The flights

The flight to NYC was uneventful. The time difference and staying up made things kind of weird. I had about 4 hours to kill, so I wandered around looking for juice for my laptop. There weren't many places to go, but I finally managed to sit at a table for 5 in a Sam Adams shop with a reach to an outlet. I had 3 big beers and a bread bowl of chowder. I was wishing that the bread was better and sourer. I was bored and I couldn't get the internet to work, so I played Diablo for much of that time. I took the best guy that either I or anyone else had saved and went into the dungeon. It was cool going toe to toe with the Butcher. I was just a bit faster, but he hit me a few times. I made it down to level 5 or so and picked up some nifty items.

The NYC-BRU flight wasn't fun. I got on with the three Sam Adams in the system, hoping it would help. I was able to get my own set of seats, but it was incredibly uncomfortable, even with two pillows and a blanket. I actually did fall asleep for a little bit, but when I woke up, we were still on the tarmac! We waited for an extra hour. Bleh. Comfort was really really hard to find, and then there was a 4 year old behind me kicking the chair. I read Harry Potter and it took me a looong time to fall asleep, but they were kind enough to wake me for breakfast. The sun was up and Belgium was sunny and cold looking, but not like there was frost.

Once on the ground, the gate was at the far end of the terminal. Seriously long. I think it was about 1/2 mile to get to the customs desk. The girl behind the counter asked where I was from, and when I said Seattle, that wasn't good enough. She wanted to hear where I was connecting from. Feh. Then I grab my bags and head through the customs checkpoint. It was super weird. They make you walk through this snake sort of thing, and around one corner was a gang of customs agents chatting about last night's drinking or something. The thing to do, because I just did it, was to walk straight through. They looked at me, but didn't break their conversation.

Next comes the rental counter and getting a car. I was lucky enough to score a Jetta, which seems pretty big compared to lots of others in the garage.

So I hit the roads in Europe! This was before having a car, any euro money, and no real way of communicating with someone via phone or internet. I was bummed to find that my phone didn't work, by the way.