pedaling...

so, one nice thing about falling asleep at 4:00 in the afternoon and skipping dinner is that you are starving at breakfast time, so you can have a gigantic one. we went to de bakkerswinkel, again. i had toast with eggs and melted cheese:

and ryan had the same thing, only with bacon and NO KASS!!

also, i had a scone, and let me just tell you: the next picture is literally what i've dreamed about since we came here 18 months ago, and it lived up entirely to my expectations: 

scone. clotted cream. lemon curd. raspberry jam. NOM NOM NOM! 

then we walked to the bike rental shop, passing the condomerie: 

 FYI-- these are for recreational use only, and don't prevent pregnancy or std's. says so right in the window. 

and here's the world's warmest condom:

i have a picture of the world's strongest condom, which was made of chain links, and said that with it, you could protect your knight for the night. but the blog doesn't want to load that one, so you'll have to take my word for it till may. 

this is me on my bike, feeling amazingly competent and thoroughly dutch. Riiiiiight. 

ryan in vondelpark. bikes really are the fastest and easiest way to get around, unless you are like ryan and you are scared that people are going to kill you. they won't kill you, but they will yell at you in dutch if you screw up the traffic pattern. lesson learnt. also, as charming as it sounds to be rolling along the cobblestones, your behind does NOT think it's charming or cute. 

police officer on his motorcycle...

so... i got really mad at ryan because he kept deciding at the last minute to go-- or not go-- or go in another direction-- or in general acted like an american riding a bike in holland. and if you're in front, and your husband says, "let's go this way!" and then doesn't, you might be riding all by yourself for a while. 

also, i spent a month having OCD with the guidebooks and remembering every factoid I could. Ryan flips through them on the plane on the way here. He tells me on the way to get bikes, "Susanne, be really careful; you can get fined 300 euro if you're riding in a pedestrian area, so don't do that. be really careful." 

he knows the consequence, he read that. he just didn't read the actual rules. So I'm yelling at him, "NO! we can't go in that lane! it's one way for bikes! no! Get off and walk it here! NO! it's not your turn!" 

lucky for me, he loves me even when i became a type A super fun lady. besides, that face up there? pretending. 

here's what happened right after the picture!

then we went for a break at a cafe. the dutch love their animals, especially cats. we've seen a few "shop/cafe kitties", who live in the shops, but the one at this cafe, was a big, big fan of ryan: 

this is for jenny, so I hope she reads this blog...

oh, here! see? chain link condom! i am so good at this blog, it's absurd. 

still working on getting last night's dutch food dinner pics from ryan's phone to my computer. harder than it sounds, but dutch food is actually delicious, especially hutspot. 

off to haarlem today!