Stolen Child

Wow, this song gives me goosebumps.

Watch out for the faeries, Chloe and Katie!!

Text: William Butler Yeats (1865-1939)

Music: Loreena McKennitt

Where dips the rocky highland
Of Sleuth Wood in the lake
There lies a leafy island
Where flapping herons wake
The drowsy water-rats
There we've hid our faery vats
Full of berries
And of reddest stolen cherries.

Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild!
With a faery hand in hand
For the world's more full of weeping
Than you can understand.

Where the wave of moonlight glosses
The dim grey sands with light
By far-off furthest Rosses
We foot it all the night
Weaving olden dances
Mingling hands and mingling glances
Till the moon has taken flight
To and fro we leap
And chase the frothy bubbles
While the world is full of troubles
And is anxious in its sleep.

Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild!
With a faery hand in hand
For the world's more full of weeping
Than you can understand.

Where the wandering water gushes
From the hills above Glen-Car
In pools among the rushes
That scarce could bathe a star
We seek for slumbering trout
And whispering in their ears
Give them unquiet dreams
Leaning softly out
From ferns that drop their tears
Over the young streams.

Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild!
With a faery hand in hand
For the world's more full of weeping
Than you can understand.

Away with us he's going
The solemn-eyed
He'll hear no more the lowing
Of the calves on the warm hillside
Or the kettle on the hob
Sing peace into his breast
Or see the brown mice bob
Round and round the oatmeal chest.

For he comes, the human child
To the waters and the wild!
With a faery hand in hand
For the world's more full of weeping
Than he can understand...

****

(Want to hear the haunting music?)

Bunter Frühling

I can't even describe how delicious it is to sit at my computer, in my very own little office, with the balcony doors wide open and a warm-cool spring breeze fluttering the things on my desk. The fluffing leaves outside are a lovely sea green. (Well, until they get older, at which point they'll deepen into emerald.) The birds are twittering springily. Fat clouds sail by, alternating with golden sun. It all just makes me want to bust out in a John Denver medley! Ohhhh, I love the life around meee... I feel a part of everything I seeeeee...

I will also be very happy to chuck the winter clothes into suitcases this afternoon in favor of skirts and sandals. My winter wardrobe is really quite awful and monotonous. Black. Dark grey. Black. Dark eggplant purple. Dark blue. Hey, it's grey and wintry outside, how about I drape my body in somber winter shrouds! I was starting to feel a bit like Frasier's ex-wife, Lillith.

So you know what I did last week? Went out and bought a bright pink button-down top. It makes me look like a tulip. I love it. And a pinstripe turquoise blouse, too. These are probably the first articles of clothing I've bought in well over a year, actually; which could be due to money and priorities -- I'd rather travel and eat wild salmon than wear new shoes -- but I'm also sure some of it is because the things in shops suddenly look appealing again. Seriously, have the last couple of years been visually terrifying in the U.S., too? I might have tried to look for some clothes before now, but every time I entered a shop, eye cancer was lurking: mustard yellow, traffic-cone orange, hospital blue. Lumberjack patterns. Leftover materials from Tron. Naturally there are bigger concerns in the world than replacing a slightly threadbare (rich, Western) wardrobe; it just makes me scratch my head how clothing designers sometimes seem to value novelty over actual appeal. "Pleasing colors have been around far too long! Let's dye things horrible instead. It will sell! We'll call it trendy!" No wonder I just hunkered down in grey and black and waited for the spraypaint to pass.

What a pleasure it then was to wander into S. Oliver recently and be greeted by shades from actual nature! Hm, maybe I'd better stock up before the next wave of apocalypse chic comes around.

My stepmom has a great sense of color. I mentioned yesterday that Sarah had given us a multi-color patterned quilt, which infuses this whole room with cheer and bounciness. She also sent me, while I was running around in circles last winter looking for a pie pan, any pie pan, stainless steel would have been fine, a beautiful, ceramic, deep-dish, fluted, deep red pie dish. With a cream-color inner lining. It makes everything that comes out of the oven look sumptuous.

Isn't it interesting, how affected we are by colors? Sometimes I choose to cook something round just because I want to use my pretty pie dish. A bed is even more inviting when the bedspread looks nice. I have eaten things, magpielike, just because the colors were attractive.

It can work the other way, too -- my mom laughs her head off at Simpsons one-liners, but she just can't watch the show because, visually, it's an assault on her rods and cones.

I remember reading somewhere that home teams' locker rooms in sports arenas are often painted aggressive "fighting" colors, like black and red. The visitors'? Pale pink! Haha.

Color, color. Colors colors colors. If I had some crayons, I'd probably be drawing rainbows today.

2010 State of the Nation

Gosh, I haven't blogged in a long time! I mean real blog-blogging and jiggity-jogging, not just posting amusing vids and random commentary. In fact, I don't think I've done an actual update all year! Yee!

Too bad the Ideal Time (free evening, stuck inside with a cold, Berti out on the town) happened to arrive when I'm not feeling particularly witty or insightful. No matter, duty calls! I must keep my self-absorbed windbagginess elastic and exercised if I'm to grant my 2011 self any sense of dismayed, oh-how-young-and-foolish-I-was satisfaction!

So. Yes. What is up. What is nyeww. Bbbp bbbp bbp. Hm. Think I'll get some chocolate.

That's better. How about I just start back in January and find my way to April from there.

Not that finding the way to April was easy. No sir, it was a long, dark, cold, dark, cold winter!

December.

Mom and Shauna and Steve all arrived on the same day toward the end of December to celebrate Christmas, and what with our new couch all ready to envelop ze guests, I was practically delirious with glee to have the first wave of butts sitting on it that I had pictured/hoped would sit on it. I was really excited for Christmas this year: it was the first time the season would be done at my place (Michael was missing, but Mom and Shauna were there) and I went out and bought a little potted tree and new tree decorations to hang on it. It's so funny, knowing that I've been settling in here for 3.5 years now, but that I still don't really have all my "stuff." Books and DVDs, for example, which I'm sure I bought at some point are simply not on this side of the pond. (I'm set for Halloween decorations, though!) Pictures, mugs, all those little things you gather up over the years that make your place yours were pretty much re-set in 2006. Not that this is necessarily bad; I didn't own any Picassos. And I took my favorite mug with me. And now I have new favorite mugs. And new things that make my space "mine," like this gorgeous riot-of-colors quilt that Sarah gave us for Christmas a couple years back and brightens up the futon in my office. It all just makes it slightly startling to say, hey, maybe I'll put up some Christmas decorations! Aaaafter, I buy them, I mean!

Anyway, it was blasted freezing outside, forcing us to stay inside and have the sort of visit I'd been needing for a while. Berti and Steve spent the week with their folks and grandfolks in the Erzgebirge and Black Forest, respectively, while we remained in Lu did nothing. No plans, no obligatory running around; just sleeping in late, getting up and lighting the tree, spending the day in our pajamas experimenting with making soups and talking, talking, talking, before decadently deciding to put in a movie in the middle of the day. Mom was a trifle (!) ill, which kept her snuggled on the couch for the first couple of days (hence the soup endeavors on Shauna's and my part) but it turned out not to be Swine Flu, for which we were all so grateful that we willingly sat through 2.5 mind-numbing hours of the Worst Arthurian Movie Ever Inflicted Onto a Strip of Film, "Excalibur." Seriously, did teenagers make this movie? You spend the first half of the film spraying gingerbread crumbs on the carpet in (unintentional) mirth, and the second half recoiling from the screen going, "What the f....?" We needed much soup and Glühwein to recover. Then we watched "Braveheart" and all was well.

I also liked how we did presents this year. We didn't really have a Present Ceremony as such, instead just whipping out appropriate items at what seemed like a good time. Shauna and I were getting ready to brave the negative-Celsius temperatures in a quest for more alchemy ingredients, when she said, "Oh hold on a second! I got you a Christmas present," and rootled around in her suitcase to hand me a pair of beautiful, chocolate-colored, sheepskin suede gloves. Just as we were leaving, Mom commented, "I'm almost done with this book, mind if I raid your shelves for something new to read?" and so I gave her the new book I'd bought her. It was quite laid-back and pressure-free.

A couple days before Christmas, Mom was feeling better so we went shopping in Mannheim, and then on the 24th we took the train down to Bavaria to spend the holiday with Sara and her family in Burglengenfeld. Naturally, there were lots of holiday hordes, and so we somehow ended up with an almost 4-hour wait for the connection in Stuttgart. Tsk! we said, We'll just have to spend a cozy evening out at the Stuttgarter Weihnachtsmarkt, listening to music and eating snacks and drinking Glühwein, doing some last-minute Christmas shopping as we peruse the booths with their crafts and trinkets!

Christmas day was lovely, and noisy. I forget how grown-up my life is, until I spend time with a family with tots and remember how lively a house can get! We exchanged presents under the (beautiful, huge) tree the morning of the 25th, and the boys were thrilled to discover what Santa had brought them. Soon, there were new treasures spread out over the house. I was partial to the toy airplane, myself, and played with it long after I was supposed to be finished assembling it, while Shauna helped Augie balance on his brother's new bike, which the latter was quite afraid of and the former couldn't wait to get back on after repeatedly, inevitably falling off. (Don't tell Augie that two-year-olds aren't really meant for big-kid bikes.) Then daddy and the boys chased each other around with plastic ray guns while Mom, Shauna and I helped Sara prepare Christmas dinner.

We were home again on the 26th, welcomed Steve back from the Black Forest, and bathed ourselves in wine for the next two days before all sadly going our separate ways again for New Year's. At least a rocking time was had by all. Mom danced 24 hours nonstop to celebrate her first "Hogmanay" in the Highlands, and Bert and I tootled over to Dresden to set off fireworks and champagne corks with friends in the middle of the city. (A little spooky, actually, watching explosions over Dresden. I voiced this to Bert, and he admitted to the same thoughts. We wondered how many old folks were choosing to stay inside with the curtains drawn.)

January.

January was cold, cold, and damn cold. Unusual for this area, which is mild and full of vineyards and grows figs and lemons, and is known as the Tuscany of Germany. Bert and I went for a couple of magical winter Wanderungen through the snowy Odenwald, sometimes wading through thigh-deep snow as we navigated the sparkling icy forests.

I also spent a great weekend with my English-speaking girls in Strasbourg. We had no particular objective, except to have a girly weekend looking for Theresa's wedding dress and eating French food and embarrassing ourselves with our long-forgotten French. We've assembled ourselves into a nice little collection of expats these last couple of years: a group of Americans and Canadians who have found ourselves settling in Germany for one reason or another. We don't get together very often -- maybe a couple times a month, more often for Linda and Chrissie and me, since we live closer -- but when we do, it's always a breath of fresh air to hang out with fun girls and make English jokes and cultural cracks. We gleefully took note that our holiday flat was located on the "Rue de Bitche" and since then, we have been the Rue de Bitches.

Also in January was a stompingly fun concert. Bert -- my little metal head -- has a few bands that he and his friends grew up listening to as twelve-year-olds in the GDR. And although they are, every one of them, by now painfully dated and cheesy, and the performers are well past middle age, Bert and his friends devotedly attend every concert they can get to. One of these bands is called "Manowar." (Yep.) Are you picturing album covers with flaming swords, warriors clenching freakish abdominal muscles, and cat-shaped naked women? Okay, then you can probably imagine what the music sounds like.

That right: it was A. Total. Blast. Bert and I walked to the concert hall in Ebert Park, where we joined a surprisingly mixed crowd who was palpably happy to be there. Really, the crowd dynamic just makes the event. Everyone was so jolly, so pleased to be wearing their cheesy '80s band tees and to get another plastic cup of frothy beer and sing boisterously along to songs about Thor the Thunderer. We stomped and sang and made operatic gestures at each other and took pictures with strangers, before stumbling giddily home serenading the neighborhood with, "Across the rain-bow bridge, to Val-hal-la! Odin's waiting for meeee!"

February.

Naturally we didn't neglect the annual sleeping-in-a-cave madness that is Boofen. A hearty thumbs-up to this year's location, too, which instead of a wind tunnel, was a dry and cozy hollow in the foot of one of the rocky cliffs jutting out of the Pfälzer Wald. We built up a huge fire, cooked us up a pot or two of Glühwein, skewered some sausages, and then settled down cozily in the leaves for a long winter's nap. Or at least Bert did. I stuffed my sleeping bag in my ears in a fruitless attempt to muffle his contented snoring. The performance left me quite in awe. He is not usually a snorer, but for some reason a little Becherovka and some cold air and he put on a symphony for the whole forest. While the others were puzzingly able to sleep (maybe because they were also providing some light woodwind accompaniment to his brass section), I gave it up as soon as the sky began to lighten and decided to take a little constitutional in the fresh morning frost.

Goodness me, is the Pfälzer Wald beautiful on a cold February morning! So quiet, hardly any birds; just the whisper of wind through elegant, clattering trees in the valley below. The crunch of patches of snow under your boots. The sonorous rumble of your boyfriend as you come within earshot, but not yet eyesight, of the campfire. (Haha, sorry Berti!)

February was also especially great, in that it was time to check out the little niche that Mom has carved for herself up there in the frozen (quite literally this year, did you see that famous satellite picture of snow-covered Britain?) North, and see what the Highlands have to offer in winter. And I'll tell you: whisky, cozy pubs, blood-thrumming music, dancing, laughter, and fellowship. I adore Inverness. I love Scotland. I love the Scots! Mom is one lucky gal, and if I weren't so danged happy toasting Odin down here in Germania, I would be shoving to make room in her dresser for my clothes.

March.

By March, we were all pret-ty tired of the cold. I would still rather have snow than drizzly muck, so that was, well, all right, but the darkness just took its sweet time in slowly receding from the 5:00pm mark. I was sick of bulky sweaters and never having warm feet. Fortunately there was much travel to look forward to!

The first weekend in March, I zoomed out to Berlin to visit my friend Conny, whose husband was busy checking out China in preparation for their move there in August. (!) Meanwhile, Conny is busy finishing her Ph.D. and taking care of her (incredibly cute, charming) 3-year-old daughter while cooking up another daughter, due just before they leave for China. It was a lovely visit. Sophia Charlotte is an extraordinarily bright and inquisitive kid who uses English with her dad and German with her mom. Okay, actually she hasn't yet gotten to where she sees the point in answering her dad in English, which is cute to observe. I would read English books to her, asking questions like, "Where's the hippopotamus?" and she'd point to it with a "Da!" "And what's this?" I'd ask. "Horse," she said. Then corrected herself: "Pferd."

On Friday, Conny let Sophie go to childcare as usual while she took the day off to have a grownuppy afternoon away from mommying. We explored the Neues Museum in Berlin, which is actually older than the Altes Museum, but has been renovated and re-opened for the first time since WWII in a most intriguing style: they've let most of the building retain its original frescoes, exhibit signs, and worn pillars, alongside the new marble staircases and grand windows, and the result is a very cool insight as to how the building really looked in the mid-19th century. The exhibits themselves (mostly ancient stuff, including Greek and Roman sculpture and the famous bust of Nefertiti) are splendidly arranged in spacious, inviting, well-lit rooms that show the collection off much better than in that dusty old Ägyptisches Museum on the lawn by the Cathedral. You could even find a blogger there who uses run-on sentences and excessive parenthetical remarks! Extraordinary.

We spent Saturday in wholesome family mode at the pool and pizzeria, and then Conny and I chat-chat-chatted the evening away over chocolate and movies after Sophie went to bed. It was so nice to catch up. Thanks for the hospitality, Conny!

And speaking of catching up with old friends: a week later, Amy came to visit!!! She'd been expressing an interest in coming back to Germany over the last three years, and we just never really found a good time until she just said, screw it, how is mid-March for you?

I have a mammoth blog post about that trip all prepared. I'll post it separately, however, since it's about twice as long as this one... (I hope the blogspot servers don't crash under all this weight...)

Let's see, what on earth did we do after that? Oh yes, Easter!

April.

It finally started to get a little lighter and a little lighter, and so we said, what the heck, we'll spend Easter in the freezing cold Erzgebirge just to shake things up a bit. Besides, it was high time to visit Bert's dad in Bad Brambach, his uncle Gert in Sehma, and his friends scattered all over that lovely mountain range.

We rubbed our hands together as we schemed how to avoid the whole Easter weekend travel rush, how to outsmart all those foolish fools who drive east on Easter Friday, oh yes, we'll rise at 5 o'clock in the morning and be triumphantly arriving in Bad Brambach while the rest of the drivers are still gnashing their teeth in 20 kilometers of stop-and-go on the Autobahn.

Haaaa, you see where this is going, of course. There was little gnashing, but plenty of silent scowling at the taillights of our fellow fools who also didn't get on the road until 10:30 in the morning, because we're not 18 any more either, and can't seem to shake ourselves out of bed four hours after turning off a late-night movie. It's probably better that we got a good night's sleep, anyway. We exited the Autobahn, and crossed a large portion of Bavaria on country roads, enjoying some nice scenery and a cozy lunch in a village pub before hitting the road again and rolling into Bad Brambach in the early evening. Bert's dad took us out for dinner across the border. (Please, Czech Republic, don't adopt the Euro! I like enjoying piles of fresh fish and potatoes and mug after mug of grog all for a pittance of Koruna!)

The rest of the weekend was lovely: cooking with Gert, making the rounds of visits, petting baby bunnies at the Schreiters', attending a small village rock concert with Bert's old friends and putting back pints of Krusovice. We passed so close to Burglengenfeld on Monday evening that it was the perfect opportunity to stage an invasion of Sara's home, and so we came by for dinner and a short visit before heading back to Ludwigshafen and our Bettchen.

Since then, it has just been getting lighter and lighter and warmer and warmer. I continue to be awed at the miracle of seasons, particularly spring. It seems like just two weeks ago, those trees outside my window were doomed to remain craggly stick figures for all time. Then last week, I got up one morning and they had been replaced by pink clouds! Suddenly the pink clouds are gone this week, and glossy bushy things have taken their place. I have a rotten head-cold right now, but that was just the perfect excuse to sit out on the balcony in the middle of a weekday and soak up some sunshine in the deck chair while listening to birds chirping in spring-crazed glee. Bikes! Birds! Weinschorlen! Spring!!!

Okay, I have officially spent Too Much Time sitting in front of this glowing screen, and so it's time to sign off for the night. And post the post about Amy's visit. Good night, Interwebs, and see you in May!

On little cat feet

We have had a visitor lately, to Bert's delight.

Despite a tailor-made wooden insert between our balconies, the neighbors' new Siamese kitten grew big enough over the winter to surmount this obstacle easily on his feather-light, chocolate feet. And since the arrival of spring -- about, oh, last week -- he has decided to honor us with his elegant presence.

His name is Puma, and he is a looong, beautiful animal. He perches himself airily in front of our glass door, waiting to float inside as soon as Bert grants him entrance into his new domain. Then we watch him from the breakfast table, entertained, twisting our necks back and forth to follow his exploration of our territory and making bets as to what he can slip into, out of, and on top of. He's so quiet and elegant! Cats are just generally intriguing -- how do they turn themselves practically two-dimensional to slide through the unlikeliest of narrow spaces, or jump onto a spice rack crammed with precariously-balanced bottles, and not upset a thing? He senses our admiration, too, turning bright blue eyes on us in triumph after each such feat. It must be enjoyable to be young and feline.

We'll have to talk to the nice people next door to make sure they don't mind these visits. Bert, of course, couldn't be happier to share their pet with them. He grew up with cats and feels that a house isn't a home without one. We've considered just getting one, but so far, the freedom from expense and responsibility has won out. Doesn't mean that Bert doesn't continue to cuddle every cat he sees, though (wild ones, domestic ones, they all respond to him). And really, is there anything more paralyzingly charming than broad-shouldered manly men holding small cute things in their big arms?

Bauch rein, Brust raus!

I'll get you, hero, if it's the last thing I do!

If you were able to assemble a gigantic corpus of all dialog ever written for film, television, and children's programming, and then sort each line by frequency of occurrence, you would have a pretty enjoyable little pile of cliches at the top. Some of these lines might have even coalesced into individual lexical items, like (everyone together!): "Timetotakeoutthetrash."

Now enter the top one hundred of these phrases into an iPod scramble. Submit playlist to big budget studio. Collect money for the script for Transformers 2.

Not that I was expecting, well, English words from something called "Revenge of the Fallen." But this "movie" (I ask the Gentle Reader to contribute emphatic finger quotation marks, thanks) actually contains these lines, and it's not meant as a spoof. Ready?

bad guy: "Revenge will be ours!" (fist curl)

dying bad guy: "We shall rise again!"
heroic good guy: "Not today!" (shoot)

hissing bad guy: "You have much to learn, my disciple."
kneeling bad guy: "Yes, my master."

bad guy: "You are so weak!" (stab)
good guy: "Arrrrgh."
other good guy: "Noooooo!"

little bad guy: "Who are you?"
hot female good guy: "Your worst nightmare."

Hahahahaha-- WAIT! Someone was paid for this! Give me his name and address, I want in on that.

The thing that really baked my noodle was trying to identify the intended audience. See, this dialog might actually sort of fit in (really unimaginative) Saturday morning cartoons. But although Transformers plays like a kid movie -- not only the script, but the voices and acting, could all have been recorded by two boys playing robots on their bedroom floor ("You will die!" "Oh no!" crashcrashcrash) -- there's way too much non-kid-friendly content. All the violence? Every curse word except the F one? Drug use? Pretty explicit sexuality?

Who exactly did they make this for?

I guess not I! (Adjusts monocle while swirling brandy glass and harrumphing over colleague's scientific new findings, written in Latin.)

Onion surreality

This Onion article just leaves me helpless! It's so... weird! Big, red-bearded man? Check. Eye patch? Check. On roller skates, holding pinwheel?

I'll Be Able To Get This Big Pot Of Chili Over To My Friend's House A Lot Quicker If I Put On My Roller Skates

By Rudy Lavelle

Done! A heaping, hearty 10-gallon pot of Rudy's Famous Five-Alarm Chili, simmered to perfection and all ready for the big party over at my friend Evan's house. Now, how do I get this delicious, spicy stew over there while it's still piping hot? I guess I could walk, but jeepers, I'm already pretty late as it is.

Wait, of course! My roller skates!

Man, why didn't I think of tossing on my roller skates before? I'll get there in no time, with no foreseeable problems whatsoever! And to be honest with you, I've put on a lot of weight lately, so I could really use the exercise. In fact, I'd have to say I'm just a 6-foot-9, roly-poly tub of jelly! Ha! But nothing takes the pounds off like barreling through busy city streets on my roller skates at breakneck speed with a giant, scalding-hot crock of chili.

Now, let me think, what's the fastest way to get to Evan's? It's down a really steep hill pretty much the whole way, so that'll save some time. Of course, I should probably cut through the back lot of the old ball bearing factory after I take that hairpin turn where all of those bottles of olive oil fell off a truck this morning. After that, it's just a quick detour through the indoor ice-skating rink and the park where those kids are always shooting marbles, past Mrs. Finestra's banana peel compost heap, straight through the outdoor antique china market, and then I'm home free!

Okay, I just have to get dressed real quick, and I'll be out the door, gliding effortlessly over to Evan's in no time, gingerly holding gallons and gallons of boiling chili in my sweaty, oddly undersized hands. Oh, nuts! The only clean clothes I have left are a pair of Speedos and my neon-yellow mesh tank top! Oh, well, they'll just have to do, I guess. Boy, it's pretty bright out there, so I think I'll put on my big sun-visor with the embroidered daffodils, too.

And I'll grab this giant rainbow-colored pinwheel, just for fun.

Geez, I don't even think I have time to comb out my bright red, chest-length beard. Well, I can't worry about that now. I'm sure it will get air-fluffed on my way over there, anyway, considering how fast I'll be going. I just hope it doesn't fly up in my face! Because I'll be on roller skates carrying an enormous volume of 210-degree chili!

Obviously, there's no real concern that anything will go awry on my way to Evan's, but I should take a minute to make sure all my ducks are in a row before I rush out of the house on my bright-white, unlaced roller skates holding this humongous, overflowing pot of chili. Have I taken my medicine for my debilitating inner-ear infection? Check. Am I wearing my eye-patch for my scratched cornea? Check. Do I have my iPod and portable speakers playing "The Good Ship Lollipop" on loop tucked into my Speedo? Double check!

I'm still a bit tipsy after that bottle of wine, but I think that's everything. A little low-viscosity machine oil for the ol' skate bearings, and look out Evan, here comes Big Rudy with the chili!

Oh, wait! I just remembered Evan said that when he wakes up from the anesthesia after having his wisdom teeth pulled and picks up a pink, seven-tiered ice cream cake, he'll swing by on his old tandem bicycle with the messed up brakes and grab me and my huge, extremely hot pot of chili!

Never mind!

Grad School and Kindergarten

Old Spice Commercials

I laugh harder with each successive one...!


"Who's laughing now? Heh. ...Me."




The Man Your Man Could Smell Like:




"Hyaaah."




"Just kidding. I'm not a woman."




"I used to be a doctor for pretend."

Happy Birthday, Katie!!!

My youngest sister turns 8 today. I hope you have a great day, Katydid!!!

Alles Gute zum Geburtstag!

What's the next best thing to drinking wine?

Reading about drinking wine!

More from Eric Asimov, the approachable wine writer:

Mr. Know-It-All

Pork Roast and Riesling

This one praises a Washington wine from Chateau Ste. Michelle! Not the Anti-Chardonnay Anymore

Pinot Noir with an Umlaut

Hey! Someone from overseas has finally noticed a German grape other than the tasty but ubiquitous Riesling. Check out this article from Eric Asimov's drinkin' blog, "The Pour."

I myself was pleasantly startled to discover that the legendary Land of Beer is also swimming in jewel-colored rivers of gorgeous, award-winning, accessibly-priced wine -- none of which anyone outside of central Europe has ever heard of. A lot of them are simply well-known varieties with German names: Spätburgunder = German Pinot Noir, Weißburgunder is Pinot Blanc and Grauburgunder is Pinot Grigio/Pinot Gris, etc. But Dornfelder? St. Laurent? Huxelrebe, Scheurebe? What are these?

Damn delicious, is what they are! Yet Eric nails it, I think, when he points out that "among the barriers to finding Spätburgunder in the United States, I forgot to mention one: It’s so popular in Germany, they drink most of it up." I can corroborate this. German wine producers (excepting those in the Mosel valley, with its long history of selling overseas) aren't interested in the nuisance of exporting -- not when they can sell as much as they want right here in Europe, and get the prices they're asking, without the hassle of tariffs and exchange rates. The wine growers here are small; no one is producing thousands of extra cases to ship overseas. Why risk trying to break into a new market?

I've also heard some people suggest that non-Europeans could be daunted by all the Umlauts and long names. But I dunno, that's never stopped anyone trying to pronounce -- or simply buy -- "Château Beau- Séjour-Bécot Bordeaux Cuvée." And when off-Continentals come here and try the wine, they jump right in. Look at my parents!

I think the main hurdle is simply lack of familiarity and precedent. People go for foreign-looking French bottles because they know about French wine (or at least know that others know it). Yet I have almost never found a German wine in the States -- anywhere! -- beyond the Riesling. Okay, there was once, in a huge warehouse-sized store in Phoenix called Total Wine that bragged a selection of 4,000 wines, where I found a single example: a "Dornfelder," which I put in quotes because this was the wimpiest, palest, syrupiest looking bit of flower-painted confection I had ever seen, hardly 9% alcohol by volume. Help! Slander! Fraud! This froot drink was not Dornfelder -- Dornfelder is a powerful, dark, deeply berry-noted purplish wine that can taste like cinnamon or leather, licorice or toasted vanilla; its body is so mighty that it is one of the few varieties (in my opinion) that really belongs in oak barrels, because it can not only hold its own against the wood (rather than being overwhelmed by it) but also carry it beautifully. Yet this sad little dribble was from somewhere in Germany. I could only surmise that some grower thought he could off his unsellable junk onto an unsuspecting American public. "They eat McDonald's," I could hear him scoffing. "They'll buy this crap." I was outraged for wine drinkers on both sides of the pond! O, the injustice! O, the criminal tragedy of it all!

Wait, there is one more "German wine" that I used to see on the shelf at Trader Joe's. But don't get me started on that cough syrup, which starts with "L" and ends with "iebfraumilch." No one in Germany has ever heard of it, either.

All of which would explain why, outside of central Europe, no one associates Germany with great wine. And which American importer is going to risk stocking his shelves full of Umlauts -- Domina Spätlese, Acolon, Frühburgunder -- when he can just refill the Bordeaux instead? I think this is certainly reasonable business sense.

And maybe it's to some extent a good thing, that Germany's wine villages are a quasi-secret. Maybe in a world of increasing monochromism and the availability of everything, it's nice to preserve a few traditions that you must visit to find. Who knows, would turning the focus to export mean the end of the small grower? In what ways would it change the wonderfully democratic nature of German wine culture? I'm not sure I want to see sprawling industrial vineyards here, like some of those giants in Australia or Sonoma Valley.

One benefit I think would result from increasing recognition of German wine has simply to do with national image. When much of the world thinks of France, they think of style and pleasure. When they think of Germany, they think of coarser (or even downright brutal) cultural artifacts. Thus a little more exposure for Germany's delightful, even refined, aspects would not be such a bad thing, I think.

In any case, I definitely think my Gentle Readers should get their booties over here to sample some deliriously fine cultural artifacts. :)

By the way, what is your experience with German wine overseas? What treasures -- or unpleasant surprises! -- have you discovered?

Männer und Frauen

One other thing that I've kinda had to come to terms with is a seemingly stronger tendency to define and and separate gender expectations. Not that we don't do this in the States, too, but it does seem comparatively overt over here.

Thankfully, I'm not nearly so rabidly sensitive to gender stereotyping as I was even a few years ago; indeed, as a taekwondo-obsessed teenager, God help the person who tried to tell me what girls do and don't do. In fact I feel more comfortable in my skin these days than ever before (a delightful aspect of increasing age). But it's still weird to be shopping for sleeping bags and be directed to the "ladies'" section. Ladies need separate sleeping bags? Why yes, I am enlightened: they are narrower and a bit shorter, and the foot area is better insulated. Okay, I reply, I suppose that makes some sense. Hey, says Bert, how come my feet don't get to be better insulated? Because women tend to have colder feet, explains the salesman.

I know sleeping bags are an odd place to start digging out evidence for gender attitudes. Yet I think this reflects a marked overall tendency to separate Women's Things from Men's Things. Of course in this case, we were also simply observing clever marketing strategy at work: the female versions are indisputably cuter, with flower patterns and cheerful colors. Marketers clearly believe that, if given an option, women will prefer women-specific things. And they're right, someone's buying it. Indeed, I found the cute sleeping bags quite appealing.

So why does this still make me feel somehow uneasy? Maybe I can illustrate it with a much more extreme example: imagine if there were explicitly black-people and white-people sleeping bags. One can argue that this is indeed the case, that marketers certainly aim for specific target groups. But imagine if you walked into a sport shop and the salesclerk suggested that you might like to see the outdoor equipment for blacks. You could justify it with all kinds of physical and social evidence: these deeper jewel colors look nice with darker skin, for example. Here are the sleeping bags for Asians, with elegant bamboo-screen patterns. Wouldn't that just be... weird? I guess I just wonder if it's vaguely dangerous to create artificial segregation where it's not overtly necessary.

Yet no one here seems to share my discomfort. A nice lady once showed me her shiny pink cell phone and proclaimed that it's perfect for Frauen, with its unthreatening technology and a calorie counter when you go walking. I smiled and complimented it. Hey, if you're pleased, you're pleased, right? But then I remembered the radio DJ who scoffed that if a woman could figure out Microsoft's new operating system then anyone could, and his female colleague just chuckling politely instead of picking him up by the throat (which is what I would have attempted to do). Then again, maybe she wasn't sure how she was supposed to react on the radio. In any case, it does seem that although the law certainly insists on surface equality, such men-do-this-and-women-do-this attitudes are apparently more tolerated -- even often accepted -- here.

Of course not all separation is equally irrelevant. There are women's parking spaces, for example, which sit in better-lit areas closer to the door. This is of course a commendable idea, considering the higher chance for women to be targeted by criminal activity in parking garages than men. I'd happily make use of this, and hope that others would, too. But the signs advertising these parking spaces bug me: you see a cartoon female selecting her parking space not according to safety, but based on its being "too dark, too ugly, too dirty... ah, perfect" -- which seems to shift the focus from practicality to pure (and even ridiculous: I mean, too ugly?) perceived female persnicketiness. An important difference. Yet no one I have ever prodded about this finds it weird.

Maybe my Feminist Kevlar is not entirely as stashed away as I thought; or maybe Germans are generally just more comfortable in their assigned male-female roles than some of us twitchy Americans.

Cultural Observations, Round Brazillion

I guess the newness of living abroad still hasn't worn off, if I'm still tickled by -- or at least, still logging -- the quirks and differences. I think that's a good sign. Maybe it means those pinch-myself, oh-boy-I-really-get-to-live-here moments are here to stay!

So bum da da dum, here is the latest roundup of Gee, How Swell It is to Live in Germany...

- I love how much Germans love their country. Not in a political or national sense (that's complicated enough!), but a natural one. The whole land is covered by a well-tended and well-marked network of walking/biking/hiking paths, dotted with cozy huts in which to park and rustle up a warm spicy Glühwein in the winter or sparklingly refreshing Schorle in the summer. And what's more, people use it. It's like Sunday is national Let's Go Outside Day, and everyone dons their gear (sleek and perfectly engineered to the purpose, of course ;) ) and joins each other for fresh air and sunshine. Bert and I have gotten out a couple times in the last week for nice long day-hikes through the snowy Odenwald, and our countrymen were out in droves -- families shrieking with glee on a sledding hill out in the middle of nowhere, jolly hiking clubs sharing their pear schnapps with us at one of the ubiquitous natural Points of Interest... to be sure, we Americans like our national parks, too, but there's a wildness and inaccessibility to them that I think can somewhat prohibit a spontaneous Sunday stroll through Yellowstone. The compacter forests of Western Europe seem somehow more manageable (and significantly freer of bears).

- This has become so second-nature to me that it feels odd to comment on it until I remember that we don't do this in America: that is, when you walk into a room for a meeting, you shake hands with everyone there. Every time. Even if you've been meeting for years. In my job, which consists almost solely of small meetings, I must shake over a dozen hands a day. It's somehow nice: I like making that physical and eye contact with each person you're about to work with (although it also means I've become a hand-washing freak! Back, ye colds and virii!). I need to remember to instruct my students that, in the States, this is only done when you are first introduced.

- The Pfalz has a noticeably French touch, which is not surprising, since this area has belonged alternately to both countries over the years. So although there's a lot of hand-shaking at work, you greet friends and friendlike colleagues with cheek-kissing. Left then right: squeek-swak. I find this pleasingly Continental and elegant (although am still American enough to let the other person initiate it).

- Frenchisms also abound in the dialect -- I even hear people exclaim "Mon Dieu!"

- I also like the Pfälzisch dialect itself. To be honest, I haven't always; in the beginning, it made me feel frustrated and excluded. Now, I still can't use it (although Pfälzer laugh when they hear me go "Ajoh" or "alla hopp") but I find it adorable. I love buying "näier Woi" in the autumn and hearing BASF employees say they start work at "sivve." (For you linguaphiles, here's an interesting overview of de Pälzsch.)

- Speaking of dialects, people have started asking me where I come from in the East! I guess that's what I get for living with a Saxon...

- Germans have often complained to me that their countrymen complain too much. It took a long time for me to gather enough input to verify this, but I think now I can agree that yes, they do. Not everyone does, and not all the time, but enough to make me notice and laugh. I mean, if Being Outdoors is the national pastime, Griping must come in a close second. You have a comprehensive national health care program, but have to pay -- gasp! -- ten whole Euros at each doctor's visit? Mon Dieu! The Deutsche Bahn will take you anywhere for even cheaper and faster and more comfortable than it is to drive by car, but it's five minutes late today? Ach, du lieber Himmel! I'm not sure where this comes from, this insistence on being (or at least appearing) easily unsatisfied. I wonder if it has to do with a cultural tendency to demand perfection and Ordnung, and displaying outrage at the slightest infraction would prove your own commitment to excellence. I dunno. Any other ideas?

Anyway, speaking of Germans, there is a lovely sleepy one waiting to have his breakfast with me. Time for some coffee!

Winter

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The dark came down on All Hallows' Eve. We went to sleep to the sound of howling wind and pelting rain, and woke on the Feast of All Saints to whiteness and large soft flakes falling down and down in absolute silence. There is no more perfect stillness than the solitude in the heart of a snowstorm.

This is the thin time, when the beloved dead draw near. The world turns inward, and the chilling air grows thick with dreams and mystery. The sky goes from a sharp clear cold, where a million stars burn bright and close, to the grey-pink cloud that enfolds the earth with the promise of snow.

I took one of Bree's matches from its box and lit it, thrilling to the tiny leap of instant flame, and bent to put it to the kindling. Snow was falling, and winter had come; the season of fire. Candles and hearth fire, that lovely, leaping paradox, that destruction contained but never tamed, held at a safe distance to warm and enchant, but always, still, with that small sense of danger.

The smell of roasting pumpkins was thick and sweet in the air. Having ruled the night with fire, the jack-o'-lanterns went now to a more peaceful fate as pies and compost, to join the gentle rest of the earth before renewal. I had turned the earth in my garden the day before, planting the winter seeds to sleep and swell, to dream their buried birth.

Now is the time when we reenter the womb of the world, dreaming the dreams of snow and silence. Waking to the shock of frozen lakes under waning moonlight and the cold sun burning low and blue in the branches of the ice-cased trees, returning from our brief and necessary labors to food and story, to the warmth of firelight in the dark.

Around a fire, in the dark, all truths can be told, and heard, in safety.

I pulled on my woolen stockings, thick petticoats, my warmest shawl, and went down to poke up the kitchen fire. I stood watching wisps of steam rise from the fragrant cauldron, and felt myself turn inward. The world could go away, and we would heal.

******************

From: A Breath of Snow and Ashes, Diana Gabaldon

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHLOE!

It's a year of great birthdays. Today, Chloe turns 10!!!

Alles alles Gute zum Geburtstag. Love you! And miss you all!!

(Here is another celebratory dance...)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MICHAEL!

My brother turned 30 yesterday!!!

Now he can drink and vote and rent a car.

Congratulations, Bro, and I hope you had a fantastic day. Love you!

(Here is a little celebratory dance...)

Pirate Google!

Arrr, but we be feelin' lucky!

Speaking of blogs...

I think I'm going to clean up the link list on the right, and remove the links to blogs that haven't been updated in a year or more. It's just too sad to keep clicking and hoping -- in vain, in vain!

Home cookin'

Check out our new family recipe blog, Scrambled Eggers! Thanks to Shauna for the lovely surprise (and the cute name, haha!). It's like hanging out with everyone in the kitchen.

Miss you guys!

Happy Wall Fall Day, everyone!

Twenty years ago today, determined masses of citizens took to the streets to declare that they'd had enough of the Berlin Wall.

Aside from the fact that the thing desperately needed tearing down and the GDR badly needed to let its people go -- without this day, I wouldn't have found a Berti. (Or his lovely family. Or many of my lovely friends.)

My heartfelt thanks to all you brave folks!