Hitting the Books

While I am sad to note that the weather has turned slightly cooler and rainier, I'm glad to say that I've taken full advantage of the great indoors and turned my attention fully towards my thesis. I've wrapped up my research and am heading into the writing phase. Things seem to be going well - I have some good theories, strong evidence, and (of course) new research. It has felt good to be productive, even if it means that this is my most frequented environment:



Fortunately, the weather broke last Sunday and provided an environment suitable for the World's Largest Book Market. Albert and I spent 7 hours browsing and still only saw about half the market. Even then, we looked, for the most part, only at English language books, which only about 10% of the books were. Here's a little peak at the market:

The market was part of the programming around Amsterdam being named World Book Capital for 2008. You can read more about both here: http://www.amsterdamworldbookcapital.com/

It looks like I will spend another year here in Amsterdam, which means I am looking for both my dream job and my dream apartment. I have a few leads for each, so I feel very optimistic about my chances at the "dream life" next fall. Plus, for the first time in my adult life I won't be a student, which promises to be a very welcome break. If you have any leads on jobs or apartments in Amsterdam, don't hesitate to let me know!

Summer is Here!

I've had a fun few weeks here in Amsterdam... It's been week after week of holidays and long weekends, complemented by wonderful sunny weather. For the last 10 days it's been 75 and sunny... wow! Great!

Before Queen's Day there was a Ferris Wheel set up on the Nieuwe Markt... but this wasn't just any Ferris Wheel. It was (according to the sign) the world's smallest turning cafe. That's right, you get on, order food or drinks, and enjoy them as you spin around. What a great concept!!
Needless to say, Albert and I jumped on, and I think we stayed on for more than a half hour... good times. Unfortunately we didn't have a camera with us, so here we are in front of it the next day:

Also, I couldn't resist posting another picture from Keukenhof. What a beautiful place!

Then, yesterday was National Windmill Day AND National Cycling Day, so Albert and I went up north to Alkmaar, rented some bikes, and saw a bunch of windmills. The first one we stopped at is still a functioning mill, so we bought some wind-milled pancake mix and ate delicious homemade cake. Yum!
Here's Albert in front of part of the milling contraption:

And me, cycling through a field of flowers:

And, of course, some windmolen. These particular ones were not mills, but instead were used to pump water off the land into the higher dykes. This is how a good portion of the Netherlands was reclaimed from the water.

Then, finally, we finished up our windmill day back in Amsterdam, at Brouwerij 't IJ, our local windmill/brewery. This was exciting enough in itself because the place is always packed with people from the neighborhood - they have a great patio and tasty, cheap beer. However, things got even better when Johnny & the Gangsters of Love pulled in:

They look just like that, and they're a three-man band in '67 Pontiac Bonneville: "the fastest band in the world". I would highly recommend watching their trailer and/or movie on their website... it was just great! They pulled up, parked on the sidewalk, in a minute had their whole stage set up, jumped on the hood, and started to play! The perfect ending to such an exciting day.
(If you want to see more pictures from Windmolen Dag, click here: http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=0BbNnLRwyYsnMw&notag=1)

Keukenhof Visit

Some people commented that my last post had too many words and not enough pictures. For them, this is a post about Keukenhof, which is all in pictures here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/kmferris/KeukenhofHasLotsOfFlowers