Gosh, I've just re-read Alan's poem "No Wait" posted below.  I just can't get over how much he was able to pack in about my brother Frank in so short a piece.  Frank was everything like that, I've just been thinking and thinking about it this last week. 

We spent most of the last week in Holland.  We left on Tuesday and returned on Saturday evening.  It was a good trip, although quite cold.  In fact it was the coldest weather since we have been here.  On Thursday, we decided to take a train trip to Rotterdam. Initially we thought it would be a good day for it because it was cold and blustery when we started out in the morning.  Unfortunately, by the time we got off the train in Rotterdam, it was a full blown gale.  We walked around the block, had lunch and got back on the train for Amsterdam and a hot bath! 

Although we could not get tickets for the Beethoven concert at the Concertgabow on Valentine's Day, we did get tickets at the Musicgabow (I love Dutch names for stuff).  We heard two Mozart pieces, including his 40th symphony, which I'm listening to just now: 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvtoqE33iZg  So, so wonderful. 

I've just made plans for another trip with my friends here to walk part of "The Way" Santiago de Compostela http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santiago_de_Compostela in September.  This is my first foray traveling without Alan.  Initially we were going to do a walk in September with friends from the States in Scotland, but that was quite a bit more expensive than we initially thought and we pulled out of that before this opportunity arose.  September looks like it's shaping up to be as busy as last year in September because in addition to this walk, our US friends are going to come to Ireland following their Scotland walk and we're making plans to get a house in the west of Ireland for the following week.  Exciting stuff.

Looking forward to getting back to the normal stuff this week, work, dance, dance and bridge, bridge.  In addition to the two dance classes I've been doing for a while and the weekly bridge game on Friday mornings, I've just started taking bridge lessons on Thursday evenings.  It was strongly suggested that I do so by my bridge companions.  There's a lot to learn about bidding, that's for sure.  Before I knew how much I didn't know, I wasn't intimidated at all to play on Fridays, now, with just ONE lesson under my belt, I'm a wreak.  They tell me that will stop.  I have to believe it's so, because it's just the way I felt after my first set dancing lesson and now I'm passable at that.