My Bags are Packed

In just a matter of hours I will be off on a 2-week trip that will take me to London, Brussels, and Chicago. What fun. I have packed and re-packed my luggage, adding things and taking out other things, trying to eliminate what I might need but keep what I will need. It's a balancing act. I read this morning that President Obama and the G-20 will be in London the same time I will, and that there are protests of one kind or another planned for different parts of the city. That should be fun, too, and I am hopeful to see a bit of what's going on. I am not looking forward to the flights first to Dallas and then to Heathrow, for they are both long and dull. Worse, I will be traveling with a nagging head-cold, though I have assembled quite an array of medicines and narcotics to make the trip bearable.

Brussels worries me a bit because the few Dutch phrases I've assembled over the last couple of weeks are meager, my pronunciation of them terrible. If I can make these phrases, along with the little French I know, work until I can ask my hosts to move to English, I will be glad. If not the Ugly American, I am perhaps the epitome of the ignorant one at least as far as languages go. But, Belgium will be an adventure, something quite different. And since the trip will be short, I will look into checking most of my luggage at a train station for a couple of nights just to keep from hauling stuff around. Being lost in Brussels does not bother me, but the prospect of being lost while carrying a duffle bag does.

If I am able, I will post updates here.