mama i'm coming home........

Hey pals, I am in Cologne, Germany tonight. It is 10:30pm on Tuesday night and i am here drinking a $1.50 kolsch beer and typing you a message. This town is pretty cool, it is unfortunate that we are leaving tomorrow morning. We are taking a train to Amsterdam, spending one last night there, then flying to london then back home.

This brings up my next point---getting home. I am flying into O'hare and I land there at 7:39 pm on thursday night. I am looking for volunteers to pick me up. The reward for picking me up is an unbelievable souvenir. If nobody volunteers I will be forced to ask my roommate andy for a ride. Then he gets the most awesome souvenir of all time. I will announce the prize when the volunteer comes forward.

Today, like I said, I was in cologne, germany, the place where cologne was invented. There is a building standing where the original scented water came from, and it still flows. However, the fountain is now surrounded by this expensive boutique selling expensive cologne. Me, myron and our single serving japanese friend maiko waited outside until 10 when it opened up. With my empty evian bottle in hand, we waited impatiently. We walked around the block and found the store open. The fountain was right in the door and running, so we stepped inside and I began to fill my bottle. When the bottle was filled 3/4 full with the watered-down beer color smelly liquid, this beast of a woman nearly attacked me. "DAS IS NICHT FUR FREI BLAH SHPRECHE BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH ETC," she shouted at the top of her lungs. I looked at her in fear and poured the contents back out into the fountain. How the hell was I supposed to know I couldn't take a taste with me back home?

I realized later, after I was chased out of the building, and after myron and maiko got up off the ground from too much laughter, that they sell the stuff in bottles. It appears I was attempting to shoplift without knowing it.

I did have the last laugh. I got 7-9 drops of the juice still remaining in my evian bottle. I will return triumphantly to the u.s. to share the scent with all, unless it evaporates by then.

I am at my hostel now, and this is the only shitty computer. I can feel the others looking at me impatiently from behind my back. In other words, so long suckers.

dave