Some Like it Hot

I wish I had may camera when I first got to Germany, because it seemed there were a lot food porn. I mean ads on how to stop AIDS. The use of food and condoms were visually interesting, and hopefully it would/will get the message out. The ads have started up again, but so far I have not seen as many of the variety of fruits and vegetables used in the ads last year. So I leave with you with the first ones I have seen in the train station this year. Click on the picture to enlarge.

I will be posting the cherry chocolate cake birthday cake soon.

I find so much joy
in small toasted squares of crusty bread
slathered with unsalted butter

Okay! Enough! I have no muse or patience right now to write a poem…Nyah!

YAY! I have a toast automat, a toaster in english, and I am so happy. I haven’t had decent toast in a year, and I finally broke down and bought a toaster. Who would have thunk that I would miss toast so very much.

I miss a lot of foods from California, but I can tell already that I would be missing food stuff Germany if I left now. I haven’t posted in such a long time, and I finally got some pictures uploaded to the computer, so crossing fingers and praying hard to get them all to the blog! Well at least some pictures anyways.

So, the weather here is been quite wonky, hot for awhile, then rainy, then very cool with wind, then hot and humid and windy. Right now we have rain…I just don’t want it to snow! I hope summer lasts all the way through September but I am not counting on it. I think all of my culture shock and homesickness has gone away, well mostly and I will be more willing to post. HUGZ

Missed you all!

I am still here. The weather is wonky, but I have 4 kilos of sour cherries! mmmm

So I have updated the new software for wordpress, and I am currently testing it out. I promise I will upload some pictures sometime this weekend. I have a lot of photographs to sort through.

Yeah, I am sure you have heard that a million times, but I miss all my bloggy friends, and all my other friends as well. Sorry the winter blues had me hard. I mean I have been living in california a little too long and well it was a shocker when the temp dipped. I had to readjust to the temperature and the fact that I still can’t really talk in German, and so my interactions with anyone not speaking english is rudimentary, and short. There isn’t many people near me who I can talk to and coupled with it being cold I have been in the house, cooking like mad, forgetting to take photographs of anything, and basically being blue.

But don’t feel all sad for me I have always been getting out to the city on the weekends, and the chocolates here are amazing, and not to mention the french fries! Man they are like crack! DH is loving the beer, and I do have to say I hated beer in the states, but I love the beer here. Well so far I like Hefeweizen, and umm…variations on weizen.

Christmas was awesome here in germany, and yes I went to Stuttgart Weinachtmarkt (Christmas market) yeah it rocked. I have a lot of pictures to upload so, maybe the next couple of posts will have mainly pictures. YAY!

Also Fasching was interesting we ended up seeing a local city fasching which was great for us as it ran through our fresh market on sat. Yeah I got feather tickled by a masked person. I will write about that later. Lets just say it was a really nice celebration locally.

I also found a four story bookstore in Stuttgart and they actually had some books in english, which I am happy about.I am contemplating getting a small book on baking german breads, but it is all in german. Maybe that will help with my language skills; at least the reading and writing part. This bookstore also has a lovely coffee shop Holanka indoors that makes wonderful cappuccinos. There is another one located near the Rathaus in Stuttgart too.

I am also addicted to a german cooking show called Essen und Trinken I am trying to pick up german by watching cooking shows! It has helped some as it has tuned my ears to hear german and I do pick up a word or two, but the jury is still out. The cooking show is interesting, with two older hosts and that seem animated. I like the fact the camera gets ups and personal and you can see them chopping and cooking. It helps when they give directions and I can pick up verbs, nouns etc. . There are other cooking shows but I can’t seem to pick up anything as the camera is further away from the actual cooking.

Well I probably should stop typing now since I had a glass of beer and with my allergies are feeling the effects of it greatly. Drunk typing is not a good type of sport. I have problems typing normally, so I will sign off for now.

Yes, it is winter, and I am worried. Remember I am a California tranplant, in the temperate part of California.When I lived in California I could drive to the snow, and come back to nice weather in winter. I am however not in California anymore.

I have been sitting here writing about german food, and looking fearfully out the window. It has rained, snowed, rained, hailed, rained, snowed, snowed, rained, and now blowing bits of snow. It seems the weather hasn’t decided if it wants to rain or snow, and what the heck lets throw in some hail. Yeah I love it here in Germany but man the weather seems fickle the last couple of days. I love the beautiful falling snow, but is it cold. I have socks on, the heater is on, and I am still cold. Well that would be only half the truth I am warm except my toes. We have radiators for heaters which do a pretty god job, unfortunately we haven’t any curtains to cover a huge window in the livingroom. Alas cold toes will have to last until we can get to the store.

I just hope everyone is warm and safe today, as I try to reheat my toes, and figure out where in the world my camera cable is located. And maybe talk hubby into bringing some of that Good German Beer home. I mean it couldn’t hurt to imbibe a little and maybe it will warm up my toes a bit.

Hmmm Next post pomme frite and nudlen

Some of you are telling me that your life is boring compared to mine, but I would like to say Phooey! I think it is in how you see your life and what you are doing. I mean there are times I think my life is boring even though I live in Germany! But let me tell you a small vignette, about excitement.

My laundry room with my washer and dryer is located in the basement of the next building. Lets just say usually I never do laundry here any more mainly because I have a vivid imagination and it thinks of vile and scary beasts that roam the halls of the basement. Already pretty exciting, no?

DH is the laundry king here because well he is fearless and brave. Well until I tell him all the scary things my brain thinks up, but then he threatens me with bodily harm and still braves the basement of doom. Well anyways usually Dh is pretty on top of the laundry even though he works nine hours and travels two hours back and forth to work. DH lately hasn’t been on top of the laundry because he is taking an accelerated database class and it is seriously time consuming.

So, DH was lamenting about the piled laundry and me being home most of the time volunteered to brave the basement of doom. DH looked skeptically at me and shrugged his shoulders and said I didn’t have to do it if I didn’t feel up to doing the laundry. I bravely shrugged my shoulders and said I would at least put a load or two in the wash.

Next day, I procrastinated going down the basement to do the laundry. I did everything to stall the process, but I didn’t want to let my husband down, so I took my keys, and a load of laundry and left my warm secure apartment. I took a big breath and opened the lights to the storage area that leads to the other building. The storage area is a long hallway lines with metal ceiling to floor cages that are divided so people can store extra furniture etc. I ran down the hallway, and into the entranceway to other building I opened the door to the laundry room and waited till the light turned on, and tried not to think about killers, rapists, and vampires dripping blood from their teeth.

The laundry room is divided into two rooms. The first room is very large. It is where clothes are hung to dry and has a sink near the entranceway into the smaller of the two rooms. The smaller room carries the washers and dryers. Each person has their own personal washer and sometimes dryer. It takes two hours to wash and load and another two hours to dry a load.

I loaded the washer, and filled it up with soap and revved that puppy up, and then checked the dryer. You see we have a condenser for a dryer and you need to remove the water it collects from the clothes. I unloaded the water into the sink in another room away from the washing machines, and then something brushed my back. I jumped nearing dumping the foot and 1/2 container that was draining in the sink. Luckily it was only some clothes drying on the line near the sink. Finished draining the water and went to replace the water collector, and checked inside the dryer. Clothes were still wet, restarted it and then grabbed the laundry basket using it as a shield ran out of the laundry room. I opened the door to the storage room and ran for my life!
Ahhh safely back into my building I climbed the stairs to my apartment and placed the keys inside. Click rattle. Strange the door won’t open. I try turning it the other way, and then back again to open the door. I push the door open, and nothing happens. I start to lean into the door to push it open. Nothing. Crap. Go down stairs to check my key, and yes it is the right key. Then I approach my apartment door and try again. Nothing.

I start to panic, because I don’t have anyone I can call, as my cell is inside my apartment. Crap! I start fiddling with the lock turning this way and that. I am near tears right now, because I don’t know how to ask the neighbors if I could use their phone. But then I am really going to cry because I don’t know the number to my husbands work. I jerk the key out and slam it back in and turn it furiously to the right and lean all of my weight to the door. It opens! I nearly collapse on the on floor of the apartment because I am so happy.

I decide I am never doing laundry here again!

Food reports coming up next. Need to load photographs.

If you like 80’s music from the U.S. you will like it here in Germany. Not to say that is all they play, but a lot of the radio stations here play music form the U.S. and other english speaking countries. Oh! Not to mention they do play songs from Spain and other plarts of the European Union. It is actually hard to hear songs sometimes by German artist, now I am new here so I could be completely wrong but I haven’t found one that plays mostly German artist songs. I will hoever leave you with some of my favourite songs and artists I have come to like in Germany. Eventhough I may not quite understand everything they are saying. Let be frank here Google translator helps but it doesn’t really do an awesome job. Anyways I hope you enjoy these videos.

Please check out the artist themselves, if you really like their songs.

Xavier Naidoo Abschied Nehmen

Xavier Naidoo-I’ve Never Seen

Culcha Candela Ey DJ

Culcah Candela Hamma

Die Fantastischen Vier – Einfach sein

Die Fantastischen Vier – Vier-Millionen Legionen-Live

I thought you would share a poem that I love greatly. It was written by Myra Brooks Welch, and I am eternally grateful for this wonderful poem. The poem stirs my soul and puts a lump in my throat, and it is quite beautiful. I hope you enjoy it as much as I or more.

The Touch of the Master’s Hand
Myra Brooks Welch

‘Twas battered and scarred, and the auctioneer
Thought it scarcely worth his while
To waste much time on the old violin,
But held it up with a smile.
“What am I bidden, good folks,” he cried,
“Who’ll start the bidding for me?”
“A dollar, a dollar. Then two! Only two?
Two dollars, and who’ll make it three?”

“Three dollars, once; three dollars, twice;
Going for three…” But no,
From the room, far back, a grey-haired man
Came forward and picked up the bow;
Then wiping the dust from the old violin,
And tightening the loosened strings,
He played a melody pure and sweet,
As a caroling angel sings.

The music ceased, and the auctioneer,
With a voice that was quiet and low,
Said: “What am I bid for the old violin?”
And he held it up with the bow.
“A thousand dollars, and who’ll make it two?
Two thousand! And who’ll make it three?
Three thousand, once; three thousand, twice,
And going and gone,” said he.

The people cheered, but some of them cried,
“We do not quite understand.
What changed its worth?” Swift came the reply:
“The touch of the Master’s hand.”
And many a man with life out of tune,
And battered and scarred with sin,
Is auctioned cheap to the thoughtless crowd
Much like the old violin.

A “mess of pottage,” a glass of wine,
A game — and he travels on.
He is “going” once, and “going” twice,
He’s “going” and almost “gone.”
But the Master comes, and the foolish crowd
Never can quite understand
The worth of a soul and the change that is wrought
By the touch of the Master’s hand.

Okay. I have been holding it off long enough, as to where I am located. But I had such awesome pictures, and my computers are not working with me.

Anyways. Where to begin?

We landed here after a very long flight. DH made it so that we could sleep on the plane and reach our destination by morning. Yeah, No sleeping for me except for the very last hour before landing, and I was feeling great! Yeah I was in a sleep deprived, home sick zombie like state by the time we landed.

Yeah, ummm. Passports. Lets just say it is better to get it very early before you leave. I got mine while I was vacationing in Michigan before my flight out to N.C.

Okay so I am at the passport control desk in my new country of temporary residence. I have a special passport for living in the country as a dependent of my husband who is working there. The Passport guy is so very jolly and talkative but very efficient. The line steadily flows and then my turn arrives.

He asks for my passport then frowns. I smile and try to look harmless as possible. He flips through it then looks at me and looks back down at my passport. Now of course I have horrible thoughts of being hauled away and interrogated.

“Why are you here?” he asks me looking up form my paperwork.
“I um came here because um my husband has to work here…”I’m kicking myself for tripping over my words, and I start to panic
He looks at me like he can see all the horrible things I have done in the past, and possibly weighs all the things I will do the future. His frown gets bigger.
“Wow I hope there is nothing wrong with my passport.” I gulp and kick myself even harder as I try to dislodge the foot in my mouth.

The passport guy frowns even more, and I can see myself in jail calling the embassy for a lawyer. I start to sweat, and really wish that I could go back home.

“How long will you be living here?” He asks slowly flipping through my paperwork.
” I will be here for three years” I barely get this out because I am in a nightmare vision of jail, and me wearing a burlap sack screaming to let me out, and that I wasn’t a terrorist.

He smiles and hands me back my passport.” I hope your stay in Germany will be wonderful!” He beams at me and waves me through the door to freedom. I nearly faint as I smile and walk with rubber legs through the door to get my baggage.

Well Germany has been quite good to us, and strange to us too, but my house is still in a half unpacked state. I have no closets, and well with no car and a transportation strike, it interesting trying to get furniture. Food has been good for the most part, and I will get to that soon hopefully.