July 4, 2008

Happy birthday, Old Daughter

She turned 14 six minutes ago. She starts high school in a month. It really wasn’t that long ago that she was spitting up on my shirts and waddling around the house pointing at everything and saying, “Dat?” And woe be to you if you didn’t answer her, and even more woe came to you if you gave her a bullshit answer. “No. Not dat. (Pointing at same thing.) Dat!”

She’s now a beautiful young woman. She still doesn’t accept bullshit. Reasons enough to love her.

June 28, 2008

Missed opportunity

AALBORG, Denmark — Sometimes, I confess, I spit in the face of my good fortune. I’ve spent a good chunk of this week bitching about my all-expenses-paid trip to Europe. Flight was too long, weather mostly sucked, it was daylight all night, couldn’t sleep, did pretty much nothing but work the whole week, everything over here is expensive, didn’t take time out to explore and enjoy myself.

And all of that was true. But none of that eliminates the complete unacceptability (wow, that’s some bad grammar; trying too hard to communicate in a second language has apparently cost me my first) of my complaints.

I did get to relax at the homes of two of my Danish co-workers this week, which allowed me a very accurate glimpse into another country’s culture, a glimpse you can’t get from tourist hot spots. I did get a lot of work done, and I made some important connections that will serve me very well in the near future.

Yes, the $16 Burger King Value Meal was a little hard to swallow. (Burger King? Yeah, it was the only place open when I was finally ready for dinner at 9:30 p.m.) Yes, it was colder than I was expecting. Yes, I’ll concede, the time was productive and reasonably well-spent.

But I wanna go home. I’m headed that way today. I’ll feel better when I’m there.

June 22, 2008

Time in a bottle (stuffed in a corner of the suitcase)

AALBORG, Denmark — It’s broad daylight at 10:47 p.m. My body is still on U.S. Pacific time. Take the “under” on number of hours I’m going to sleep tonight.

June 21, 2008

Ominous beginnings

You might remember the last time I went to Denmark, in which a simple trans-Atlantic trip turned into an intercontinental adventure. I’m supposed to be on my way back to my company’s home offices as I write this. The airline raced against a Florida thunderstorm to get the plane boarded. The storm won. As soon as the last person boarded the plane, we were told to go ahead and unboard (which, in retrospect, beats the hell out of sitting on the plane watching it rain for two hours.) Un-boarding the plane was a wise decision; from my seat at the gate, I can no longer see the 737 I was on through the rainfall.

As is my wont, I scheduled a long-ish layover in Newark between this flight and my international flight. Scheduled layover was 3 hours, 44 minutes. It’s counting down now.

June 18, 2008

Life’s little triumphs

I almost quit my job and almost got arrested by U.S. Customs in the same 24-hour period. Thankfully for me, I did neither. Being an asshole is apparently neither a violation of company policy nor Federal law. And knowing when to shut the f— up has proven once again to be the greatest skill I possess.

June 18, 2008

Love/hate relationships

PORTLAND, Ore. — Tonight’s Song Stuck in My Head While Fighting A Losing Battle Against Likely Terminal Insomnia:

Well, it’s true, I love the money

And I love my brand-new car

I like drinking the best of whisky

And playing in a honkytonk bar

Not sure why. Better than some of the alternatives, certainly.

June 12, 2008

Week 16

WINNIPEG, Manitoba — I’ve had me just about all the Canada I can handle. One more day here in le nord grand blanc, or however they say it in Québec, and I can drag my worn-out ass home for a few precious days.

It’s been a bit of a rough week back home, from what I hear. The Young Daughter is not a happy little girl right. Quite frankly, she’s pissed, and she doesn’t give a flying shit what you think about it.

You know what? I am, too. I’m right there with her. This is no way to be 7.

The reality of the situation has started to set in a bit for all of us over the last few days, I think. We all deal with it in the ways that we can.

The Wife takes action. She spoke Wednesday at a luncheon for a local community organization that supports families who need help, families like, well, ours. She told me it was not easy. I know it was just about the hardest damn thing she’s ever done. This, of course, on the heels of having to explain to The Young Daughter that, just because she’s pissed and scared, that doesn’t mean she’s allowed to be mean, which, of course, was just about the hardest damn thing she’s ever done.

The Old Daughter writes, and we publish it without her knowledge. From earlier this week:

Dragging my five foot three frame through

What seems like miles of rickety plastic tunnels

May be hard, but the four-year-old in front of me

Had a spinal tap not four hours before.

Yet she turns around and grins infectiously

Her tiny nose crinkling and a bubbly laugh spilling over.

I got a crash course on how to be a mommy cat,

A mermaid, a baby cat, and a human mommy, too.

The tiny green globes ten feet up turn into ships

The brightly colored triangular steps morph into beds

And the slide is a death trap, to be avoided at all costs.

Wisps of black hair shift position as a hollow thump

Tells me that her head has connected with the ceiling.

She just laughs, calls, “Come on, come on!”, motions me onward

And I slither through more tunnels designed for toddlers.

Yes, it’s uncomfortable, but I’m laughing in spite of myself.

The Boy tries his best to be the 9-year-old man of the house. He wants to help. He doesn’t know how. It makes him angry sometimes, too. I can hear it when he talks, can see it in how he interacts when things get touchy around the house. He tries to be the peacemaker. He tries to be the good guy. Sometimes he fails, and gets caught up in it all. What the hell. He’s 9. He’s allowed.

Me? I go to Canada. Because people are paying me to be here, and fairly handsomely. If I’m here, people will pay our doctors. I hate it. I hate it with every goddamn fiber of my being. I’m fairly certain I’m going to start screaming at people myself at some point soon. Because I don’t really know what’s going on. All of the above? Guesses, based on what I hear on the phone, what I read from IMs from The Wife, what pops up in the RSS feed from the web site that the Old Daughter posts to. I don’t know what’s going on, and from north of the 49th parallel, there’s not a goddamn thing I can do about it.

June 9, 2008

Random stray thought

WINNIPEG, Manitoba — I’ve wasted an enormous amount of time today. And I don’t feel the least bit bad about it.

June 7, 2008

Catching up

CHICOUTIMI, Québec — No, I didn’t get trapped in Winnipeg. I’m fine. It’s just been a bit of a wild ride the last couple of weeks. I had a few very nice days at home, and now I’m back in le nord grand blanc. I have some atypical weekend work to do here in Québec, and then I’m off from here tomorrow to the Canadian Midwest for another week. It’s all part of an effort to gain Exalted Titanium frequent-flyer status on Air Canada.

And thus begins Summer 2008. It is indeed shaping up to be an interesting one. We’ll decide in a few weeks whether that is a good thing.

May 28, 2008

The other Canada

WINNIPEG, Manitoba — Imagine my surprise to discover that Canada has a Midwest. I’m in the Canadian equivalent of Omaha.