Flora and Fauna

What started as a minor ivy-trimming effort became a major ivy-stripping process, after I did my first Dutch housewife window-washing number, yesterday morning, and realized that my rear garden had virtually NO light in it (when ivy, or ''klimop'', translated as ''climb up'', won't grow in a spot, it's time to thin it out).

I'd seen very tiny piles of what seemed to be wet dirt and wondered what they were, having eliminated cat and bird deposits. Then I started spotting SNAILS amidst the ivy and generally on wet soil. Could it be? The little dirt piles, though, didn't seem the right size to have been left by snails. So, that mystery remains unsolved, but there are lots of snails out back.

After visiting Leiden's famous botanical gardens today ("Hortus Botannicus'', a/k/a ''Hortus'') and seeing LOTS of snails (and consulting Google, which was inconclusive), I'm not sure that snails are a bad thing. That said, there's no way that I could move them from the garden to the saute pan!

What else? Oh! A goodie. While washing my front door and transom window yesterday, I spied a brass knob that I'd thought was purely decorative. It's my door bell! One pulls it out and the bell sounds inside the little vestibule, a bit like "Upstairs, Downstairs''. Now, I'm eager to have a real visitor, and see if he/she/they realize it's a door bell!

Being a rental, the house hasn't had much TLC in quite a while, other than fresh paint upstairs. The tiny strip of land by the front door is void of anything but a rose, which I pruned back to near-stump, and the area cats apparently have used the area for their purposes for years, but no more. Most other houses on the street have covered their strip with bricks or paving stones and then put plants in pots on top of the stones, and now I see why. While buying lavender plants yesterday, I explained the situation to the lady vendor, and she recommended some sort of pellet available at the garden center, which the cats hate, so we'll see.

Next week should be very exciting: my STUFF arrives! It won't fit very well into the little house, but at least I'll have a bed again. Three weeks on an air mattress has been nasty. My things piggy-backed in a container box with a Belgian's belongings, and the shipper is hopeful that my load will clear customs along with the main load, so the customs process will be expedited.

Oh, another win: there IS central heating! Having left Washington in heat of about 103 degrees, I haven't been eager for more heat, but some nights have been nippy, and I hadn't been able to get any heat. I tried and tried, turning all possible knobs, looking at all meters and the thermostat, and gave up. Finally, I called the rental agent, and two days later, they called back, with the solution being to turn the thermostat all the way up and leave it to warm up. I did this, left the house, and voila! Heat. No more wearing socks to bed and shivering.

I haven't met any more neighbors, and still wonder who the gentleman is on the west. He is rarely at home. His house and garden are a bit of a mess, so his interest and time lay elsewhere.

It's 5:15pm. I should go and replenish the pear popsicle supply, and the ''Spanish orange'' yoghurt, and the OJ for the Campari, and see what's tempting at the little supermarket. I need to find a neighborhood bakery (haven't looked), since the market's bread is mushy, believe it or not. I continue overwhelmed by the dairy products' quality. While I rarely use butter, I bought some (full-fat, as long as I was buying butter), and it comes in a cake, about 3x5'' and about an inch thick, and is VERY rich.

Did I say that my oven has no degrees? It seems to be either on or off. I'll ask the realtor, but may have to just get a thermometer. I'd like to recreate my biscotti recipe and at cook a lamb roast, at some point.

And the EURO. The coins are:

2 Euro (nickle, with a brass center, a little bigger than a U.S. quarter)
1 Euro ( smaller, but the same, I think)
50 cent (brass, about the size of the 1 Euro)
20 cent (brass, smaller than the 50 cent)
10 cent (brass, smaller than the 20)
5 cent (copper, bigger than the 20 cent)
2 cent (copper, smaller than the 5 cent)
1 cent (copper, very little)

Paper:

50 Euro (earth tones, lots of colors, sporting a map of europe, some arched bridges and a few portals)
20 Euro (don't have one now)
10 Euro (same, but red and pink)
5 Euro (same, but blue and grey)

I miss the beautiful Dutch guilder notes, which highlighted famous Dutch culture and technology (Sweelinck on the 10, a gorgeous huge sunflower on the 100, I think, and can't remember the rest), and each bill had tactile dots on it, enabling the blind to "read'' their money. I'm shocked that the Euro bills lack this.

While I'm on money: proving again how very sensible a country this still is, credit cards as America knows them are mostly unusable here! One can pay with U.S. plastic at hotels, major restaurants, car rentals and the like, but for daily things and most other, one pays either in cash or with one's bank ''pin'' or ''chip'' card. The explanation given me several times is that the fees are too high on the plastic for vendors here to accept. So, this is a cash-and-carry country, for the most part. The chip cards' money is cash transferred from one's checking account, and has to be replenished. The ''pin'' card (I **think** I've got this right) is like the U.S. debit card. So, so far, I've just withdrawn cash with my debit card from the ATMs. Even at department stores, one cannot pay with a credit card.

Right: off to the food survey. Here's to a lovely weekend.