to block me in. a few brave souls had paved the way through the deep snow on our street before my blazer and i could have the pleasure of conquering the road on our own. however, i was still quite giddy whenever i got into my car today and went off-roading (which, in this context, means any of the secondary/neighborhood streets). today was the best day of my car's life. unfortunately it was not all just fun and games; there was some work involved with the blizzard if you can believe it... today i spent a decent amount of time snow blowing, shoveling, and rescuing cars that had foolishly driven into snow that was beyond their capabilities. this may sound crazy but i didnt despise doing all of that. i think that what made it ok was the fact that the sun was shining, a rare occurance in the west michigan area. sunshine on my shoulders makes me happy (john denver knows what he's talking about) but the opposite is also true. darkness is not the condition in which i prefer to snow blow. that being said, you can imagine my dismay when i pulled up to my house and realized, with one horrified look at the end of my driveway, that the snow plow had visited. midnight - hard snow, three feet high. such is the life of a michigan resident.

modeling the height of the snow at 2am... it snowed for another 7+ hours

shrine time

remember the late-nineties show "hey arnold!" and how helga had a shrine dedicated to arnold? she even had a decorated football to symbolize her beloved arnold. i am the modern day helga and travel is my arnold. i have successfully created a shrine to my cherished verb: traveling. i revamped one of the walls in my bedroom from this:

to this (this gives a better idea of the size of my memorial):

the framed pictures are of random old people i sneaked up on and photographed in greece two years ago. that sounds creepier than it really was (i hope). they had such character! i really couldnt resist. the maps are of germany, spain, the uk, and the world and then my awesome dad got me some antique maps on canvas. they are very cool. i think that the shrine will continue to grow in the next 44 days whenever i become inspired to sketch something or see an interesting picture. and then, when i come home from my european adventure, the shine wall will no doubt explode with thousands of my artfully taken photos.