Double-Half
or One Ten without ham

... sleep tight.
I don´t know how I managed without internet access all those years...

It´s good to say good night, even if it´s only via Yahoo...

I´m not "allowed to" buy any more Gilmore Girls-DVDs. But that doesn´t matter, my friend brought season five to me today, so for sure this is what I´m doing tonight, watching Gilmore Girls :-)

Well and will you believe it? In "Written In The Stars" they have this "artwork" on the wall at Rory´s place:



Well, this for sure is at my place - am I hip or what? Yay for Ikea :-)

Gotta go back for Gilmore Girls now! Need some more distraction on a Monday evening...

After my little, hilarious two-buck-shop-shopping-tour (see last post) it was still early. And hence I thought, having in mind that I park my car for free, hey. Have a look around in this rather ugly town.

You see, Wolfsburg was build to match the needs of the industry of Volkswagen. Wide streets but .. industrial. At least the places I´ve seen. Heaps of multistory buildings for the people. No charme.
OK, OK - I didn´t have a closer look (yet)! But that´s a different story...

I was right in the shopping area.
I went to a big grey building, called the "City Galerie Wolfsburg" (german and their pic, borrowed):



I went inside.

I had to admit, it´s way better done than the stupid castle arcades in my town!

In fact, it was.... wow. A mall, a real mall! With water-fountains everywhere and well done, too!
With REAL plants!
And people running around in summer dresses, just like I saw it in December in Perth!

I walked through there and got homesicker with every step. I didn´t buy anything, I just enjoyed the atmosphere, the memories. Alone.

I went into the store (chain) I got my lion from.
Being in deep memories, I wanted to turn left - certainly I immediatly realized where I am, made a loop and went to the right, like everybody else. Did hurt a bit.

I went out, and, sure, guess it, a shoe store. I wanted to simply pass it, but then I looked at my feet. I was wearing my red sneakers. I love them and they fall apart due to that! I can´t wear them in rain anymore, they leak!
I thought, maybe I find some red sneakers there.

I didn´t, not for the price I wanted.

But.

Does it matter if you travel back in time to December last year or if you go back further? When I saw those clogs.. well, you know what I mean - there is a connection, really, let me show you!!!

Me, as a kiddo, wore clogs like those (mine had white dots on 'em, too):



Now, see. I was looking for red shoes, right?

I was in memories of a time that has passed, right?
When seeing the clogs I was in a time where I wore red shoes.

And I got no sneakers, still right?

How about at least clogs, then?

Not Perth 2006 but my home town ca. 1977 - sounds waaaaay too logical to not see it, huh?
So, here we go:



Deep breath!

I´m gonna need some new sneakers anyway, and soon. But for today, I´m happy with my new clogs! :-) Agree?

..., the receptionist told me on Tuesday for the appointment at the doctor in Wolfsburg on Friday.

Time... 60 cent per 30 minutes. Heck, that hurts!
But, nahhh...
I parked just across the main road in a side road, for free. Price: 8 minutes walk to where the expensive parking starts. Yay!

I had two books with me and certainly I was way too early so I had a look around the place... and knew where I wanted to go after the appointment! :-)

I made myself comfortable (well, as comfy as you can get in those norrow waiting-areas) and started reading. The book Ingo´s father gave us, "The dig tree" (in german). It´s about the first walks across Australia. Interesting, but the author, Sarah Murgatroyd, goes into every single, tiny, little,... detail. Exhausting! And I hardly can differ about which group I´m redaing at the moment! I was hoping to finish the book this morning there.

After just 15 minutes they called me in! In my town "take some time" means something different, for sure!
I certainly was happy, though!
Afterwards I went straight to the two-buck-shop I had just discovered before!
I just loooove that!

And I got some pretty stuff for my advent-calendars.

NOW???! It´s only July!, you think?

Yep, quite right. But whilst my friend is running around in panic in November - which means btw in cold, rainy, nasty weather when it´s getting dark early - together with heaps of others in panic, searching for presents, desperately!

Then... I sit in my warm room and just grab the bag of little presents I gathered here and there all year round. Gathered not on purpose but when seeing something by chance, thinking of the people I will give them to.
I prefer my approach. It´s light and easy and fun.
And it takes "no time at all" ;-)

And I also got something for me, too. I mean, it came to me and made me do this title:



Guess you know which color I like best :-)

What a good day! What a good planning at the doctor´s place!

Tuesday I went to the doctor, a new one, in Wolfsburg. 60 cents for 30 minutes parking - I was kinda... well, not amused! They took some tests and told me not to wash my hair 'til Friday, where I have to come back, too. Eek! I don´t feel comfortable that way!

But there was enough work to do. My colleague leaves for holiday on Monday, my customer on Wednesday. And my customer wanted to have the new job she gave me ready before her holiday.

I have two projects running, the first one has to be updated by lunchtime, always. The second was a pixely one this time.
It´s a portal that was "designed" by some agency in a big hurry. It wasn´t developed after those guidelines later on and in an even bigger hurry. It´s a content management system and every... body can work the way they like on it.

The result: Freaky chaos in bad design full of technical defects.

They did some research now on usability and guess what? Big surprise - it´s bad!

My job was to combine the available elements in different patterns with the technical defects.
I used Photoshop and it was really a nasty job. The content of that portal is huge and unstructured. Finding elements in the positions needed and stuff was no pleasure.

I cannot simply leave that work and go back to it easily - it´s too chaotic. Hence I worked as long as I could on it and after two days I was really done. Including a guideline to all the elements and how they work for different content.

Phew!
Two days of over 10 hours of tiny work in a big chaos.

I couldn´t let go - I jerked out of sleep several times at night. On Wednesday evening I got headache. That sort of you know aspirin won´t help. Slept bad again and was down on Thursday. That combined with the feel I got from my hair (bad!), I decided, nahhh, no work today! I was soooo tired anyway.

My doc send me home for two days.

That makes three days off work due to sickness in six years - see?! It makes me still feel guilty... Stupid, I know...

But it came in handy. My brother was to come over again.

To get some calmness back we bought the two "little white men" you saw on top. "Please tear before planting" the signs on their heads say. I´ll give it a go :-)

.. that´s like we are just now!
I got migraine today. Was in the bedroom, recovering the afternoon - and am fine again, YAY!!!!
(Usually if I get it, I have it one side of the head on Saturday, on the other on Sunday - hope tomorrow I´m free!!!)

Well, there is nothing on TV. Ingo is at his computer - two comfy 19" tft-monitors. I´m on the floor on a lousy notepad (15"), enjoying 108-year-old Olives´ blog, or blob, as she calls it. Have a look, it´s amazing! (See last post).

Well. I guess "normal" couples are just like this: Being in one apartment/room, doing different things.
Usually we cling to each other ´cause time is so precious to us.
It still feels good, though.
Tomorrow we´ll be there just for each other, I hope!

... this is the language I learned at school (apart from english) - and regretted it now so often!
Cuba, Isla Margarita, Mexico.... I had to fight through with english.
Since french and spanish are relatively similar, I don´t get it with spanish. Or portugese...

And now I find this article (german).

It´s about a blogger, she starts with this:

"Friends of the internet, today is my 95th birthday. It´s my birthday and my avaricious grandson gave me a blog as a present."
It´s Maria Amalia López from Muxía, Spain. She thought she might attract some few elderlies but is the hit now!

This is her blog (spanish). There are Links to other languages, but reveal only an interview she gave on the subject (and I couldn´t get english, just german).

She writes about her youth, her home - I bet it´s really totally interesting, I´d really loved to read it. Darn!!! I can´t!!!!

Man - I wanna be like that! Always open to new stuff, no matter how old I am.

Maybe I should get an iPod for a start. Try to play Mario.
Ummm...

Addendum!: On doing research, I found the blog of Olive Riley - "The life of Riley" - she is a 108-old lady from near Sydney, born in Broken Hill - I was in both places :-)
Guess what I´ll do on Monday evening!!!! 108 years of age!!!!! A blogger! Wow! My deep respect! She was born Oct. 20th 1899!
She doesn´t blog herself but has an assistant. Anyhow... deepest respect! If it´s true and not someone making it up?
And a note goes to my Mom who bought a notebook and never turns it on!

We went to the Okercabana (german) yesterday, my brother and me. Got rid off the shoes and ran barefoot in white sand. Had a beer and talked about heaps of stuff. It was good and ended up with a yummy Pizza.
Amongst other he tried to talk me into having a family. He thinks I will some day regret it bitterly, not having kids. I dunno. I just can´t imagine that way of life for me. And he said, at the moment he can´t see it for himself either. Who knows what life´ll bring.
Later I finally got my new washing machine. It´s smaller and hence fits better in in my small kitchen. It was "cheap" (the cheapest I could get), which means it doesn´t show the time needed to finish. That´s crap, but, well...
I packed stuff for the weekend, watered my plants - I hope they make it 'til Monday evening.

Then I watched Toy Story. If I hadn´t known I wouldn´t have guessed that Buzz is spoken by Tim Allen - he sounds different in Home Improvement.

I ended that day with Queen "Live in Rio 1985".
Freddie was so sweet there.
Brian May got a chair and started "Love of my life" - no other instruments involved than the guitar.
And not Freddie did the singing, but the fans.
Freddie obviously enjoyed it so much! Partly he joined in but mostly he conducted, eyes closed.
Meanwhile he said in an unostentatious way, "you sing very nice".

Touching, that was.

And Ingo´s point of view was, have you seen one concert, you´ve seen it all. Naaah!

I didn´t finish, hence, I know what to do on Monday evening.

In three hours I´m on my way to my family`s place. My brother said there is a take-away where you can get good doner kebab. After all those scandals on rotten meat used for doner I never had one. Maybe I give it a go.

I bought a feeding cup for him, probably the moment he died. I still - after five years (!) can´t cope with the thought my father is dead. How long will it take?
My brother will be in my town today.
I worked extra hours yesterday and Monday (Tuesday I took off early - to go to the dentist - there goes my time to!) - I will leave here at 12:15 to meet my brother.

In April five years ago my grandmother died. Out of 15 grandchildren she raised two - my brother and me. I can cope with her loss. Why not with my fathers´? We never went along well, either! My Mom says we were too much alike to cope (same thing for her and my brother - two "bullheads" they are!).So why can´t I let go?!
I cannot go to the grave either. Too real, still. My Mom said if I don´t feel like it, it´s ok.
I have pics of the whole family hanging all over my place, so I see him every day - in times he was healthy and happy. Maybe this is what I´m doin´ wrong? Actually I don´t think so. In my dreams, too, he is always well and healthy, not eaten up by cancer, which is a good thing, really.

I don´t know yet how to handle my brother today.
He and our father were so close. Whilst my brother studying hard he made me (already on a routine job) feel like it´s just a little thing, nothing to worry about. He took all the weight on his shoulders alone. The doctors said it´s just the gullet - nothing serious, anyway.
In the end I drove from Wolfsburg to Goettingen every second day, some 150 km one way. The day my father came home I was there, too, doing errands for him. Small town, I was on foot. When I came near the house the ambulance was still there. The rolling grill of the business was down - for the first time in my life during the day.
So I knew.
He didn´t want to die in hospital.
He could have waited for me to say good-buy, couldn´t he?!

My mother forced me later to see him. And it really struck me. Glad to say his nails were short. But apart from that and a bit bigger - my hands. I never recognized that before. Exactly the same. Why did I never see that before?
I see him every single day that way and I´m not sure if this is good.

My brother and me didn´t go to my grandmothers´ funeral, we had our reasons due to other relatives. So the first funeral ever in our lifes was that of our father. I felt like being put in big waves of cotton and at the funeral I nearly passed out.
My brother was one of the guys carrying the coffin.

I´ll never understand were he got that power from?!

I cannot call my Mom today, I hope she doesn´t call me.

He also gave me the love for sunflowers. My mother had the coffin decorated all over with mini-sunflowers that day. I hated his stupid sister even more for coming along that evening five years ago today now in my absence, putting a red rose in his hands and folding his fingers like for a prayer.
She never cared for him when he was alive! She obviously didn´t know him either - a rose! Woman!!!
No good thought to end this post I probably should´t make anyhow!. But I have the feeling I have to let these darn words out. I don´t wanna sound pathetic, really!

Not a good thought either, but true: Today five years ago the little creek beside Ingo´s home flooded Ingo´s apartment and amongst other things my whole Jerky from Alice drowned.
I couldn´t go to his place, the streets to it were flooded, too. First time in ten years I slept in my old girls´ room, too. Strange feeling on top.

It was a hot and sunny day, just like today.
Farewell.
We miss you.

My new shoes say inside: "Specially made for your Gorgeous feet".
I bet that sentence came from a man - but, well. I fell for it. Mission accomplished!

Argh! The darn... really darn... ??? Restaurant? Could you ever call a place like that a restaurant??? I don´t wanna ever rest there and I´d eat bugs before... ok, noo.

ACK!
I complained (second time!!! First time successful - for some months...) at the town´s council about the icky "restaurant" down here!

They cook with the oldest oil ever. They don´t use the outlet air stuff (costs money) but open the windows instead. I seem to be the only person to recognize (fall nearly dead on the floor due to the stink) about it.

I have to close the window for good!

If you don´t hear a bit of me in the future... I baked down to some centimetres, not able to go to work (car! Height!) or reach the PC (also for BIGger people!).

Help!

And never dine in here (the keyboard missed the "n" in "dine" - guess here!!!!).

The heat is still on (I will afterwards cherish this moment in winter!!!). I roam around. My tooth stopps hurting. I still feel it as something not normal. Had a look at it.
Smooth. Like silverware in golden color or something (Ingo just yahooed good-night. His apartment is located in an old mill - thick walls, still cool - sweet dreams, you!).

I look like Richard Kiel from 007 - only on that part of my set of teeth. Luckily!
Breeze.. come in here, pleeease (my first rhyme!! -ok, not a bummer, but maybe it might work?)

Since about a week Knut (thanks for "borrowing the pic) has no more shows running. He´s now about 50 kg and really strong, hence already a dangerous, wild animal (does he look like that here?!).

Great that they succeeded in raising him. Sad that it went so fast. He was such a cutie (teenagers don´t like to hear stuff like this, I guess. Well. Knut can´t read so... CUTIE!!! Yes, Sweet boy!).

He spends his "summertime" in the pool. Go, little polar baer (I even bought the first DVD!).

For me: Ack. I really DO looove summer. But. Hot! 10:30 and hot. All (haha! That makes two!) windows open. Not a breeze. Neighbour tries to watch in here, too. Stupid guy.
Some teenage wind, pleeease?
Need (can!) go to work tomorrow and wanna be fit for it!

Yay for summer!
22 tomatoes so far on my little balcony!

For my sunflowers it was too long too cold, sadly. My lavender gave in, too.
Basel and some thyme are doin´fine, the aizoaceaes grow but there are no blossoms yet.

Umm. Did I mention I actually don´t like tomatoes too much? Do they want to make up for all the un-yummy tomatoes I had in my life so far? That would be nice of them :-)

There are yummy tomatoes out there, I know this! Two weeks ago we had lunch at a students´ café round the corner. I had a rocket salat (rocket??? In german it´s Rukola) with really, really tasty cocktail tomatoes.

So guys, out there on my balcony - try to beat that! :-)

I hope they survive next weekend. Finally it´s my turn again to come to Ingo´s place which means I can water the plants on Friday early morning and then again only on Monday evening.
I´ll leave them with water in bottles upside down and hope that´ll do.

Would be my first self-grown tomatoes!

And it´s a little competition here, too.

A friend of Ingo lives in a "clean" little village. Last year his sunflowers were small, looked sad.
Mine, sitting in this "dirty" town were big and lush and just beautiful!

So again, go guys, here me?

Awwww, it´s over! Phew! More than an hour I sat in the chair at the dentist.
Luckily I finally have a good one! A young woman who is very understandable. Both times now the anesthesia worked properly - if someone could invent a drill with no noise, that would be great!

The dentist explained every step and said, I´m doin´ just fine.

After the dentist I went through the city a bit and bought some skirts for half price (and two pairs of shoes for altogether 14 € ... they are very small, so Ingo will hopefully not even see them).
I really needed some treat after that treatment! :-)
What a creative language english is!

Luckily it wasn´t necessary for me to speak. No one would have understood my words anyhow. I really wonder why the lips are the very last part you get the feeling for back after anesthesia for the teeth!

Tooth still hurts a bit, but that´s ok.
I got a temporary arrangement and next Tuesday I get the crown. And then I hope that was it with the dentist for quite some time! Somehow I can´t find trust in the anesthesia really working - after it failed only once, but that pain was eeeeeeek!

And I was so afraid I could do it worse by banging against the drill in my mouth, ack!

.. is over now.
Here an update:
On Saturday we went to the TU-Day (german). There were heaps of things to see like this one:

See what happens if a cup of water goes into boiling fat? MAN! How horrible!



True story: Ingo is a voltunteer firefighter and told me the following that happened in the village he grew up in - there was a girl who had a boyfriend. So far, so good. The boyfriend visited her and left his moped in her parents´ garage.
When he wanted to leave the moped didn´t start.
He did the following: Lighted up his cigarette lighter to see if there is still fuel in it.
Which was the case. And the garage in flames. Poor girl. I guess she was quite ashamed to have a boyfriend that stupid...

On the TU-Day we also saw Helios in action:



Sadly there were others already talking to the team so I couldn´t ask where his station is - he opens and locks the door himself there!

Are you interested in making three-dimensional laser scans from any object for nearly no money? Use their free programme David - it´s easy! Well done, students! After we´d been shown how to do it, I said "thank you" - obviously no one else did the whole day - an astonished and really reassuring "thank you!" was the answer. Hey, guys! This is the students´ leisure-time, they are volunteers! There for your entertainment - honor that!

We also tried to extract DNA. But didn´t succeed - Ingo was the only one who wanted an apple. All the other had kiwis and succeded, but with apples it´s difficult we were told afterwards. Well.

The evening was still like a summer should be! We sat outside playing cards. As usual Ingo lost most of the time in Mau-Mau - I think he does it in purpose (noooo, he does not, sorry!). We used to play Mau-Mau a lot in Australia - each time we were in a laundromat, waiting for the clothes to get ready. Since Ingo lost all the time and therefore lost the interest to keep on playing, too, I suggested that the winner has to mix the cards - some not so enjoyable task. Which was mine all the time, guess who is too lazy for the job? ;-)



Sunday - hot and sunny, too! We hopped on the bikes and went for the parks. FINALLY!
See how far the chestnuts are already:



But then... what happened to these?! Mutants?



In the second park, the prince-park, Ingo caught something and that was it - a leak in the tyre. Well, it was too hot for cycling anyhow and, btw, he was very quick in fixing it afterwards (have to remember to buy a new inner tube)!

I just vacuum-cleaned my apartment, mopped it through. Too small a place for two people, really...

When Ingo called me via skype I started to cry. I know that it´s silly. But I miss him more than ever. First time we stayed here in my home for so long together.

My washing machine has nor arrived yet. Ingo suggested he comes over when it´ll arrive to make sure everything is done properly and "just like that" (´cause I certainly can handle that myself! ;-)...) - a treat I´d more than love to scream "YES!" to - but when I see the petrol prices.... school-holidays just started - a good reason to rise the prices. Again.

So I guess I´ll have to wait ´til Friday ´til we meet again.
Time´ll fly, I´m sure. Monday evening already. Thursday my brother will be here and - wrooom - it´s Friday evening.
Tomorrow I´ve got something to do, too... go to the dentist :-(
I will not only get a crown - or the preparation for getting it. Part of another tooth broke away! Argh, I just hate the pure thought of the sound of the dental drill! Ingo would be welcomed to come with me to that appointment!

Still 27 °C. But on time for the weekend rain will come. We´ll never get to ride our moped!

YAY! The german team got bronze in the World Championships 2007 in American Football in Japan! 7:0 "against" Sweden - No 6 is "our" Joerg Heckenbach. So you can see players from our Braunschweig Lions helped a lot! Here is the good news and here (german) is the news from the Lions´ site.

... reached me from Helgoland, a little island in the northern sea!



Isn´t that cute? My Mom is there for a little holiday, she really needed.

Memories... my those days little brother on the way back to the land... high waves and he pukes his little mind out, or lets say, he feeds the fishes ;-)

I had to take the pic with Ingo´s camera, though... He´s repairing mine at the moment...



Yep. He can do that., too! :-)

me! - not Barbie... ;-)
Ken is now guiding me - I´m so fed up with loosing my way, I bought the navigation system TomTom. And I choose the voice "Ken", an australian male.
Seems to be easy to use and a very likeable voice, too.


Seems to... Ingo is checking it out like any other man .. or boy? - would, it´s his new toy for the moment. I only want it to do its work, I´m a woman here!

Will you believe it: On our last holy-day summer is finally here!!!
So we hopped on our bikes and went to the OKERCABANA:



Isn´t that orange plastc palm just... kitschy? Hehe! :-)

And the view, ahhh.. beach, sand, beach chairs...



Refreshing drinks and Ingo:



Our dinner was very exclusive - we went to El Gaucho and had the yummiest steaks again. The waiters were very informal again, making us feel very comfortable.
Hmm even the cutlery is just beautiful:



Friday alreaday. Time was in such a hurry, like always when you have a good time.

Time... in a few moments the "70´s show" is on TV. We are getting old! There is a "show" of the time we grew up in! I´ll love it, I´m sure! What great times those were, full of color, full of life, full of untroubled, light-hearted moments. Flares, sideburns and those great shoes (I´m still wearing today, thanks to the revival!).. ahhh, memories!

Tomorrow the TU (technical universities) have their open day (german), it´s right around the corner, guess we´ll have fun (I only hope I don´t run into my former roommate, Marco. Ack, he´s so odd...).
30 °C are expected - at least! YAY for summer!!!

A common pic?
Whilst I am sitting in front of my two TFT 17" monitors, blogging now, Ingo is sitting on the edge of my fouton with his notebook, bathing his feet, in front of him the TV.

A normal day.

Nooo.

I am sad.
Tomorrow evening he would be here anyway, starting a normal weekend. Leaving on Monday morning - which he will do (have to do)!!!

No more

• sleeping in peace


• with the door open, just like that


• not being afraid of the smoke detector making alarm (Ingo is a volunteer firefighter and knows what to do - even if the darn thing just wants to tell me that the battery is low!)


• having company when going outside (darn neighbour!)




• having a warm, loved body beside me, no matter what!


• fresh baked rolls in the morning


• sleeping ´til nearly 09:00 am (05:40 it is again)


• cuddling


• kissing


• holding fingers




• feeling safe and loved

Guess it´s so hard this time because....

Over public holidays we´re either far away or (usual) christmas at Ingos´ and hence my familys´ place - FIRST time here - at MY home!

What´s a home, anyhow?

Yes! I should love and enjoy the time being ´til Monday morning.
Love to sleep with the door carelessly open (no strangers in my apartment like in my dreams!).

I´ll try.
Yep!
Today is good, for sure.

And I feel so small

We went to the science centre Phaeno today - you can find 250 experimental stations and a diversity of programmes here. We went there early and visited with at least 4 or 5 school-classes, grade 3 and 4. It wasn´t just so plain LOUD you could hardly concentrate (I really do believe we were more disciplined those days! Ingo even thinks we went to museums and stuff only from grade 7 on...).

Sadest thing was: the kids never read the - really short - instructions but pushed buttons and everything without any sense.
Well, ok! There was the one or other little fellow who tried to work himself through seriously. But he never got a chance, cause the others simply outnumbered him.
When we - strangers and grown ups - were at a station they didn´t mind interfering - as I kid (and also now) I would never dare to!

And the teachers didn´t mind. Neither the noise nor the des-interest. What was this worth for the kids?

Am I old? Old-fashioned? Narrow-minded and a white-bread?!

There was one station that measured the pressure you make when running against a wall - boys ran for it like crazy.

Around lunch time the school classes left and man... it was so silent suddenly! Uhhh, look - or rather hear! - this thing really makes a noise when touching it!
Finally we could enjoy. Having no kids you´re just not used at all to those high and loud voices and then so many of them!

Scary was the fire-tornado - I hope I will never see it in nature!



We were on our feet all day long and man... I´m obviously not used to that, either. My feet and legs really hurt!
Maybe I´m getting old?

This evening we went for another lecture, this time on acoustics. We were 10 people only (apart from me just men) and... no lecturer showed up! Will you believe that? We stood (!!! on our sore feet and legs [I have to say, I wore sneakers all day and still my feet did hurt!]) for some 10 minutes and then went home, disappointed.
I´ll take a hot shower and that´s it for today.
Temperature below 20 °C, rainy. Still.
The weekend - when our holiday is over - the weather will get fine. Argh!

What a cold and nasty day this was! 15 degrees Celsius (or 59 Fahrenheit), no sun. Hence... we tinkered around a bit.
A second "go" for the vegemite-mobile - sad thing I couldn´t thank the Mc Donald´s-team that gave me this stuff! (I wrote an e-mail with the pics, but got no answer):





In our little holidays last year we also went to Hamburg where you get a special beer, Astra (german - give it a go and hear how the hamburg dialect sounds - a little gaming-stuff is there to find, too). We bought that brand in our little holiday in Husum and here is another mobile we (Ingo!) made out of the crown caps:



Sketch for another one:



And the result:



The token we bought - if you read along, Hann: I´m wearing it as a necklace, thanks for the tip! :-)



The (given) engraving says "Braunschweig die Loewenstadt" (Brunswick, city of the lion) and on the other side we now have "City of Science 2007".
In the end I thought, argh, we should have taken "07.07.07.", but then Ingo said, "aw well... we know it" - and it´s the whole year 2007 for being the City of Science!

The last meal (for today): Another go of the roulades - this time with noodles that show from which animal the meat is (muuuhhh):



I only wish the weather will get better! Who wants to jump on a bike in a weather like this?!

We didn´t do much today...
We started with a yummy brunch that included prosecco in cans, strange, but the one with added lemon was really tasty:



I got the rose here from the supermarket Edeka (german), who celebrates it´s 100th birthday.
They are a big bunch - but still you get the trolleys for free! Can you believe this?! Everywhere else you need a token or a euro - not here!

We wanted to take a guided tour on the Oker, the river that runs through town. But... nahh.. the weather wasn´t inviting!

Instead we had roulades with heart-shaped noodles (you can click to enlarge) - YUM - Ingo let the roulades simmer for way over 90 minutes, the meat was so dry, it just fell apart when you simply looked at it! It fell apart on our tongues, just plain right (and two more are left for tomorrow!!):



The weather warmed up a bit - my apartment got all sticky from the cooking - but I can´t open the window - the restaurant underneath has it´s doors open again - the stink of old cooking oil is just everywhere - again!
I complained via online form at the town again - last time it worked - keep fingers crosses they help again!
So... if you ever visit my town: Don´t dine out at "El Mundo"!!! Knock at my door instead - although I´m not a good cook, I can fix you something that´s at least not "eeeek!!!"... ;-)

I´m really good in making three-minuts-noodles with olives and Mozzarella, if you wanna give it a try, you´re welcome!

Don´t buy this - it´s really crap!
We went to IKEA today and amongst other things (...) I found this clock - special feature: You can record a message as alarm-"sound". I thought, great, that way Ingo can wake me even though he´s not here inbetween the week!

Forget it! He sounds like a cheap metall-rubbish bin! You can hardly understand words, let alone the sound of a voice.
This morning we went to an "exhibition" on air and space travel - crap, too. We were through in 30 seconds.

In a couple of minutes we´re on the way to a lecture on how we sense time.
Let´s hope this isn´t also crap (it´s in an auditorium, which means if you leave, everyone looks at you...).

Talking of crap: We´re down to 15 °C, rainy.

... I looked at him. Today I took him home!



He´s quite loud, I just love it. What an expensive day... in addition I bought a washing machine.
But isn´t this fountain just beautiful?!

In about an hour we´re off to the PTB, a guided tour where we look behind the "coulisse", subject will be "Physics and Art", well, we´ll see!

Today we visited the Nanotruck (german). The use of nano technology ranges from preventing shoes to smell bad to the use of material that repels any fluids and further on to help fight cancer very specifically - let´s hope reseach goes on very, very fast in this last mentioned part!

The other day I took this pic from Henry the lion, or rather from his bottom:



Ingo said, why the heck are you doing this? And I went, well, I guess not many people take a pic from him from this angle.

Today we went to a grocery shop where I found Spunk (german), some salty licorice I loved when I was a kid and never saw it again. What did Ingo detect?! YEP! A bag... and Henry is on it - well, his bottom, for sure! So much for that! (you can click to enlarge) :-)

On Sunday morning we joined the city tour of science. We should have stayed in bed! Some actor who was the "guide" tried to be funny, but it was just plain stupid and we didn´t learn much knew of the town.
Wasted time and money.

On Monday we just went in the city, doing some shopping. It was still warm but started raining in the afternoon.

Today we went into the museum. We saw fishes, frogs ... insects (luckily most of them dead! I get goosebumps from anything that has more than four legs!) and really great dioramas like this one:



The sun soon went away and it seemed like the town got sad...
At least I felt that way when I saw this lost rose - or had it been thrown away? Fell out of a bunch unseen?



A few steps further we saw this bike...
Locked away but all robbed out... and forgotten, too?



Where is the summer? Forgotten? Lost? We´re down to around 16 °C, rainy.
Can only get better, hm?

I tried to comfort myself by buying some CDs, but the dedication made me somehow sad again: "Dedicated to the immortal spirit of Freddie Mercury" - the weather for sure suits this sentence...

Wanna buy the castle plaza in Brunswick? No problem! Just play Brunswick Monopoly (german)!

There are two versions of Monopoly on Lower Saxony - Hannover and Brunswick! Yay for my town! :-)
I don´t play Monopoly, but still ... YAY!

Nooo, this is not a post on Tim Allen or his lovely, great show where it´s all about more power.

It´s about my loo and a great memory of my childhood days and how I was able to convince someone to do what I want, which is tough for me!

I live in an apartment from post-war-time, nothing much is standardized and so my toilet-seats tend to break down in their anchorage couplers. I was able to fix it with some paperboard, but that´s no good use in the longterm. So we went to a home improvement store to buy a new one.

Look what I found! That´s for kiddies! No more falling into the toilet like when I was little, isn´t this great?!



Well, and then I saw it! I kind of.. jumped with the seat in my hands - look!



This is the sample only. I wanted it!!! I asked the staff who was rather not friendly, informing me, it´s just a sample, they don´t have and don´t get it anymore and I cannot have this one.

I went, "I am really that old, I grew up with this! Our living room´s wall paper looked exactly like this (it had silvery threads, too) and if you give this to me, questions on that subject will stop altogether".

I got it for half the price (which was still some proud 25 euros!) and here it is, right in my 70´s corner - YAY for being a kid again!!!



I feel all cozy. See my white high chair and the first yuccky gulp of beer they gave me. I looked horrified but since everybody laughed, I joined in. I see the white phone with wich I called China - my Mom only realized it when I said some easy chinese words - an expensive fun that was!
I was filmed all the time the first years and I really - maybe because of that - have very early childhood memories. Memories I won´t let go, memories that make me buy all the stuff I do!

Beautiful, isn´t it?