Sorry; still trying to write some fiction, so I haven’t been blogging. Here’s a quick state-of-the-Gil address:
The Germany trip went pretty well. I did manage to get out from behind that fence with the barbed wire, and I had a long conversation with one of my German advertisers about psychology, guilt, evil, responsibility, reconciliation, and the 2006 World Cup, which went a long way in helping me work through some of my issues with visiting Germany.
I was invited by another advertiser to attend the European Outsourcing Awards, sponsored by a competitor of ours. I thought of doing a Kanye West and bum-rushing the stage during an acceptance speech, but was trumped when one of the losing companies began heckling a winner. (Essentially, the prize was won by a company that managed to get its clients’ products back on shelves a few months after one of its warehouses burned down. The heckler said, loudly, “Maybe I should let MY fucking warehouse burn to the ground and then I’LL get a goddamned plaque!”)
At the awards, I was seated beside a CEO who’s worth north of $50 million. We shot the breeze for a while. He laughed at some of my shtick, making him the highest net worth person ever to find me funny.
I spent an overnight in Freiburg for another client visit. My dad tells me his dad was from there. Walking around the old town, I noticed two different awnings for shops named after Roths.
I took a ton of pictures, but haven’t sat down to process and tag ’em yet. I’ll get those up this weekend, maybe. There are some neat ones of the cathedral in Freiburg.
After 3 or 4 days, I found myself enjoying my walks around the city and such. I realized that it’s because I couldn’t understand a word anyone was saying. Unlike other European languages, German is less passionate, and more purposeful. So I felt like everyone had something relatively important to say, but the words themselves didn’t make any sense to me. I found myself growing angry when I heard people speaking in English. It’s much easier not to listen to insipid conversations when they sound like gibberish. Eventually, I figured out that I was in a very boring episode of Aeon Flux.
I drank so much red wine on this trip that I’m surprised I didn’t develop gout.
The Lufthansa Lounge at the Frankfurt Airport leaves the booze out for the patrons.
My flight home took more than 16 hours, thanks to the freak snowstorm that hit the northeast on Saturday. I boarded the plane at 11:00 a.m. (5:00 a.m. EDT) and disembarked at 9:15 p.m. EDT. Then I got to drive home in that gnarly weather and dodge fallen trees and power lines as I got close to my house. Where we had no power or heat for 30 hours.
I’m very thankful that there’s a wood-burning stove down in my library.
I haven’t shaved since I got back, and, catching up on my RSS feeds, I discovered that it’s currently Movember, the month that guys grow mustaches in support of prostate cancer research. (Go make a donation.) So this morning I shaved off everything but the ‘stache, much to my wife’s chagrin.
Luckily, I have John Hodgman’s guide to mustache etiquette to help me through this month.
There’s a lot more to write about, but I’m afraid I’m consumed with the story about the time the princess of Yugoslavia and I discussed philology.