Day 45

1. Completed a long-overdue-but-much-needed house cleaning extravaganza, and then enjoyed how the Bims* burned our nostrils for the next 2 hours or so.
2. Enjoyed pretty much the warmest, prettiest day since we came here.
3. Went shopping and got ready for our Grillparty tomorrow.
4. Was shocked and dismayed to find that there is (I kid you not), a lady named Katie who married a German, moved to Germany and then started a blog.  Small world, right? ....or clones????

*Bims is kind of like Windex here.  You can clean pretty much anything with the stuff, it's vinegar-based and very powerful. 

Day 41

1. Learned what is verboten and allowed in the various cultures represented in the class.
2. Went for a long walk in the park by the river and saw a herd of sheep with new lambs- so cute!
3. Got ready for my alien interview next week with Joern.
4. Joern quizzed me on articles and plurals...tough teacher asking trick questions!  :-)

Day 39

1. Finally finished the curtains for 2/3 windows.
2. Had a big German Frühstück with fresh bakery bread...heaven!
3. Studied modal verbs and regular verbs a bit.
4. Made fresh asparagus for dinner*.

*Asparagus season is a big deal here.  They have special pots, whole books devoted to recipes, festivals.  If only every vegetable got such glory!

Day 37

1. Spent most of the day making curtains.
2. Marveled at all the stuff in our life that somebody made*.
3. Went shopping with Joern for a few odds, ends, and deals.
4. Grabbed a doenner for dinner. Yum!

*Example: Curtains are surprisingly more complicated than you would think. 

Day 36

1. Learned how to fill in German forms.
2. Had my first real, full conversation with a stranger in German!!!!!!!!!!!!!
3. Made wurst salat*.
4. Did some homework. 

*Gotta love a country that considers a bunch of meat a 'salad.'

Day 35

1. Learned how to ask about a job.
2. Tried to learn verb conjugation.
3. Went walking through the neighborhood with Joern.
4. Watched Plastic Planet...and was very afraid. 

Day 34

1. Had my second day of German class*.
2. Tried to learn simple past tense.
3. Did some additional educational activities**.
4. Made pfannkuchen (savory filled pancakes- think crepes) with Joern. 

* I love school!  It starts at 8:45, so I wake up super early with Joern and get him to work, and then I drink a coffee and get ready, and then I go on the Tram and a subway to my school.  I have two teachers, one for Mon-Tue, and one for Wed.-Thur.  There are 3 Americans, 2 Brazilians, and 1 each of Greek, Maldovian, Cuban, Chinese, Hungarian, South Korean, Romanian and Spanish people.  They are all very friendly, and we are all at about the same level, all ages.  Several have a spouse working for Siemens, which is headquartered here.  We're in class until 1:00, and I get home a bit before 2:00 (lots of schools get out then, so traffic is busy).  I have so much to learn, and writing is the hardest so far, but I feel like things are clicking more.  Since we come from everywhere, we really do need to talk in German!  I'm looking forward to meeting the Wed-Thur teacher!

**Watched TV (in German of course)

Just Hanging Around (Day 26)

1. Had a big breakfast of pretzels and wurst with Jana and Anne.
2. Went to the Kletterwald*.
3. Pried my fingers from the ropes.
4. Had twice-baked potatoes for dinner. 

*The Kletterwald is a high-ropes obstacle course.  Joern's sisters were very eager to try it, and wanted me to try too.  Not to be outdone by a 12-year-old, I agreed.  A nice guy strapped some ropes and clippy-things to me and spoke in English sometimes and most of the time German.  I understood "this should be tight" and thought to myself "ya think?" as I yanked on my straps in an attempt to cut off circulation in my legs.  He then took us to a little course about three feet off the ground and showed us how to hook the clippy-things to cables attached to the trees in various ways, and when to hold on and when to JUMP OFF THE PLATFORM.  We paused for translation, and it turns out he wanted me to JUMP OFF THE PLATFORM.  Jana and Anne jumped, and they went flying gracefully across the cable.  I was not so sure the same would happen to me.  So, I gathered my courage and jumped.  I was connected to a zip line and went flying across the cable, and after discovering I hadn't fallen or died, I thought it was really fun!  There I was!  Soaring three feet off the ground, like a bird-that-doesn't-fly-very-high flying!  We went on to more challenging courses, and it was amazing.  I climbed, I swung, I tightrope-walked, I flew through the air on a surfboard, I did the splits!  Needless to say I left the park exhilarated and  unable to move.  It was pretty awesome, and Joern had a great time capturing every moment (next time he will have to join of course!).

Training

Hanging out

Surfing!

Landing

Wahoo!

Easter Weekend (Days 22-25)

So, I have a few highlights from over the weekend, things were pretty quiet here owing to the dark cloud that descended Thursday and pretty much stayed with us until Easter morning (coincidence? I think not :-).

1. Joern and I went to our neighborhood Aldi on Thursday to pick up a few things and it was like Black Friday and the day before a blizzard rolled into one.  What seemed like thousands of people were pushing, grabbing things from under your nose, and generally panicking because all of the stores would be closed ALL WEEKEND and you might run out of something (though with milk in tetra packs, I highly doubt this).  Needless to say, we pretty much filled our fridge to capacity and stocked up on some candles too.
2. On our just-in-case-we-can-never-buy-stuff-again shopping trip, I was walking through the salad dressing aisle and was delighted to find a new flavor called "American Dressing."  It looked suspiciously like French Dressing.
3. Joern fired up the gas grill for some amazing brats, and it was a great success, in both the flavor and diverting fireball departments.
4. Joern's sisters came to test out our guest suite and help us eat all of the food we bought.

Day 21 (Wed)

1. Went for a walk and found my German version of Shelley Lake, a lovely nature park along the river.
2. Walked over to Aldi to get the Wednesday deals.
3. Began preliminary work on an oil painting I have planned for the bathroom.
4. Got what I prefer not to call a migraine, but rather an Unexpected Mandatory Meditation on Lights, Sounds, and Smells You Were Previously Unaware Of.

Day 20 (The Bürgermeister)

Wow, what a weekend!  I feel like we've finally got our household up and running more or less and so we made time to go to Angelloch and get a quick sewing lesson, see Joern's mom, and listen to some friends play in a concert.  It was really fun, with a mix of classical, oom-pa-pa (these really got the crowd going), and current songs.  It's a small village, and so when the Bürgermeister (mayor) came on stage I figured he had shown up to congratulate the performers.  He checked the mike for sound, cleared his throat...and began belting out Thriller with full band accompaniment!  It was a great moment in musical history.  And I must say, perhaps some of our prominent political figures who feel the need to sing in public could pick up a few pointers from this guy.  Angelbachtal, I tip my hat to you.

The past few days have been pretty quiet, but I really should try to keep up with my 4 lines a day, so here it is:

1. Got started washing the giant mountain of stinky clothes that still haven't magically gotten cleaner by virtue of being at the bottom of the basket.
2. Enjoyed the birdsong as I read in our wohnzimmer*.
3. Discovered some sort of pipe on my washer isn't hooked up properly and halted washing activities for the time being in favor of finding a mop.
4.  Had dinner with Joern and heard about his second day at work (lots to learn, but really enjoying it!).

*Which I liked much better than being dive-bombed by clumsy pigeons as I hung out the window trying to wash it yesterday.