Lunch (and nutters) in the park

A quiet day in the office, so a group of us headed over to the Vondeltuin for lunch -- and to take advantage of the glorious weather. Is is really toasty out there today! Despite the cafe being relatively quiet, service was Dutchily slow; 4 of the sandwiches turned up after about 20 minutes, but we were still waiting for the other 4 30 minutes after that. On prompting, they bought 3 of them out but claimed that one would take another 5 minutes because "they had to slice the bacon." Whatever. As one colleague pointed out, they staff are all students, employed through a temp agency, and making €9.50 an hour, so it's not like they have an incentive (in the form of pride, ownership, or tipping) to work reasonably effectively.

Still, it wasn't exactly a pain to sit outside on the terrace and soak up the vitamin D. The park and play area provided the requisite bunch of loons to watch. Particularly striking today was the mother who decided that a bra was acceptable outerwear in public -- a bikini top I would have understood, but a bra? With rolled up tracksuit bottoms? And she was French! I guess she must have been exiled from France for crimes against fashion. Also impressing the onlookers was the heavily muscled, bronzed chap who was doing some odd exercises using the children's playground equipment; it looked like he was pretending to surf, swaying around on his ankles -- building up those all-important metatarsels in advance of football in the park, perhaps? Call me old-fashioned, but I think there's something weird about a grown man hanging around a kids' sandpit without a child in tow. No wonder the mothers were escorting their children away from him.

Time for a snooze, I think. Wake me up when it's time to go home.