Gone with the wind...

Chattering away one day, excited about my coming trip, I wondered out loud "I wonder if its windy in the Netherlands. I don't mind cold places, its when they're windy as well as cold that it really gets me"
I was remembering my trip to Scotland, when I was tempted to walk around with two walrus-tusks of tissue up my nose. It was either that, or stop every two seconds to blow my nose. Those of you who have experienced incessant wind will understand what I mean.

So I sat peacefully drinking my cup of tea for 10 minutes, thinking about nothing in particular. Until the thought rose unbidden in my mind, like some unpleasant sea cresture from the deep.
"Windmills!" I said, startled out of my blissful repose.
"They have windmills!"

The first Saturday I got there was the worst. I walked home from the town centre, but as I turned off the Mekelweg and onto my street it hit me like a tonne of bricks and almost knocked me over. Conveniently I discovered, my street happens to be the windiest in Delft.

People on bicycles were weaving past on trajectories not entirely of their own choosing. "Suckers" I thought, until I discovered that the wind was actually blowing my legs about when I lifted them to take a step. This makes walking impossible. You lift one foot, only to have it blow sideways and hit your other leg, as though some poltergeist were maliciously animating your limbs. And you discover that it is in fact possible to trip yourself over without any external intervention.

Lets just say I'm glad that I got my hair cut short before I got here, otherwise I would be opting for dreadlocks.