Last week, as Ben was off working hard and I was at home (doing something terribly important, I'm sure), the doorbell rang. When I answered it there was a guy standing there and he started talking to me, and the conversation went something like this...

Guy: Dirkadirkadirk,sjfdskjfhdsfkjhdkjfhdsfds?

Me: I'm sorry, I don't speak Dutch.

Guy: Oh, English?

Me: Yes!

Guy: I'm from Q Services and we will be on your street soon cleaning windows, and I was wondering if you would like to have you house done?

Me (wondering why everyone here, even the window cleaning guy, has such a strong command of the English language and the extent of my Dutch is "Hallo!" and "Sorry!"): Oh, no thank you.

Guy: Oh, you'd rather do them yourself? That's okay, but if you change your mind, here is one of our fliers. You can give us a call.

Me: Okay, thanks a lot. Bye!

Now, here's thing. This was a very brief, polite exchange. The guy was nice, his English was perfect, but he lost me completely at "do them yourself". What? You mean, clean the windows, the outside windows? Ummm, when I said no thanks, I was fully intending to just not clean my windows. Seriously. And it didn't really seem like a big deal tom me, because back in the U.S. I rarely saw people hanging out their second story windows with a squeegee, because it just isn't that big of a deal. But after he said it, I realized that here, I HAD seen it, and on multiple occasions. People with little squeegees, big squeegees, cleaning solution, rags, everything, toiling away on their windows, even if it meant hanging out one window while cleaning another. Window cleaning is a serious enterprise here.

So, this means that not only are we the Americans with the barky dog and the Americans with the noisy lawnmower, we are also going to be known as the Americans with dirty windows.

The sidewalks here may be littered with trash and dog poop, but the windows? Sparkling!