Amsterdam is what Venice would be like if all the tourists smoked crack. If the most ambitious restaurant served waffles. If the souvenir shops pushed marijuana blunts instead of pastel-colored carnival masks.

Oh, who am I kidding? It's not even close. It's hard for a city to have any kind of grandeur when everybody's staggering around like Otis from the Andy Griffith Show. I stop in a bar around nine one night and there's not one person who can complete a sentence. Sure, it looks fun as hell, but I require a little more in my drinking companions than conversations that consist of "How?"

On the plus side, it's the least intimidating European city I've ever visited. When the clientele are crashing into the walls, the bartender's not going to look down his nose at some dude who mispronounces Grolsch.

There's not a lot to do here, so I figure it's time to tackle my cold. Five days of rain in Prague started it, and now it's kicked in hard. I head to a pharmacy to see what they've got. I'm expecting walls full of fabulous chemical wonders but instead all I find is one shelf bearing nose spray and aspirin.

"I have a cold," I tell the pharmacist. "In fact, I don't inhale or exhale so much as purr. What should I take?"

"Something with ephedrine," he says. "To dry you up. Like Contac or Dristan."

"Oh, okay," I say, pulling a wad of colorful bills from my pocket. "Give me some of those."

"They're illegal in Amsterdam. People use them to make speed."

I look at him, expecting him to break into giggles and then announce I've been punked. Nope, he's serious. "Wait," I say. "So you've got hookers in pasties dancing in all the windows, squirting themselves with hand lotion and making sucky sounds at the dudes walking by, and you've got stores on every block advertising magic herbs, magic leaves, magic mushrooms and everything short of Magic Ponys, but you don't have Actifed?"

He shrugs his shoulders and I realize that's all I need to know about Amsterdam. Good try. Nice thought. Doesn't work.

I leave the city the next day, and I'm not particularly sad. I've learned something new about myself, I realize, which is part of the reason I travel. I'm maturing. I'm . . . dare I say? . . . growing up. Because I'd never have guessed it a month ago, but there are days when I'd rather have a time-release Coricidin caplet than a bag of Red Lebanese or a hand job.