Well, today it was a wild day / As crazy as they come / From Zurich by bus to Frankfurt / And then on to Reyjavik /
Let’s see, how did it all begin; it was a simple Sunday / I woke up late, lunched and read / Worked on QI, played some hoops / After that, back to Culmann, worked some more / Simon was making fondue and hired me for the HB to go / To buy some bread /
Then we dined on rich cheese / Clotted in tangles around cubes of bread / After dinner Janna’s man from the States showed up, a mathematical man / But I couldn’t talk for I had to clean / Simmered in my inability to avoid the taking / Of tasks the Swiss think need doing /
Then I crushed some yokels at foosball / And went upstairs to clean the bathroom, sad saga / But then I was borrowing a suitcase from Clarissa / (Couldn’t get mine back from Ruth) / And I was out on the road / The air was clear and fresh /
Finally I was on the bus / Met a couple playing chess on the tray tables / Read my RandAlg for a tad then joined them in conversation / They got off in Freiburg some 1.5 hours hence /
I calculated I had to sleep on the plane to avoid jet lag / Kept up on the bus reading On the Road and giggling / drawing the attention of some lovely old ladies across from me / And the border guards /
Finally slept for a couple of hours / Missed the alarm I set but thankfully the commotion woke me at the airport stop / It was 6am in Frankfurt /
I had 5 hours to kill / Hit a cute grocery in the terminal / Everything was Germany-cheap / Got a banana and a yogurt for total 50 Euro cents / A hot coffee for E1 and a couple Ritter bars for the folks /
Then I made it to Terminal 2 / Chilled a couple hours in Mickey-D’s / With an egg and bacon McMuffin / And my banana and yogurt /
Finally, got past security trivially / Tho’ my too too honest self lost my toothpaste at the portal /
Settled down with randAlg in the soul-crushing blandness of the beyond / Markov chains and mixing times made up for the acres of tile and black leather / There was also a smoking lounge “A story in every Camel” /
I got myself a Zimt Wuffi / just as I had arriving in Frankfurt the first time / A light sweet cinnamon pastry tasting of hope /
Found the gate, boarded / Finished my chapter of On the Road and crashed / 4 hours to Reyjavik / Woke up in time to see the frozen country / Brutal and alien, but bright and beautiful from above /
We were late to Reyjavik, a frantic rush ensued / Got into the line for LAX without a second for food / Met some contract nurses on vacation / Their lives sounded pretty neat / Stresses of contract work to be sure / But they could live and learn most anywhere in the US /
Swapped my aisle for its adjoint in the middle / Space to spare / Slept, then read / Slept, then read / Ate my salty peanuts and salami / Drank down my last swaller of good European Wasser /
Wrote this log listening to some soft sweet music / I’d heard traveling to Whitman two summers ago / On the road /