Tagged: americanabroad

Tomorrow I am working half a day and then taking a flight to Charles de Gaulle airport for an off-site meeting Tuesday and Wednesday in Paris. We arrive around 6 p.m. in the evening on Monday and will also hopefully have some time Tuesday evening to do some sightseeing or enjoy the city. I’ve been to Paris, once, with my family when I was 15. We didn’t have the best experience while traveling there because someone tried to steal my mom’s purse as we were boarding the Metro with all our suitcases, and also because on the train (and I...

No one has said “Top of the mornin’ to ye” but Karin’s been called a wee lassie at least twice. We’re in Tobermory and tomorrow is our last day in Scotland. We took the bus from Inverness on Tuesday all the way to the west coast and the lovely little seaside town of Oban, where I have officially left my heart. Hot and sunshiney, with the glare off the water rolling in swirly psychedelics, we dumped our suitcases at the hostel and got immediately on a boat. Out to the seal colony we went, and saw seals, which, if you...

The purple of the heather on the moors as we passed through the Highland mountains was breathtaking. It wasn’t a soft, muted lavender at all; on the contrary, the purples of Scotland are royal and insistent. The heather, the thistles, the big pom-poms of clover, foxglove and the invasive purple marshflowers I’ve seen everywhere near water. The hills are all rolly here, green and purple and plump. I could be quite content, happy to listen all day long to the Scots talk around me in their plummy rolly accents (just like their hills). I have no idea if the mountains...

The evening sun is shining over Arthur’s Seat and Anders and the kids have set out to climb it while the sun is still up, so I’m grabbing the opportunity to post an entry at the internet café around the corner from our lodgings. We’re staying in a sterile dormitory apartment that is quite roomy for the 4 of us as it has a long corridor with 4 separate dorm rooms opening off it, a kitchen, and a bathroom. No other amenities, really, it’s barebones for students here. The hostel we stayed at the first night in Glasgow was much...

May the best ye hae ivver seen be the warst ye’ll ivver see. May the moose* ne’er lea’ yer girnal wi a tear-drap in its ee. May ye aye keep hail an hertie till ye’r auld eneuch tae dee. May ye aye juist be sae happie as A wuss ye aye tae be. May the best you have ever seen be the worst you will ever see. May the moose* never leave your grain store with a tear drop in its eye. May you always stay hale and hearty until you are old enough to die. May you still be...