Dave is going to Dortmund

I will be traveling to Dortmund, Germany for the next two days, spending time with the purchasing department there. Dortmund is a four hour train ride or a two hour drive, so driving sounds like a better idea. Every time I visit Dortmund, I have the same set up. I stay at the Steigenberger Hotel, a hotel I really like. The best part about it, they leave these sheep gummies on your pillow when you arrive, and they are some of the best gummies Germany has to offer. I also usually eat at Mango’s; it’s the only restaurant within walking distance of the hotel. Mango’s is a Mongolian BBQ style restaurant, which is good for me, a non-German speaker, because I know what I am about to eat. They also offer quite an array of meats and vegetables, including Kangaroo and exotic mushrooms.

I wrote the above paragraph before I went to Dortmund. Today, I woke up at 4 am this morning, rode my bike to the train station, and began my trip to Dortmund. I traveled to the boarder of Germany, where I was to change trains. Upon arrival at this train station, I was informed that my connecting train was cancelled, and that taxi’s would be arriving at noon to take me to the next station. I was told this at 8 am, so I waited at an unheated train station four hours for this taxi. The taxi showed up, took me across the boarder to Germany, and dropped me off at an abandoned train station with three other people. We soon discovered that trains no longer run through this station (the plants growing over the tracks were a dead giveaway.) So we waited, until one of the group located a local taxi phone number, called it, and got us a taxi ride to the next station. So I am about a half an hour drive away from Dortmund, so I figure that the train ride can’t be that bad. Two hours later, I pull into the Dortmund train station, the time being 4 pm. That’s right folks, a two hour car ride took me 12 hours to arrive at my destination. It took less time for me to travel from Detroit to Amsterdam than from Breda to Dortmund. I looked some info to compare the trips

-Detroit to Amsterdam My latest flight 7 hours 14 mins

-Breda to Dortmund My latest trip 12 hours, 33 mins

-Distance from Detroit to Amsterdam Like 6000 miles, Google maps wont give me driving directions, so I had to estimate

-Distance from Breda to Dortmund 134 miles

I also have been hearing that people have been having trouble leaving comments on the blog. I think the main reason is that you must have a blogspot account or a google id. I have corrected this, now you can enter a comment without having to create a profile, you don’t even need to do that thing where you have to type the words that appear in the image above anymore. I hope this helps, so let the comments roll. I would like to hear suggestions, criticisms, praise (of course), or just a friendly hello.

I met my landlord this weekend; he is a very nice guy. He works at a Brewery here in the Netherlands, which is one of the coolest places you could work. Plus, he gets a lot of free beer and beer related swag. I work for a company that manufactures mechanical pumps, valves, and seals. I do really like working for this company, but sometimes I wish I worked for a company that made something that I might use. Like my sister-in-law gets a bunch of free and discount clothing from her work, which is a big benefit for her ( and me on Christmas, birthdays, ect). I’m not exactly in the market for a 14,000 gallon per minute slurry seal that is 12 feet tall and weighs more than 10 tons at the moment, so no need for any discount from my company.

Daves Dutch Food Review "Big Americans Pizza"

This here is the ‘BIG AMERICAN” pizza. The sad thing about this is the emphasis on the size of the pizza, with the box and name implying that this is a huge pizza, the type of huge pizza that Americans must eat. Atlas, it’s not very big at all, at least in US pizza standards. There where several topping choices, including Hawaiian, BBQ Chicken (which includes corn and what appears to be oatmeal toppings), American Supreme (big ham circles, corn, zucchini, and onion) and the one I chose, bacon, which is actually ham. I do have to admit, there was a faint hint of freedom in every bite though.

One final note, today I watched our 44^th President, Barack Obama, sworn in today at 6 pm. I watched this from a hotel room in Dortmund, Germany. This was the first inauguration I ever watched, or was the least bit interested in. I found it very interesting, I found Obama’s speech very inspirational, and overall I enjoyed it. Although I will not be in the US for the first two years of his term, I look forward to what he has in store for us and wish him the best.