Am I compulsive?

Well perhaps a bit - for some reason, since I described [part] of one set of friends visit, I feel compelled to describe them all. But I'm lazy, it was a couple of weeks ago now, and frankly, as Travis pointed out in the comments of the previous post, not all of the visits were marked by disasters, leaving my blogging lacking in narrative heft.

Nonetheless, I feel I cannot move forward in my blogging life until I get this out of my system. Therefore, a photo-post (even worse, some of these are already up on Facebook, making this even more redundant).


_{It looks vaguely like I am holding miniature people in my hand here. I WILL CRUSH THEM!}

With nine visitors, I spent much of the latter part of May like this: blathering about Strasbourg (points to anyone who's taken my tour who can guess what I'm blathering about in this photo. Hint: look at the decorative elements on the building on the left, or the pattern on the road that my hand's blocking. Closest answer gets a Twinkie!*)



We spent a few days on/near the Mediterranean coast with friends. The weather was not cooperative, meaning that with the exception of some French people walking around in winter coats, we had the beach to ourselves.



We swapped Tim and Joç for Tasha and Travis, and so I subjected them to same bike ride. It went much better, and we made it as far as Obernai, after a detour to a lookout spot from which we could see nothing, at a convent we were not allowed to visit, though orchards and vinyards from which we could not pick the fruit. En route, we met a pony that was doing its darndest to pretend we weren't there.



The next day we went on a hike north of here, picking our way over trees and branches downed in the most intense lightning storm I've ever seen. Our ultimate destination was the Chateau of Wasenburg, pictured above, that had once been besieged by the Archbishop of Strasbourg. Oh, the good old days! On the way we passed several pagan sites which were, depending on which plaque you believed, either used for bloody sacrifices, judicial executions, or baby-making. The castle incidentally, had also been visited by Goethe (Travis, on Goethe: "Is he really any good, or did they just need someone to be their Shakespeare? Did the Germans just say, 'Hey, we need a writer - Goethe, you'll do. And while you're at it, go visit a lot of places. We'll put up plaques: we love visiting plaques!")

I don't have any pictures from our subsequent visitors, as we never strayed out of the city, but I did learn that if people get googly-eyed over one baby, they lose their freakin' minds over twins. Also, Carol didn't stay long enough.

* No it won't.