Days 1 and 2: Geneva

There's something strangely familiar about Geneva. Maybe it's because it's a city on a lake, with a river winding through it. Maybe it's the Starbucks, the crepes, and the designer labels—not too far off what you find in any other European city. But I feel like I've been here before.

Geneva feels like France, but slightly off-kilter and prettier. Even the accents are a bit different. I think it's surprisingly like Chicago.

I had to snap the postcard view, and I'll probably take more pictures of it tomorrow. The sunset was very pretty tonight. The famous Geneva water spout didn't show up on my camera because it was so close in color and texture to the clouds, but I saw a rainbow on Lake Geneva as we descended in the plane.

Lots of swans glide around Lake Geneva. There were at least eight or nine preening themselves (basically, scratching their butts with their long necks). That posture wasn't befitting a swan, so here's a picture that is. Also, I like the creative way the Swiss tell you not to feed the swans.

 Kingsley invaded the postcard...

Since we're staying at the Holiday Inn tonight we wandered into two swanky hotels to people-watch. I ordered consomme at one and it was delicious. This flower arrangement is at the Four Seasons; I thought the textures were really cool. Evidently Geneva is one of the most expensive cities in Europe as far as hotels go; that's why we're going to be staying outside of the city tomorrow night.

-- Diana

Buffy's On A Plane!!

The prospect of putting a dog a plane is an scary one. There are many stories online of dogs getting sick, traumatized and even dying on plane flights. So, when we decided to fly to Seattle from Chicago with Buffy, it was an intimidating idea.

K, IM ALL PACKD AN READY 2 GO!!!!

When you take dogs on planes there are two choices: checking the dog right under the cockpit in a temperature controlled but checked luggage situation or taking the dog on board as a carry-on bag and stick the dog under the seat in front of you  Almost all of the really scary “dog dying on the plane stories” are a result of checking the dog under the cockpit, so we felt a little better knowing that Buffy would be on board with us.

OMG!!! SECURITY IZ REDIKULUS!!!!  GRRR. . .

The weight limit for dogs on plane is usually about 20 pounds but the thing is about Buffy is that even though she is only 12 pounds she is a tall dog for her weight. It was tough to find a carrier tall enough for her to sit, stand, and lie down comfortably. What we found to help accommodate this is the Sturdibag brand dog carriers.

We got the large size and it was the perfect size for Buffy. Flexible rods in the bag could easily be bent so the bag could be put into a smaller space—in this case, the low height of the seat in front. The bag has great ventilation, easy–to-carry shoulder straps, and a really cute hole on the top that Buffy could stick her head out of to see what was going on. Also, Buffy amazingly figured out how to climb out of the bag out of that hole, to our surprise.

I'S ON PLANE!!!!

The thing is that even after doing research, finding the dog areas at each airport, getting Buffy on a schedule that lined up with the plane flights, and thoroughly tiring Buffy out with play dates, I was still nervous about taking Buffy on a plane.

We’ve been through a lot with Buffy and she’s proved herself a resilient, strong and a really “good dog” but it still really worried me what would happen on the plane. I mean what if she needed to go to the bathroom or just started to whine for no reason? What would we do?

SIGH . . . K IM STILL ON PLANE . . .

The thing is that you can’t make decision in life according to worst-case scenarios. Am I never going to drive my car because sometimes people die? No, of course not.

WE LANDD!!! AN I SNUCK OUT OV TEH BAG!!!! HEEHEE

 
So we took a chance got Buffy to the airport, through security, and on the plane. After a temporary escape from the bag, Buffy sat in her bag for three hours and forty minute and didn’t make a sound. She reminded us that she’s a sturdy and even-tempered little trooper.

GIT ME OFF DA PLANE!!!

Yes, it cost an extra $100 to take Buffy onto the plane and the stress of the whole process was indeed palpable but it was definitely worth it to travel as a whole family and watch my mom run around the house in delight playing with my little angel.

I'm On A Boat by The Lonely Island

One of the things I love about my wife Diana is how she has introduced me to new experiences. Often she will suggest that we do activities that I wouldn’t necessarily think of and these experience make up some of my favorite memories. So, when Diana suggested that we go on whale watching, I didn’t think twice about it.

Too bad boat trip ended up being a puke-fest.

One of our best friends got married last weekend in Carmel, California. It’s a small city South of Monterey Bay right next to the legendary Golf Course, Pebble Beach. The wedding was on Friday, so we decided to stay for the whole weekend and spend some quality time by the ocean.

Before we left, Diana and I were in contact with our friend Bonnie, who was also coming to Morgan’s wedding. Bonnie thought up the idea of going whale watching and her and Diana found this company, “Monterey Whale Watching.” The website looked great and there were some good testimonials so we went ahead and got tickets.

On Saturday morning we checked in with Monterey Whale Watching on “Old Fisherman's Wharf” and Bonnie, with her friend Aaron met up with Diana and me. Before we got on the boat, the boat’s naturalist did a little speech to all of the passengers.

The naturalist went over some safety rules on the boat, and explained what to look for to spot a whale. Then she proceeded explain what to do if we got seasick. She explained how if you lost the “good fight” and had to throw up to do it off of the back of the boat, not the sides (because the puke would travel down the side of the boat). She went over the best place to be on the boat to go if you felt seasick and told us if we were feeling seasick, to take deep breaths and keep our eyes on the horizon. In retrospect, it wasn’t a good sign that the naturalist spent more time talking about seasickness then watching whales.

We all piled on to this boat, The Pacific Explorer a 75-foot long and 23-foot wide “wildlife observation vessel.” It had a small cabin in the center bar and space around the outside to walk around.


Diana and I started our boat ride sitting on the side of the boat and as I gazed at the 10 to 20 foot waves, I started to feel queasy. After about ten minutes, we found Bonnie and Aaron who were at the back of the boat leaning on the back railing. As Diana started talking to them, it happened, I made an a-line to the back railing and there went my breakfast.

About five minutes after my first “pukage” Aaron lost it as well, and I saw his Chai-Tea Latte and Cranberry Scone fly out into ocean. The sight of this caused a visceral reaction in my body and I lost whatever was left in my stomach. By this time, both Bonnie and Diana trying to take care of us handing us gobs of paper towels, provided by crew.

In my own haze of seasickness, I began to notice that Aaron and I were not the only people leaning over the back of the boat throwing up. This made me feel a little less embarrassed and not so emasculated. Some people didn’t quite make it over the back so there were puddles of puke around the back area which the shipmates kept cleaning up. Meanwhile people took their turns running to the back of their ship to get better acquainted with the contents of their stomachs.

A little bit more than half of the boat got sick and the various friends and family members approached the crew members about the people who were getting seasick. They did provide paper towels but they didn’t do much else. Diana and Bonnie asked them repeatedly as did many other to turn back early, but they did not. We stayed out for the 2 1/2 hours.

Now I understand that if you have one person sick on a boat ride then it’s not fair to the other paying customers to end the boat ride early. However, if half of your passengers are sick and the other half are not having a good time because there were no whales to be seen (though Bonnie did say she was an otter laughing at the people who were sick) you probably should cut the boat ride short.

As I was leaning against the back rail trying to focus my gaze on the horizon (which didn’t help AT ALL) I was desperately trying to play music in my head to help the time go faster. The only thing I could come up with was marching band music, which didn’t help at all. Later I found out that Aaron had the same idea as I did and had “I’m On A Boat” going on in his head.

We certainly were on a boat and though it wasn’t nearly as glamorous as Andy Samberg described with his “flippy-floppies,” we definitely felt the righteous anger that Samberg inexplicably directs at the good things on the boat. Our anger, however, was focused on this “wildlife observation vessel” that we could not wait to get off of.

Even though the boat ride was one of most miserable experiences of my life, I don’t blame Diana or Bonnie. It’s not their fault. The thing is, I don’t even blame the boat company for the bad weather and the fact that we didn’t see any whales. However, the fact that we didn’t turn around after so many people got seasick . . . yeah, that’s not cool.

I just thank God that I don't have to clean up puke as part of my job.