Chez sweet chez. I am now back with my European surrogate family, the Knapps.
Morges, Switzerland.
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"So, where are you headed next?"

"Uhhh.... I dunno," I always say with a deliberate pause, meant to convey the impression that I am actually searching for an answer that doesn't really come until game time. "Probably go back to Switzerland. I have some friends there."

That is how I answer THE question posed to me, with a canned response designed to taste freshly-baked.

I've been serving up that response for about five weeks now, ever since the last time I hopped off the Morges lilly pad, back on July 5, en route to Pamplona. As I was running out the door, I told Letitia, the eldest of the three Knapp children, to expect me back "in about a week, maybe two."

Then, after SummerJam.

"Where are you off to now?"

"Uhhh.... I dunno. Probably go back to Switzerland. I have some friends there."

And after Den Haag.

"Uhhh.... I dunno. Probably go back to Switzerland. I have some friends there."

After Berlin.

"Uhhh.... I dunno. Probably go back to Switzerland. I have some friends there."

(Once I got up to Denmark, I held no illusions about an immediate retreat from Scandinavia, considering how long it takes to get there).

But then again, after the Reggae Sundance Festival in Eindhoven, NL.

"Uhhh.... I dunno. Probably go back to Switzerland. I have some friends there."

Only this time, I meant it.

There's something refreshing about having a home base when you travel as much as I have these past nine weeks. In a world that is constantly moving, shaking and turning itself upside down, having that main lilly pad to keep your feet from getting all wet is a godsend. A place to relax without having to buy something, a place to get a good, homemade meal, a place to do laundry, a place to feel ... like you're at home.

The bastion of stability that you subconsciously crave amidst a world if instability is what that lilly pad -- firmly rooted to the ocean floor below -- represents.

Unlike the person you're chatting with on the train from Berlin to Copenhagen, or the kids you meet at the bus stop in Utrecht two minutes after the last one back to your hostel has departed, or the person dancing next to you at Steel Pulse, the home base is a constant. It's not going anywhere.

And neither am I...for a good while. I am here in Switzerland stay for a bit.