Spijkenisse vice versa

An appointment 13.00 hours in Spijkenisse (296 km from Delfzijl) was on the agenda today. And it's not one I was looking forward to.
I'm representing a client, together with his lawyer. We're meeting a business partner, and his lawyer. Since lawyers are involved, we won't be chit chatting away. Some serious matters have to be discussed, in order to keep things out of a courtroom. I doubt if they will. (still am after the meeting)
Anyway, the lawyer will do most of the talking. At least that's the idea.

I left at 09.00 am drove southward. After I'd past Almere, my navigation became somewhat confused and suddenly I found myself driving in the direction of Amsterdam. I had planned to go via Utrecht.
Change of plans, not a huge issue, my calculated ETA didn't change.
I came past Schiphol (where I saw lots and lots of blue KLM planes all lined up, doing nothing) and went on over the A4.
Once in the area of Rotterdam the traffice became heavier, and the final kilometers to Spijkenisse were done in a walking pace. What an awful place I arrived in.

I soon found the adress and met up with my lawyer, who had arrived just minutes before me.
At 13.00 the meeting started and within 10 minutes papers were flying around the room, all thrown by our opponent. A hot-tempered Turkish entrepreneur. Boy, was I happy I wasn't alone here! A dangerous man.

The angrier this man became, the calmer we became and that stirred him up even more. After I while I was starting to actually like this game.

It was quite an experience to see this man change from raging anger to a smiling kind face staring direct into your eyes within seconds. He made that mood-change about 6 times during the conversation. Impressive and terrifying at the same time. Definitely not my type.

In the end, no deals were made. As expected (and planned to be honest). He had shown a few of his cards and that was what we were aiming for. We had kept ours up our sleeves.
By then it was 15.30.

Around 15.45 I was back in my car, destination Delfzijl. Another 300 kilometer to go. I soon stranded in a traffic jam near the Botlek-bridge. In total it went up and down 4 times before I could cross it. The final time I was just seconds too late to cross, I was the second in line waiting.

Just after Zwolle (I'm back in 'my' area, 18.00 hours and still about 100 km to go) I stopped and bought a quick snack, and around 19.00 I was home again, where I was greeted by a very happy beagle. He jumped in a straight line, all four legs at the same time, into my lap and stayed there the rest of the evening.


(Happy Birthday Queen Máxima!)