Amsterdam for a RIPE/NCC Board Meeting

I had to fly to Amsterdam for an NCC Executive Board meeting with a follow-on NCC Winter party and then socializing with EC and whatever in Amsterdam for the weekend. I would have flown back immediately after the board meeting, but the fare would have been thousands more. December fares are very high. I did decide to try the KLM non-stop Portland to/from Amsterdam, as they had been so kind bailing me out of the flight cancellation in September.

Monday 2025.12.08

I was pretty much packed the day before. I received a text from KLM that WiFi would not be working on my PDX-AMS flight. This ws not a major concern, as I hoped to sleep. The KLM online boarding pass did not show TSA Pre, which meant I would have to stop at the counter to get a boarding pass. Between the funky web site and this stuff, I was not impressed with KLM infrastructure. Kaiby? knew i was packing so would not leave my lap.

I finished packing, said goodbye to Kaiby?, Katen picked me up at 11:30 and, despite traffic due to serious downpour, we were at PDX by noon. I went to the KLM counter to get a boarding pass with TSA Pre, and went through Security by 12:20. It took me a bit to find the Delta Lounge. Their WiFi sucked.

There was no boarding announcement, so I left the lounge at 13;50 and walked down to the gate to find most people had already boarded, and it was quite the queue. I was in my seat by 13:00. Oops! I was in the wrong seat, 7A as opposed to 6A. But the woman in 7A was accommodating.

KLM flight 616 was a 787-10 Dreamliner in pristine shape. I think the flight was fairly full. Indeed, the onboard Wi-Fi was not working; one could associate with it, but there was no connectivity. At 13:25, the scheduled departure time, the captain came on the PA to tell us some passengers had some security issue, and we were waiting for them, which was easier than offloading their luggage. At 13:35 they withdrew the jet bridge and the captain said they were mucking with the luggage and we might take off in 10 or 15 minutes. The purser welcomed us and asked us not to take photographs of other passengers without their consent. Indeed, we pushed at 13:50 and wheels were up at 14:01.

The cloud layer was so all the way up to cruising altitude. My in-flight entertainment didn’t work so they reset it. I had the takeoff meal. The salads were excellent. The chicken was horrifying. I then got about 2 1/2 to three hours of nap, but couldn’t get back to sleep. I watched junky movies.

Tuesday 2025.12.09

I had the breakfast crepe, meat plate, oatmeal, and drinkable coffee. We landed in Schiphol at 08:05 and we’re at the gate by 08:20. It was a fair walk to passport control where there was only one agent so a 15 minute queue I did not get through until 8:50. The SIM store had been disappeared. I caught the 09:09 Sprinter to Centraal, arriving at 09:25. I was in the NCC office by 09:40.

I chatted with Lea who had taken a three week holiday with her sister to tour China. Mirjam arrived and we dove into RIPE/NCC Board issues and IETF LLC Board issues. The parallels were interesting. At noon, we went to the in-house lunch and sat with Daniella and Hans Petter. Discussions got serious. Mirjam dropped out for a one o’clock call. Hans Petter and I kept going to two. I went back tot he work desk and cleaned up more email, read logs, and gossiped more with Mirjam.

Mirjam left at four o’clock. By 16:15 or so, the NCC offices thinned out. Hans Petter and found ourselves in the coffee area and chatted for an hour or more. At 18:30, I finished working and walked to my hotel, the Kimpton de Witt as usual, and checked in. I unpacked in my room and worked a bit and was asleep by 20:30.

Wednesday 2025.12.10

I did not sleep well after about two o’clock. At eight, I gave up and dressed. I walked to Centraal to get a croissant with ham and cheese, ans was in the NCC offices at nine. I had my croissant with half an Americano, left a box of Baker and Spice cookies on the counter, and went up to the board room to work while waiting for everybody. Mirjam showed up quite soon, and we got coffee and gossiped. By 10:30 others started to show.

The Board meeting opened with discussion with the Works Council, kind of like a proto-union. They were concerned with maintaining communication if the Board structure changed and about ongoing salaries. The day chugged on through the long agenda. Hans Peter did the Acting CTO presentation and was very direct. It was scary. The NCC technology had been swept under the carpet for years. Then back to boring but competent reports. Then all but Board and HPH left, and we discussed the Managing Director’s performance, both against goals agreed at beginning of year and new issues such as the deep engineering issues.

At 18:00 we broke up. Piotr and I walked back to the Kimpton talking about or differences on the issue of a possible NomCom. We actually converged. I went upstairs and dumped my bag etc. At 19:15 I did the 15 minute walk to the Restaurant-Café In de Waag on Nieuwmarkt, guided through heavy tourism and the red light district entirely by iPhone. The food was good, nothing special.

Mirjam and I talked seriously with Athina much of the eve. At ten o’clock Mirjam and I left, she to walk home and I to walk back to the de Witt. I was in bed by eleven.

Thursday 2025.12.10

I could not sleep past about 04:30. I gave up at seven, dressed, cleaned up some email, and left the hotel at 08:20. I got to the NCC offices in time for breakfast with the rest of the Board. At nine, we started the Board meeting with things running sloppily over time. We went down some fairly deep rabbit holes on Mirjam’s RIPE Meeting Report, Risk Appetite, and the Charging Scheme, We zipped right through the Activity Plan and Budget, which struk me as odd. Then Fergal presented the five year Strategy plan. Then I presented my The RIR System: A Longer Term Gedankenexperiment, which caused stunned silence and then chaotic brainstorming through lunch. After lunch we had a few hours of the Governance Academy organising Board omphaloskepsis. I found it mildly useful. Then we did an hour or so on ICANN and other RIRs, APNIC, AfriNIC, … And then at last it was a wrap!

I hung out in the board room to help Daniella clean up the dirty dishes. I looked up one of my fave restaurants, Slouizer, for Piotr, and found out it was permanently closed. I imagine it did not survive Covid. At seven, I met Mirjam, Kees, and Athina at Gió Cucina Italiana for a nice dinner. No work chat. I was back in my room by ten and crashed.

Friday 2025.12.12

I slept to eight!! It was wonderful. I went to the office, where I found Mirjam. Anna arrived around ten, as did Daniel. I worked the morning, and booked my train tickets to Louvain. Then the four of us ferried across the way to a soup and sandwich lunch. We talked openly and heavily of Board and senior management issues. Anna had to go back to get her partner, while Mirjam, Daniel, and I went back tot he office and continued the omphaloskeptic discussion until four o’clock or so. Then Daniel and I walked to the Kimpton, and I got a hour and a half nap, interrupted by Board folk Signaling each other and a text from Lizzie. At 18:15, I met Daniel in the lobby to walk to the party at NEMO. There was a fun Rube Goldberg reaction/dominos event,

a bad meal (burgers and fries), and some blah blah. I dressed as Pikachu

Then the live band of NCC staff, which was fun.

Then Hans Peter, Daniel, and I huddled for a long while while the dance floor did its thing to a DJ. We headed for the door around midnight to find that a Board member had insulted the DJ who was now sulking outside. I apologized for the Board and left Hans Petter to mollify his staff. The three of us walked back to the hotel, and I was asleep by one o’clock.

Saturday 2025.12.13

I woke at 06:30 and pretended I could sleep until I gave up at 07:30. I dressed and packed an overnight into my knapsack. I was out of the hotel by 08:15 and in Centraal by 08:30. I ate a ham and moz sandwich and a double at an Illy place, Julia’s. I caught the 09:11 Eurostar, 2nd class, to Brussel-Midi, found the free WiFi, sent a report of the ugly event of the last eve to the Board Chair, and tried to catch up with backlog. The Illy was pretty good. Past Rotterdam, the track improved and the Thalys moved right along. The WiFi remained usable. We got to Brussel-Midi at 11:06 and I managed to find track 14 to catch the 11:32 IC toward Luxembourg. Brussel definitely looked funkier than Amsterdam.

I arrived Ottignies at 12:15, and Cristel, Camile, and Justine met me on the platform and we walked to the car to meet Lionel. We drove a far bit to a nice restaurant where we all ate an excessive lunch. I had tuna tataki on a bed of stir fried veggies, and it was good. Then we drove to drop Camille off at a friend’s and then on to Cristel & Lionel’s home. It was still being renovated and had moving boxes galore. But it was really nice. We sat in the kitchen and talked shop, AI, etc. They made a fresh pumpkin soup for dinner

which we had with some smoked ham and sausage from Lionel’s home area. We played a fun game, No, Merci!, talked more shop, and went to bed about 22:20.

Sunday 2025.12.14

I woke a number of ties and gave up at seven o’clock. It turned out that Lionel and Cristel were up and in the kitchen. Two cups of coffee and two croissants later I took a shower and packed up. Once Justine woke, we went for a walk around the neighborhood and through the woods and a small field. Then a lunch of sauteed ground beef with onions over rice with steamed legumes. We talked a bunch. At 14:30, I slouched in a lounge chair until four o’clock when we packed out. Lionel drove Cristel and me to the Ottigenes train station. We caught the 17:44 to Brussel-Midi, an hour earlier than I scheduled because Cristel had to catch the train to Lyon. So, when we got to Brussel-Midi I said goodbye to Cristel and tried to get on an earlier train; no chance. So I went into the Cafe and had a salade aux chevre which was actually quite good. I then wandered the station ontil I could board my scheduled 19:55 IC to Amsterdam. Not the Eurostar/Thalys, but perfectly fine. I boarded it 20 minutes early because it was far warmer than the station. And it was mostly empty. We departed on time. We arrived in Amsterdam Centraal at 22:05. I walked to the De Witt, was in my room by 22:15, and asleep by eleven o’clock.

Monday 2025.12.15

I could not sleep past five o’clock, so dressed and started packing. I cleaned op email and organized my mess. I. checked out of the hotel at 06:50 and caught the 07:18 from Centraal. We arrived at Schiphol at 07:36 and I wandered up to security. The queue wasn’t bad for priority. I was through by 07:55 but then passport control was chaos, and took 15 minutes. Yet another escalator wasn’t working, that was two of three. I found a pharmacy and they had Katen’s cosmetics. The KLM lounge was right across the way, so I went up and had a mediocre coffee with a slice of bread with ham and cheese. I caught up on email, sent thank yous to Daniella and Hans Petter. I left the lounge at 09:40, as KLM said boarding had started at 09:35. It was a fair walk to the gate, but when I arrived at ten o’clock it was not yet boarding. I finally made it on board at 10:10 and found my seat.

KLM flight 615 to Portland was a 787-9 in rather funky shape. And I suspected it was full. They actually finished boarding at 10:25, but we were delayed 15 minutes by ground staff for unspecified reasons. We pushed at 10:45 and took off at eleven o’clock.

I had the takeoff meal which wasn’t bad. I read a little, then napped for 3 1/2 or four hours and then read until we landed at 11:25. It took five minutes to get to the gate and then another five minutes figure out how to get the jet bridge attached to the plane. I was through immigration by 11:40; but then I had to board a bus and wait for the bus to fill before I could get a ride to the main terminal. Only half a dozen people were on the bus so we left five minutes later. Uber took a while. So I was not in the Tesla X until noon. I was home at 12:30. I reassured Kaiby? and unpacked.

Tokyo to Work at IIJ Lab and Deal with SMBC

The previous trip to Tokyo had left the SMBC situation far from resolved, and they said that I needed to come back for seven contiguous business days. So at the RIPE meeting in Bucharest I worked with Maz to coordinate schedules between his travel and Thanksgiving, and found a narrow window.

There was a lot of sturm und drang in the national news about flight cancellations due to the US government shutdown over the fight with Trump over Medical Care. Flights looked OK a week before. And then two New England supposed Democrats sold their souls and the American people to Satan.

In all the craziness, on the tenth, five days out, I realized that I had forgotten to book a Tokyo hotel. I spent hours finding that almost all hotels were booked, except for a few expensive ones still two train stops from the office. Finally, Kitamura san figured out that I could ping pong between the two Iidabashi APA hotels, and booked for me.

Friday 2025.11.14

I checked in using my iPhone the day before the flight. But the web site on my computer showed not checked in. And then I got a text saying “We’re sorry about the changes to your travel plans …” and offering a free meal voucher. So I called Global Services. We concluded that United’s computer was having a bad day.

Saturday 2025.11.15

I woke at three o’clock, did the last touches of packing, had breakfast, called an Uber at 04:25, and the Tesla arrived at 04:35. We were at the airport at five o’clock. Security was a walk-through and then there was the long walk to the E gates. I got to the gate five minutes early and boarded.

United flight 1164 to San Francisco was a 737max-9. It looked pretty full. My seatmate had the sniffles. A s usual, I was one of the few with a mask. I texted a bit with Tom Hirsch. We pushed back five minutes early at 05:55 and took off at 06:10. We landed in SFO at 07:35. Our gate was still occupied, so we sat in a penalty box for a bit and docked at gate E13 at 07:45. The walk to the G Concourse took me 20 minutes. I settled in the Polaris lounge.

I left the lounge at 09:20 for the long walk to G12 and boarded by 09:35. United flight 875 to Haneda was a 777-200 in so-so shape. and the FAs said it was completely full. I filled out the automatic immigration form and got my QR code. The doors closed at 10:05, we pushed at 10:10 five minutes early, and the wheels were up at 10:25. It was a bumpy ride for the first 3/4 of an hour. I slept through it. Then they served to takeoff meal; I had the washoku which was OK.

Sunday 2025.11.15

I slept for four hours or so and then watched a Chinese movie called “The Wig“ which was pretty good and then had the landing meal. We landed in Haneda at 14:07 and were docked by 14:20. There was the long walk to Immigration as usual. But I was through Immigration by 14:35, and in an Uber by 14:45. It was mostly sunny and 14c. The Uber was a Tesla again. traffic was light, and the driver liked having a zoomy car. We were at the APA Iidabashi Ekiminami by 15:15 and I was in my room by 15:25.

The room was a bit bigger than the last time. It had a luggage rack, but I did not think there was really room. I unpacked the computer etc., and cleaned up some minimal email. To stay awake until a reasonable hour, I watched junk until eight o’clock.

Monday 2025.11.17

I did not really sleep past two o’clock. I obsessed about bank bureaucracy and that I had not brought a copy of the revised death certificate. So I prepped Katen to FedEx one. At 07:40, I walked across the street to the machine udon shop and had a ¥700 bowl of udon with an egg; pretty junky. Amusing noise from outside as the construction workers received their morning instructions and pap talk.

By nine o’clock, I was ready to go back to sleep. But, of course, Maz was soon to arrange to meet to go to SMBC. What I needed was coffee.

At 10:15, I went to Doutor because I did not remember just how bad their coffee was. It was a beautiful 22c day, as if it was early autumn. I hopped the Tozai Sen to SMBC and met Maz in the Lobby at 11:00. They gave us the papers to be notarized, I filled them out, and we grabbed a taxi to the Japanese notary over the other side of Marunouchi to catch them before they closed for lunch at 11:30. We did the signature dance quickly, and they said for us to come back at two o’clock to pick up the papers.

We went down to the basement and ate in a saba restaurant. I had saba with miso, which was actually good. Maz wanted to go shop for a Christmas present for Kaede, so I took the Yurakacho sen back to my hotel to get a half hour nap. Maz met me at 13:30, and we took the Yurakacho back to the notary in Marunouchi and picked up the papers. Then a taxi back to SMBC. They drowned us is an amazing mass of paperwork until four o’clock, and told us to come back the next day for more. Maz headed back to Mitaka to pick up Kaede, and I took the Tozai sen back to Iidabashi to the IIJ office.

Of course I had missed Cola’s presentation of our work.

I spent time with an American Waseda grad student intern Yoshi, from Westchester, whose research was trusted environments. Then I spent time with Cola on the v6 topology work, and gossiped with other folk about v6, RPKI, security etc. I worked some and cleaned up backlog. I left the office at 18:45, and picked up some konbini food on the way back to my hotel. I worked until eight and then went to sleep.

Tuesday 2025.11.18

I woke at 03:30 which sounds bad, but it was seven and half hours of sleep. I wondered if it was not drinking coffee all day except for the bad one in the morning. I lolled around trying to get more sleep, but gave up at 06:30. I dressed and packed, as I had a discontinuous hotel stay and would have to move to the other APA Iidabashi around the corner for one night. There was a com.lb zone file issue with rip.psg.com being out of date. I looked at it, was confused, and begged Rob to take a look.

At eight, I left my luggage at the front desk and walked to Café de Crié down the street and had a ham and tomato with gloop breakfast sandwich and an Americano with an extra shot that was drinkable. At 08:30 I took Tozai Sen to Otemachi and did the long walk to the SMBC main office. Maz was a few minutes ahead of me. We went in when they opened at nine and spent an hour doing more paperwork. I wrote my home address for the nineteenth and twentieth times and stamped a lot of papers. I even used their iPad to specify the details of the transfer. We were out by ten, which was amazing. They said they had what they needed to do the transfer. I should watch, and when it was received, come back, or go to any branch to finalize closing of the account. It was 15c and a clear day, but not the previous day’s warmth. I got on Tozai Sen back to the IIJ Lab, arriving a bit before 10:30. The place was pretty empty.

I chatted with Romain about the Lab in general and some ideas for getting graduates back to visit. A gang of us wet to lunch at Charcoal Grilled Dried Fish Restaurant Echigoya Kamemaru, and I had my favorite miso gindara as usual. Then some work on the com.lb zone problem, finally hacking around it. At 15:30, Pascal and Thomas presented on using City Community Tagging to detect anycast; it was muddy and not conclusive. I reviewed a few APRICOT submissions. I resisted checking whether CitiBank had received the transfer. In reality, my guess was Thursday. I chatted more with Romain and Yoshi.

I left the office shortly after seven. I grabbed two o-nigiri at the konbini, and got my bag from the APA Iidabashi Ekiminami, which had no room that night (big concert at Tokyo Dome), and went to check in at the APA Iidabashi Ekimae two blocks away. The check-in was a big computer thing, which was as difficult as paper. But I made it. It was 80% more than the Ekiminami, and was maybe 10% larger. But it was only one night, and not a lot of choice. I unpacked, ate my o-nigiri, cleaned up some email etc, and tried to get to bed by 20:30, as it had worked the previous night.

Wednesday 2025.11.19

I managed to sleep in, with breaks, until 07:30. I began to believe this no coffee after noon thing. I showered, dressed, and packed up. I ignored email, as I assumed I would have plenty of time to deal with it in the office. I checked out of APA Iidabashi Ekimae at 08:30, dropped my luggage off back at APA Iidabashi Ekiminami where I would check in that evening, picked up a katsu sandwich at the corner shop, got a great coffee at the little place next to IIJ’s building, and was in the office by nine. It was 8c and clear blue, a pretty Tokyo fall day.

I cleaned up email until ten. I removed the ProxMox backup server work from raid0.dfw.rg.net as Rob and Hans were pushing just staying on restic. Then Rob dragged me (and a silent Hans) down a couple of DNSSEC rabbit holes. I tried calling an eyeglasses place recommended by Kitamura san, Ogura, but they did not speak English. George Michaelson talked me into trying PhotoStructure.app. So I loaded it up and let it start finding photos on my laptop.

I had lunch with Kitamura san, which was really nice. We went to a real soba ya over in Kagurazaka, Kagurazaka Kuzuryu Soba, to which I had not gone since living in Tokyo. Very tasty. We talked about her twelve year old, Annie, who was very over-sensitive, noise, social, …, but bright. And I told of Salma’s difficulties. Of course we also talked about the Lab sociology.

Back at the Lab, Kitamura san called the recommended optical/glasses shop for me, and they said it would take a week to ten days. So much for that. I chatted for a while with Pascal, an Anja Feldman graduate who had been a visitor for a few months and was going to DE-CIX. The afternoon is a quiet email time in Tokyo as the States is going to sleep and Europe has yet to wake; and the Lab was pretty empty.

I tried to reserve my flights to Jakarta in February for APRICOT but the ANA web site let me get all the way to the end and then failed with an error code. I tried three times. And I could not call them, as the English language version of the web site assumed I was in the States.

I left the office at 18:30. It was down to 10c. I stopped at the konbini and got one o-nigiri, checked back in to the APA Iidabashi Ekiminami, and unpacked. I managed to get rid of the big stack of the ¥10,000 notes I had been carrying for six years or whatever. I worked, ate my o-nigiri, and was asleep before nine o’clock.

Thursday 2025.11.20

Though fitful, I managed to sleep until 06:30. I worked for a bit, dressed, walked to the sandwich store, up the hill to the little coffee shop, and to the office by nine. I ate my sandwich, drank my coffee, and cleared a bunch of backlog. Eventually, Malte, Pierre Luis, and Romain showed up and we chatted about various research work, IIJ Lab server infrastructure, and other fun stuff. Eventually Cola showed up and we worked with him on the IPv6 topology growth work. At one o’clock, everyone went to lunch while I joined the APRICOT PC call.

As I wanted to be sure to get a good fare to APRICOT, I spent an hour on the phone with an ANA agent and actually managed to get a reservation and pay for it. As I was calling from Japan, I had to pay in JPY. But it looked as if the base rate was cheaper than the USD quote on the web site; so maybe, with the exchange costs, it came out in the wash. It took me another hour to select seats on the web site from hell. I could not select the seat on my last leg, SFO to PDX, as the site would error out.

I chatted with Christof Visser for a while. He was doing a lot of infrastructure and redundancy work in the Pacific Islands. I Then chatted international politics with two interns, one from China and one India. It was a bit sophomoric. I Left the office at about 19:30, stopped at the Konbini for minimal food, I was back in my hotel by 19:45. I worked until after nine and went to sleep.

Friday 2025.11.21

Katen and Helen woke me at four o’clock with pictures of the Bainbridge septic field work. Great progress and looked horrifyingly professional. I went back to sleep until Katen woke me at seven to ask about the bank transfer; no visible progress. So I dressed,left the hotel, got my breakfast sandwich and my sole cup of coffee (snif!), and was in the office by 08:30. It was sunny and 8c.

In the office, I ate my katsu sandwich, had my one cup of coffee (snif), exchanged RIPE political email with Mirjam, reported on the result of moderating coffee intake to a bunch of friends, cleaned up email, and wrote to the septic guy to say thanks. I worked through the morning, and made lunch dates with Emiko and Kempei (Wednesday) and Zita’s friend Peggy (Monday).

At one, five of us went over the Kagurazaka hill to Tonkatsu Kenshin, regular but good. After, Romain, Cola, and I discussed the IPv6 growth research, with an eye to a possible presentation at APRICOT; though Mark and Philip had yet to encourage me. Kitamura stopped by to say goodbye; though we might meet Wednesday morning. Pascal showed me some new interesting results on his and Thomas’s measurements using city community tags to detect anycast prefixes. I suggested RIPE Atlas traceroutes to validate anycasted sources.

I left the lab at 19:45 and headed back to the hotel. There were a lot of folk out in the side streets, eating, walking, whatever. The konbini was out of o-nigiri. As I was still not hungry after a large lunch, I took it as a sign. I stopped at the shrine, but it was a bit busy so I was not comfortable. I got back to the hotel, worked to 21:45, and went to sleep.

Saturday 2025.11.22

I woke at 03:30 to find that the bank transfer had completed. I texted Katen and went back to sleep. By 07:30 I had decided to get the hell outta Dodge, and leave closing the bank account to another trip. So I rebooked United for the same flights but on Sunday, saving three days. I wrote to Emiko apologizing for cancelling lunch with her and Kempei; a bit of a bummer. I also wrote to Peggy telling her I was bailing early. I dressed and went down to the lobby and spent 15 minutes dealing with the early departure. They were kind. I grabbed my usual katsu sandwich at the corner and headed up the hill. The favorite coffee shop, Aomi Coffee, was closed until ten o’clock, so I had to settle for FourBucks; half as good, almost twice the price.

In the Lab, I emailed Kitamura san and Romain about my bailing early. A RIPE/NCC email conversation with Mirjam got pretty serious. At eleven, Peggy called on the phone and we agreed to meet for soba at 12:30. I kept working until 12:15 when I walked to Kagurazaka Kuzuryu Soba to meet Peggy, who was 20 minutes late as usual. I did not have to hold up my end of the conversation to say the least; nary a word in edgewise. We finally broke up at 15:15, and I was back at the office by 15:30. It was a gorgeous day, 17c and clear.

In Second Life, a neighbor offered to sell a piece of land we had always wanted. We started discussing price while I looked in all our accounts for land tier. When I went to look in Zita’s account, it was suspended!! I wrote to Aiyana to ask what the heck was up. Per Rob’s suggestion, I started to installing forgejo to migrate git.rg.net. That lasted until seven in the evening when I gave up and walked back to my hotel. There was a complex exchange where they had left a note asking if I would please return the original receipt as I was checking out early and it would change. It was in my room and the room key did not work. So it was a few elevator rides. I read until eleven and went to sleep.

Sunday 2025.11.23

I woke at seven, dressed, and started packing. Fergal had great comments on my long term view presentation. So I incorporated them and sent it off to Hans Petter. Fergal and I exchanged a bunch of email about the usual. I finished packing by 09:30, and went down to check out. I left my luggage as I did not want to haul it up the hill to the Lab. It was finally cloudy, and a warmish 10c. On the way up, I stopped at the konbini for an o-nigiri, and arrived at Aomi Coffee just as it opened at ten o’clock. I chatted once more with Fergal and hacked some more on the forgejo conversion. A co-researcher at the Lab, Thomas Krenc, pointed me to a podcast on Tokyo micro-scale, The Magic of Tokyo, which I found a good description and explanation.

At one o’clock, I headed out of the Lab and walked back to the APA Iidabashi Ekiminami to pick up my luggage. Having had no lunch, I was tempted to stop for another o-nigiri; but one may not eat while walking or in the train. The streets were full of people and the shrine was totally crowded for Thanksgiving. I wondered if this was the last time I would see Tokyo and missed Zita a lot.

I got my luggage from the hotel and walked the one block to the Tozai Sen which I took to Nihonbashi to change to the Asakuka Rapid Express for the thirty minute ride to Haneda Terminal 3. I got a seat on both trains. I arrived in Haneda just after two o’clock. I went to check-in for the doc check, and decided to not check my bag. I walked through security and Emigration, and was in the ANA lounge by 14:15. As I had eaten little, I had three pieces of spicy, for Japan, Korean karaage and some rice. I cleaned up some final email and pretended to work.

At 15:30, I waked down to the gate and played the Global card to cut through boarding. United flight 876 to San Francisco looked to be the same 777-200 as I flew in, and was in OK shape. I think it was full. Because I had booked late, I had a non-window; no big deal. We pushed back at 16:25, exactly on time, and took off at 16:45. The captain came on the PA and was a woman. I watched Rocky Horror Picture Show which I had never seen. I was impressed. Acting, choreography, music, production. No wonder it remains a classic. The washouku was OK and I indulged in a citrus cake and watched Goodfellas. Then I slept for maybe three to hours until the landing washouku, which was much better than that on the same flight in September.

We made the softest landing ever at 08:50, taxied for 15 minutes, and were then tugged to the gate. I was through Immigration by 09:15. but, due to the construction, to get to the domestic terminals, put us outside a long walk, and then a partial walk back to get to global services entry. then security claimed I was randomly selected and they wanted to wipe my cell phone. I powered it down and let them do it. I watched and all they did was wipe it with the Kleenex. I was done by 09:45. The United Club was standing room only, but the agent said Global flying business, go to the Maple Leaf Lounge which was roomy and comfortable. I worked with Rob and crew on forgejo and texted with Lucy. Without thinking, I had a small bit of chicken in a cream sauce; and this was 30 minutes before I needed to head to the gate. So I hung around the lounge for an extra twenty minutes and then headed to the gate. Despite their computer telling me that the plane was about to board, when I got to the gate the equipment wasn’t even there. At 12:35 I sat down and watched the plane arrive. We finally started boarding at 12:55.

United flight 1668 to Portland was a 737-900 in very new shape. The plane was full, but some standbys made it on. They closed the door at 13:20. Wheels were up at 13:37. I slept the entire way. We landed at 15:06. Then there was the long walk, and I was in an Uber by 15:33. The Uber came in one minute! It was very grey, foggy, with a misty drizzle, and 14c. I got home at four o’clock. There was much petting of the cat as I unpacked. She claimed Katen and Latif had not fed her the entire time I was gone.

Bucharest for RIPE 91

To be able to make an Exec Board video call on Friday the 15th, I had scheduled to fly the previous Wednesday. Eventually, I realized that this was crazy as it would stick me in Bucharest for four extra days. But I could not change it online as Air Canada said no alternate flights were available. I had great trouble reaching them on the phone with ridiculous wait times, and they dropped a call after thirty minutes on hold. I finally go through on Thursday 2025.09.11, and managed to change it to leave on the Friday late enough to make the video call first.

Friday 2025.10.17

I had a midnight to 02:00 NCC Board zoom which whacked me for the whole day. Jet lagged half a day before my flight. Liz had stayed over to avoid a neighbor’s roof construction, so the morning was less simple and ritualistic than usual. Once Rosa finished with the upstairs, I packed. It took about 45 minutes, half of which was meds and so forth. I worked most of the day. Lizzie took about as much attention as Kaiby? :). Lufthansa texted or whatever to tell me the Vancouver to Munich flight would be forty minutes late. I suspected there would be further slippage. The Internet said the TSA queue time at PDX was eleven minutes, which seemed good to me.

Liz offered to drive me to PDX. We left at two o’clock. Traffic was heavy; I had underestimated Friday. But we were still at the airport by 14:30. I stopped at the Air Canada counter for a doc check and to pick up a paper pass for that missing third segment. TSA was a bit of a pain as I set off the alarm; but made it through quickly. I was in the United Lounge by 14:45. I had a half of a bad sandwich to hold me over.

i headed for the gate at 15:30 for a 15:35 boarding, and then sat in the boarding area for ten minutes. i was on board by 15:50. Air Canada 8653 was an old de Havilland Q400 and completely full. We pushed exactly on time at four o’clock and took off at 16:15. The flight attendant was sniffling and I was the only person wearing a mask. It was supposed to be a 45 minute flight but took 55., landing at 17:10 and at the gate at 17:15.

I did the walk to automated passport control and had fun finding the Air Canada Lounge. I had some udon and checked email. At 18:25 I headed to the gate, and was on board by 18:40. Lufthansa flight 477 to Munich was an AirBus 350-900 in spiffy shape. I imagine it was pretty full. The flight was captained by Stefanie Schwartz. Yay! It pushed 30 minutes late at 19:10 and took off at 19:30. The meal was OK. I did some work, watched Godfather 2, and slept for a few hours.

Saturday 2025.10.18

I woke 1:45 out of Munich, but skipped the breakfast and just had a bad cup of coffee. We landed at 13:30 and were at the gate by 13:35. It was a short walk to Passport Control and a short line. I was through by 13:45, took the train over to the G Concourse, settled in the Lufthansa Senator Lounge,and had a bite to eat, a double espresso, and picked up email.

At three o’clock, I walked down to the gate waited about three minutes and then got to walk down four flights and stairs to get on the bus for a long ride to a distanct stand. I was on board by 15:25. Lufthansa flight 1652 to Bucharest was an AirBus 319–100, and a bit funky. I think it was full in back but not in front. At least three people had kitties in carriers. We pushed at 15:55, 20 minutes late. Then taxied for 20 minutes and took off at 16:10. We landed in Bucharest at 19:05 and took a tow to the gate. It was a long walk to the exit. I ran into somebody I knew and I agreed to share a ride and then he disappeared. I waited twenty minutes. The airport Wi-Fi wasn’t working and I was having a hard time raising Uber. I was finally in an Uber at 19:45. The driver had to take a detour through town because there was a very serious accident on the freeway. We arrived at the JW Marriott Bucharest Grand Hotel at 28:30 and I was in my room by 20:45. I unpacked and was asleep by ten o’clock.

Sunday 2025.10.19

I woke at 02:30 and asked Katen about the No Kings March, which evidently went quite well and non-violently. I slept in to 08:30, dressed, and went down to breakfast. The spread was OK, but not great. I sat with some Swiss/French friends. It was a pretty day with a pretty view.

At 10:30, I went to the Secretariat office to settle in and work and listen to the staff gossip. At 12:30, I went across the street to a chicken shawarma joint with the networking crew. There was nothing else close. And if one ordered carefully, it was almost healthy. I worked until four thirty and then napped until seven.

At 19:30, a bunch if the board and NCC management met in the lobby and we walked a half hour to Hanu’ Berarilor Casa Oprea Soare to have dinner for fourteen of us. It was a fancy beer hall with a large menu, two bad signs. I teamed with Mirjam and had a bunch of vegetarian starters etc. Then the stuffed cabbage, which was luke warm and mediocre at best.

At 21:40, Sander and Mirjam said it was time to go, and Sander got us an Uber back to the Marriott. I was in bed by 22:30.

Monday 2025.10.20

I woke at two and slept fitfully at best until 07:30 when I dressed and went down to breakfast. I sat with some NCC folk and had scrambled eggs, a pork sausage, and some fair bread. Then I wandered the lobby and talked with folk. At 0930, the Global Cyber Alliance had a two hour side meeting about measurement. It started pretty much in outer space thanks to ISOC, but gained focus as time went on. I had to leave early as I had to attend the Newcomers’ Session. I had a short chat with Fergal about the charging scheme and then went to lunch where I accidentally sat with a bunch of NCC staff. Athina and I chatted and tried to recruit NCC Board candidates. Then we had a short chat with Constanze and Andrei regarding the ICP-2 document.

Then the first real Plenary with the usual prelude, but including a set of welcome dancers by the Bucheresti local host.

The first technical presentation was by Maz on IPv6 scanning. Then gNMI and other semi-interesting things. The Plenary ended at 17:00 and at 17:30 we had a long session on ICP-2 which segued into a small conversation with HPH, Athina, Constanze, Andrei, Herve, etc. Then we all had to attend the Opening Reception with Meet the Board etc. At 21:00, the board, Mirjam, and assorted NCC staff retreated to the in-hotel steak house for a dinner that lasted until 23:30. I was asleep about midnight.

Tuesday 2025.10.21

I got very little sleep. Essentially was up by three. At seven I dressed, cleaned up a bit of email. I had an eight o’clock breakfast with Laura, Mirjam, Niall, and Anna regarding how to accommodate under age (18) fellowship applicants and attendees. Niall had a 17 year old local who he wanted to invite to the May meeting in Edinburgh and Laura, an NCC super retentive bureaucrat was freaking out. Detente was reached with some effort, but with humor and respect. Then I wandered into the Plenary which did not impress me. Talking to Matthias after, he was horrified,

Lunch was in a private room with the NCC Board, two Board folk from ARIN and their lawyer, three from LACNIC, and two from APNIC, one of whom was Maz. Instead of exploring how we could cooperatively improve the Internet, the ARIN folk dominated the meeting for over an hour explaining how the ARIN banana republic structured itself to protect itself from the proletariat. Then I had time with Andrei and Constanze from the NRO ICP-2 team, followed by an NCC Board group photo shoot, which seemed a bit silly. The last technical session of the day was the MAT (measurement) Working Group., which started with Geoff Huston on Network Measurement in the Dark, i.e. when the data are hidden by surveillance prevention. Then the Italian IP blocking disaster. Then DNS measurements.

I gossiped with Hans Petter for a bit, attended the Diversity session, and went up to my room to dump my stuff and get a jacket, Then I met Matthias and Mirjam to go out to dinner at Kaimo, where Matthias had succeeded in getting a reservation. At 19:30 we had a delicious dinner, and did not get back to the hotel until 23:30. I went to sleep.

Wednesday 2025.10.22

I slept to five, and gave up and worked. I had a nice breakfast with Liman. Then I talked with Rüdiger and Hans Petter in the hallway before I sat in a bring Connect WG session and cleaned up email. There was some EB faffing because of the slime NRO/NC candidate scam from Germany. I had a calm lunch and then cornered Michael Abejuela, the ARIN lawyer, who seemed somewhat sensible.

I had to attend the NCC Services WG, which was repetitive and boring. Then there was the NCC Members’ General Meeting, which was totally boring PowerPoint bombardment. I had to be on the stage and managed to stay awake for most of it.

I took a one hour nap and then met Mirjam and Anna to go to Aubergine which was funky but tasty. We got back at 22:30 and I was asleep by 23:30.

Thursday 2025.10.23

I was up from 01:00 to 05:00 and then woke to the alarm at 07:30. After breakfast, I hung out in the hallway to be open and social. I had a conversation with Tim B and then HPH about a single RPKI root for a cooperation between APNIC and RIPE. Then more corridor time followed by the Address Policy Working Group. There was an interesting presentation on RIPE document history, and Marco did a great job on Registration Services.

I had lunch with Rüdiger and a German contingent and then went back to the boring second half of Address Policy. After Address policy, I had lunch, napped until 17:00, and then went to the Shaping the RIPE NCC’s Strategic Direction BoF. Then I changed to smart but informal and queued for the bus to the dinner. I sat with Mirjam, Anna, Hans Petter and wife, and a gang of others. The food was sub-mediocre. There was a performer who did silks quite well.

We left before closing to catch an eleven o’clock bus. I slept the whole way back to the hotel and was in bed shortly after midnight.

Friday 2025.10.24

I got four and a half hours of sleep, woke to the alarm at eight, and had breakfast with Mirjam, Anna, and Niall. Then coffee and sitting with Maz at the morning Plenary. I reserved my Tokyo flights for November to deal with the bank mess. The rest of the Plenary was not exciting. Constanze won the NRO election by a landslide. And the Secret Working Group was sad. I had lunch, said goodbye to Mirjam and Anna, and went upstairs to take a nap.

I woke at five o’clock and showered. Maz texted to meet in lobby at six. We decided not to leave hotel. Neither of us had the energy to go out, so we went to the hotel Italian restaurant. It was, shall we say, tolerable. But we did get to hang out for two hours, chat, come up with some constructive ideas for APNIC/RIPE cooperation etc. I was back in my room at eight, cleaned up email, chatted with Hans and Cristel, and organized to depart early in the morning. I was asleep by shortly after nine.

Saturday 2025.10.25

I could not sleep past two o’clock. I texted, well signaled, with Lucy who fell out of the trial to attack her blood disease. Packed. Checked out by 03:45. We were on the road by 03:40. My phone said I had left my laptop behind, but I was sure it was in the boot. Bucharest had worse potholes then Portland. They also seemed to have a serious medical and dental tourism business. We arrived at the airport by 4:05. I was checked in by 04:15, checking my bag as it was homeward bound. The security queue was quite long. I was through by 04:35. It was a bit of a walk to the Lufthansa lounge, which was shall we say funky, with broken coffee machines, little place to sit, etc. With much effort, and a long queue, I managed to get a double espresso. And I actually found a seat. The Wi-Fi was unusable. Boarding was supposed to be at 05:35 so I headed to the gate at 05:25, to find the boarding it already started and was a little aggressive. I was on board by 05:45.

Lufthansa flight 1423 to Frankfurt was an AirBus 321-200 and completely full. We pushed on time at six o’clock. We taxied forever and took off at 06:15. I ate the mediocre breakfast. We landed in Frankfurt at 07:33, taxied to a stand, and were bussed, arriving at Terminal A at about eight. We went through the tunnel to the other terminal, and up to passport control with no queue. Dave wanted to use the Air Canada Lounge, so we did, and were settled in by 08:20. While the Air Canada Lounge was more comfortable than Lufthansa’s, it did not have quite the same spread, particularly geräucherter schinken. So, at 09:00, I dragged Dave and went to the Lufthansa Senator Lounge. They had no shinken!!! At eleven, Dave headed out to his flight and I walked 1km to the Senator Lounge at the advice of the Biz Lounge attendant. It was much emptier, had same food, and a German, not an American, shouting into his phone.

I left the lounge at 12:30 for the long walk to the other end of B Concourse, arriving while there was still a crowd. I boarded anyway as there was no uncrowded place to hide. I had found my seat in the nose of the plane at 12:45 next to a macho South Africaaner. i watched them load my luggage using FindMyIPhone.

Lufthansa flight 492 to Vancouver was a 747-400. We pushed back at 13:28. It was raining. wheels were up at 13:45. I had a small nap until the take-off meal, watched Blood Diamonds, and slept until the fuss of the landing meal which I did not eat.

We landed at 14:55, followed by the usual long walk to security and US Passport Control. I settled in the Maple Leaf Lounge by 15:20, checked email, and had some rice with mystery meat. We were due to board at 17:05, so I left the lounge at 17:00 to find they were already boarding. Air Canada 8654 was an old de Havilland Q400 and completely full. So I did. I slept the whole way until we landed at 18:37. I did the 1 km walk to baggage claim arriving at 19:05, and baggage was still not up. We had the luggage at 19:15 and I walked out to Lyft pickup. It was a five minute wait to 19:21, and I was home at 19:45.

A Day Trip to Eugene to See Lucy and Joel

Saturday 2025.10.11

I had been procrastinating about just about everything. So i thought I would try to break the cycle by just doing one of the thinks i had been postponing, visiting Lucy and Joel in Eugene.

I did my normal morning, actually sleeping in a bit. As it was just a day trip, it needed no prep, packing, or other logistics. Maybe I should have fed Kermit fully, but he was at 73%, so what the heck. I poured the last of my coffee in my thermos, asked Katen to feed Kaiby? in the evening, and managed to get out the door by noon.

The drive was relatively easy, traffic most of the way, but not bad. It took two hours, and I arrived just before two o’clock. Joel had a Level-2 cable to feed Kermit; though it took me an hour to remember to tell Kermit it was OK to eat off power saving schedule.

I had never been to Lucy’s before. Her place was small, close, warm, and stuffed. But they were remodeling a second adjacent space, and together it would be downright modern but cozy. And the site was definitely old Eugene and very wooded. We spent the afternoon talking: Lucy’s illness, Joel’s doing construction, my state and work, etc. etc. We went for a walk, maybe 1km, around the neighborhood.

At 17:30, we rode in Joel’s Tesla to Domek, an Eastern European restaurant with a modern twist. We had starters of potato trout coquette (quite tasty), golden beets & cream, which was tasty but classic, deruny, delicate and delicious, and garlic pork sausage which had some killer spinach and other tasties. All in all, it was a bit chaotic and slow, but delicious. I would rate it above Katchka in Portland.

At maybe 19:30 or so, we drove back to Lucy’s. Kermit was at 30% or so, and I headed North. Kermit was not going to make it without a charging stop. The computer suggested Albany, which turned out to be a 60kw Hundai dealer very close tot eh freeway. So it was a bit slow to get to the 50% the computer said would give me a good margin to get home. I arrived before 20:30, unwound, and went to sleep.

Tokyo to Visit IIJ and Sumitomo Mitsubishi Bank

I had been trying to get to Tokyo for four years, mostly to close out our old Japanese SMBC accounts which had been locked. I had kept canceling reservations due to Covid or Zita’s cancer. This time it seemed I would make it.

Sunday 2025.09.14

I packed lackadaisically during the day while doing work stuff and housework to prepare for my absence. I went over to Katen’s for a chicken soup dinner. As I was leaving she mentioned that she had just done her taxes. Whoops! I realized I needed to do my quarterlies. So back home I had that on top of housekeeping. I managed, and took out garbage, etc.

Monday 2025.09.15

I could not sleep past three o’clock, so dressed and finished packing. I worked, ate breakfast, did last chores, and then called a Lyft at 05:55. I was at the airport by 06:30, decided to check my bag as I would be in no rush at Haneda, and was in the United Lounge by 06:45. At 07:15 I left the lounge and headed to the gate. I almost made it when my phone said the flight was delayed to 08:25, i.e. 40 minutes, due to air traffic control throttling in SFO. So I went back to the lounge. At 07:45 the lounge attendant said we should head to the gate and board. So I headed for the gate and did so.

United flight 1660 was an AirBus 320 in clean condition. It was not completely full but close. Maybe 10% of folk were masked which was unfortunately high in my recent experience. We landed in SFO at ten o’clock, and only had to wait a few minutes for the gate and jetway.. When we docked, Global Service detoured me into a limo which took three of us over to gate G1 through too much construction and confusion. I was in my seat on the Tokyo flight by 10:20.

United flight 875 to Haneda was a 777-200 in clean but aging shape. While we finished boarding and pushed back, I did the automated Japan entry forms on my phone in the hopes it would reduce the craziness on arrival. I napped, had a mediocre Japanese take-off meal, read some more junk, napped, had a horrible landing meal with cold and dry rice, and read until the landing.

Tuesday 2025.09.16, Zita’s Birthday

We landed at Haneda at 12:55. My APEC card helped a lot through immigration, as did the pre-registration QR code. I was out in the arrivals hall by 14:35. Things got a little crazy finding the Uber pickup point, especially as it was 36c and 200% humidity. But we were in motion by 14:50. Luckily I checked email to find a message from my hotel saying they had canceled my reservation. I had made the classic mistake of reserving from the day before due to international time zones. I called them and they fixed it. Traffic was heavy, but we were at the hotel by 15:35.

The APA Hotel Iidabashi Ekiminami was clean but quite modest, almost minimal. No English anywhere, which did not really deter me. The WiFi was good, so I cleaned up email and took a shower. At five o’clock I heard the bells I had all but forgotten. They brought heartache for the years Zita and I were together in Tokyo. I wanted to sleep but knew that was a bad idea. I upgraded my iPhones and was asleep by eight o’clock.

Wednesday 2025.09.17

I woke at five and could not get back to sleep. But that was a decent sleep, so no complaints. I dressed and cleaned up email until seven o’clock when I could walk up the street to the sister hotel for breakfast. It was poor, minimal, but pretty typical, soft egg, fish with tomago, miso soup, rice, and a salad with potato salad. The coffee was horrifying. I went back to my room to work until I could head to the office at nine. The walk to the office was fifteen minutes including a stop at the 7-Eleven for masks. It was 29c and rising.

I stopped at the FourBucks for an iced double, and went up to the office. My badge stll worked. Two German visitors were in the office, and my old desk was empty. Kitmura san soon arrived, and I settled in to the WiFi. I had forgotten my mouse at the hotel, so had to borrow kit.

I spent the morning with Romain, the new Germans and French, etc. discussing existing and new research. Suddenly my Mac started being crazy, as if it had a stuck left arrow key. We tried to debug. At one o’clock, We went to lunch downstairs at the classic fish restaurant and I had a delicious gindara as I remembered. After lunch, Cola, Romain, and I worked on the IPv6 history project. My Mac’s keyboard brokenness was making me crazy. I finally discovered that it was associating with a broken Bluetooth keyboard I had tried. I killed the association and everything went back to useful and normal. Whew!

The new guest researcher from Oliver Gasser’s group cornered me for an hour on ISP BGP policy and strategies a la the old Borg work. So I gave him the old Borg presentations.

Because I had an eight o’clock call I wanted to make from my hotel room, at seven o’clock I headed out. It was down to a tolerable 31c, so I did not even break a sweat in the ten minute walk. I stopped at the neighborhood poke joint, and picked up a take-away ahi poke and ate it back in my room. It was OK; what do you want for ¥1,000? I worked until nine and crashed.

Thursday 2025.09.18

I slept much of the night, well minus three hours, and woke to the alarm at eight. I dressed, went to the other APA for the bad breakfast, and across the street to the Doutor for a mediocre iced double espresso in hopes of becoming awake. It was already 32c outside.

At 10:15, Maz met me at my hotel to help with liberating my funds from SMBC. He wanted to try a convenient local branch first, despite my recommending the main office where my accounts actually were. So we walked there in the rising heat, and spent almost an hour before they said for us to please go to the main office. It was 36c when we took the Tozai Line to Otemachi and went to the SMBC Main Office. Much back and forth ensued. Eventually, they said they wanted Zita’s death certificate and Letters of Testamentary translated to Nihongo and then they could probably transfer her funds to my account. Then they wanted me to come back for seven business days, i.e. two weeks, so that I would be easily on call if/when they hit speed bumps in closing my accounts and transferring them to the States.

Then Maz and I went across the street to SMBC Prestia, which had bought CitiBank JP. It took maybe a half hour to close my accounts there and have the funds transferred to my SMBC accounts which would then transfer to the States, inshallah.

Then Maz indulged me in grabbing a taxi to go to Jimbocho to my old small family soba ya. We had age nasu soba and reminisced.

Then Maz headed back to Mitaka to pick Kaede up after school and I walked down Hon Dori to see if the quaint old washi place was still there. It was not. Many of the places I remembered on Hon Dori were no longer there, starting with Sanseido, the big book store. And many new buildings had replaced old. It made me feel no longer at home. So I headed to the IIJ Lab, grabbing a double over ice as I entered.

I worked and chatted in the lab until five o’clock when I headed back to the hotel before rain was due, as I had neglected to carry my umbrella. I showered and re-dressed to meet Maz and Kaede at six o’clock. Izumi would meet us at the restaurant as she worked quite near Tokyo Eki. So I met Maz and Kaede at six, and we walked maybe 700m to Yakitori Kagurazaka Imaiya Yakitori Kagurazaka Imaiya, an up-scale modern place and and had a really tasty dinner. It was a cool 25c, so a nice walk.

Izumi and I talked about Zita, difficult and formal signaling issues between Japanese parents, etc. And then we played a finger count guessing game I don’t think we have in the States. At eight, it was time to get them on the train for the hour ride to Mitaka, but we had some chaos with Izumi not finding one of her three phones. We said goodbye, and I navigated directly back to my hotel without using my phone. I was asleep by 21:30.

Friday 2025.09.19

I woke at 07:40, dressed, cleaned up email, checked in with Katen, and, at 08:45, headed up the hill toward the office. I had skipped the bad hotel breakfast. I stopped at FourBucks far a double Americano and a piece of too sweet cake. I texted with Katen and Lizzie.

By ten, folk started to arrive. I chatted with Pierre and others and finished reading Thomas Krenc’s paper on BGP city communities. At 13:15, folk finally decided to go to lunch. We walked over to Kagaruzaka and way over the hill past the shrine to Tonkatsu Sakataro that was pretty good. We walked back and I got coffee at Aomi by IIJ, which I had forgotten about; much better and cheaper than FourBucks.

I processed some more email and homework, and then met for an hour with Cola and Romain to discuss the IPv6 history project some more. It was like 2010 and Olaf all over again; too much data obscuring what should be a simple story.

At six o’clock, I met Shima san in the IIJ building lobby and we walked over to Kagurazaka to eat. It was Friday evening, so the place he had planned was full. He mucked with his iPhone a bit and we walkd a bit more and went to ????? Nakizakasa, a really good fish restaurant who managed to seat us. We had various wonderful food

and talked about what each of us had been doing since I was last in Tokyo. We finished up about 19:30, and we parted ways at the Tozia entrance of Iidabashi Eki. I made it back to my hotel in 15 minutes, diddled at work for a while, and was asleep by ten.

Saturday 2025.09.20

As the office was not open on Saturday, and I would need to check out of the hotel, I figured to just go to Haneda early and hang out in the lounge. So I woke at eight, dressed etc., and worked. I skipped the hotel’s bad breakfast again, figuring I would get better food in the ANA Lounge. I checked out at ten, but Uber was optimistic as usual and I was not in the car until 10:20. Despite being Saturday there were spots of traffic. The driver chose the monorail route, not the Rainbow Bridge. We arrived at Haneda Terminal 3 at 10:50. United was not yet open, so I went through Security and Emigration and found the ANA Lounge by 11:15. I had a small soba and some Korean style karaage and chatted with Katen about Salma’s fever, now at six days. Air Pikachu was still flying!!

And the lounge had great toilet art I could not resist photographing

I headed for the gate at 15:10. It was a short walk, not nearly as bad as that of the inbound. As boarding was just starting as I arrived, I could get on immediately. United flight 876 to San Francisco was a 777–200, maybe newer than the one I came over on. It was the same attendants, or at least some of them were. We pushed back ten minutes early, and then waited 20 minutes in some penalty box by the active runway, finally taking off at 16:25. I read my trashy novel until the takeoff washuko meal which was pretty good. I then read for a few minutes and went to sleep until the landing meal of yellowtail which was OK.

We landed San Francisco at 9:05. I was through Global Entry by 9:15. I had a very long walk along way to the D gates, the new United expansion. But security was quick. I got a Peete’s coffee and looked for the United lounge, but there was none at the D gates. So I sat in a public area, had my coffee, and checked email.

I walked to the gate just in time to board at 10:15 and was in my seat at 10:20. United flight 2119 was a 737max-9 in good shape and completely full. We took off on time and I read my novel the whole way to Portland without falling asleep. We landed at 12:20, but it took until 12:55 to be in a Lyft. Traffic was a bit of a mess. but I was home at 13:25.

A Week in Amsterdam for a RIPE Exec Board Meeting

Sunday 2025.08.31

Since my flight was in the evening, I did not start packing until mid-morning. First, I had a last bit of laundry. But by 14:00 I was even with work and pretty much packed. I had my Gouda and Fuji apple lunch and then summoned a Lyft at 16:15, was in the car by 16:30 and at the Portland airport 20 minutes later. I hit the check-in counter to do the document check. Security was a walk-through, and they directed me to the United Lounge; though Condor seemed to be part of the Alaska Alliance. I had a cup of tea and texted Katen who was helping Suzie start the move to her new cabin.

At 18:00 I headed for the gate. It was chaos for some reason but I managed to board by 18:20. Condor Air 2091 was an AirBus 330-900 in clean shape; though hard seats. We pushed ten minutes late at 18:45. I watched a bad movie for an hour or so and had the quite mediocre takeoff meal. I think I slept for six or seven hours. I was woken for the bad breakfast with weak coffee.

Monday 2025.09.01

We landed in Frankfurt at 13:50, taxied to somewhere way out in the boonies and parked at a frelling stand. We waited ten minutes for the stairs, down which I had to carry my luggage, and then drove from Wiesbaden to Frankfurt. Happily they let us off at the A Terminal which was my outbound flight. Passport control was trivial and I was in the Lufthansa lounge by 14:15.

As we were due to board at 16:00 I left the lounge. It turned out we did not board until 16:30 and then it was down a flight of stairs to get on the bus to go back to the remote area, climb another set of stairs with luggage, and get on a teeny CRJ 900. Lufthansa flight 996 to Amsterdam was not completely full.

We landed at 17:50 and taxied for 10 minutes. Then down the stairs, and the long walk and then down two flights of stairs as the escalator was not working. My back was killing me from carrying my bag up and down stairs to/from planes. I made it through the exit but the SIM card sellers were closed. So I went to catch the 18:35 to Amsterdam Centraal but it was canceled. So I got the 18:39 which was five minutes late.

The Kimpton de Witt was a ten minute walk from Centraal, and check-in was empty. So I was in my room by 19:20. Not the most efficient trip. But, as Zita would say, a first world problem.

Tuesday 2025.09.02

I slept for two hours and then from 06:00 to waking to the alarm at 08:00 after a night of negligible sleep. I dressed and walked to Centraal where I got a new OV Kart and bought a ham and cheese croissant. Then down the road to the NCC, where I tailgated someone who knew me. Fergal met me at the barista, and gave me a key card and we had coffee and gossiped. I said good morning to many people. At about ten, Cristel arrived, and we spent the day talking measurement with Ties and Tim, and I was drawn multiple times into layer nine discussions with passers by. Lunch was served and much coffee was had. At about 17:45, I went to chat with Hans Petter; but it was cut short by my having to go meet Mirjam and Kees for dinner at Capital Kitchen. We had a nice evening. I took the Metro back to Centraal, and was back in my room and attempting to sleep by eleven.

Wednesday 2025.09.03

After negligible sleep, I woke to the alarm at eight and walked to the office. There was breakfast. I spent the day talking with Simon-Jan about the charging scheme, budget, etc. In the evening, Raymond, Piotr, and Maria had arranged dinner at Ashoka, an Indian restaurant across from the hotel. The food was good but typical Indian for Westerners.

We then went back to the hotel and sat in the lounge for a while.

Thursday 2025.09.05

I slept from six to waking to the alarm at eight after a night of negligible sleep. I dressed and walked to the NCC office where breakfast was served. The Board meeting started at nine, and lasted all day. At seven in the evening, we walked to the Sea Palace Restaurant, the Chinese fantasy on the river just down from the office.

Mirjam and I bailed at ten, and I went back to the hotel to try and get some sleep.

Friday 2025.09.05

I woke to the alarm at eight after negligible sleep, and walked to the NCC office. There was a light breakfast, and an intense day of Board meeting. That ended at about five, and I went back to the hotel and napped from 17:30 to 20:30. I walked across the way to Koepel Cafe and had an entrecot with salad. Back at the hotel, I read a bit and was trying to sleep by midnight.

Saturday 2025.09.06

I woke at noon and dressed. I grabbed a coffee, banana, and cake in the lobby cafe, and started cleaning up the email and the backlog. At three, I went on a search for Katen’s candy. I went to the local Albert Heijn. Then an 1.5km walk with a million tourists to the giant Albert Heijn at Dam Square. I then visited four candy stores along the shopping street. One had sold out of them last week. Haribo was everywhere, of course; but no Mao Croqui. I figured to try again at Schiphol and Frankfurt en route home. But I did get a 5km walk, 22c and sunny. I was still jet lagged and needed a nap.

At six, I headed past Centraal and past Sea Palace to A Beautiful Mess, a hipster Maghreb style restaurant to have a nice dinner with Mirjam and Kees.

We had a nice meal and good conversation. I was back in my hotel by 21:30, and asleep by eleven.

Sunday 2025.09.07

I woke at eight, showered, dressed, packed, was out of the hotel by 08:40, and after walking to Centraal, was on the 09:05 Sprinter to Schiphol. I decided to check my bag for the first time since forever, as I did not want to haul it down and up stairs to the Lufthansa City Hopper as I had on the inbund. So I went to the Lufthansa counter. Security was easy and I went to duty-free and managed to get one of Katen’s two cosmetics. After some searching, I found the Star Alliance Lounge, and had coffee and ham and bread and cheese.

Lufthansa texted that my flight to Frankfurt was delayed by 25 minutes. And then it took further delays. Eventually, the flight was canceled. They sent me a text saying that I could try to re-book using my phone, but nothing worked. Then I got a text saying they had re-booked me on KLM to Vancouver. So I went to KLM transfer desk T2 and they had a reservation but could not print a boarding pass for at least an hour. So I went through automated passport control and the to KLM lounge. As I did not have a boarding pass or the booking number I could not get a ticket to enter the service desk queue. Finally, they took pity on me and an agent started working it. That was at 12:30 and it took to 14:00, an hour and a half. The ticking carrier was Condor, the flight Lufthansa, and this was KLM, And Condor was zero help. Lufthansa did not have the ticket number. The agent was very good, but he kept getting sent around in loops. Eventually, he got some very senior person on the phone and they gave him the magic numbers he needed. He printed my boarding passes at two o’clock, and I got a snack and some water and waited for my flight.

At 14:30, I headed for the gate, a ten minute walk, waited for ten more minutes, and boarded. KLM flight 681 was a quite spiffy and completely full Boeing 777-300. I slept a bit, watched Amsterdam, and did some homework. We landed in Vancouver at 15:40, and I did the very long walk to passport control and security. I was then in the US area. But Alaska had no lounge, and I had almost three hours to my flight; a first world problem. I sat in a not too uncomfortable seat and got on the WiFi. But I kept having to move because of coughers.

I went to the gate at 18:30, and we boarded at 18:45. I looked at my phone, and the Air Tag in my luggage said it was a fair bit away in the airport, a bad sign but too late to do anything about it. Alaska 2127 to Portland was an Embraer 175 in very spiffy shape and completely full. I read mail for the short flight until we landed in Portland at 20:10. It was a long walk from the B Concourse to Baggage Claim. My iPhone told me that my luggage was still in Vancouver. So I spent 20 minutes at baggage claim doing the paperwork to get my bag some time in the future. It was the first time I had checked luggage in a long while, and it failed. I headed for the pick-up area and summoned a Lyft. The driver was a hipster in a stick shift BMW 3, but he drove very sensibly. I was home by 21:30.

Lillestrøm for a RIPE NCC Exec Board Meeting

In Lisbon, when I was elected to the NCC Executive Board, I was told that I should plan to be at the EB meeting in Lillestrøm on 28 June. This would normally have been a two day meeting, and during the week, but it was to be up against an IGF meeting, so was squeezed. After some discussion with Daniella, I booked it myself on Lufthansa as it had the best pricing and i could get lie-flat seats to/from Europe in one hop, avoiding US domestic cross-country. I would only get one day home after returning from the family trip to the Big Island.

Tuesday 2025.06.24

I unpacked from the Hawai`i trip, did a laundry, and started packing my small carry-on for the Oslo run.

Wednesday 2025.06.25

I was in the Lyft at 08:55. The driver had succulents planted in the console well. The car was a Kia hybrid and she said she liked it a lot. We arrived at PDX at 08:20. The airport was empty. I stopped at Air Canada check-in because the app had not given me the boarding pass for the FRA-OSL segment. There was zero queue. Same with TSA and security. My bag set off the inspection for human remains. They were kind. I grabbed a decaf Italiano at Stumptown, plugged my laptop in at the really nice laptop tables, and tried to deal with the day’s AfriNIC drama.

At 09:30 i headed to the gate and boarded. Air Canada flight 8651 was a funky De Havilland Q400 turboprop and was completely full. I took off 20 minutes late at 10:20. I slept the ride to Vancouver, where we landed at 11:10. I went through passport control and settled in the Air Canada signature lounge to have some Hamachi and steak. There was much back-and-forth in signal regarding the RIR statement supporting ICANN I had initiated. The Vancouver to Frankfurt flight was delayed by an hour and a half.

I left the lounge at 13:30 and headed to the gate. I boarded directly and settled in. Air Canada flight 838 was a DreamLiner 787 in very spicy shape. I think it was pretty full. At two o’clock we we’re ready to take off when someone decided they didn’t want to fly. So we got another 15 minute delay while they found their luggage in the cargo. We finally pushed back at 2:30, and took off at 2:45. I slept for three hours and watched bad movies. I hate the takeoff meal and the landing omelette with two cups of coffee.

Thursday 2025.06.26

We landed at 9:05 and we’re at the gate by 9:10. I had to go catch the bus over to the gates which I did at 9:20.. We were at the gate and I was in the passport queue by 9:30. I was through passport control by 9:40 and at the gate at 9:45. they were still disembarking from the inbound flight. They started boarding at ten o’clock. I was in my seat by 10:05.

Lufthansa flight 860 was an AirBus 320neo in pretty good shape. It appeared to be pretty full. I was actually pretty awake and feeling OK. We were scheduled to push at 10:15 but did not do so until 10:30. I was just happy to have made the connection given the two hour late departure out of Vancouver.

We landed at 12:16 . I was waiting for the train for Lillestrøm at 12:40 and it departed at 12:50. It was ten minutes to Lillestrøm, and the hotel was right across the road. I checked in and was in my room by 13:15. The Scandic Lillestrøm was not posh but quite adequate. Gobble said four star, I would say three, which was appropriate for a board member of a non-profit.

I unpacked, showered, worked, and napped until 18:00 when I went down to the lobby to meet Mirjam. We ran into Hans Petter, Fergal, Ukla, Karla, Ole, etc. and gossiped for half an hour or so. Then Mirjam and I walked into the Lillestrøm shopping area and to Feniqia, a Lebanese restaurant and had a rather nice vegetarian dinner. We were back at the hotel about nine o’clock, and I crashed.

Friday 2025.06.27

I woke at six, dressed, and went down to breakfast at seven. It was your basic good Scandanavian breakfast. I worked in my room until an 11:30 meeting with Athina to cover the role, duties, and liabilities of an NCC EB member. I spent three hours with her, doing the paperwork and slide deck as planned, but then going into depth on many social, political, etc. issues RIPE faces and maybe more of NCC internals than is appropriate for a board member. I napped from four to seven, and thanked everyone on Signal and iMessage for birthday wishes.

I napped from three to 18:30, showered and dressed, and worked a bit. I then went down to the hotel restaurant for dinner with the Board, Hans Petter, Athina, Mirjam, etc. It was very collegial and somewhat multi-cultural. I managed to stay fairly quiet. Piotr, who is cute in a Polish kind of way, served as the life of the party at our end. Hams Petter and I managed to gossip a bit. Mirjam and Athina left soon after ten. Ondrej, who had hung back, suddenly grilled me about my jobs at IIJ and Arrcus and how I ended up in them. I left as we were kicked out of the restaurant at 23:30, and I got so sleep shortly after midnight.

Saturday 2025.06.28

I woke at seven o’clock, dressed, and went down to breakfast. I had put on a real collared shirt, but no one noticed. I sat with Mirjam, Ole, and Fergal. At 08:30, Sander and I tried to take Athina’s advice to go across the street to the station to Garcon for good coffee, but they were closed. So I had more bad coffee with the crew at the hotel restaurant. Then to the second floor to the meeting room for the Board meeting.

The Board meeting was highly varied. Simple procedural actions were prompt and easy. But anything which took thought rat-holed. Particularly the subject of the change from Executive Board to Supervisory Board, which I thought was very simple, got seriously wrapped around the axle. And Remko van Mook, who was no longer on the board, seemed not to have gotten the memo and tended to dominate conversation. We finally broke for lunch at 12:30.

After lunch we went into more strategy, but focused on data sovereignty, AI, and other technologies. Then we went down rat-holes of various services, charging for diverse services, … What about war, regional fragmentation, climate change, etc? The work day ended with a closed meeting on remuneration of the RIPE Chair and Vice-Chair.

At 17:30, I went to my room and napped until 18:30, showered, and met folk in the lobby, took the train to OsloTheater, and walked maybe one km to XXX and had a dinner of shellfish by the harbor.

At 10:30 or so, Mirjam and I bailed and took the train back to Lillestrøm and I was asleep around midnight.

Sunday 2025.06.29

I woke at six, showered, dressed, packed, etc., and was drinking coffee in the cafe by 06:45. They opened and seven and Mirjam met me. At 07:30 she walked me to my train to the airport. I caught the 07:50 express, which was overflowing and arrived at a minute or three after eight. I walked through the automated check, went through security, and found the lounge by 08:25.

I left the lounge at 9:10 and walked to the furthest D gate.We boarded at 9:25 and I was in my seat by 9:30. Lufthansa flight 859 to Frankfurt was an AirBus 320neo in funky shape. My seat would not recline. My seat mate arrived and it was Harald. I fell asleep instantly and slept until we landed in Frankfurt. I went through the underground tunnel to the B gates, went through a very short passport control queue, and went to the Lufthansa lounge. At 12:35 when my outbound flight was supposed to be boarding, I went to the gate. It wasn’t boarding, and it was a closed gate area that was jammed full. It looked like a Covid event to me. So I sat down outside and waited for the boarding area to clear. I was the last person through passport check and I waited for the jet bridge to clear to board.

Lufthansa flight 492 to Vancouver was a 747 that looked new. It had been years since I was on a 747. I think it was completely full. The was a delay for unknown reasons. We finally pushed at 13:45, 25 minutes late. I watched Inception which was OK. It would’ve been better with less violence. They served the best airplane dinner I had had in decades. I slept about six hours and spaced out the rest.

We landed in Vancouver at 14:30 and were at the gate five minutes later. There was a bit of walk to security, but then security took 40 minutes. It was insane. I walked to the Maple Leaf Lounge, plugged my laptop in, and had a Coke strangely enough. The TV had Fox News on, in Canada!!

I headed for the gate at 16:55, boarded at 17:10 and immediately fell asleep. I woke to the landing bump at 18:45. I did the silly long walk to get a Lyft, was on the road at 19:20, and home by 19:45 to a starving cat, or so she said.

The Island of Hawai`i to Say Goodbye to Zita

Zita had asked that her ashes be spread on the Island of Hawai`i where we used to live. It was the first home she/we owned, was where we were married, and she had great attachment to it. In hind-sight, she might have been happier had we not sold it in 2017. But any time she went there, the whole of her time was spent on maintenance, there was and is no functioning medical care on the island, etc. But she definitely left a large bit of her heart there.

So the family, Katen, Latif, Salma, Aaron, Cat, and i scheduled a trip once Salma had finished the school year. Katen found an AirBnB, I booked tickets and a car, and I think K,L,&S looked forward to it. I was less comfortable as I feared too many emotional memories.

Sunday 2025.06.15

We were booked on Alaska’s non-stop Portland to Kailua-Kona. I checked in online, but they would not assign seats, and said we would get them at the gate. I did not take this as a good sign.

In the afternoon, I packed a full sized Rimowa check-on because I was carrying Zita’s and Ookii’s ashes, tennis shoes, etc. and needed the room.

Monday 2025.06.16

I woke at four, dressed, made coffee, and finished packing. At 05:10 I summoned a Lyft as Katen, Salma, and Latif arrived. The driver could not atop talking. We were at the airport by six, checked two bags, and went through security. I had a wrap for breakfast and we went down to the gate. We were due to board at 07:20 but they said the plane had a mechanical and they had a different plane for us at 10:20.

We finally boarded at 10:15. Alaska 867 was a 737-800 in newish shape. We were in the back of the plane. I had a window next to a cute three year old. I slept on and off, ate a bad banh mi I bought at the airport, and watched the landing at 12:50. We were sent to a penalty box because another plane had our gate. We finally started moving an hour later at 1:48.

We finally had the rental car at 14:40 and drove north to the AirBnB in Puako. We sorted out rooms, and unpacked. Katen checked out the local lava beach and declared it lovely. Then she, Latif, and Salma headed to the Puako General Store. Aaron and Cat texted that they had just arrived at the store. They all came back with armloads of snack level groceries.

We hung out, walked to the beach, and sat around a bit.

Salma was hungry so we went to Kawihae for diner at the Seafood Bar and Grill. OK, up market, but nothing special. We were back by eight and asleep by nine.

Tuesday 2025.06.17

I managed to sleep to 05:30 when I heard Katen in the kitchen making coffee. So I got up, dressed, had some coffee, and cleaned up email etc. Katen took a walk and ran into Aaron and Cat.

After eight or so, Katen, Latif, Salma, and I got in the car and drove to Hawaiian Style Cafe in Waimea for breakfast. It was was not the old funky place I remembered, was maybe half the size, and cleaned up in a plastic sort of way, more for the tourists. Pos-Covid I guess. Latif and Salma over-ordered, Salma vastly so. Katen and I split an omelet with fried rice, which was fine.

Then we drove into downtown Waimea to shop at the KTA, the same place Zita and I used to go. We did the whole store, with Katen shopping for an army for the week; the bill came to just shy of $400. Then down to the bread store, which looked pretty good. We were back home to the AirBnB by eleven.

We milled around until after noon. Then everyone but I got in Aaron and Cat’s car and went to Beach 69. I got in our car and drove up Akino Pule to Kapa’au to meet Sally. I went to the Takata Market, which was just the same as I remembered. Sally and I talked and agreed to meet up at the cul de sac at our old house in Maliu Ridge. We parked in the cul de sac and walked down the driveway. The house looked in great shape and had been painted a different color. Most of the big fruit trees we loved were gone, as were the coconut palms by the house. But the bananas and our wedding palm remained. And they had planted some beautiful flowers.

No one was home. So Sally and I walked to our mauka neighbor Tom and Julie, who were home. We spent a few minutes remembering who we all were. I asked about the folk who now owned our old home. They said they spent much of their time up in Alaska from where they had come. And, as it was summer, were probably up there. But they remembered that the daughter lived in Waimea and had a kid in school with one of Tom and Julie’s friends, so called them to track the daughter, Sally, down. They got the number and I called and explained. She said anything would be fine with here, but she should check with her parents so conference called them in from Alaska. They were all really sweet and said anything would be fine.

We gossiped for a while, saw Tom’s restored MG-TD which was gorgeous, and said our goodbyes. I agreed to sync will Sally when we came back to spread Zita’s ashes. She headed back down to Kapa’au, and I took the Mountain Road route back to Waimea and then back to Puako, arriving about 15:40. The family was all still at the beach. I had half dozen bites of potato salad and made decaf coffee to have with three more Island Delight macadamia nut shortbread cookies. I ate outside and picked up a plumeria flower to put on the box of Zita’s ashes.

The crew returned about five having had a great time at the beach. Katen, Aaron, Cat, and I sat around and talked until 18:30 when Cat and Aaron headed off on bikes to see the sunset. Salma made macaroni and cheese. Katen put up rice and broiled the ono with a soy, ginger, honey glaze and made a salad. We all ate out on the deck. Then we hung out in the kitchen and discussed the details of interior decorating issues in Katen’s Paris apartment. We all were asleep by 21:30 or so.

Wednesday 2025.06.18

The birds woke me at five, and I remembered how many and loud they were and how much Zita liked them. I could hear that Katen was up too early as usual. But was not in the kitchen when I checked. I gave up and dressed at seven and made coffee. Katen showed up with a bowl of yogurt and an apple banana. I made two eggs and toast. Aaron and Cat showed up around eight, but had decided against a run to the Volcano, so we let Salma and Latif sleep in. Aaron and Cat went for a bike ride.

We hung out all morning. Salma caught some rays. I reserved Bamboo for the next evening, part of the plan to spread Zita’s ashes. I Slacked a bunch on Arrcus #engineering about whether to fix a CVE in old code. Then I had some poke and cold noodle salad for lunch while others ate various things. At about 13:15, everyone left for the beach, Aaron and Cat on bikes and Katen, Latif, and Salma by car to carry the beach chairs, umbrella, etc. I tried to nap, but was tangled up in Zita, the past, and just being crazy. At three o’clock I had a research call with IIJ folk. Katen and Salma returned at 18:15. Latif passed through grabbing beer and heading back to the beach.

After the sun set at seven, folk trickled back to the house. Katen set up dinner for eight o’clock, steak, salad, mashed potatoes, ziti from the store, etc. We all ate outside. Katen headed to bed immediately, shortly followed by Salma. The rest of us cleaned up. I was in bed by ten.

Thursday 2025.06.19

I did not sleep well; my last night with the physical manifestation of Zita. I woke to Katen’s puttering at 06:30, dressed, made coffee, and hung out with Katen. I cleaned up email. It was light, as it was Juneteenth in the mainland. At eight or so, I made eggs and toast. Cat had snuck out and gone for her morning walk. Aaron appeared and we milled around the kitchen until 10:30 or so, when Aaron and Cat headed for the beach and Katen and crew went to Kings and Queens Markets to feed Salma, pick up doughnuts, etc. They reappeared a maybe 11:45, and milled about until heading for the beach at 12:15. I listened to birds outside for an hour, had another half sprouts and cheese sandwich, walked the back yard, and had a cup of coffee.

Folk returned between 14:30 and 15:30. We milled around a bit. Soon after four o’clock we took both cars and headed north toward Hawi. I wanted to stop in Lapakahi to get sea water where Zita and I got it for our wedding. But they had closed at four o’clock. So we drove to Mahu Kona and I filled the bottle from the ladder where we went in to snorkel. Then we drove up to Hawi and the crew walked the town a bit. Then on to Kapa`au where they did the same. On to Malieu Ridge to our home, where we met Sally. We walked into the property. I spread ashes at the fan palm we had planted at our wedding

and then all over the front acreage. I said the Buddhist Prayer a lot. Sally had two pikake lei, one for me and one she placed on the wedding palm. We all talked until six or so.

We said goodbye to Sally and drove down to Bamboo in Hawi The place was almost empty. I saw why they were now only open for dinner Thursday and Friday. I talked with Joan, the owner. Since Covid and Trump, there were no foreign and few domestic tourists. She said that when the Biden Covid relief money ran out, it was likely they would close. Heartbreaking. Aaron had noted that I did not go back to places I have left. It is because I have them encased in amber in my heart and mind; Joanie is still thirty and at the farm on Cherry Creek; Zita is still in our home in Hawi. Seeing them changed is heartbreaking.

We had a nice dinner. Aaron and Cat would fly back to Seattle in the morning. At about eight o’clock, we drove back to Puako. I said goodbye to Hawi. We were asleep by nine.

Friday 2025.06.20

I woke at 05:30 to say goodbye to Aaron and Cat and tried unsuccessfully to get more sleep. Katen and I had coffee, and I cleaned up email etc. After showering I realized we were not getting on the road any time soon, so made breakfast. By 09:30, Salma was having a double breakfast, and departure was not in sight. We finally made it out by 10:10. We went straight to Waimea and stopped at Waimea Coffee Company, Good Friends Bad Habits, for coffee and a breakfast burrito which we all shared. It was quite good. We grabbed gas and headed to Saddle Road which was now a fancy superhighway. We made it across to Hilo and headed down Route 11 to the Volcano National Park. First we went for a walk along the inter-lot trail to the Lava Tube and did that. Then back up to walk the trail marked to the view the current eruption across the caldera. Then to the ranger station and Katen hit the General Store for snacks. We went down the East road past all the small craters down 20 miles to the ocean and back up. Back to the entrance, we exited and drove back North. We drove the Northern route through Kappa`a to Waimea to Moa Kitchen to have some ramen and sashimi to dinner and then home by 20:30.

Saturday 2025.06.21

I slept in to seven as did Katen. I made coffee, dressed, had a couple of eggs, and cleaned up email, which was quite light due to weekend plus the Juneteenth holiday. By eleven, we all piled into the car and drove down to Kailua-Kona. Parking was not easy, but eventually we found a paid lot. The crew hit the ABC store, which was definitely their speed. We walked down Ali`i to Scandanavian Shave Ice, Zita’s old favorite, and they got one small. We sat around and observed. Traffic and craziness was very light, good for us bad for business. By 13:30, we were ready to head back to Puako, arriving at 14:45.

The gang went to the beach and I took a nap. They returned shortly after five with groceries from the Puako General Store. Katen and Salma took a short nap while Latif lounged in the garden. We had a snackish dinner, a salad Katen made, some lentil soup from the General Store, and some pseudo-sushi made with older poke. We sat around and talked, well Katen, Latif, and I did while Salma FaceTimed with Adelaide in her house. We were asleep by nine.

Sunday 2025.06.22

I was up at six and making coffee by 06;30. For once, Katen seemed to be sleeping in. She appeared at 07:30 and we had coffee. I eventually made eggs and dealt with the recalcitrant toaster. I Slacked a bunch with Rob re L3DL pre the Madrid meeting. Salma and Latif eventually woke and Katen made oatmeal. At about eleven o’clock we all packed into he car and headed to Waimea Coffee Company and had breakfast. We got gas and drove back via the Belt Road and Waikaloa, where we stopped at the KTA to pick up ahi, a steak, and some potatoes for dinner. We made it back to Puako by 13:30, did the usual milling around, and Katen and Salma went off to the beach for a while. Latif had been feeling wonky since the morning, and stayed home organizing.

Katen and Salma came back at 15:40 or so, and started showering. I was starting laundry; got a couple of loads of towels done. I got a splash of bleach on one of my favorite orange tee shirts. I took the pikaki lei Sally had given me and walked across to the lava and ocean, and placed it at the waters edge, said a prayer, and yet another goodbye.

We grilled Ahi and a steak, and had two salads and a sliced mango. Washing up took a while. Then Katen and I collapsed a bit in the living room and then were in bed by nine.

Monday 2025.06.23

I was up half the night, gave up shortly after six, made coffee, and dealt with email etc. Great fuss about the corrupted AfriNIC election. I did the main body of my packing. At seven, Katen went for a morning walk and I put another load of laundry in, sheets and towels this time. I had some toast, and put away the clean dishes.

We closed up and were in the car shortly after nine. We stopped at the General Store to get a breakfast burrito, but they were weekends only. So we just drove South to Keahole. Eliana called Katen to say that Ami, next door, had her husband die of a heart attack, which explained all the cars before i left. Tragic.

Katen dropped the rest of us off with the luggage while she returned the rental car. We checked the bags and waited for her. Then Security and to the restaurant where i had a pork sandwich which i hoped to regret less than the banh mi on the way out. We went to the gate and sat around for 15 minutes before boarding. I switched my aisle seat for a middle so an elderly woman could have the aisle. We finally pushed at 12:30, 20 minutes late.

Alaska flight 868 was a different 737-800 and in somewhat older shape. It was completely full. I just kind of zenned out the whole ride, no movie, no sleep.

The captain put down with a real thwack at nine o’clock. I waited for Katen and crew, and we went to get baggage. We caught a Lyft at 21:40. The driver was either on cocaine or had a cold, constantly sniffling. Given his erratic and aggressive driving style, I bet n coke. The Banfield was blocked due to an accident, so we took Powell, and were home by 22:20.

Lisbon for RIPE 90

As I was running for the NCC Executive Board, I had booked going to the RIPE meeting in Lisbon back in March. I was happy to be seeing friends in the last comfortable home of Internet operations; though I was not anxious to travel and to leave home.

Saturday 2025.05.10

I woke at seven, dressed, did the last bits of packing, had breakfast, organized the computer bits to pack out, and worried about what I had forgotten. I could not find my pouch of Euros, which was annoying. At nine o’clock I summoned a Lyft, and was at the airport by 09:35. TSA Pre was a long line, but at least I did not have to take my shoes and take stuff off. I headed to the United Club where Hans was serendipitously waiting; though we had not arranged to meet. He was on the same flights as I, with Christine going a different route later. At 10:15, we headed for the gate and boarded.

United 534 to Chicago was an uncomfortable 737-900 and completely full. It was old enough to have ashtrays in the arm rests; though they were screwed shut. I was glad I had taken Aleve before leaving home. Hans and I did not make the fuss to sit together, as we would probably see each other too much during the week. We departed on time. An 18 month old boy in the front row shrieked pretty much the whole flight, probably embarrassing his Chicago parents more then annoying other passengers. I managed to mark up the stultifying Governance Document for the Recognition, Maintenance, and Derecognition of Regional Internet Registries and napped. Then I watched most of No Direction Home, the recent Dylan movie.

We landed in Chicago early at 16:40. Hans and I went to the lounge right across the way for half an hour and then headed to the gate. United 265 boarded at 17:40. It was a completely full spiffy new 737-900. I realized that i did not have a boarding pass for the air Canada flight from Toronto to Lisbon. We landed in Toronto at 20:55. It was a major walk to the central transit point, and then back and forth from passport control because they demanded my boarding pass. So it was a walk back to Central where some nice agents printed my pass. So we made it through passport control and security, and then made it to the Air Canada lounge by 21:45 and decided to eat there instead of the plane. It was really good. I had a beet carpaccio salad and some fish with muscles and crab. That was also quite good. We had a sorbet for dessert, and headed for the plane. We stopped to pick up some maple cookies on the way as gifts.

Air Canada flight 810 was a 777ER in very fancy shape. I had problems storing all the fancy crap they gave me. We took off on time, I passed on the dinner, and I watched the conclusion of No Direction Home and then napped until about an hour and a half hour out of Lisbon. I ate the breakfast aside from the crunchy melon.

Sunday 2025.05.11

We landed early at 10:30, but were out at a stand not a gate. It took 20 minutes for the bus to pull up so we could get to the terminal. The computers are out at passport control and the queue was at least three hours. Very polite chaos.

Electronic Passport Control finally opened and we were out, bought SIMs, and into an Uber by 1335. We arrived at the hotel by 14:05.

Hans and I hung out in the lobby bar with Mirjam until sixish. Then we each headed to our rooms, Hans across to an AirBnB, unpacked, and showered. Then we met in the lobby, picked up Liman, and walked ten minuted to A Valenciana, an open family style market and churrascoria restaurant. I had a fish and shrimp rice stew which was pretty good. We were back at the hotel and asleep by 21:30.

Monday 2025.05.12

I woke at 07:30, dressed, and went down to breakfast, sitting with Marco and Theodoros from the NCC. The barista was open, so I managed some coffee before the first plenary. The NCC graphic designer had done a bang up job of the whole meeting space, but the stairs was the touch.

The opening talk was How to Rewild the Internet by Maria Farrell. It was absolutely brilliant; watch it. I spent the morning and lunch talking with whomever. At 18:00, I went to the BoF on Updating ICP-2. I tried to be constructive and polite; but Daniel was aggressively negative, a role reversal.

Mirjam and I joined Christine and Hans for dinner in the hotel’s outside restaurant.

Tuesday 2025.05.13

I Woke at 7:30, dressed and went to breakfast, followed by a boring plenary. It was too much BGP. Then more plenary and lunch with Anna and Carla and a bunch of folk I didn’t know. Then the CoC session, which was quick and painless and pretty content free. At 13:45 I went back to my room, napped from two o’clock to 15:30, showered, and went down for the break and then the MAT WG. I don’t know if it was just that I was tired or the content was not my cup of tea. After MAT i chatted with Cristel, Eric Vynce, and other researchers. Then we wandered up to the NREN/RACI session which was not particularly exciting, mostly pre-IMC presentations. Niall and Mirjam were wondering if RACI was worth continuing in its current form.

At 19:30, Mirjam, Cristel, Niall, and I took an Uber to dinner at Pap’açorda in Mercado da Ribeira which Niall had arranged from Katen’s list.

It was good, though not memorable. I had fish soup, a veal shank, and raspberry sorbet. At close to ten o’clock, we took a taxi to the social in Jardim Botânico in the Estufa Fria de Lisboa. The big event was that Jim Reid had fallen into the pond. Mirjam and I stayed for half an hour or so and then walked back to the hotel. I was asleep by eleven or so.

Wednesday 2025.05.14

I got some sleep, though nothing great. At 07:30, I dressed and went down to breakfast and then the Address Policy WG meeting. It started with the darned ASO Updating ICP-2 PowerPoint all over again. I wandered out talked RouteViews and RIS with Ties and Nina. Then I spent time gossiping with Warren. I had lunch with Ole and Jen Linkova and discussed why we were at RIPE and how to find safe spaces in our careers. At 13:30 I spent half an hour with the CoC Team and moved on to the NCC Services WG which started with the usual NCC PowerPoint storm. I had to enable my AT&T SIM to get a call from FreeStone to approve a payment verbally.

The General meeting started at four o’clock. First was a massive PowerPoint series recapping the Annual Report, the Financial Report, etc. etc. Then Lu Heng went to the mic threatening a multi-million dollar lawsuit. Then he threatened anti-trust action for the NCC rejecting his offering to sponsor the meeting. The PowerPoint resumed its drone. There were valiant efforts to design a new charging scheme on the fly by a dozen people. Then they did the same with the proposed amendments to the Arbitration Committee. The GM finally finished with the Executive Board candidates’ movies and the instructions on how to vote. We had fun because the AV folk borked showing my movie, it had a French singer, etc.

After the GM, Hans Peter and I went out on the patio and had dinner until eleven; talking family history, careers, and, of course RIPE NCC management gossip. On the way back to my room, I ran into Fergal and friends, and we chatted a bit. I made it to bed just after midnight.

Thursday 2025.05.15

I was up from two o’clock until five and then woke at eight. I dressed, had breakfast with Ole, coffee with Christine, and went into the Cooperation WG to sit in the back of the room and work. I could not resist going to the mic to whine about the proposal to use only RIR RPSL databases by AmsIX and DE-CIX. During the break I talked finding ROV-enabled routing with Q Lone, a researcher at the NCC. Then Ed Shrayne dragged me into he Database WG to talk about the PrefixLen Internet Draft.

I had lunch with Andrew McConachie and friends. Then I had to go to the Routing WG to hear Tim present on NCC’s ASPA and Router Key implementations. At the break I was cornered by Salam trying to drag me to Beirut. Then, at 15:30, I had a Code of Conduct Team meeting to draft the presentation for Friday’s Plenary. At 16:45 I napped until 18:45, dressed, and went down to catch the bus to the RIPE dinner. I was in a very mod place on the waterfront. But a beautiful setting.

Very pretty but loud. I sat with Mirjam and Greg and Stephanie from IETF. Greg had caught on to the major difference from IETF, ARIN, ,.. in the cooperative nature of the RIPE community. So there was much discussion as to why this was. Mirjam, Greg, and I bailed at 22:30 and took an Uber back to the hotel. I was in bed by 23:30.

Friday 2025.05.16

I woke at 08:15, dressed, and went down to breakfast. I sat with Mirjam and Niall. Then I went to the Closing Plenary. Email’s talk on the power outage was interesting, especially the topological difference between Portugal and Spain. Then Emil and his student presented on the Baltic cable cuts. During the coffee break election results were presented and I had been elected to the NCC Executive Board. There was much resulting social interaction which I survived. Then back for the Closing Plenary for the Code of Conduct report, the meeting network report, etc. Mirjam closed the meeting and then on to the Secret Working Group which is sadder and sadder as the years go by.

The last lunch had one really tasty thing, a ravioli with maybe bleu cheese filling. I talked with Constanze Buerger and Franziska Lichtblau, and then back to Greg Wood, Stephanie, and Jonathan Black from NANOG. I then took off my badge, went up to my room, and cleaned up email etc. At 14:40, I lay down for a nap until 18:00. At 18:30, I met Hans and Christine to walk down the street for a ramen dinner at a small place on a noisy road. By 20:30, I was back at the hotel. I packed and went to sleep by 21:30.

Saturday 2025.05.17

I woke at 06:30, dressed, finished packing, and went down to breakfast where I ran into Niall. We ate calmly, and then met in the lobby to share an Uber to the airport, where we arrived at 08:15. The airport was chaotic but moving along somewhat. The security queue was a dozen long zig-zags and then chaos, and it took 40 minutes. Passport control was only a mild queue as the electronic passport gates were mostly working. I made it to the gate by 09:15, one hour to traverse the airport.

They started to board at 9:35. But we queued at the jet-way for 15 minutes. so I was on board by 9:55. United flight 65 to Newark was a completely full 787 in drab shape. We pushed back exactly on time at 10:25, but didn’t get much further. At 10:40 the Captain came on the PA and said that the airport was closed because there was a drone overhead. She came back on 10 minutes later to say 15 to 20 minutes. We got in motion again at 11:05 and finally took off at 11:20. I had the takeoff meal and then slept most of the way to Newark.

Before landing, I disabled all biometrics on my phone, laptop, watch, etc. We landed Newark at 13:15, deboarded fairly quickly, and I walked to the Global Entry Kiosks. Passport control was trivial, and we were dumped ground-side. We were in Terminal B and I asked where a Polaris Lounge was and they sent me to Terminal C, so I took the AirTrain. TSA Pre was easy, but Security was chaotic. And they decided to inspect my bag as Joanie’s ashes had set off the x-ray. I was in the lounge by 14:45.

The lounge was enormous and very crowded. I managed to find a soft armchair, got a bit of lounge food and an Americano, and helped Amol sort out a restic restore problem back in Arrcus San Jose. I tried to get to the most urgent email, but did not have the focus to sort through the mass. I did get details for the Oslo meeting at the end of June from Raymond.

At 17:30 I walked to the shuttle bus to Terminal A and walked down to Gate A14. I decided that I was insufficiently impolite and aggressive to deal with Newark or New York in general. I boarded at 17:55 and found my seat. United 1184 to Portland was a pretty new AirBus 319, and seemed quite full. We pushed and took off on time at 18:30. The meal was inedible. I cleaned up more backlog and then watched The Godfather, which I had never seen. We landed at 21:11. I did the long walk to grab a Lyft at 21:35 and was home at ten o’clock. I comforted Kaiby?, unpacked, and went to sleep.

San Jose to Visit the Arrcus Mothership

Tuesday 2025.04.22

Nalin Pi convinced me to sneak into the Arrcus San Jose mothership to hang out with him, learn a bit about the developments in networking for the AI datacenter world, and to just be sociable. So I booked a day trip for Thursday of the following week.

Wednesday 2025.04.30

I used my iPhone to check in for my outbound flight the next day to San Jose. Easy peasy. But that evening, when I tried to check in for the return flight, the app would not let me. It showed the check-in button, but gave an error. I obsessed about this for many hours.

Thursday 2025.05.01

I woke at 03:30, dressed, made coffee and fed Kaiby?, packed my computer bag, and headed out by 04:40. I arrived at 5 o’clock and left Kermit in short term parking. I queued up at Alaska check-in because of being unable to check in for the return flight. I told the agent that the meeting in San Jose was optional but being back that night was not. She did magic and gave me a paper boarding pass for the evening flight. I saw only one other masked person.

I was in the TSA queue by 05:20. I had forgotten to leave my pocket knife at home, but it made it through security. After security, I went to Oven and Shaker and had a bad omelette with potatoes too disgusting to eat for breakfast. As opposed to the United Airlines space, the C concourse was new and open and airy, quite nice. On the other hand, after breakfast, to get to the B gates one walked through United-like ugly, temporary, tunnels. I was at the gate by 6 o’clock, for a 06:30 boarding. I Slacked with Rob about the DNS servers in San Jose.

At 06:30 i scanned through the gate and did a five minute walk to the farthest outdoor boarding gate where I re-scanned. Alaska 2210 was a Horizon Embraer 175 in spiffy shape and completely full. We took off at 7 o’clock on the dot. We landed at 8:30 and I walked to the office arriving about 910. It was pretty empty. I grabbed an empty desk and verified that the espresso machine still produced an acceptable brew.

At 09:30 Keyur appeared exactly on time. We talked Arrcus customers, prospects, bugs, engineering etc., and then some strategy for IETF/LSVR/L3DL for the meeting the following week. At 10:40 we wandered out and I got grabbed by Sandy who gossiped family stories for twenty minutes.

Nalin and I talked Bluefield and squashed VDR from eleven to 12:30, went over to Gateway to grab cheap lunch and continue, and then came back to the office. Back at the office I chatted up a few people, saw old friends, and met with Nalin and Nithyesh over the two node flattened VDR hack. I shared some RPKI clue with Sonal and Larry. Then contacted Hery to see if he would be willing to come back to Arrcus if we could protect him.

At 17:30 Nalin gave me a ride to the airport. I got off at the start of terminal A because I did not remember where the sushi place was. TSA let me through with my pocket knife again, and a helpful shopkeeper told me the sushi stand was all the way at the other end of the terminal down almost to my gate. So a 15 minute walk; i needed the exercise. I got a rainbow roll, ate it there, Slacked with Rob about a getty problem, and headed to my gate.

Alaska 3002 was an Embraer 175 in SkyWest livery and completely full. I could not sleep, but spaced out the whole ride. We landed at 20:45 most of the way down the distant B Concourse. I walked to Kermit and headed out. Traffic was rather bad considering the time of the evening. I got home at 21:30, and immediately fed Kaiby?.