Bible Study at the Best Western

Here we are in Luxembourg -- a tiny little place, and an easily walkable city. This has already been a crazy trip.

We landed yesterday morning and took a taxi to the Hotel Mercure, which I'd reserved and paid for on Hotels.com. Imagine our surprise when we found the hotel locked and dark, with a note on the door apologizing for having to close for "technical reasons." The note directed us to a nearby Avis office, which also proved to be locked and dark. No one answered the phones.

We did what any sensible person would do -- we went next door to the Best Western and got a room. The clerk there said the Mercure closed suddenly on Wednesday. A dispute between owners and managers, or something like that. Police were involved.

Well, I got on the horn to Hotels.com and they have promised me a refund. They also sent me a £25 voucher for use on my next reservation. Then, several hours later, they helpfully called me and said, "Are you aware that the hotel you've reserved for tonight is closed?"

Thanks for that.

Once the accommodations were sorted, Dave and I went to a cafe where we ordered some soup and croques monsieur. We each got a sandwich -- and then we each got another sandwich. I'm not sure why that happened, but we ate them all. The TV carried nonstop news about Orly airport, while a guy nearby drank a mixture of orange juice and Campari in a tall, stemmed glass. It looked like a tequila sunrise without tequila.

Then Dave went off to the concert hall where that night's honor band concert would be held. He not only has students in the honor band, he and other teachers from our school are bringing all their music students back to Luxembourg later this week on their annual "Music Tour." So Dave wanted to see how the concert space sounds and functions.

I, meanwhile, went for a walk.

I strolled through the city's downtown to the bluffs above the River Alzette, where the old fortified walls, or "casemates," are (top). And I browsed the streets and descended from the bluffs into the "Grund," an old neighborhood along the river.

Finally, after a couple of hours, I wound up back at the hotel, where I edited my pictures and read for a while. Dave ditched me for dinner -- he wanted to stay at the concert hall, which annoyed me. But I wasn't hungry anyway (two sandwiches!) so I wound up just skipping dinner and buying a packet of peanuts on the way to the concert.

After the performance, which went really well, we chatted for a while with kids and parents from our school, and then bummed a ride back to our hotel -- where, of course, the kitchen was closed. So we had a beer, and then another beer. Peanuts and beer -- that was my dinner.

I told Dave that I'd found a bible in the nightstand in our room. "We can have bible study!" he joked. "Bible study at the Best Western," I said -- and he declared, "That's the title of your next blog post."