Mission Accomplished! (But no spoilers)

I succeed in reading all of "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" in a single weekend. I will definitely need to go back and reread at a slower pace to take it all in. But I enjoyed the book and some things definitely didn't play out like I expected but it was good and worth the read. (But if you have any invested in Harry how are you not going to read, regardless of my opinion?)

Friday night at the bookstore was fun - I have never been so excited and/or nervous about buying and reading a book before and I doubt I will ever be again. Gretchen I got outside the Barnes and Noble with our books and read the Table of Contents together, we stood there and excitably named chapter numbers that we thought sounded interesting or exciting or intriguing.

The one funny moment of my reading occurred when I was reading a particularly tense scene yesterday afternoon while sitting in my over sized chair next the front window when the mailman walked by. This blocked all the light from the window and scared me to death, I nearly fell out of the chair.

To not give anything away to those who have not finished, or even started yet, that is all I will say.

Number 104

Tonight I will be at a bookstore at midnight to purchase my copy of "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" and I will be the 104th person to purchase it at the Barnes & Noble of my prior choosing. I have never done a midnight release of any book or movie but this is the one time where it is worth it and I am really excited about it. (How much of a dork am I?)

So at about 1:00 this morning I will hold in my hands the answers to all of my questions. What does "deathly hallows" mean? Will Harry, Ron or Hermonie die? (I really hope no to all 3 of them, and I would really like Ginny to survive so that she and Harry can some day get married.) Who will die? How will Voldemort die? Is Snape good or evil? What about Draco Malfoy? And so many others.

After I purchase it and walk out of the bookstore it is up to me to read all of it. Earlier in the week I had visions of myself starting to read it in the parking lot but then thought "How am I going to drive myself home?" Obviously I can't do that because once I start I don't know that I am going to be able to stop reading. But will I really be awake enough to read when I get home? Hmm...

I have never completed a Harry Potter book in the span of a single weekend but I am going to try - I have very little planned for this weekend on purpose. I started "Half-Blood Prince on a Saturday afternoon and finished Tuesday night but I don't think I tried very hard. And I tend to be one of those people who flip towards the end to get glimpse of what is going to happen, I never flip to the last page but usually somewhere in the range of 2-3 chapters to the end where the climax is likely to occur. Hopefully I will be able to overcome this temptation because I will hate myself if I spoil it.

And it will all begin in just under 6 hours...

5 Most Interesting People

Following the idea of "The Greatest Hits" we starting discussing some other lists of 5 that we could come up and I wrote a number of them on the plane ride home so here is another list. Maybe at some point if I can come up with a list that is just a list rather than a short story with each number I will combine a few but for now here are the 5 most interesting people (or actually 6 most interesting people)...


5 Most Interesting People:
My working definition of "interesting person": someone that stands out in my mind for whatever reason and I have very likely told several people the story involving this person.


Honorable Mention (because I couldn't narrow it down to 5): The Indian businessmen we met on the train from Salzburg to Munich who asked if we were students and thought our accents could be British.

5. The woman in the cafe where we ate breakfast in Paris - I remember her because she is the one nice person we came across in Paris - Suzanne didn't eat anything but got an orange juice which we were not charged for and it was fresh squeezed, the orange peels were still sitting on the bar. Not only do you not come across fresh squeezed in the States, you don't get anything for free.

4. The woman who waited on me at the Beatles Tour Museum in Liverpool - she could identify my accent as being from the Midwest and when I said I was originally from Michigan she started naming the Great Lakes. I didn't ask where she was from but her accent seemed like a combination of American and British, not really one or the other.

3. The woman who was our tour guide for The Sound of Music Tour, Nancy. She was very excited about The Sound of Music - if I did it for a living I know I would get sick and tired of it. And at one point she said she was going to stop talking to help with traffic, I assumed that she was just going to talk the bus driver through the tough spot but she got of the bus and stopped all traffic going the other way.

2. This is the story that has been told the most - we were across the street from the Cathedral of Notre Dame and I bought a crepe from a street vendor and when she handed it to me I said "thank you" the lady behind me in line hit me for saying it in English.

1. And lastly the immigration guy going into England - Angie went thought before me and then I when I stepped up he asked me if we were traveling together and of course I said yes. He then responded with "She is a governess and your an engineer?" with a look that said he didn't really think an engineer and a governess would be traveling together or maybe that we shouldn't be traveling together.

Greatest Hits

One night over dinner, I believe we were in London but I can't be sure now, we were discussing Lost and based on Charlie's list of greatest hits we started listing our "greatest hits" of the trip. So here is my list of greatest hits from the trip...


Top 5 moments (or extended periods of time) of the trip:

1. The Sound of Music Tour - if you are ever in Salzburg I strongly recommend it, not only do you get to see a lot of places in the movie you see quite a bit of Salzburg and the surrounding countryside.


2. The first night we were in London - we didn't have anything planned so it almost felt like extra time and we just wandered around. We walked through St James Park and stopped and watched some birds then we walked over to Buckingham Palace and then went and ate a good dinner (something we should have done more of while traveling).


3. The Cathedral of Notre Dame - I didn't really enjoy Paris but this was my favorite of anything we saw in Paris and my favorite of all the cathedrals or churches that we saw.


4. The first time we stepped out of the subway systems in Paris and London. In Paris the first time we came out of the subway we knew we were at the stop for The Arc de Triomphe but as we came up the escalator it was right there in front of us, it was a great sight. Then in London it was similar, the first time we came out of the subway we were right next to Big Ben. I thought it was pretty remarkable that some of my first glimpse of each of these cities were of things that represent their respective cities.


5. Eating dinner at The Eagle and Child in Oxford - this is one of the places that CS Lewis and Tolkien used to get together and discuss what they were writing. For me it was just neat to reflect on that while eating dinner there. (I guess I will mention that the other two didn't feel well after eating there but I felt fine.)

Back Home!

After 12 days in Europe I returned home yesterday. It is good to be home. It is good to sleep in my own bed and use my own shower. It is good not have to worry about whether or not I will be able to find a bathroom when I need one and what that bathroom will look like, or if I will have to pay for it. It is nice to be able to know where I will eat my next meal and be able to plan for it. I have already had my first Chipotle burrito since arriving in Denver just over 24 hours ago.

But what I don't understand is that after 12 days of missing my own bed and quilt is that once I was in my own bed (and after a 22 hour day so I was plenty tired) I didn't sleep very well. Out of 9 different hotels room and a sleeper train only twice did I wake in Europe and have no idea where I was. Last night at least 3 times I woke up and had to figure out where I was.

So wasn't so fun to go back to work, but let's face it, I have make money to be able to finish paying for it.

Oh, and I haven't said this yet but it was a great trip and I very glad that I went. Details, stories and my favorites of my 400+ photos are in the works.