Pretty full-on weekend. Friday night commenced with furious empty-stomached, post-work drinks, an oft occurring event which, I’ve conclusively found, leaves me dangerously drunk by 9pm. At this moment I know to make a tactical retreat, from then on in I am bordering on no longer responsible for the style, topic and content of my rambling and well, there are plenty of faux pas’ to be made with my assorted $LARGE_CORPORATION colleagues.
This night in particular, I happened to be out with my manager who, after a pint, confessed he had to talk to me about something. We already have a slightly strained relationship since I’ve shared my rather negative perception of working as a vendor for $LARGE_CORPORATION to him, quite clearly, in .. err.. my third week on the job.
It seems some confusion had taken place, I had a case at work regarding someone attempting to access “harassment in the workplace” training. The link I was provided had failed to load in the clients browser, so I had tried in my browser.
As you do.
Only a minute later an email arrived in my inbox.
This is to confirm your registration for Workplace Harassment Prevention.
Oh joy. And my manager’s “little talk” was about my application for this training, which he was asked to approve.
I really am making myself popular.
So anyway, I jetted of to lil’ old England early on Saturday morning. Basiq air.. was just that, and took a miraculous 40 minutes from Schipol to Stansted where my mother was waiting. Had a peculiarly English experience in a pub where I was treated to the drama of a disagreement at the bar. The scene involved the sturdy barwoman, a middled aged “local” in what I’m sure he considered a rather smart and trendy suit, and his younger companion in an Arsenal t-shirt, replete with medical tape across the bridge of his nose, an area from which an angry, red swelling was radiating outwards. It seems someone had been drunk and badly behaved “da’an the road” at another drinking venue and the local himself, or perhaps his friend was being insulted or somehow (mis?)judged by the bar staff. After much blokish strutting, protestation and accusations of “s’not your place to be sayin’ that” the gentle(?)man in question concluded with an “Ah’m sorry, but that’s aaht of order”, theatrically grasped at his car keys, and stormed out, Arsenal supporter in tow.
I also shared the marvel of bad pub food with L.V. although sadly, not for the first time. Of the two veggie meals on the menu I cleverly selected the veggie lasagna. You can rarely mess up veggie lasagna. This left L.V. with “Veg Stroganoff” (at least it wasn’t the ever prevalent mushroon risotto). Interestingly one of our dining companions had selected the Beef Stroganoff and I had assumed these two might be vaguely related.
The beef stroganoff arrived looking unsurisingly brown, stewey, mushroomy and with lumps of meat in it. The Veg stroganoff , however appeared to be a vegetable stir fry without any sauce. There really wasn’t anything very stroganoff about it.
To be fair, they both appeared on a bed of rice. Anyway, obsessive nerd that I am, I checked the ’net and can confirm that vegetable stroganoff, although varying in it’s preparation, usually includes a creamy sauce and plenty of mushrooms. The co-op offer a recipe.
My 24 hours were concluded on Sunday morning’s Red Eye (do I mean that?) back to ‘Dam and our boat on the canal.
After that we found ourselves accidentally at the starting line of a rather huge race. On closer inspection we discovered it was the (heavily Nike sponsored) Dam tot Damloop. This is one of the largest and most popular running events in Amsterdam. Haggard looking joggers follow a 16km course from Dam Square to the centre of Zaandam through the IJ-tunnel. Apparently the race regularly attracts over 20,000 runners from all over the country, including a number of top athletes, and there’s a prize of EUR 11,000 for the first three athletes across the finishing line. B.R. enjoyed the opportunity to continue with his photography, adding to a project about people in motion. We watched several waves of the racers start, charged up by a booming PA playing alternately the Indian Jones soundtrack or cheesy Euro techno (the techno appeared energise the runners more effectively, by my judgements).
Sunday afternoon was spent in true ‘Dam style. We ate a cold lunch whilst sat in a line on the roof of the boat, like birds on a telephone wire, giving critical analysis of the passing vessels and commenting (often cruelly) on the demeanour of the boaters.
I’m back working today (well, I am present at work), and my star caller of the day was one Voltan, of the Budapest office. Voltan came with a perfect Transylvanian accent. A quick glance at his photo on the internal LDAP directory illustrated his pale skin and most remarkable, transfixing green eyes. I’m sure he was a vampire (despite the theory that a vampire has no reflection, and accordingly can’t be photographed) and, although I failed to solve his issues with an IP Phone, I found myself strangely reluctant to end the call.