I wouldn't blame her if she never came to visit again...

A few weeks after Chad left for Afghanistan, my wonderful friend, Nicole, came for a short one week visit. She is one of my dearest friends -- in fact, we met over 20 years ago when we both worked at Burger King. She was the maid-of-honor in my wedding, and I was her matron-of-honor two years later at her wedding. Nicole arrived mid-morning on a Monday. I needed to wait for my cleaning lady to show up before we started any exploring of Belgium, well, the cleaning lady never showed up, so off we went on an adventure to the local cheese lady. Nicole love the quaint Belgium country side and we even got to visit my great friend, Ellen. That evening we enjoyed the cheese, the wine, and a lot of laughter. The next day, poor Nicole woke up with a terrific migraine (probably from the cheese, wine, and dehydration), so we stayed home all morning and then ventured out to Mons that afternoon. We ate frites and enjoyed some waffles. That evening, after getting Ella down to sleep, Bennett noticed a large lump in the field behind our yard. Well, I couldn't distinguish what the lump was, so I used binoculars to see. I then could tell that it was a man sitting in the field. I told Ben not to worry and to get his things ready for the morning. Ben took the trash out and LOCKED THE DOOR, got his backpack ready, and was going downstairs as Nicole and Nora were coming upstairs to read a book before bed. All of the sudden, I hear Bennett's paniced voice saying, "There is a scary looking man standing at our kitchen door trying to get it!" I told him to come up the stairs immediately. I really wasn't that frightened, so I decided to call my friend, Renee's house, so that her husband could come by and "scare the ruffian off." They live about 10-15 minutes from my home. Well, as I was talking to Renee, she told me that her husband was away for the week. As I was talking to her, Nicole was looking down into the courtyard to see what the man was doing, I really thought he would just leave. Renee, fortunatly, had a friend over for dinner who thankfully spoke fluent French. Nicole noticed that the man was still in the courtyard (there is a light at the front door that is motion sensitive) and he was not leaving. For over 20 minutes, he went to all three downstairs doors, trying to get in. I then started to panic and told Renee to call the police. Her friend got on the phone and actually had to convince the Belgian police to come to my home. When she was sure that they were coming, the friend got into her car and sped to my home. At this point, I decided to barracade all of us into Ella's sleeping room by shoving a desk in front to the door. We opened the window in this room and told the man to leave and screamed for help. The man then decided to take a brick (a rather large brick that has our name painted on it) and bust through the downstairs window. We screamed at him to leave, he said, in perfect English, "I will leave if you open the gate." We have an automatic gate that opens when you push a fob button, Nicole screamed down to him, "Stay by the front of the house, do not move, and we will open the gate." She bravely took a bat that just so happened to be in the room we were in, went downstairs, and pushed the fob button to open the gate. He did not leave, he just stood there. What seemed like forever, Renee's friend showed up flashing her lights and beeping her horn. He just stood there. And then, after 25minutes, the Belgian police arrived. He just stood there. I went downstairs along with Nicole, the police came to the door, but let the guy stand there without cuffs. When they enterend, as did Renee's friend, they asked me for my passport. I gave it to them. They then proceeded to question the guy out in front of my home for over an hour -- only one foot from the door he tried to break into. They did not cuff him. They did not take my statement. They just talked to him. After an hour, they left. We got the kids down to sleep and stupidly stayed in the house that night, broken window and all. A great couple from the unit came over and put cardboard over the window and calmed me down, but I did not sleep the whole night. The next morning, I went to the police station to provide my statement, as did Nicole. We found out that they released the man, that he was homeless, and that he just wanted me to feed him. Nicole said, "Well, he didn't ask nicely." I then went to housing and proceeded to break down in tears, and they obtained a hotel room for my family and Nicole, until the window was replaced. After this, we decided to stay the night in Brugge...and on the way, my wonderful SAAB started to break down. I turned the car around, kept it at 120km per hour, and literally coasted into my driveway, turned the car off, and it hasn't started since. So, we packed up the Expedition and I very very very nervously drove it to Brugge...white knuckling it all the way. I stupidly put above ground parking into my Tom Tom and it proceeded to take me directly into the heart of Brugge. Mind you, I have only driven the Expedition a half dozen times, and narrow European streets are SCARY. We had a lovely time in Brugge and then drove home late the next afternoon. We packed up our belongings, checked into the hotel, and ordered pizza. Nicole decided to repaint her finger nails as well as the girls toe nails. Well, I moved the nail polish to a high shelf after she was done and she accidently knocked the nail polish onto the floor...all over the white tile. On Friday, we just went back to the house, relaxed, and waited for the security man to show up. He did and his suggestion was to have the landlord put flood lights in the backyard. I cannot get out of my lease because it is vitually impossible to do so in Belgium. On Saturday, we were off to Paris...almost missing the bus because I forgot my military ID, which we needed in order to retreive Nicole's driver's license which they took in order for her to sleep in the hotel on the military base. Paris was stupendous, it rained, so we purchased matching umbrellas and we ate a fabulous meal at an Italian restaurant. We went the Saint Chapelle as well as the Orsay and oohhed and aahhed over the art work. We stayed at my home that night, because the driving service to the airport was picking Nicole up there and I couldn't change the pick up point. Needless to say, I didn't sleep. Poor Nicole's feet were blistered from all the walking in Paris, and she literally hobbled to the car that was to take her to the airport at 6a.m. on Sunday morning. I really would not blame Nicole if she never came back to Belgium for a visit...I think she still loves me and the kids, but not Belgium.