Welcome to the Jack Pransky Three Principles European Tour blog. The purpose of this tour is to help spread the three principles throughout Europe. The tour came together like a knife through soft butter. Even two years ago it would have been impossible. But for some reason my books, particularly, Somebody Should Have Told Us!, have gotten semi-popular enough in Europe that some people want to see me there. (Europe and Topeka, Kansas, of all places; that’s about it.) All I had to do was put the word out that I was going to tour Europe and asked if anyone was interested, and all these wonderful people from all Western European countries between Portugal, Sweden and Italy except Luxembourg and Lichtenstein came out of the woodwork

Day 1. February 28, 2014. First, I was so sad to say goodbye to Amy, the love of my life, for more than two months. But I am okay with sadness. It means the three principles are working perfectly within me. Out of all the possibilities of Mind, I use my incredible gift of the power of thought to come up with sadness. That thought enters my consciousness, and I get a real, intense, feeling of sadness. It is impossible for me to feel sad in any other way. It’s perfectly fine. But do I want to feel sad for my entire trip? No. At some point it would stop serving me well.

Auspicious start? It actually started the night before. I knew I couldn’t check in and select my seats until 24 hours before my plane left. So I got on line to British Airways and tried. It wouldn’t let me change my seat. So I called a British Airlines representative while I was still online. He said he couldn’t change my seat. I said, “Why?” He said, “Because you checked in already.” I said, “But I didn’t check in. I was trying to change my seat before I checked in.” He said, “I’m sorry. It says here that you checked in. There is nothing I can do.” “You’re kidding.” “No, there is nothing I can do with you’ve checked in.” “But I didn’t check in. Are you saying I hit a wrong button or something? If I did, I didn’t mean to. Please, I would really like to get an aisle seat. ” “I’m sorry, if you had done that before you checked in it would not be a problem.” I felt like I was in some catch-22 nightmare. “Can I please speak to your supervisor?” “He’s just going to tell you the same thing I am. Our hands are tied.” “Let me get this straight: With all the technology you have, you cannot change a seat for me when you know I didn’t mean to check in yet?” “Those are the rules. You can change you seat at the airport.” “But I’m in Vermont, four hours away. All the aisle seats may be gone by then…” In my old days I would have lost it. Now I just shook my head in disbelief. What can you do? So I ended up in an aisle seat in the last row of the plane. Oh well…

It occurred to me that night also that I had better let my bank know I am going to Europe so they would know what was happening with my debit card. I had already informed my credit card company, but I had heard that a debit card was the best way to change currency in Europe. It was late so it would have to wait until I was on my way out in the morning. I almost phoned while driving but instead I stopped in because I was going right by there, only to discover that the bank had removed my debit card from the system due to inactivity. I almost never use a debit card. Then, once they finally straightened that out my password wouldn’t work. Now I have to wait until Monday to email the bank branch manager because it’s the weekend. Oh well…

Then I had to drive south of Boston to leave my car with my cousin and have her drive me to the airport. I have not been stuck in a traffic jam like that for years! We spent about an hour on one ramp. I kid you not. Not the best of starts. Am I being tested? Oh well…

Day 1. March 1. I got almost 2 ½ hours of sleep on the plane. But here I am in lovely Colchester, England—jet-lagged but glad to be here. Sue Pankiewicz’s husband Peter picked me up the airport, I just took a walk on a footpath in the countryside, got all muddy because of the inordinate amount of rain they’ve had in England in the last couple of months, took a couple of naps even though I didn’t want to but had no choice because I was so exhausted, and all is good.Tomorrow I meet up with the “Space for Connection” group that Sue is hosting, along with my friends from Spain, Sheela Masand and Katja Symons. If I can handle it I’ll join the group of 15 or 20 for dinner tonight. If not, I’ll see them tomorrow. Now if Amy were only with me… Oops, careful, no sense going down that road.