More pictures today:

Below: World's Largest Breadzels (otherwise known as Pretzels), traditionally eaten on New Year's Day.

Above: Sarah opens Christmas present as ax-murderer looks on.
Below: One of the roads leading out of Kandern; again, note the building built ON the sidewalk.

Above: some traditional Bavarian architecture in Kandern; it, as you may have guessed, is made entirely of some type of material.

Below: Sarah's high school; it, as you may have guessed, is a building.

Seriously, who’s the guy who goes into the public restroom and uses exactly 2500 cubic yards of toilet paper? I realize that the stuff is only one-ply, but let’s be realistic: do you really need to use that much? You know what I’m talking about: there’s always one stall where the toilet bowl is COMPLETELY filled with toilet paper. Nearly all of the water has been soaked up, the paper looks as if it’s been there for three or four months, and someone has used the facilities despite the obvious clog. Actually, who is THAT guy: he goes into a stall, finds it completely unusable, and uses it anyway. You know who you are. I’ve made an executive decision, there need to be two kinds of public restrooms: those for the two types of people outlined above, and those for me.

Today I will post some more pictures from Europe. Once again, please feel free to make up your own stories (you know, because a picture is worth 1000 words, I've already written 5000, so I'm tired...).


Above: Compared with its American cousin, the European pizza is very thin and has stronger cheese, resulting in a completely different taste (one that I like). In addition, the European pizza isn’t nearly as filling: I easily ate the one on the bottom by myself.

Below is Basel, Switzerland. I posted a similar picture yesterday, but some peoples’ heads were in the way.


Above is another cathedral in Dijon. This one, as you might have guessed, was actually made completely from mustard and its derivatives (much like its American counterpart, South Dakota’s “Corn Palace"). Below is a closer view of some of the cathedral’s exterior. Incidentally, the gargoyles are eating ketchup.

Below is a street in Kandern; note how close the buildings are to the street (building codes are quite different in Europe than in the US.

Episode 1, part 2: The Automatic Flush

Amidst our travels, I found myself in a stall at Washington Dulles Airport. The thing itself was rather unremarkable, but the man who occupied it before me had made me nervous (something about his funny grin as he let himself out and walked past; it was a sort-of, “wait till you see what I did” look), so I naturally decided to use a seat cover; I pulled one of the sheets of paper from the holder on the wall and found myself hoping that such a thin (and, might I add, obviously permeable) barrier could stand between me and the evils below. Irrational or not, I applied the cover and turned to unbutton my pants. Woooshhhh, went the, apparently, hyper-sensitive, automatic flush of the toilet. I acted quickly, holding the paper barrier in place, lest it be sucked down, forcing me to reapply (I did have to use the bathroom, if you’ll recall; it’s not as if I just went in looking for comedic fodder…).

With the flush cycle over and disaster averted, I went back to the business at hand (unbuttoning my pants, you’ll remember): whoooshhh. I made a wild stab at the cover but missed. Crap. (Be wise to realize, “crap” was my verbal expression, not my action: I have better bowel control than that. See what I did there.) Anywho, I replaced the seat cover with a fresh one and turned my attention toward my zipper: whooooshhh. I fleetingly considered the silly thought that I might be an unwitting participant of “Candid Camera”, my movements tracked by an unseen assailant, grinning and brandishing a remote control. I quickly dismissed the thought and reached for another seat cover, hoping that privacy laws and decency standards still held. Either way, my pants were now completely undone and hovering perilously, making my task more difficult than I’d hoped, but, waddling and twisting, I put a third cover in place, turned quickly and began my descent to the seat. Wooooooosshhhhh. “Nooooooooo!” Already too low to stand back up, I thudded onto the now-bare toilet as the middle of the flush cycle churned toilet water unto my bare bottom. I distinctly heard the sensor murmur, “Check, and… mate”.

As I finished my business and considered the fine for destruction of airport property, I ultimately decided that, all things considered, too many flushes was far superior to too few (as in none: I’m sure you’ve seen the aftermath of zero flushes of a public commode…). Satisfied that I needn’t take revenge on the inanimate object, I stood up and waited for the whoosh: none came. I turned to leave…still nothing. Exiting the stall, the whoosh curiously absent, I wondered if I’d soon see myself on TV. Ahhh, technology.

Join us tomorrow for “The Airport Bathroom 3: The Mystery of the Clogged Toilets”.

Today marks the first installment of “What the heck is with the airport?”, a here-to-for recurring, occasionally updated, series of aviation-related observations.

Episode 1, part 1: The Airport Bathroom

So, I was in a bathroom stall at Chicago’s O’Hare Airport, and I knew something was up because there were directions on the wall. The fact that a toilet needs an instruction manual undoubtedly indicates that something is amiss: either someone is insinuating you’re stupid, or that particular commode has been unnecessarily complicated (“sit and go” really hasn’t changed much, no matter the technological innovation). In either case, the wall said that if I waved my hand in front of the small sensor, the toilet would move a new sheet of plastic around the seat, and I could sit down on a ‘clean’ surface.

I’m sure you’ve seen these: there’s a box on the back of the toilet; it whirrs and rotates the sheath around the seat, and all is hunky dory. Not today. Naturally distrusting the sign (again, the bathroom is not meant to be complicated), I thought I’d examine things a little more closely. Upon inspection, I immediately noticed the box on the back of the seat had no outlet, no tube leading to the trash, and no auxiliary storage. Big deal, you say? Think again. Because there was no place for the USED plastic to be disposed, I’m quite sure it just came whirring back out again when the next poor sucker waved his hand in front of the sensor. In other words, not only do you have to sit where everyone has already trodden (or, more appropriately, sodden), but you also have to wave your hand like an idiot in front of an sensor that’s probably programmed to work for 1 out of every 100 frantic waves. You know what I’m talking about: wave: nothing; wave, wave: nothing; wave, jump, wave, wave, punch: nothing; walk away: whirrrrrr. Join us tomorrow for: The Airport Bathroom 2: Curse of the Automatic Flush.