Author: Andy Smallman

So Melinda’s and my niece Stephanie turns 30 today. That’s the oldest she’s been yet (look it up!) and 10 years since her age ended in a zero (do the math!).

Oh, regarding the blog post title, the Roman Numeral for 30 is XXX which would suggest this age is for mature audiences only (as would my blog post title – we’ll see if it drives more traffic to my blog). Good thing you’re 30, Steph.

Okay, in honor of Stephanie’s birthday, while wandering around Amsterdam today I looked for things that made me think of her. Those that lent themselves to photographs, I snapped with my cellphone camera. I had some simple rules for this. One, all pictures had to be taken today. Two, I had to take them myself.

This was quite a fun thing to do. It was a gray, rainy day, unfortunately, so Melinda, Christine, Bernard and I scrapped our plans to rent a paddle boat in order to look at the city from the water. Being on foot likely helped me with getting these photos. For instance, could I find something like the place below while on the water??

Before presenting the next photos, I need to provide some additional context. Most of my blog readers know that my immediate family (Melinda, Chloe, Ella and me) lived in Nantes, France for 13 months beginning in July, 2010. That’s what got me started blogging, in fact! Every day for those 13 months I wrote a post related to what we did that day. You can find that blog here.

Anyway, in November that year, my parents came to visit. We had a great time showing them around town, including visiting a variety of restaurants. One day, I got creative snapping a picture of my mom outside a restaurant called “Le Caribou.”

As you can see if you look at my blog post that day, I snapped the picture in a way that blocked out the o and u in caribou. Then I wrote a silly story designed to entertain her grandkids. It did. Stephanie still talks about this one (and another called “Frozen Granny”).

The whole point in telling you all of this is because I spotted a restaurant in Amsterdam that made me think of the restaurant in Nantes, the day I took my mom’s picture, and Stephanie’s appreciation of it. I did my best to replicate the Nantes photo as a selfie.

To wrap things up, you should familiarize yourself with Stephanie’s and my mutual interest in the number 143. Do so here. Having done that, you should appreciate this photo below, dedicated to my appreciation for Stephanie, especially so on her triple X birthday.

On the subject of 143, Stephanie’s roommate Mina is going to help me reintroduce this project I started two summers ago. Look for some new poems once I’m back and feel free to send me your submissions!

First, Stephanie, I’ll have something for you later for your 30th birthday. For now, something more important. Beer!

Click on the photos to enlarge them.

Gesundheit?

No, I did not sneeze, silly. Sarphatipark is the name of the park I ran in (and around and around) this morning for 30 minutes. You can, and should, learn more on Wikipedia. Below is what the park looks like from the perspective of a satellite (I assume you can locate the expanse of green space). Oh, the shaded blue area to the right is where our apartment is located.

So, yes, it was easy to get there this morning. It was a fun place to run, too, in that the trail weaves in and around a pond and a beautiful fountain. There are multiple benches and, as you can see in the image above, lots of green space. There is a workout area that has permanent installations of equipment for doing exercises like pull-ups and push-ups, among others. I was in the company of a lot of other health-minded people, the kind of thing that keeps a person incentivized.

Speaking of images, if Google Translator is to be believed, the expression in the photo to the left says, “Our Sarphatipark is a public park.” My experience bears this out.

I liked the park so much I went back and ate a picnic lunch there while Melinda and Christine went shopping.

Melinda, Christine and I flew from Nantes to Amsterdam this afternoon and are getting settled in our apartment (another glorious AirBnB discovered by Melinda). More updates to come.

It’s our last night in Nantes (the post title may have tipped you off). We leave tomorrow morning for Amsterdam where we will be staying for three nights. Christine is accompanying us and then Bernard will join us on Friday night, meaning we are getting a little bonus time with our friends!

So you know how I said in today’s earlier post how I had no luck getting a souvenir from the construction work taking place along Line 2? Well, Bernard, being the good city host and ambassador that he is, took one look at that post and said, “Let’s go.” The following photos document what happened next.

I took another long walk in Nantes today, providing me the opportunity to document my day through a series of self-portraits. Put aside the obvious narcissism this entails and join me…