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We got back last night with very few difficulties-even while passing through the zoo that is Ohare Airport on the Sunday after Thanksgiving. The cat survived-but was most decidedly pissed off with us. He took it out on us by deciding that 5am would be a good time to start meowing-loudly. Throwing him off the bed only seemed to heighten his fervor to wake up us up.

Thus I am awake and writing this post. S.O. is back asleep. It is just as well for today is going to suck at work-lots to get dug out from and I have not checked my work e-mail in over 9 days. Plus I have to give a presentation tomorrow. Its done-but I actually need to review sometime during the busy day today.

I really did not pay so much attention the news while we were over there-save from occasionally watching CNN and the German news broadcasts. Col Gundel would be proud-it appears I actually learned something in his classes. because I understood them and the newspapers well enough. Germans did not seem to understand me th0ugh-seems my accent on the words is too profoundly American.

I did note with interest the Swiss referendum on minarets-good for them. One of the most jarring things to me while walking on the shopping streets in Belgium was the number of women wearing hijabs ( scarves). That had increased a lot from the last time I was in Brussels-and I found it troubling.

Not because I one of those zenophobes who laments the loss of old “Europe”-the immigration that occurred was a concious choice by those countries and a lot of the labor these immigrants do is not being done by Europeans ( which is a whole another post). Rather the issue I take with the hijab is that it is such an “in your face” refusal by European Muslims to assimilate and blend into the country’s culture. By the end of our trip, I wanted to reach out and rip the damn scarves off these women.  If the women were not wearing the damn things, they would have most probably been just another slightly overweight woman walking on Brussels streets. The Muslim men-well they don’t wear anything that distinguishes them-they just look very criminal when you see them hanging around Donner kebab places. But it seems to me that if I were a European, seeing the scarves would just make me even angrier at what had happened with immigration over the past decade and a half. And make me vote oui or ja on a referendum like that in Switzerland. The Muslim women-and their native European citizens would be better served if they were not wearing them.

So count me in the camp of those in France who want to ban the hijab. Because it should be.

On other items, I’ve got 387 pictures to upload to my machine today. I’m thinking about getting a Flicker account and putting them there. I’ll let you know how that goes.

And now its time to go shave and shower and begin the day’s toil. Man it sure was nice being overseas!