Joys of Running a B and B

On the heels of reenacting Prison Break-Hungarian style, we welcomed two older couples traveling together. Often, people suggest we write a book about our guest, but in reality, for the most part, it would be deadly dull. The vast majority of our guests are delightful at the time they leave, we are sincerely sorry to see them leave us. This foursome, though nice enough are starting to wear thin. Here is an example of a conversation regarding my computer monitor, but you have to understand my monitor can flip 90 degrees. It can work as a horizontal or vertical display monitor. Since I grade so many papers on the computer, I keep it in the vertical position to decrease the amount of scrolling I have to do. The two husband love to hover over me when I am at the computer, like two children waiting for a cookie. A: "I have never seen a monitor like that before. Have you ever seen a monitor like that before? L: "I have a monitor like that and it does the same thing." A: "That is not what I asked. Have you seen a monitor like that before?" L: "Of course I have. I just told you I have one myself. Of course I have seen one before. I own one. What's the matter with you?" Or another example: A: "We stayed in one of the hotels you recommended in the book for a night when we went to Szentendre. Would like our review?" R: "Yes, I would love to know what your opinion of it was." A: "That is what a review is." This type of back and forth goes on non-stop, but tomorrow it is over. When they came home last night raving about a Kosher restaurant they went to, I did not dare tell them that it is not Kosher, though it is a Jewish restaurant. I have been there and asked for guests as well as for the book. After almost six years, I can only say that the juicy material would never fill a book, but at the moment, just a hefty pamphlet.

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The Jailbird Flies the Nest

Our jailbird friend has left us today. After spending hours trying to retrieve his passport, his laptop, and other sundries scattered hither and yon through his adventures, he now has to wait it out until Monday to try yet again. From his perspective, the US Embassy does not get a A rating for helpfulness. Hesitant to take his word as gospel, I did tend to agree when his sister starting forwarding me the letters she was receiving from the Embassy employee assigned to aiding him. The fact that he is banned from going anywhere near the embassy and they do not answer the phone when he calls does not promote their reputation in anyone's eyes. I made him promised me to send a postcard from the US when he arrived. I wanted to make sure he made it and we would not have any more surprises waiting at our door some evening.

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Hungarian Jails

If you read this blog regularly, then you are aware that the muralist who painted the mural in our kitchen was arrested back in November. He was just released last night. We listened to his stories for hours, using slivers of wood to keep our eyes open. The next morning, I went to school with an extra spring in my step, knowing I had a reprieve for a few hours, leaving Ron to play social worker. He was in jail here in Budapest and then transferred to Veszprem. As a word of warning, the US Embassy does not supply a great deal of assistance to Americans in trouble. They are limited to the laws of the country, which he did not seem to comprehend. The main purpose of an embassy is diplomatic relations with the host country, not to play nice nice with wayward Americans. My dramas continue...

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Election Day

What should have been a simple process, turned into Star Wars. I opened an account with E-Fax.com for their 30 day trial period, but my credit card was on the line for another month's service if we went beyond that. I had multiple reminders in my Google calendar to end the service. From the 15th, I have been receiving faxes with ballots. After opening each one, I had to print them. One person faxed his same ballot twice in the same fax. Others faxed two ballots in one fax, but since I did not catch it right away, I had to go back and check all seventeen faxes to make sure nothing was missed. When a fax only contained a note stating they would fax the ballot later in the day, I wanted to strangle them for wasting my time. The shut off time was 3:00 pm today. At 3:05, the Democrats Abroad International computer support person released the e-mails from the voting e-mail address. I had to open all of those, even if they did not contain a ballot just to verify the contents. There were twenty-two of them. The International has a ruling that all ballots have to be signed. Not having a secret ballot, caused quite an uproar, but it was clearly stated on the ballot that an unsigned ballot would be discarded and not counted. We received one in an e-mail where the person e-mailed the ballot in the body of the e-mail, contrary to instructions that it had to be printed out, filled in, signed, and scanned as an attachment. Armed with the ballots received, we went to the meeting. One of my committee was there signing everyone in, where we had to show a passport or picture ID. This is the first time I had met anyone on my committee; after three attempts at arranging a meeting, I threw in the towel. Ron was running for Member-At-Large along with three others for two positions. After the opening of the meeting, each nominee had three minutes to give a short ditty about why they should be elected. The rules were announced. After I passed out the ballots and collected them, the Nom Committee would split into two groups with one additional non-partisan person in each group. First, broken into two groups with me in the middle, each group checked off names from the membership list as I read them off of the ballots. Only one ballot was from a non-member and had to be discarded. This was also to prevent anyone from voting via fax or e-mail and again in person. All ballots were checked for signatures. One group would count the fax and e-mail votes while the other group counted the in-person votes. We marked each vote as it was counted with a different color pen to make sure each group had counted it. When each group was done, they would switch piles and continue counting. At the end, we compared numbers for agreement. Our 'friend' Michael who had promised to come to the meeting, never showed up. He had grave concerns about having to sign the ballot since his university thesis advisor was running for Chair. Ron lost by one vote, raising my ire with Michael's inability to be a man and not a rat. When the results were read out, there were glad tidings and major disappointments all around. The woman who ran unopposed for secretary and received 50 votes, called for a recount since the Chair position was won by only a three point lead. I sprayed her with my most potent laser beam killing force stare while asking "Are you for real?" No one seconded her motion, so it was dropped. It had already been two hours of agony; everyone wanted to make like Casper the ghost and disappear. We arrived home, opened the front door and found our jailbird mural artist standing in the hallway waiting for us.

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Hallway Tile and Democrats

When we arrived home last night, there was a piece of cardboard in front of our door that had STOP written on it in English. We were not sure if it was a warning from the tile man or an omen left by a burglar. To our great relief, it was the former, so we tip-toes over the newly grouted tile until it had time to dry completely. It looks magnificent. He perfectly lined up the tiles with those in the kitchen, so it looks like one straight line. Although I should have been reading students' essays, I did spend the day arranging books on the new bookcases. I cannot work in chaos, so have to have everything in order before setting down to a task at hand. Normally, my stress reduction technique is to clean a closet, but they were done so recently, there was nothing left to do. Arranging books is the secondary mind flush experience. A good mind flush is definitely in order now. I had allowed myself to be nominated as the Nominations Committee Chair for the Hungary chapter of Democrats Abroad. It seemed like a simple enough task, when I agreed to it. Come into my web said the spider to the fly. It just turned into another of those bait and switch experiences that melts your mind and makes you question the meaning of life. The two men and I use the term loosely, who were running for Chair of the chapter were at each other like two five-year-olds, using the mailing list as their forum. They each wanted to conform the rules for the election to their own liking, which meant the International Democrats Abroad had to be consulted for rules and regulations. I had to set up a temporary fax service and the International created a special e-mail box for those who wanted to vote absentee. The results of the mailbox will not be released to me until Wednesday afternoon. The election is that evening. The infighting was worse than any national presidential election, causing me pause about being a Democrat at all. After I created the ballot, when nominations were closed, some complained that they were supposed to be on the ballot, though they did not think to nominate themselves or ask anyone else to do so. My committee of three were either out of the country at the time or just non-responsive to my missives and requests for assistance. With all of the e-mails going back and forth, this turned into a part-time job, causing much regret on my part. When Wednesday comes, I will celebrate and then purge my mailboxes of hundreds of e-mails.

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Vysehrad

We return home today, but the flight is not until 5:30 this evening giving us tour time. The weather has actually cooperated giving us reasonable assurance to leave umbrellas at the B and B. Jan and Jitka assured us there is no reason to leave our room. No one is coming until tomorrow. Jan encouraged us to see Vysehrad, the National Cultural Monument. Obediently, that is where we headed. It was a fortified settlement dating back to the 10th century. Large enough to spend hours wandering around, this is what we did. When we returned to the B and B, we took advantage of having our room still for a short nap. Jan drove us to the airport. Here are a couple of travel warnings: When we checked in, after receiving our boarding passes, we were asked when we made our reservation. Honestly, I could not remember, so looked at the date on my print out. What was explained was that as of April 1st, Click4Sky changed the rules. You had to print out your own boarding pass or be charged 10 Euro for each. This information was not on the site when we booked it. I would have remembered this. Still, we were not charged extra or informed of this when leaving Budapest. We paid it and moved on. The Czech Republic is now part of the Schengen zone, relieving us of having to go through Passport Control; however, the line for security was through the massive airport taking us forty minutes to make our pass through. The overhead announcements were calling people non-stop to get to the gate or be off-loaded. We arrived at our gate five minutes after our flight was due to take off. We had to wait for the second bus to transport us to the plane, along with ten others. The plane was a propellor job, small and inconsequential. When we reached Budapest, I opted for Zona taxi without an arguement. For the time getting to the airport, the flight, and the ride from the airport, consumed four hours of time. A train ride there is 7 1/2 hours. Is it worth it?

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Rainy Days and Mondays Really Get Me Down

There is something about cold wet weather that just sucks the enthusiasm right out of my sense of adventure. Wandering around in weather that is just a few degrees shy of producing snow sends me to cafés to ponder what I am missing while I am toasty warm. One thing that Prague has going for it is that it is cheaper than Budapest. You can get a heaping platter of food, just like here, but with better beer and for half the cost. We were a pleasantly shocked at the cost of food, entrance fees, and other traveling expenses. Of course, we did the mandatory walk over the Charles Bridge, but half of it is under construction. Yet, the vendors are still there hawking their heavy plastic covered wares to protect them from the rain. We did go to the Museum of International Art. One of the exhibits was a functional glass elevator that only transports between the ground and fifth floors. The layout was spacious and extremely well coordinated. Ron wanted to visit the Cubist Museum, but I was holding back. I am a real square when it comes to that type of art work. I am a well rounded type of guy. At the last minute, he decided not to go in either. Walking through Old Town, there were gazillions of street markets set up ready to trap the unsuspecting tourist that wants some cheap piece of tourist crap that is bound to be tossed as soon as the romance of the city has worn off. Most likely it will happen minutes after unpacking at home. Of course, we had to see the astrological clock, but were too impatient to wait the fifteen minutes for it to do its thing. We bought tickets to another theater performance tonight. Don Giovanni performed by marionettes. Mozart composed the opera especially for Prague where he personally conducted the first performance in 1787. Prefacing this with "I hate opera", this was a spectacular performance. Marionettes mesmerize me. I could never really understand how they could train them in the first place. Seriously, this was a show to remember. Though you could see the puppeteers hands from above, their hand work was like an orchestra. The settings and costumes were superb. This is one show I would highly recommend, but get there early. It is open seating.

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Frigid Prague

Freezing, windy, torrents of rain. This is some welcome back to Prague. It is more like déjà vu from our last trip here. The wind was so bad it was blowing those oversized metal V stand signs with the patio umbrellas that the tour operators use across the squares. If you are aiming at attracting tourists, hitting them with your sign is not the best approach.

Prague has a similar set up to Budapest. A river runs through it, though not the Danube. Most of the city is on one side, the major castle area is on the other. Prague seems much larger than Budapest, yet both have three metro lines, a number of trams and bus lines.

Thinking we were overdressing by carting along coats, we were not only grateful, but just as pleased we had sweatshirts to wear over our shirts. Waders would have been helpful. This was no weather for Crocs, not the style I was wearing with the little portholes under the upper part. These were little breaks in the dam for water to flood my socks.

The major castle area, I would guess is about the size of the whole castle district in Budapest. That Czech royalty really liked to spread out. While we were waiting for some famous library to reopen after lunch, we escaped the cold by running into the Miniature Museum. The caretaker was not at all friendly until we spilled the money for entry on the counter. If it were not so damn cold, I would have walked out, but hey, someone has to pay his heating bill and defrost our bones. Where else can you see a horseshoe and a golden lock on a flea’s leg? Most of the exhibits had to be viewed through a microscope; others were viewable with a high powered magnifying glass.

The library was interesting, run at one time by monks. It reminded me of the Pannonhalma Library in Hungary, but not as large or elegant.

We wandered the Jewish district deciding not to return to any of the synagogues or remembrances. Did it the last time.

At our host, Jan’s suggestion, we booked tickets to see the theater production “Aspects of Alice” at the Black Light Theater. Described as being based on Alice in Wonderland taking up where Carroll left off, Alice floats through the air through historic sites in Prague. Lewis Carroll must be doing back flips in his grave. This was among the worst shows ever, so much so that Ron suggested we walk out. Ron who can tolerate anything had had enough ten minutes after the second act started, when we realized it was no better than the first.

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Prague

This was one of those cheater weeks at the university, when there are only two teaching days due to the holiday overrun. I taught Wednesday and Thursday, done at 12:30 and ready to rock and roll. Two of our guests left this morning before I did and the others were leaving this evening two hours before we started out to the airport ourselves. We leave for Prague tonight.

Most of my time, I spent working on the computer, setting up vacation auto-responders, and answering e-mails, in between reinstalling programs and making a list of those that still needed installation.

The flight was a quick 50 minutes, yet Click4Sky, the budget offshoot of Czech Air served sandwiches and soft drinks at no charge. The driver for the B and B was waiting for us, a lovely young woman who was chatty with Ron sitting in the front seat.

When we arrived at the B and B and approached the large black metal doorway, Elena our driver, rang the bell, then said look at the animal. When we looked down, I could see something scurrying around at our feet, but could not make out what it was. When she said “I don’t know the name in English”, the word rat kept leaping to my mind. In retrospect, I am not certain why I was calm as I said it. Perhaps, I did not want it to be so. After all, who wants to be greeted by a rat where they are going to spend three nights? It suspiciously did not have a long hairless tail. Either it was not a rat or a rat that had escaped from some pharmaceutical research lab. When she opened the metal door, our new pet mate beat us inside, but this door only led to the concrete stairs leading to the house. In the light, this creature was easier to identify. It was a small hedgehog. Actually, it was more like a hedge piglet. It was so small and adorable. Before I could have any thoughts of adoption, Ron mentioned he read an article about a disease they are carrying. But can’t I just pet it? Killjoy!

The room was lovely with a large double bed, but we needed some dinner. Jitka, our hostess suggested a restaurant not too far away, but warned the kitchen closes at 10:30. As it turned out, she was misinformed, it closes at 9:30, but they had cold platters. I did manage to get a grilled sausage. The waitress must have taken pity on me.

The last time we were in Prague was 1996, in December. This balmy April night is much different.

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A Booklovers Dream

Alec was returning to install all of my programs after he put in a new network card. He arrived before I left for school, my first day back after spring break. He had an epiphany last night. Googling different issues, he found that some network cards do not play well with some routers. Their syncing time is off. Since my last router went up in smoke, this could well be the case. He picked up a router manufactured by the same company as the router. This seemed to be a match made in cyberspace. It worked. I left Alec loading programs and went to school. Zoli and the bookcases were due at 11:00. I was thrilled that the guests were out for the day for less disruption to their day, not to mention that I was going to be at school avoiding the same uproar. Guess again! When I slunk into the door at 1:00 pm, it was quiet, no pounding hammer, so whir of a drill, nothing, but Alec’s clicking fingers. Zoli postponed us until 2:00, but when he showed to install the three bookcases, they were beautiful, beyond my expectations. It had occurred to me too late that we had never discussed color. Zoli being a professional cabinet maker made them to match identically the wood of the other furniture. One was customized as I had specified with six drawers on the bottom and bookcases on top. The other two were over 6 feet high, covering the wall. I now have plenty of room for books if anyone wants to send me one, I will be please to supply an address. Alec finished up at 6:00 after I said I would finish reinstalling the dangling programs needing a search for registration codes. One difficulty of buying software online is having to write to the support staff to have them send you new download sites or codes to validate the software. Many sites will not allow you to use the old URL to download the program again after a reformat. At this point, we have three new bookcases, empty, but books strewn on our bedroom dresser and the remaining bookcase waiting patiently to find their new niche. Of course they have to be categorized and alphabetized by author’s last name, so this is not some project to start now with the computer pulling on my leg to make it feel complete again. So many projects, so little time.

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Mercury in Retrograde, My Butt

We know someone here, an American, who blames all techno problems on the Mercury in Retrograde. For me, that is every week. The computer nightmare continued for days. After Alec, the computer tech worked on the computer for five hours on Thursday, it seemed to be working fine until Sunday, when it rolled over and played dead again. Being Sunday and Monday were holidays, Alec was not available, but promised to come over Tuesday, today. He hit the door at 10:30 ready to rock and roll and take a byte out of whatever came his way. We had tickets for the theater with Michael, but that was not until 7:30 tonight; this still being my holiday, so it did not matter so much.

We had guests in both rooms; all lovely people and they managed to make friends with each other as well. In the small room was a mother who was visiting her daughter who is studying in Denmark, but both from the States. In the large room were a mother, father, and twenty-something daughter who were from the States, but the daughter lives in Munich. They were all such a joy to have around; when they saw Alec working, they commiserated and Mike, the dad in the group offered suggestions.

Alec did everything he could think of, including the Voodoo dance to the computer gods, but things just kept getting worse instead of better. His final diagnosis was to reformat the computer. It seems to me that this is a cop-out for critical thinking to stop. It is an easy way out. Reformat is the word I hate the most in the English language. Reformatting means spending two days reinstalling all of the programs I depend on, with all of the customized settings I have created for each of the programs, setting up the toolbars, and so on. Sometimes it takes me a couple of weeks to remember how I managed to arrange something in the best order for my work practices. Formatting: Them there are fighting words. Alec suggested that he wanted to take my computer to the shop, to return it the next day, with the programs installed that they could install. This meant not my monitor, since I have a swivel screen and not the printer either. My whining convinced him it was not a good idea. Perhaps barricading the door, stealing his keys, and suddenly supplying a six pack of cold beer was a determining factor too. Who knows?

If there were a worst time of year for this to happen, this is it. Students are trying to beat the deadline for finishing their thesis, there are tons of papers to read, and I, Mr. Techno have them send everything via e-mail. I need the computer now. This never fails that April is reformat the computer month. If I had a reminder on the calendar, I could start antidepressant therapy weeks before. It was formatted last April and the April before.

I begged Alec to at least get it back to where it was when it was marginally working and we would reformat it at a later time. He tried, but it was not having it. There were too many tweaks and trials attempted for it to want to return to a time in the past. Ron went to meet Michael for the play without me; I fed Alec dinner and at 10:30, he called it a night with the promise to return in the morning.

We have new bookcases coming tomorrow. Each time I walk past the existing bookcases, I grab a stack of books. We ordered new taller and wider custom bookcases to be put in and these bookcases need to be out of the way. Hence, all of the books had to disappear as well as my dysfunctional computer.

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Easter Greetings

For those who celebrate Easter, I wish you pleasant holiday celebration in whatever way you observe it.

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A Belated Passover Wish

I hope for all of my Jewish friends, Passover was a joyful seder celebration with family and friends.

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Trivia for the Day

This was sent to me by Jennifer: At five minutes and six seconds after 4:00 AM on the 8th of July this year, the time and date will be 04:05:06 07/08/09.

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