Mmm...Free Music

I recently found and joined, for a nominal yearly fee, the city library. Of course the University of Mainz has a main library and many other subject-specific libraries. But I haven't spent much time exploring those, they're a bit imposing, and I know there are supposed to be some restrictions on what you can take out. Also, the University libraries are at least 15 minutes farther out of my way than the city library. Aside from these perks though, the most alluring thing about the city library is its fairly large CD collection.

This will be a good way to bulk up my music library, especially with the inclusion of German music. I can take up to 25 things out at once -- I settled for a mere 10 CDs my first time. Let's just say that the nominal yearly fee has already paid for itself. I'm exactly halfway through importing the CDs to iTunes. In addition to a few German rap CDs, not all of which I've listened to yet, I got some good English music, such as The Clinic, Cake, The Beta Band, Afu-Ra, and a couple from The Cure. You really can't go wrong with a free CD collection unless it's comprised entirely of Celine Dion and country music.

Along with the music, I am also newly enjoying my subscription to The Economist, which started as an early Christmas gift from the 'rents (thanks guys!). I can already feel myself getting smarter and more worldly as a result. In case you've never felt that and are wondering, it feels like walking through rain made of honey. Of course, for a weekly magazine, the thing has got to have as many words as the Bible. It takes forever to read, and a lot of the financial and business stuff is extremely foreign to me -- it's really like homework sometimes, albeit interesting homework. I keep it in my backpack or jacket pocket so I always have it with me, and I whip it out (just the magazine) whenever I'm waiting for the bus, riding the bus, on break at school...well, really anytime I have a few minutes that aren't being used for something else. Otherwise I will never get through it and will eventually end up buried under a pile of unread Economists.

Finally, I had my weekly Ultimate Frisbee practice tonight, which was even more fun than usual because we spent practically the whole time playing 5-on-5. It took them a couple of practices, but my teammates are now beginning to grasp the true extent of my tallness. They suddenly realized tonight how often they're able to just toss up a Hail Mary in the general direction of the end zone and depend on me to reach high over the heads of mere mortals in order to make the catch. The German equivalent of "Just go long" became the team "strategy." Apparently trying to make things even tougher on themselves, the opposing team kept having the shortest girl try to mark me, which was impossible. But then again if I had to mark her she'd run circles around me so it can go both ways.

Anyway, it's been Thanksgiving here for the past hour, and so far I'm thankful that my first class isn't until 10:40. Enjoy your vacation time, slackers; I only get Fridays off, so I'll be slogging through my full three hour workday tomorrow.

Don't Bring Me Down

First, it's always nice to wake up and check the sports pages online and find out that the Patriots keep on rollin'. What's even funnier to see is that the Miami Dolphins keep on gettin' rolled. The '72 Dolphins are the only team in football ever to have a perfect season, but while the Patriots keep their sights on tying that record, the '07 Dolphins "are on their way to setting another perfect record - a season unblemished by wins," as it was hilariously stated by someone in a www.fark.com article description. Yes, while the Pats are 10-0, the Dolphins are 0-10. This is truly a bounteous season.

Second, the kids in my 6th grade class toyed with my emotions today. Well, not all of them, but some of them -- okay, one kid in particular. I saw the students as I was leaving school; they were waiting for their bus to the swimming pool. They got me to admit that I speak German, though they didn't really have to twist my arm. It's good if they try to speak English with me, but I don't really mind admitting that I speak German either. Honestly, I always feel a little pride when they realize it.

But I had barely gotten to enjoy my pride, and already one of the kids had decided that I didn't speak the language very well. It didn't seem hostile or teasing, so it's quite possible he just assumed my hesitance to start speaking German with them was because I was unsure of my ability. He may have been trying to shelter me from the onslaught of German I was about to face from his classmates when they heard about it. Gee, aren't children helpful? Whatever his intentions, picture it: some more of the kids would ask me if I could speak German, and before I had a chance to prove myself he would run to my aid with "Yeah, but not very well!"

He certainly deflated the balloons in my pride parade.

On the other hand, the little girls all love me still. Does that count for anything?

Kentucky Fried Nonsense

This article, "Legislators Hear Global Warming Disputed," well...frankly, words escape me. But I'll try to recapture the words necessary to discuss the sheer absurdity of the events describe in said article. In a very brief summary, there was a "hearing" organized by a Kentucky Democrat who apparently lives in Big Coal's pocket. I say "hearing" because only two panelists were invited to speak, both of which were hand-picked by this Democ-rat to explain why Global Warming is baloney. Even worse, this Democrat, Jim Gooch (how can you vote for a man whose name clearly defies any classification as intelligent?)...well, I'm going to cite passages from the article so you can just see for yourself, and hopefully you'll see that you should read the entire thing. Here are a very telling few paragraphs:

"Chairman Jim Gooch, D-Providence, a longtime ally of the coal industry, said he purposefully did not invite anyone who believes in global warming to testify.

'You can only hear that the sky is falling so many times,' said Gooch, whose post makes him the House Democrats' chief environmental strategist. 'We hear it every day from the news media, from the colleges, from Hollywood.'

Neither of Gooch's invited panelists was a scientist."

Wow, yes, Gooch, you're absolutely right: hearing about problems is a serious annoyance. Especially from those stupid scientists -- what have they ever done for us anyway? Instead, let's find some corporate sponsored goons to tell us lies. Everyone trusts corporate sponsored goons. Don't you feel better already? It's fun to play pretend, whether it's pretending WMDs do exist or pretending Global Warming doesn't.

Seriously, can't we just keep the scientists out of this? They're such buzzkills, and they still haven't invented a pill that can make Jim Gooch attractive to the opposite sex (see the picture in the article, please), so why would they be included?

"'It really wasn't my intention to get into so much science today,' Gooch replied."

Plus, don't even jump to the conclusion that this is some kind of purposely one-sided defense of Big Coal companies for Jim Gooch's personal gain, or that Jim Gooch really hates scientists, because that is far from the truth:

"'Well, I mean, where are we going to get scientists?' Gooch asked. 'We're limited here in Kentucky to what we can do. I don't know how we'd necessarily get scientists to come here.'"

Clearly, the truth is that Kentucky is devoid of scientists. And are you surprised by that? I didn't think so. I suggest an emergency air drop of scientists to help Kentucky through this rough period in its development as a democratic nation. Or at least some Intelligent Design pamphlets, anything's better than their current situation.

But seriously, I find the anti-Global Warming movement incredible mostly because I haven't heard a single good argument as to why we should act as if Global Warming doesn't exist. Even if Global Warming is baloney, it's worth the lie if it gets us to develop clean, renewable energy and to help the rest of the world deal with crises of environment, too...or at least, I used to think that way. Until my eyes were opened by one of Jim Gooch's "experts":

"Similarly, Taylor said most scientists don't believe in global warming. Not that warming is bad, he said. Hotter weather means more vegetation and crops and more diversity of wildlife, as in the tropical rain forests, he said. He distributed a report that urged Americans to burn more coal, oil and natural gas so 'our children will therefore enjoy an Earth with far more plant and animal life than that with which we now are blessed.'"

Do you understand now why this article robbed me of speech? This is one of the most ludicrous yet insidious advertisements for evil since somebody started telling Arab men, "Yup, that's all there is to it, just run into the food court, call for a group hug, press this button, and then you'll spend the rest of eternity high-fiving Allah while virgins pleasure you." Not only are these people trying to deny that Global Warming exists, they're trying at the same time to convince us that we need to burn MORE fossil fuels. Didn't the smoking industry try this a few decades ago? I mean, it sounds too stupid to work, but somebody will obviously buy into it. Somebody always buys into it.

The Callahan

I'm involved with Campus Radio at the University of Mainz. They do one 1-hour radio show per week, during which they have various segments, including interviews, music, campus happenings, etc., but so far my only contribution has been gracing them with my presence at the weekly meetings to discuss the upcoming show. I mostly just listen attentively, stifle my yawns (not always successfully) and try to figure out the appropriate times to furrow my brow and nod approvingly. Just as I'm improving my "Attaboy!" expression at school, I'm also refining the "I think I know what's going on but please don't make me prove it" look when trying to follow German conversations and discussions happening around me. I spend way too much time refining that look in my life.

I'm nervous about volunteering for any assignments because of the language barrier. I don't think it would be wise to include me in interviews or really anything where German is required -- I could probably get by, but it wouldn't really help the image of professionalism and trustworthiness that I think they try to cultivate. If they ever need someone to spell "exorbitant," though, I'm there. Anyway, there's also a music discussion once a week now which I also attend, during which we pop in the new cds we've received from various labels and try to decide what songs to play on the next show. I can handle that since music is an international language. And by "international language" I of course mean English, since that's what most of it is.

So today there wasn't a big selection of new music to check out, but on one of the sampler discs there was a song by a Swedish band called The Callahan. It's a shame they left out the "g," but since they're Swedish I can cut them a little slack (Sweden lost the letter "g" in a bet to Norway a few years ago). Plus, after after hearing the song I wasn't so upset, considering that it wasn't very good. Best that they didn't sully the Callaghan name. If anybody's going to give Callaghans a bad name, I fully expect it to be me, probably involving a wet wipe, a stick of dynamite, a vat of engine oil, a 20 pound turkey, and a lot of bad decisions. I hope your Thanksgiving goes well, though.

Tempting Fate

I shouldn't have written about hurting my fingers, because that was just an invitation for the fates to hurt my fingers some more, which happened tonight. The same finger that I hurt playing basketball 2 weeks ago started to hurt again while I was playing volleyball with a bunch of the teachers, and one of my thumbs was added to the mix too. But then again, every other part of my body hurts after an ultimate frisbee workout last night and multiple hours of sports with the teachers tonight, so I hardly notice the pain in my fingers. That's good...right?

Those gym teachers in Germany really know how to train. I mean, every Thursday night we warm up and do various stretching and exercises, then we play three different sports, each for about an hour. I'm usually dead after the first round of exercising. It's really quite embarrassing to be the youngest guy out there, a former athlete, and yet feel like I'm about to pass out from exhaustion the whole time. My only consolation is that, since most of them are gym teachers, there's a reason they've kept in some kind of shape and are pretty versatile when it comes to all the different sports. I had a good reason for getting out of shape my last year of college: exercising cut into my drinking time. Anyway, getting back into the realm of things I know, we had some beer at the end of the night, and that helped to ease the pain. So does the prospect of falling into bed in a few minutes and not having any school tomorrow.

Before I go, you should check out this article, about "melody roads" in Japan which play music when you drive over them. My initial reaction: I really hope one of them will play "Jive Talkin'" by the Bee Gees -- since the inspiration for the beat of that song came when the group was driving over some bridge in Miami and heard the thudding of the car going over the gaps in the road, it would be utterly appropriate. Plus "Jive Talkin'" is a sweet song. Talkin' 'bout jive, turkey.

My second reaction: that's gonna get annoying reeeeally quickly unless you can come up with an alternate route to work. Maybe this will finally be the catalyst that sparks Japan's love affair with the off-road vehicle.

Ouch

First quick but important thing: check out this program Free Rice. It's a multiple choice vocabulary game for a good cause, so you can feel good about learning. Every time you get a word right, 10 grains of rice are donated through the UN to people who need it. All of the info is on the site and it's quite simple to just check it out, so I'm not gonna paraphrase anymore. But seriously, it's really interesting stuff.

On to the schadenfreude: I've hurt my fingers a couple times recently. A couple weeks ago I jammed one playing basketball, which reminded me of just one of the many reasons I don't like basketball. But I don't usually have a problem with ghost stories. I was reading one to my 6th grade class yesterday, and, I mean, it obviously wasn't scary and we had to go through it pretty closely before they actually understood all of what was going on.

But at one point the ghost "taps" at the window or door or something, and I tried to spice that part up a little bit. In trying to make the tapping louder and louder, I may have gone too far. The kids weren't scared by the story, but they definitely gasped when they heard how hard I was tapping on the underside of that table. I soldiered on without missing a beat so they wouldn't catch the scent of weakness and devour me, but I bruised one of my knuckles pretty badly. What a way to catch an injury.

Damn that ghost, Sir Henry, if that was his real name. Why couldn't he have just kicked a table over or something? I bet I can do that without hurting myself.... Of course, to tie my injuries together nicely, Sir Henry's problem was that he was missing his head. Since he was the sissiest ghost ever, the little girls in the story agreed to help him look for it -- and when they thought they had found it, they woke up, and were holding a basketball instead. I'm being haunted by basketball.

Weekend Update

Brittany and I went to Trier and Luxembourg on Friday and Saturday. We spent the day in Trier before heading to Luxembourg and spending the night in a hostel. I'll post some pics so you can check those out and basically skip the trip yourself in the future. I mean, they were both nice, and would be fine to visit for a day, but especially Luxembourg should be avoided by anyone on a budget who wants to spend some time enjoying himself. The cheapest restaurant the hostel could recommend was an Italian place with meals for around 20 Euros. That's brutal. We ate at the hostel instead. Oh well, the cold, rainy weather didn't help either -- my teacher told me it's much nicer to go in the summer with all of the street vendors and such. On the plus side, the hostel was quite nice, and I did have a great sleep followed by a good breakfast.

So we came home earlier than planned on Saturday, which gave me the incentive to meet up with Ben, Michaela, and Katherine in Frankfurt that night. I relied heavily on my flask of Scotch to combat my nagging cold, and followed that up by sharing in a giant pot of Apfelwein with the others. Well, "pot" is not the right word here, it was classier and bigger than a pot, but my brain is fried right now from the continued cold and from watching too many episodes in a row of Street Fighter II V on YouTube. It's surprisingly good for a 1996 cartoon based on a video game -- definitely better than the live-action movie was.

But I digress...once we trudged through the rain back to the hotel Saturday night, I wrangled my way into bed with two girls. Yeah, the two mattresses were pushed up against each other so I got to sleep in the crack while Ben was stuck on the floor. Apparently I'm a better negotiator when I have a belly full of Apfelwein. We had a nice brunch on Sunday, while a strange/funny Italian guy waited on us. Yup, his name was Luigi, and he used to be a professional soccer player and a professional opera singer, and he has a book coming out soon with an amusing name that I have forgotten. He showed us all kinds of pictures and letters and stuff and we had to wonder why he was waiting tables at a somewhat fancy cafe now. I guess I could write to him and ask, since he gave us his card and asked us to write.

This post was really just an excuse to mention that Jeff and I are officially going to Milan and Verona for New Year's though. I would have felt bad if that were all I wrote.

Useless

Recently I've been trying to keep up with "news" more than in the past (like father like son?). Yeah, I know, a pretty distasteful prospect. But as an ambassador to a foreign land, I get asked a lot of questions about a lot of stuff and it sucks to never have a better answer than "Look over there!" followed by a cowardly retreat (it also sucks to refer to stuff as "stuff" all the time). Hence the quest for knowledge.

But it's so hard to get any real information. Here's an example of an opinion piece on global warming: http://icecap.us/index.php/go/joes-blog/comments_about_global_warming/?ic
Now, this was written by the founder of The Weather Channel. Granted, it's just a blog post and therefore understood to be very opinionated, but that doesn't mean it can't be useful. But it's not. Why?

"I have read dozens of scientific papers. I have talked with numerous scientists. I have studied. I have thought about it. I know I am correct. There is no run away climate change."

I don't care if you're the founder of The Weather Channel or the founder of the Hair Club for Men. Hearing that you've personally "read dozens of scientific papers" and so on and so forth doesn't help anybody else believe what you're saying. I'm not going to take what you say based on faith, just as nobody else should. He doesn't even mention any specifics, let alone point me to them so I can come to the same conclusions as him. Until you link me to some of these studies, I can safely assume that you're making this up, which sounds like par for the course for a weatherman anyway.

Here's an example of an in-depth article which lays out ways of analyzing the issue of global warming so that a real debate can be had: http://www.slate.com/id/2176156/pagenum/2/
This Slate writer/economist goes into great detail about how whether or not you agree with Al Gore, Al Gore has done little more than bring up the issue of global warming -- he hasn't really given people the proper information about it to get a debate going. This author then goes about trying to correct that mistake.

He concludes by bringing up The Stern Report, a review of the economics of global warming done in Britain. According to him, the Stern Report basically concludes what Al Gore concludes, but only after going into much greater depth than Al Gore does. Of course, one thing I still have a problem with is that he neglects to link to the Stern Report in his article, but at least he cited it so someone can check it out for himself.

This is in no way the defining essay on the state of modern news, but it's an introduction to what I find most frustrating in trying to educate myself: useless articles with no apparent basis in fact. Sure, my example of a bad article was a personal blog post, but isn't that the trend anyway? And "mainstream" news is rarely better; I'm not going to go into it right now, but how often do you hear any real science in an article about global warming? It's just about whether Bush is going to call Gore to congratulate him on his Nobel Prize or not. Or think about how often we hear about the "latest polls" during the election race. Who cares? That's not responsible reporting -- I'm not trying to pick my candidate based on how many other uninformed people told you they're picking that person. I guess it's a pipe dream to think I'll get more information about the candidates, though, since giving out information usually just hurts them in the polls anyway.

Anyway, this post has been way too serious and pseudo-intellectual, and since I'm sick and poorly educated, now me brain hurt, and as a direct result your brain is bound to hurt too. So for some serious laughs check out www.fark.com, which is not your average news aggregate site. And on the plus side, it also offers a scathing look at the sloppy condition of your average media today. Plus sometimes boobies! (You can usually blame Fox News for those.)

Sub-par Sub

The substitute teacher system in Germany is a lot different from the one in America -- in fact, there are no special "substitute teachers." When a teacher is absent, other teachers at the school have to fill in if they have coinciding periods free. Every day, all of the teachers have to check a list to see if they've been assigned to fill in anywhere.

It's a painful system. Teachers check the daily list and find out hours or minutes before they're supposed to go into a strange classroom and try to teach the kids something, anything, whatever they can come up with, instead of having a free hour. It's like getting kicked in the crotch by your own foot. Don't ask me how -- I mean, don't ask me how it's like that, or how you'd get kicked in the crotch by your own foot. Just, no further questions.

My first experience with this system was a while ago, when one of my teachers was out for the day. On Tuesdays I have two classes with her. One of them was fine, since Chris, a teacher-in-training (I'm gonna call him a TIT from now on...tee hee), is also in that class and he had a lesson prepared. I worked my usual magic, which involves sitting back and nodding solemnly while someone else takes care of things. I'm really perfecting my "Attaboy!" face while learning to hide or at least soften my "Wow, are you sure you wanted to say that?" expression.

But for the second class, I waited, and waited, all while the chaos of 33 8th graders flowed around me, and...nobody came. After what seemed like an eternity but was probably only three weeks in reality, I decided I'd better do something with the class before they toppled my empire. Let me warn you: it's tough to assert your authority over these kids after waiting like 10 or 15 minutes while they acted like you didn't exist. I'm not sure I would have survived if I wasn't so tall -- it's like my only dominant trait.

Eventually I got them somewhat settled and we talked about ourselves in English. Finally, as they were telling me their names, hobbies, and credit card PIN numbers (what? I don't get paid enough, get off my case), the sub finally showed up. Instead of teaching them geography, he suggested they write down what they had been telling me before he came, since that allowed us to avoid any real work. I made it out alive, but not unscarred.

Afterwards, Frau Bluemel, the teacher who looks after me and ensures that everything is going well, told me that I'm not actually supposed to go to the class if the teacher is absent. That is quite a relief.

Or it was a relief, until today, when the same teacher from before was missing again. I didn't need to go to the first class anyway since the Chris the TIT had that under control, but while I was relaxing during the second class, a teacher I've never seen before found me and told me that I was supposed to be subbing for the 8th grade class. Oh boy -- that's exactly what I wanted to hear 10 minutes into a class I had already written off.

Yeah, it turns out my name (or at least three apparently important letters of my name, part of the reason I missed it...CAL means less to me than my full name, thanks.) was on the list as the sub for this particular class. Well, I'm not supposed to do it, but another TIT whom I haven't met before was there too and she said she could help. That's fine...except for the 10 minutes during which she has to leave to take a phone call.

Oh well -- we got in there and started playing a ghetto version of Bingo where the kids write down 15 numbers from 1-100 and the TIT calls out random numbers. The order doesn't matter in this game. There are no prizes. There is nothing about this game that makes it worth playing except for the most important factor, which is that it gets the kids doing something other than lighting fires and heaving bricks. It worked okay, until she left and the kids started clamoring for a different game again. Whatever. I held things together until the TIT got back and moved on to something else for the last couple of minutes.

So Frau Bluemel's gonna talk to the guy who makes the sub lists and tell him once again not to assign me as a sub. It's what's best for the kids' education and for my pride.

Got To Be Tha Sure-Shot

So far, I suck at being a teacher. I've got the assistant part down fine, but when it comes time to step up to the plate everyone can see that I'm still the bat boy. Even my lesson last week on Halloween, the coolest holiday since Whacking Day, felt kind of off. I also had trouble keeping a conversation about Irish immigrants going. I tried to engage in a historically accurate role playing activity, but the kids really couldn't hold their alcohol.

And today the 7th graders started to learn about about sports in their English class. Since all they learn is British English, all they're gonna know is cricket and tea-drinking. Well, not if I have anything to say about it. So I took it upon myself to introduce them to America's pastime, and I don't mean deep-frying.

Proudly sporting my Red Sox -- Youkilis t-shirt and equipped with a homemade fill-in-the-blanks worksheet, I entered the fray. I boldly attempted to explain the rules of this complex sport, lobbing terms at them and sketching shapes on the board. All this while trying not to rely on the one kid in the class who lived in America for like the past 5 years -- of course he's gonna raise his hand, so it's up to me to shamelessly ignore his flailing appendage.

After covering the intricacies of the pitcher-catcher-batter love triangle (the pitcher pitches to the catcher, who catches, while the batter tries to bat using his bat), I finally unleashed them upon the worksheet. And following my teacher's shrewd advice, I made the American-versed whizkid come up with the German translations of the key words while he waited for the others to finish. That's no intentional walk; that's hit by piatch, biatch.

After that it was just a matter of cleaning up -- I had the kids read through the sentences with the answers in place, and then they got to hear and write down the German translations from that kid. The bell rang, and ya know, I feel like I finally hit one out of the park. Of the lessons I've prepared on my own, this is the first one that seemed to go smoothly. In your face, Yankees. Tune in next time, when I dare to demonstrate: if things go well with props and pics, maybe I can farm this class and produce the next Jacoby Ellsbury. Plus I'm gonna introduce them to American football, courtesy of an arm-bar to the face followed by a pelvis-intensive victory dance.

I'm goin' to Disney World!

Live and Let Liver

The Halloween party on Wednesday was fun -- I stayed out until past 5 AM and then magically found my way home. I honestly had no idea where I was, so I picked a direction and walked until I saw something I recognized, which fortunately happened quickly and turned out to be about as close to home as I could have hoped. I guess my drunk GPS kicked in. It still took me half an hour, but I'm used to those walks by now. If I hadn't guessed correctly which direction to walk, I could have ended up in France, where French punks might have beaten me with a baguette. Or worse: there's a little "French" bakery chain in Germany called Cro-bag. I think it's supposed to be a mix of croissant and baguette, but it makes me think of cro-mags, ho-bags, and crowbars, all at the same time, none of which I'd want to eat or get attacked by.

Thursday I played some sports with a bunch of the teachers. We played soccer, which was cool since we used Indoor Soccer rules, and I wasn't the worst one there, which is surprising since this is Europe after all. But then we played basketball, and of course I jammed my finger at one point, and it's only now starting to hurt less. Basketball sucks. I had to skip out on volleyball afterwards, which is probably okay since I was completely spent at that point anyway.

On Friday the students had a 4 day weekend, so the teachers spent the morning in different seminars followed by a trip to Frankfurt for the rest of the day. I wouldn't normally want to be in school on a Friday, especially not at 8:30 AM, but I was in the Cooperative Games seminar so we just got to play a bunch of different team-building games and talk about how they could be used in the classroom.

Frankfurt was interesting -- I went on a tour of the Goethe House, most of which I didn't understand but that's okay. After a shopping trip which confirmed that, yes, German women are also from Venus, we all had dinner at a cool, typical Frankfurt restaurant. I mean, this place really prided itself on being typical Frankfurt. So of course I tried what someone told me was typical Frankfurt food: Leberknoedeln. This is what the side-splittingly hilarious pun in the title of this post refers to, because Leberknoedeln are some kind of dumplings made out of liver. Sounds gross, and if you don't like liver or liverwurst or anything, then it would indeed be gross. I actually enjoyed it, especially with the generous portions of mashed potatoes and sauerkraut involved. Together with some Apfelwein (apple wine) and half a schnitzel from another teacher who couldn't finish hers, I really distended my stomach with typical Frankfurt food that evening.

Gotta be Lomo

So I've been teaching the kids at school a bit about Halloween. It's no good without pictures and demonstrations and stuff though -- you can't just explain it, you have to get them in the spirit of things. Unfortunately there isn't a huge spirit of Halloween here, so I guess I'll have to wait until Carnival season. Carnival sounds like a sweet mix of Mardi Gras and Halloween, so when that takes place I can point to specifics and say: "THAT is what I'm talking about. Dress up like an idiot and run around town!" I did mention that one of the "tricks" people pull is egging houses, which they seemed surprised at. I hope I didn't just plant the seed of revolution. But they told me that on a slightly similar holiday in Germany, they do stuff like put toothpaste on car handles and such -- that kinda sucks too. I blame the plaque industry, trying to give toothpaste a bad name.

I went on a bar tour or pub crawl with some people involved in the University of Mainz Campus Radio program tonight. It was actually less of a crawl and more of a standstill, since we only saw two bars and only sat and drank at one of those, but that's still two new places I got to mentally note for further visitation. Eventually I'll find others. The first place I had seen and would have bet my life that it wasn't fun. Why? You already saw why if you read the title of this post: it's called LOMO. How can a bar called LOMO be anything but terrible? But against all odds, it actually looked pretty nice, and I saw they have a breakfast buffet from 10-2 every day for less than 5 Euros. Obviously I'll be back to try that out soon. My one weakness is that I have many weaknesses, including a fondness for buffets.

Anyway, Lomo was full (yup, apparently other people got past the name too), so we went to a bar called Quadrait Mayence or something similarly pretentious. Yet another bar I would have never found, let alone entered, considering its proximity to the police station -- getting drunk at a bar directly behind the local law enforcement building seems like an unnecessary risk. But this was also a cool place with better-than-normal prices, so I'm sure I'll be back.

Anyway, gotta get my beauty sleep in preparation for a costume-less Halloween tomorrow. Since I can't wear a mask I gotta try to keep my own face presentable. I know, I know...very disappointing -- I've never had a costume-less Halloween I don't think. But even without costumes this party should be awesome, so I guess I'll try it the German way for once. At least their way involves a holiday on November 1, something which America is lacking. Can somebody do something amazing on Thursday so in the future it will be a national holiday and we can sleep in the day after Halloween? Go big then go home.

Lesson Planning

What are you doing for Halloween? I've been preparing one of my first real attempts at a lesson plan, focusing on this wonderful holiday, of course. It'll be for a 6th, a 7th, and four 8th grade classes, so I figured a Word Search would be an appropriate exercise. I dunno, is there a minimum (or a maximum) age requirement for a Word Search? They're not that hard, which may be why I always enjoyed them and probably still do. Thankfully there are websites that also make it not that hard to create a word search these days. I used a site called Discovery School's Puzzlemaker for this one. The words involved are a bunch of typical Halloween costumes, such as "vampire," "pirate," and "doctor." I thought it was odd that I came up with doctor since almost all of the rest are "scary" costumes of some sort, but then I remembered that doctors are also pretty scary. I certainly wouldn't want to BE one in real life.

Germans have a vague idea of Halloween, and people do have some parties, but in general it's nothing like in America. While figuring out what traditions to describe, I wasn't sure how much time I should spend elaborating on the "trick" portion of trick or treating. If I inform them of Halloween tricks, will I be ensuring that they engage in such heinous acts? Is it better if kids not know these tricks exist at all until after marriage, just like with sex? Throwing eggs at houses and having sex are quite similar, after all: they're sloppy, soggy, hateful activities, after which somebody ends quietly sobbing into a pillow, right? Hm, maybe my sex education wasn't so great after all.

I decided to talk about it anyway. I hope the government doesn't pull my funding over this.

By the way, in case it was missed, I'm joking about the crappy abstinence-only "sex education" that the US government believes is the best thing for school kids. "Hope is not a strategy," to paraphrase a paraphrasing I recently saw.

Don't you forget about me

It's been a while, hasn't it? Yeah, I missed you too, give us a hug. Okay, you can let go now...awkward.

What to tell, what to tell? I'll start off recent, don't want to get too ambitious or I might scare myself away from this thing again. Gotta ease my way back in. Be gentle. Sam came to visit this weekend. I must say we had a good time, but Friday was tops. We had a fantastic lunch buffet at the Eisgrub (it means "ice cavern, basically) -- a place where they not only brew their own delicious beer, but also have some of the cheapest buffets I've ever seen -- and right after that we had an even better wine buffet.

There was a "Wine Forum," whatever that means, for the Rheinhessen region, so for five and a half hours we tried our best to work our way through over 150 types of wine. I mean, we gave it the ol' college try...which meant that instead of swishing a little sip around in our mouths and then spitting out the rest and dumping half a glass of perfectly good wine in a big bucket, we swallowed each large gulp we took. There was no way we were getting through 150 types of wine, but I still felt like I accomplished a lot. Namely, I got my money's worth and didn't throw up. Seriously, when everyone else around you is spitting wine into giant communal buckets, it is not a relaxing atmosphere. We soldiered on, though, and had a delicious time.

Did you eat some peanut butter today? I did, for the first time in a couple of months. They don't have good peanut butter in Germany. Brittany and I found a connection to the military PX in Wiesbaden, so she brought me a jar of Jif yesterday, and it is glorious. I recommend you spread some on an oreo or some other treat right now, just because you can.

I just set my clocks back for European Daylight Saving Time, but I'm not fooled: I know it's not that early, and I am tired! Thus, bed.

Go Sox.

And Pats.

And go, Gadget Blog Post.

Argh.

I was about to post the start of an ambitious new project when my computer decided to teach me a lesson in saving frequently. As I finished up my long post, my computer shut off on me, and I lost it all. *@%^$#*&^(! Only the following sequence of characters can effectively convey my feelings regarding this egregious offense: *@%^$#*&^(!. I will try to begin anew either this evening or tomorrow. Good day.

Puff

Sitting or lying out in the sun after a hard day's work (or, in my case, an easy half-day's work), sipping a beer, and puffing on a cigar: quite enjoyable. Jeff and I have started enjoying this timeless hobby every now and then, so here's a quick cigar breakdown based on recent experience:

Captain Black (Peach Rum flavored) - I hope you didn't expect to hear anything bad about a pirate-themed brand, because you won't. Three dollars for a pack of 20 little cigars, and they're surprisingly delicious. Of course, they're really kind of girly cigars--they're more like cigarettes and they're strongly flavored. But whatever; they're cheap, they won't bore you or destroy your tastebuds with an unending supply of tobacco, they're tasty, and they're Captain Black. Yarrgh, matey!

Black and Mild - Not doin' it for me. Even the mild versions seem to be rolled with no other intent than to make a drunk person sick(er). Especially if that person is Jeff Silvan. They've got that special plastic tip, but who cares? When I tried to open mine the other night, the tip got caught in the plastic and ripped off anyway. When I tried to smoke what was left without that crazy tip, bits of stuff kept breaking off into my mouth, which is clearly not cool. If I wanted to chew my tobacco, I'd buy some chew. Plus, these suckers cost a heck of a lot more than Captain Black, and that ain't right. I can't in good conscience recommend this brand to human beings.

Phillies Blunts - Surprisingly good. I gotta say, the Honey flavored ones smell like sweet, sweet honey, straight from the bee's bottom. If you're not crazy about honey, maybe these aren't for you, but then again, if you aren't crazy about honey, you're probably some kind of cold, heartless monster. Not that there's anything wrong with that. I haven't actually partaken of any honey flavored ones yet, but I intend to at some point. A few of us smoked the Original flavor last night though, and those were good stuffs. Deegs even left me the last one in the package; bangarang! Not too expensive, so I'd say a good deal. These cigars are fairly large, but then again the last quarter or so kind of loses its charm, so feel free to stomp that when the time comes.

So that's it for now. Go get a cigar and a beer and sit out in the sun, just as God intended, assuming I've interpreted His Word correctly. If not, may lightning strike my next cigar, lighting it in the coolest way imagineable.

This Can't Be Healthy

I can't say much other than prepare to laugh in anguish at this Japanese game show, where the contestants have to say the tongue-twister correctly or face dire consequences:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aEKqU1fkYCI

I wonder if they test that thing to make sure it won't cause any lasting damage...
If it was China, I'd think they did this just to help with the overpopulation.

He's Very Tricksy

This article (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/5217698.stm) on the BBC News website today (and probably every other news site, too, but that's just the one I look at) talks about Saddam Hussein's wish to have a firing squad rather than be hanged if he is sentenced to death.

It might sound as though he's giving up, accepting the fact that he will die at our hands, because of which he seems to think he deserves special treatment. Next he'll want a glass of milk to go with that cookie during his last meal, but then he'll need a straw, and my goodness it will never end.

However, Saddam's defense plea deserves closer consideration. Keep in mind that the following quote is from Saddam himself:

"I advise you as an Iraqi, if you were in a circumstance in which you have to issue a death penalty, you have to remember that Saddam is a military man and in this case the verdict should be death by shooting not by hanging," he told the judge.

Yes, Saddam has slipped up this time: he talks about Saddam in the third person. By speaking as if he were some sort of man who still issues death penalties, rather than some sort of man who is about to face the death penalty, he has clearly indicated that a stunt double will be performing during his death scene. "You have to remember that my friend Saddam...er, I mean, I, Saddam Hussein, seriously this time, am a military man!" Didn't this just happen with Ken Lay, too? Well, let's just hope his captors aren't fooled by some elaborate ruse wherein Saddam switches places with a patsy...although it would make for a tense movie of the week.

LONG LIVE THE EIGHTIES

...That's the 1980's, not the 1580's, which are pretty much dead and buried. Actually, the research I'm doing this summer is based partially in the 1580's period, but that's neither here nor there. Okay, it's there, but definitely not here. Um.

Oh yeah, my point: http://insuranceandnews.com/ Yes! Hey, stop that. Seriously, don't make that face. If you'd just give it a chance, you'd find out that this site, although it has the most boring name in the history of the internet (even more boring than www.boring.com, which used to be thought impossible), is actually a freaking gold mine of 80's nostalgia. That's because it is a collection of FIFTEEN HUNDRED MUSIC VIDEOS FROM THE NINETEEN EIGHTIES. I'm sorry, but a collection this good requires dramatic use of CAPS LOCK and the SPELLING OUT OF NUMBERS.

It's like a pirate stole the 1980's and buried them at insuranceandnews.com because he knew nobody would ever look there, but then a Space Monkey who comes in peace totally found the copy of the map, dug them up, and spread them all across the world.

Current Highlight: "Down Under," by Men at Work. Not because it's really a great song or anything. No...because it's a POP UP VIDEO. Remember those? Man, those were the days. I love my music videos peppered with inane facts.

Current Disappointment: "Putting on the Ritz," by Taco. Not because it's a crappy song (it's a totally awesome song. Don't fight the Taco.). No...because it doesn't work right now. I hope they fix that, cuz that's a sweet song.

Go now. http://insuranceandnews.com/ And don't thank me...thank the 80's!

What's Worse Than A Lobster On Your Piano?

Well, God, or Darwin, or whoever controls the supply of new creatures in this crazy world, you've done it again! Scientists discovered crabs covered in fur (click here for BBC news story) and quickly went to the clinic to be tested for other potentially serious issues. Personally I think the Yeti Crab would make a great mascot--college kids are much more likely to relate to a fur-covered crab than something unusual like a leopard. How many kids come back from freshman year or the beach with leopards? Seriously, though, I can only imagine where the jokesters will take this one. Lowbrow humor has never been so fortunate.

Perpetual Motion

I always thought that inertia would cause things to eventually stop, but I found out last Saturday that skiing doesn't follow the rules of inertia, because it's impossible to stop while skiing. That's not true, I'm just bitter because I don't have the (key) ability to stop while skiing. It was my first time ever (can I finally start living up to Mainer status?), so I guess I couldn't hope to perfect everything right away, but that would have been a nice trick to pick up.

Jeff's been calling me "Runaway Train," referring to one instance in particular where I somehow went from 0-60 mph within milliseconds and obviously couldn't really control myself. It was just down the terrain park, so it wasn't really steep or anything, but it was cluttered with very large jumps, which I told myself to avoid at all costs. Amazingly, I made it through the run without wiping out, whereas Jeff said he almost fell just trying to catch up to me.

Overall, skiing was an interesting experience, in that it scared the crap out of me--I could barely sleep Saturday night thinking back on the craziness of it all. I also couldn't stop hating the small children who were all better at skiing than I was. If I never have to "pizza pie" or "snowplow" again in my life, I won't be terribly upset. Maybe next time I'll just hop on the lift and never hop off, because the lift ride was my favorite part.

I've Never Met An Accident I Didn't Commit

(Alternate titles: An Accident's Just A Friend You Haven't Finished Off; Accident Shmaccident--You're Dead, Whittington!)

Furthering solidifying his position as "so evil he's just got to be a movie villain," Dick Cheney went positively Wedding Crashers on a 70 year old man Saturday (click here for article).

Yes, that's right: according to BBC News, during a quail hunting expedition, Cheney "had turned round to shoot at a bird but sprayed Mr Whittington with shotgun pellets instead." Instead of the fleshy buttocks, however, Cheney went straight for the jugular, hitting his victim in the "in the cheek, neck and chest."

What set him off? Was it an insult to his ridiculous attire? Perhaps Mr. Whittington had expressed having a problem with Cheney's general attitude toward everybody here and in Iraq.

Whatever the provocation, one thing is certain: Cheney will not rest until his prey's head hangs from his wall. "The Whittington clan is overpopulated in this country and they're decimating the grubworm population," raved Cheney, flailing his shotgun around as if to indicate that the power of Christ was compelling him.

Mr. Whittington "is said to be 'alert and doing fine' in hospital," and in fact could not stop flinching and mumbling about his credentials. "I-I-I'm allowed to b-be here; I didn't...I've never, I-I've never given a fake n-name i-in my life."

When asked to comment on the actions of his second in command, an excited President Bush stammered, "Yeah, ah, ah love that scene when Dick was throwin' up in the toilet, and he told that Claire, he tells that girl to go get him some 7-Up, 'cause he's about to get invulnerable agin'!"

"The local sheriff's department is investigating the incident," reports BBC News, but then again, the local branch of Haliburton received a grant from the government to rebuild Cheney's shattered alibi, creating a potential roadblock to the capture and incarceration of Public Enemy #2.

Torn

I'm torn over the ridiculous, absurd, despicable response in the Islamic world to the printing of "offensive" comics in Danish newspapers. I want to decry it--and I do decry it. But every time I go to condemn Islam, I find myself needing to balance it out by condemning the Christian world as well. I mean, we think of them as insane, and they are, but so are so many Christians. Case in point: George God-Also-Speaks-To-Me-In-The-Form-Of-A-Burning-Bush. I mean, what's the point in tearing down one religion, when that only makes me look as if I'm supporting the other? I want to tear them all down. If money is the root of all evil, perhaps organized religion is the parasitic vine that grows around the tree, wrapping itself tightly around the tree, throttling it, in the name of crushing the life out of the evil tree, all the while crushing the life out of all other trees too, good or evil. Feeding from the same source that feeds the evil money root. Then again, perhaps this analogy is out of control. When I don't take my pills, I tend to get cranky, and religion tends to irk me the most. And since I don't actually take pills, it's like religion is constantly a bad thing. Oops, I should rephrase that to show that I'M the one with the problem, not religion. I must need to reevaluate the positives in my life and see if they match up with causing negatives in other people's lives. Either that or I must need a new doctor, one with a free-wheeling pill supply.

Iconic

If you've got any German blood running through your veins, you've always felt a strange tugging at your gut at any sighting, or even mention, of David Hasselhoff. You know Germans love this guy, but do you really understand why? In the ongoing interest of explaining this phenomenon, here is another example of why he is worthy of an entire country's adulation:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gi2CfuqcUGE
Didn't even have to take his shirt off for that one.

In other news, I wonder who invented homework. His legacy is killing me, which is what I would have done to him if I had heard that pitch: "Let's make the children take this stuff home and do it on their own time, because I really need a smoke." Jerk. I don't have class on Wednesdays or Fridays, so if I can get a handle on this "managing my time" business, I might just make it. If not, I guess I can move to Germany, adopt a dog, and get paid by the government to live on the street. Doesn't seem that tough, if you don't mind fleas and freezing in the winter.

Praise For My Blog

Some high profile celebrities have been singing the praises of this blog and, well, other stuff:

"Billy Jean is not my lover, and neither is Adam Callaghan--but then again, I always say look for the good inside a person, and Adam Callaghan is still a kid at heart, an adorable little boy at heart, a luscious, beautiful little boy at heart oh my Godcalmdown.......which explains not only why his blog is fantastic, but also why I find myself developing an unhealthy attraction to him, making an Adam Callaghan hair doll, and receiving an Adam Callaghan restraining order from the powers-that-be. Fight the powers!" - Michael Jackson

"I really respect Adam Callaghan's never-say-die, take-no-prisoners style of cat grooming, but I feel that his writing is lacking in...well, let's call it "quality." I mean, my cat has never before been so spiffy clean, but the free grooming was not worth promising to tell all my friends about his blog. Gosh, what was I thinking? I mean, let's be serious, I don't need my cat groomed for free; 45 year old women pay me good money to sign their chests all the time." - John Mayer

The Naked Truth

I went shopping today with my mom. We had a fairly productive day: a winter jacket, a belt (reversible!), and a pair of running shoes. I despise shopping though, especially for shoes. I realized when I was in Germany that I could really use a pair of dress-casual shoes, since cross-trainers didn't cut it at some of the nicer places, plus it's a lot easier to look nice no matter what you're wearing if you've got dress-casual shoes instead of sneakers. But, while it's hard to find size 14 sneakers, it seems to be impossible to find size 14 casual shoes. I pointed out that apparently tall people aren't supposed to dress nicely, but my mother wouldn't accept that; No, she reminded me, tall people apparently aren't supposed to dress at all. Yes, the bright side of the issue is that it's not just shoes that are hard to find, it's everything, when you're tall. Sweet bright side.

On the actual bright side of things, when some movers took my sister's old desk and bureau out of her room the other day, I found buried treasure: a Dumb and Dumber pog. Yes, that's right, a Dumb and Dumber POG. No, stop, please...it's not for sale. It's a keeper.

Back In The U.S.S.....A

Greetings from Maine. Yeah, after about 5 months I'm home. The trip (the traveling home, I mean, not the entire German trip thing) was long and, let's be honest, sucky. It was over 30 hours of being awake and traveling. The worst was Basel, Switzerland. Basel is close to Freiburg, really close, so I figured it would be a good place to fly out of...but that was when I thought I was leaving Dec. 18, from Freiburg. I was flying out at 6 AM. I had to take a train that arrived there at 12:00 AM. Have you ever spent the night alone in an airport? Don't. I don't recommend it. Airports at night are huge, dark, and eerie. If you really need a place to rob somebody, the airport at like 1 AM should be right up your alley. You'll find 1 or 2 suckers like me, sitting in a chair with 2 bags under my chair and between my legs, with my suitcase standing up next to me as I try to rest my head on it and catch roughly 10 minutes of sleep per hour. Lame.

So finally I'm able to fly out of Basel, aaand...it's a 30 minute flight to Zurich. That's right, a half hour flight to Zurich, where I proceed to wait for almost 7 more hours. Zurich was closer to me by train than Basel was--where's the justice in that? Finally I fly from Zurich to Boston, a lovely 8 hour flight. I had my first airplane alcohol--one of those little bottles of wine. It wasn't as exciting as I would have expected, and I really couldn't understand why, on a SWISS Air flight, the only beer was Heineken and the only wine was Californian. There was also at one point a meal served that was basically a large hot pocket. The package told me it was made in Italy. My instinct (and tastebuds) told me it was a Nike factory in Taiwan.

But enough about airline food. My mom picked me up in Boston and brought me home to some great belated Christmas gifts, which it turns out were just to soften the blow of the 8 AM dentist appointment the next day. So anyway, by now hopefully my negativity has plunged you into depression, and because I'm still jetlagged, I don't feel like raising your spirits by talking about positive things, so I'll call it a night. Tune in next time, when I may slip up and write about things that I actually enjoy/ed.

Kleine Kinder Kacke, So Zu Sagen

That's a direct quote from a German soccer player, basically "little kid's crap, so to say," describing his and the opposing team's goalie's behavior during the game. They were arguing, and one of them jerked his head a little bit for unknown reasons, but then they both fell to the ground holding their faces, pretending they had been head-butted. It was awesome, especially since one got a yellow card and the other got a red card. The one with the red card had to leave the game of course, and this was just before a shoot-out, which meant a normal field player had to step in as goalie...and he still managed to help his team win. Fußball rules.

In other kleine Kinder news, little 3 and a half year old godchild Lenjo was telling his father and I the other day about me being at their house, and I shall paraphrase: one day I was suddenly gone (that was in August), and he didn't see me for a little while, and then one day I was just there again (about a week ago), and he just didn't notice me because he was looking down and must not have thought to look up high enough. End paraphrase. It's funnier to hear it from the small German child's mouth, considering how earnest he was about not noticing me because he didn't think to look up, but how often do you get that opportunity anyway? He also regaled us with the story of how he used to say my name as "Äbäm" but can now say it the German way of "Ädäm." Of course, if you don't speak or read any German, you won't know how to say either Äbäm or Ädäm, but imagine saying the American name "Evan" but with a "b" or "d" in place of the "v," and an "m" in place of the "n," and you'll basically have it. Lesson complete.

Merry belated Christmas and frohe Weihnachten and so forth, and here's looking forward to a happy Sylvester as well, which you'll of course recognize as the Looney Tunes cat whose comical lisp (what cruel person invented the word lisp?) allows us to enjoy the fact that he always gets the stuffing knocked out of him when he attempts to eat adorable Tweety Bird. You also might recognize it as the time in life when a giant ball slowly drops from the sky, people all over whatever time zone chant numbers together, and the hopeful and the misguided make resolutions that are supposed to last 356 days but instead last for 356 minutes: New Year's. Being in Germany, I'll of course receive my new year 8 hours before most of the people I know, and even 9 or 10 hours ahead of those unfortunates toward the middle or west of America. I'm not sure if the telephones will work--I've never been able to phone back in time before, so I doubt you'd be able to hear me from the year 2006. But if I can somehow send a message all the way back to 2005, I'll see what I can do--you'll no doubt want to hear if 2006 is worth it, because everyone hates surprises, which is why we all tell each other what we want for Christmas and have a phrase about "upsetting the balance of things." That'th all for now, folkth.

Winter in Deutschland

So you're saying it's been about a month since I last posted. Well here I am again, in case anybody else is still here too. Finally finished my semester in Freiburg on Thursday, and left on Friday...although "finished" is a tricky word, since I actually still have one short paper to write in the next few days, haaaa ha crap. All in all it was amazing, I can't really believe it's over, which is helped by the fact that I'm staying in Germany until Jan. 11 now. I'm at Thorlef and Brigitte's house, arrived on Friday, and I'll be here for a couple more days probably, before I go to Britta and Wolfgang's for Christmas and perhaps New Year's.

I'm really lucky I get to stay longer--I don't think I would have been able to go straight home, it would be such a shock to the system. Now I get to just absolutely relax (well, except for the babysitting hundreds of little kids part, but I enjoy that too), drink lots of wine and Schnappes, and speak more German. It's nice to actually be able to do that now, whereas at the beginning all of my relatives were pretty much forced to speak English with me. It's good to see relatives again, too, and I'm seeing more than before--Michael and LaNon and their 4 and a half kids were here from Saturday to Sunday, I hadn't seen them for 6 years. And then I have plenty more time, so I'll hopefully see others at some point.

And this is my first time seeing such familiar places in the Winter--Thorlef and Brigitte's is beautiful in this season too, with a dusting of snow, especially when viewed through the glass-wall from the comfort of the hot tub. We've gotten a lot of snow recently, but the ground's still too warm, so it hasn't stuck. They took me to a classical music concert last night in Frankfurt, which was really cool.

I'm gonna go for now, but enjoy the last few hectic, ridiculous days leading up to Christmas.

Lange Zeit, Nicht Sehen

Hey there. Been a while. What's been up? Oh ya know, same ol'. Tough week last week, then Basel, Switzerland Thursday night for a play, and then I missed my flight to London Friday >:\ Of course, on the plus side, I woke up to realize I had missed my trains, but then later (after having run/powerwalked like half an hour to the train station to find out I couldn't make it to the airport in time anyway), I realized that I was still in Germany, so I could deal with it. I was sad not to get to visit Meredith though. She's coming in a couple of weekends, so all is not lost. Anyway, I had a fairly relaxing weekend here in Freiburg. Alex and I took it easy Friday and then painted the town sort of a light red Saturday night.

The Weihnachtsmarkt (Christmas Market) opened up today, which is awesome. Yeah, it's really early for that, but oh well. Got a couple glasses of Glühwein (mulled wine); also saved some on my sweatshirt. It was tasty, and also stains easily. Hopefully going to a place called Oma's Kuche (Grandma's Kitchen!) tonight for live jazz, which should be far out, man.

I dunno what else to say right now--I'm kind of passing out at the computer, but I've got class in less than 2 hours, so I can't really go home. I guess I'll fool myself into thinking I might do some work. Maybe new pics sometime this week. Au revoir.

Once Again, Pics

And by Once Again, Pics, I of course mean Once Again, I have forgotten to mention that I posted new Pics. You've already seen the coolest one, but go peep the rest as well. Goodbye, cool world.

Davy, Davy Crocket

...King of the wild frontiiiiiier. That song got stuck in my head randomly, so I hope now it transfers to your head instead. That way you can have a cool song playing in your head while you check out my cool pics from this weekend. You should also check out this hilarious Bill that Idaho wants to pass, commending the creators of Napoleon Dynamite for making it in Idaho and increasing tourism and so forth (Thanks to Maddox's Best Page in the Universe for bringing it to the attention of the world at large). I don't have much else to say at the moment, which is why I'm gonna stop now and simply allow you to contemplate the incredible picture above, the greatest Coffeshop in Amsterdam.

Amsterdamncool

As usual, I'm alive. Don't underestimate my ability to live. Brian and I had a pretty sweet road trip this weekend. I won't go into how many times we were lost, whether it was on the highway, in a foreign city, or just right outside of Freiburg. We made it to the Netherlands Thursday night, but it was very late and we crashed at a rest stop just after crossing the border. Yes, we slept in the car--the seats actually leaned back to basically horizontal, so it was alright. I mean, I wouldn't choose a car over a bed, but sometimes beds can't get you everywhere you need to go.

Friday we got to Amsterdam. How come nobody ever talks about the awesomeness of Amsterdam, outside of the puff-puff stuff? We spent 8 hours wandering around this very confusing and absolutely wonderful city, and it has other charms too. I think the coolest part has to be all the canals--every street is separated from the next by a canal, basically, and it makes for great atmostphere. The Red Light District was crazy--I guess I'm not a huge fan of girls behind glass. Anyway, even if you're planning to stay off the grass and not stop for red lights, I recommend going to Amsterdam sometime in your life.

We drove a bit out of the city and slept in the car again that night. Saturday we decided to go to Brussels--we wanted to get Belgian waffles in Belgium, and Belgium's not huge, so we figured we might as well go straight to the source. We saw some cool stuff, although we were in a lame part of town for a while, but once we found the city center, Brussels bloomed. It's a gorgeous city, and I must say, Belgian waffles in Belgium are some of the most delicious things I've ever eaten. If we had stayed any longer, I would have been broke and fat. They also have a lot of great beer.

After we left Brussels, we were just sort of driving in the direction of Luxembourg and Germany. We were passing a town called Namur, so we figured we'd stop and check out a city no one would ever plan to visit, since we had the car anyway. It turned out to be really cool too--there was a huuge citadel overlooking the city, and because it was nighttime we got to look out over all the city lights. Also, one part of town is basically like stepping into the 18th century.

We left Namur, and were driving through Luxembourg--we didn't stop, since it was night and we probably wouldn't have had much to do, but at least I've been to Luxembourg now, sort of. They actually speak Luxembourgish there, in case you were wondering. So we're driving, and we're trying to figure out what to do, and we're really wishing we could sleep in a bed at this point. Well, 2 beds preferably, but when you've slept in a car for 2 nights, you don't get picky about bed mates. So we were east of Darmstadt and Seeheim, and I called up Thorlef and Brigitte to see if we could intrude upon them. Naturally, they said yes, and we got there at about 1:30 AM--they were sleeping by then, but had made beds for us. Oh, glorious bed! We spent the next day eating and relaxing mostly, and we also checked out Castle Frankenstein, although we couldn't go all the way inside, unfortunately. All in all, it was a magnificent end to a crazy weekend.

Gotta go see a play tonight--Die Marquise von O... (The Marquise from O...). Erin and I had to do a presentation on it yesterday, we're seeing it in town tonight, and then Thursday we have to talk about it a bit more. It was pretty funny cuz my professor, who's the man anyway, was so pumped after our presentation. He told me it makes him so happy when I talk, and that I'm so important to the class. There are only 8 of us, and often I'm pretty tired by 6:00 PM, after 2 or 3 other classes, and he said he thinks when I'm slouching off, it brings the whole class down. It's nice to feel appreciated. Oh and it's been a while now, but I never mentioned what I was for Halloween I don't think--I was Tom Cruise from Risky Business. If you've seen the movie, you know the scene, and if you haven't, you might still know the scene, where he's home alone, so he puts on some music and comes out dancing in just some tall socks, underwear, a tie, an unbuttoned button-up shirt, and sunglasses. Not the most original costume, but it was nice and simple. What were you guys? Tell me, and show me pictures if you have them, I wanna see that stuff. Bye bye.

Say Cheese And Die

Yeah, that's an R. L. Stein, Goosebumps reference. And here are the new cats my parents ordered through a Russian Mail-Order Feline Friend Service. This gray guy is Higgins, and the orangey one is Roebuck, or Bucky. I didn't get to help pick the names, so direct your complaints to them! Or compliments, if you can think of any. Now go and check out my new pics: http://community.webshots.com/user/bleibcool. But don't forget to check out the previous post if you haven't, that's important stuff too.

So it's official: Brian and I rented a car. We're picking it up tomorrow, going to Amsterdam tomorrow night, and coming back Sunday. Yeeeehawww!

Important Outrage

I'll be posting some pics later I think, but for now just some important news. The following was written by Dan Savage, a gay man who routinely encourages both gays and straights to fight for their rights, in his Savage Love column (well, he also routinely answers totally bizzaro questions). I thought I'd copy and paste it here too (in its entirety, with only a couple of words bleeped out for the younger crowd), especially considering I know how some of you (read: Mom and Alena) love Target. Turns out you shouldn't.


"There were two disturbing developments in the battle over straight rights last week. First, we know that Target fills its ads with dancing, multi-culti hipsters giving off a tolerant, urbanist vibe, and runs hipster-heavy ad campaigns positioning Target as a slightly more expensive, more progressive alternative to Wal-Mart. Well, as John Aravosis revealed on americablog.org last week, Target's politics are as red as their bulls-eye logo. The chain allows its pharmacists to refuse to dispense birth control and emergency contraception to female customers if the pharmacist objects on religious grounds. What's worse, the company claims that any of its employees have a right to discriminate against any of its customers provided the discrimination is motivated by an employee's religious beliefs. Read all about it at americablog.org and plannedparenthood.org.

Second, more troubling news from Tucson, Arizona, where a 20-year-old rape victim called dozens of pharmacies in town before she found one that stocked emergency contraception (EC). "When she finally did find a pharmacy with it, she said she was told the pharmacist on duty would not dispense it because of religious and moral objections," reported the Arizona Daily Star. Emergency contraception, the story continued, "prevents pregnancy by stopping ovulation, fertilization, or implantation of a fertilized egg. The sooner the emergency contraception is taken after intercourse, the more effective it is."

Don't just sit there, heteros. Defend your rights! Don't shop at Target, and write 'em and tell them why you're going elsewhere. (Go to target.com and click on "contact us," then "Target Corporation.") As for Fry's Pharmacy in Tucson, the shop that wouldn't dispense EC to a freakin' rape victim, the fundamentalist pharmacist claims it's her "right" to not do her f$$$$$$ job. Well, you have a right to free speech. Call Fry's at 520-323-2695 and ask them why the f$$$ a pharmacy that won't dispense EC keeps the drug in stock. Do they do it just to torment rape victims? ("Oh yeah, we've got EC—but you can't have any. Don't you know that Jesus wants you to bear your rapist's child?") Rise up, straight people, and demand your rights!"

Am I Talking To Myself?

If there's anybody still reading this thing, you don't understand participatory exercises. If there's nobody reading this anymore, I'm officially a high school chemisty textbook, but with fewer questionable stains on my pages (I've got my share of stains, I just usually know what they're from). No offense to my parents, but if I wanted to talk to them and only them, I could just email. If you're out there, question authority, chase squirrels, and post comments for me. Especially Halloween related comments, Halloween rules.

Amsterdam didn't work out for this weekend, so we're gonna go next weekend instead, hopefully with a rented car. Adventure, excitement, Autobahns! Stay tuned.

It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like krismis...

(Warning: if you don't care at all about hip hop music or me ranting about the state of the music industry, skip to the bottom for a more interesting discussion of Halloween, it'll be fun.) Well, it's not really, since the weather's awesome, and it's still Oktober. But then again, I might be Santa for Halloween (and to make sense of me being the skinniest Santa ever, some girl should be my wife and keep telling me to "Eat...Eeeeeeat!"), so that sorta made me think of it. My parents are always complaining that I don't give them ideas for gifts, or not in time, or something, so here's a couple small ones to start with. Anyone else who likes music (well, hip hop music) should consider these too:

Blackalicious - The Craft
Danger Doom - The Mouse and the Mask
Atmosphere - You Can't Imagine How Much Fun We're Having

These are three recently released hip hop albums. Blackalicious is probably my favorite group, already having two flawless albums out there, and being the best live act I've ever seen (3 times!) Danger Doom is a team-up of Danger Mouse, the guy who gave us the incredible Gray Album (the mash-up of The Beatles' White Album and Jay-Z's Black Album), and M.F. Doom, from whom I've only heard a few things, but who puts out consistently praised, intelligent, interesting stuff. Atmosphere is one of the few hip hop groups that performs at the Warped Tour alongside hundreds of punk and rock bands, and of course they're cool too. If you want to check out

Now, I don't normally buy music anymore, but it's not just because I like to steal, it's mainly because I don't like when major labels steal from artists and force crappy music on us (don't believe me or know what I'm talking about? Go directly to www.downhillbattle.org and find out). Well, have no fear, these have all been run through the RIAA Radar (at www.riaaradar.com, conveniently) and they check out as safe--that means the album is released by an independent label, not a major label or affiliate. And that means nobody's getting ripped off and it's not supporting a horribly corrupt system. Doesn't that feel good?

Of course, if you're in the mood to steal some awesome hip hop anyway, you should check out the hard-hitting conspiracy-theorist Immortal Technique, who actually encourages it in one of his songs: "I made this to bump in your ride, or burn it off the internet, and bump it outside". Can't argue with that. Of course, it's very explicit, so you'd better not decide for yourself, you'd better contact your local senator and insist that they ban it, if you're reading this and you're under 18 or 21 or whatever the catch-all age should be.

Well, if you're not interested in music, you're probably dead! Just kidding, what I meant was you probably didn't enjoy that, and you probably didn't even make it this far. But if you did, how about telling me what your plans for Halloween are? Trick or Treating? Partying? Enjoying the one day you can wear your girlfriend's clothing without getting those strange looks in the subway? Germany isn't huge on Halloween (blasphemy!), but there are some big parties, at least one of which I'm sure I'll be going to. Oh, and they actually do it better than we do in America: we don't have CLASS the day after Halloween, since it's "All Saints Day"--I knew there was a reason we created Sainthood. Okay, that's all for now--talk to me, people.

Disappearing Posts Aren't Cool

I just typed up a post and then when I tried to post it it messed up and then all the text was gone too, so I couldn't just retry. So now I'm gonna try to type a short post in its place, and it darn well better work.

Friday we had to give theater presentations at our professor's house, which I was not at all excited about. I was wrong though, it was awesome. The presentations turned out reeeally easy, and the professor is the man. He made us such a huge meal with stuff like bread, salmon, and flammkuchen (like pizza but with a white sauce, so delicious). And about 6 bottles of wine. Of course, I think I ate and drank about 1/3 of everything that was put out, my professor was so happy about how much I consumed, in typical German fashion. There's only one other guy in the class of 10, and he didn't eat or drink very much, which meant I totally solidified my place as the professor's favorite guy student, and perhaps overall student. Plus, the dinner was in the middle of the presentations, and I gave the last presentation, which meant that both my professor and I were not sober for it. That always helps, in my experience (granted, this is the only experience I have...). Anyway, I gotta hang out with the professor again, he's the man. He also loved finding out that I had a pipe, even though he doesn't smoke anymore.

Speaking of pipe, Thursday night at the Dubliner for karaoke I smoked mine. It was fun, but I probably won't do it again. It's not worth it--it totally burns the tongue. Pipes are definitely one of those "cool...in theory" things.

And last but not least, Happy Birthdays to Tante Vicky (tomorrow, the 24th) and dear cousin Carley (the 26th). I didn't forget about you either, Julie, but you're not until Halloween. The end.

Okay, So Theater's Okay After All

If I was able to take just 4 classes instead of 5, theater is probably the one I would have dropped. But it's turning out better than I expected. Friday we had to give presentations at our professor's house (this was especially rankling considering we have no classes on Fridays, and since it was going from 3 pm to who knew when, I couldn't travel this weekend). But those turned out reeally easy. And our professor is the man. He made us such a huge, multiple course meal, with stuff like salmon, bread, and flammkuchen, which is similar to pizza but with a white sauce, and absolutely delicious.

Also, we went through about 6 bottles of wine. I'm one of 2 guys in the class, I think there are 10 people overall, and my professor definitely loves me--don't get me wrong, he's so nice and likes everybody, but I think it's safe to say I'm his favorite, especially after he saw how I could eat and drink. At dinner, I was the garbage disposal, and also the wine disposal, but the other guy wasn't eating or drinking very much, so I could tell the professor was disappointed with him, in typical German fashion. Of course, we had this incredibly long meal in between some presentations, and I went last, so I was definitely not sober for it, and neither was my professor. That always helps, in my experience (which is limited to this one time, granted...). Anyway, it turned out to be such an awesome time, and I definitely want to hang out with the professor again sometime.

Workin in reverse chronological order, I smoked my pipe Thursday. I went to the Dubliner with people for karaoke, as usual, and we smoked the pipe a few times. I don't think I'll do that again. It was fun, but not really worth it. That stuff is crazy, and it really burns the tongue. Pipes are one of those "cool in theory" things.

Couple of birthday shoutouts: Tante Vicky, tomorrow, the 24th, and Carley, the 26th. I didn't forget you either, Julie, but you're not for another week. Happy birfdays. The end.

I'm Back, Been Around The World

But mostly just the Köln (Cologne) and Bonn part of the world. Stopped at a Monastery on the way to Köln, it was gorgeous. The tour guide lady spoke as sl ow ly as humanly possible to us, but still used tons of vocab we didn't know, so it took roughly 3.5 times longer than it should have.

We also stopped on the way and took a boat ride for a couple of hours down (okay, up) the Rhine. That was absolutely beautiful as well. I've never imagined so many castles in my life. Brian and I would have jumped out of the boat for the right amount of money; that is, between €75 and 100, depending on whether we did it alone or together. No one else would really consider it. Cowards!

Köln was sweet. Definitely much more city-like than some places here, and big, but still highly attractive in its way, with the river running through it, and the Dom, the Cathedral, was crazy, in a huge and cool sense. Brian, Dave, and I drank some Kölsch, the Köln beer, and we got a free round of drinks and got charged less than we should have by the really cool bartender. We also talked to a fat, drunk, old man for a while, he was pretty hilarious. We also checked out the AntikMarkt, which was a lot like a flea market. Got some neat stuff there, including pipes for €5 each--pipes are just fun to have, more for the classiness than the smokiness. Also, we ate in one weekend more than we probably have in a month. If you've never felt drunk from eating too much food, you've never lived.

Bonn was nice too, although the fantastic weather helped, naturally. The University campus is a lot like an American one, with the huge green and the long stretches lined with trees and such. And we saw Beethoven's house.

Busy week ahead, lots of work to do, including preparing an oral presentation for theater. We present them on Friday, which isn't cool, but nothing I can do about it, and at least the professor's making us Flammkuchen. Brian and I are probably still gonna try to make it to Leipzig and Dresden Saturday and Sunday; we'll see. I'll try to get my Köln pics up tomorrow maybe (I forgot my camera on the bus for the couple of hours we were in Bonn); since they're mostly scenery pics I doubt I'll be putting many captions on them, and that's what takes the most time normally. See ya next time.

Representations Of Reality

That is, pictures. I posted a ton of them. Go there now and feast your eyes and souls. http://community.webshots.com/user/bleibcool

I have 2 classes on Tuesdays. One's at 9:00 AM, one's at 6:00 PM. Today the 9:00 one got cancelled, but I was already almost here, so it was too late to shut back down and sleep longer. I don't know what to do with myself all day--so much potential, so little drive.

Maybe I'll hit up the outdoor track. Maybe some grocery shopping. I just don't know. All I know is I accidentally baked a frozen pizza with some plastic last night. Tasted even better than normal.

Homework Sucks

Especially when it's in German. Oh well, I still goofed off for most of Sunday, and only had to read for like 4 hours. I do have 4 classes today though. Pity me.

The weekend wasn't bad. When I say weekend, I'm including Thursday, of course, since there are no classes on Friday. Envy me. Thursday was Brian's 21st birthday, which loses most of its meaning when it happens in a country whose drinking age is sweet 16. We still got crunked though. Dave baked a lil cake and brownies so we ate those while we "prepared" to go to the Dubliner for karaoke. Karaoke was fun, naturally. Brian, Dave, Chris, and I sang Roxanne, and apparently we were awful. I don't care--we don't have to hear ourselves. You get a free shot for singing, too--this time it was a real shot. The last time we did it, they gave us a shot of straight margarita mix, which is not only alcohol-free, but sickly sweet. Mix it with something.

A few of us slept over Brian and Dave's (they're in the same building, not suite though) that night 'cause the buses to our dorm stop running at 12:35, and it's a much shorter walk to their place than it is to ours. Actually I ended up sleeping over there again the next night, Friday, because I didn't feel like heading home alone, although I did remember later that the night bus runs Friday and Saturday, so I could have taken that. Anyway, it was convenient because we got up Saturday and just went straight into town, met up with Dave and Erin, and spent around 5 hours hiking near town. The weather has turned beautiful again so it was pretty awesome. Then we made a huge, delicious German dinner together. Then that night we tried to go to a Quentin Tarantino--Kill Bill and Pulp Fiction themed party at the JazzHaus, but it was 7 euros to get in. We're too cheap. Potential fun averted.

I'm off to check out this Film course now. Don't stop a-rockin'.

I'll Have My People Call Your People

In response to Mark, but also info for whoever else might have a burning desire to call me: my home zone cell phone number is 07612048038. I'm normally in my "home zone," but if it goes to some sort of German woman speaking about voicemail, don't leave a message, because I don't have my mail set up. I don't know if that's exactly how you would have to call me from America though--when my parents read this, they can post a comment clarifying, I'm sure.

On the other hand, it costs me 15 cents a minute to call America from here, so it's not a horrible deal (my friend has a phone card that only lowers it to about 13 cents a minute, but he mostly uses it to call France, because I guess it's expensive to call to other European countries for some reason?). So I can definitely make an effort to call some people sometimes, the only problem being that I don't have many people's phone numbers anymore, since I don't have my normal cell phone or even normal access to talking to people on AIM to ask for numbers. I've even forgotten your cell phone number, Mark, embarrassingly enough--I wanna say 671 something, but I don't want to risk an international wrong number. Of course, if anybody wants me to have their number, but doesn't want the other 2 readers of my blog to know it, they can email me at MonkeyBitesKlown@yahoo.com.

Thanks to dad for a couple of good links over the past few days, including an interview with Neil Gaiman at The Onion's AV Club and a wonderfully nostalgic article at the Washington Post about the new complete collection of Calvin and Hobbes. I gotta check the library and see if they have some Calvin and Hobbes--although if it's in German, I have a feeling it wouldn't be quite the same.

And disaster averted: I got my IPod to start working again. I'm not sure exactly what happened, but there's a button combination you have to hold sometimes if it messes up, and I had to charge it again. Crazy IPod.

I had 2 classes yesterday, my normal Advanced German course at 9 AM and then Midieval Mindset at like 6 PM. German 305 will be alright I suppose, even though I wish I had been able to pull myself up to the middle level course instead. Midieval Mindset seems like it will be interesting--the professor seems really cool, and actually not that difficult to follow so far. He has a ridiculously deep voice too, it's nuts. I've never been that interested in history, but oh well, we'll see, and also we've got tons of field trips planned, so that'll be good.

I meant to check out a literature course, but I didn't notice that it was today at like 12:15, so I missed it, but I also had an advising session with one of the IES people at 1:00, so I wouldn't have been able to stay for all of it anyway. It's only a backup course, too, so I'm not that worried. I'm going to Media, Society, and Politics at 4ish, that seems like it'll be a cool course. Skyy (the woman with whom I had my advising session) warned me that the professor often tries to make the course seem really hard at first, because everybody wants to take it, but not to be worried because it's mostly just to try to scare some people off. Good to know, since I frighten easily, and am known to freeze up and even wet myself.

I'm still waiting to hear back from Meredith--she's in London now for the semester, and we're planning to meet up at some point. She emailed me just over a week ago, but of course I was in Berlin so I didn't get to respond until Monday. Good times.

Aaaaanyway, I have a lot of time until my next class, but I'm getting bored and will probably just start writing about things like my grocery list if I don't quit now, so I'll bid you adieu. I expect comments too, people, I slave over this blog and you give me nothing...nothing! I'll think about posting more pics if I get a better response with news and stuff, like the cool one Mark wrote. I just enjoy the imagery of doing a mix of karate and The Robot. Like the Robot Fight from Eurotrip. So, okay, um, see ya next time?

Ich bin ein Berliner

But now I'm back to being a Freiburger. The week in Berlin was fun, although the 11 or 12 hour bus ride each direction was somewhat less fun. Berlin is definitely an interesting city, very different from any I've ever experienced. It's so strange to think that 60 years ago so much of it was destroyed. Of course, there's still evidence of this, since some building were never really rebuilt. We went to at least one museum or historical attraction every day that we were there, and I'll very briefly try to describe a bunch of them.

We arrived Sunday night, but Monday we took a tour of the city in our bus. That wasn't much fun, because it was 2 hours long and it's impossible to pay attention to some woman pointing out about 3000 different buildings and sites in a brand new city. Especially when she's doing it in German. The part where we got out for a bit was much better, especially since we saw this crazy frog sculpture thing come to life--I got a couple pics, so when those ever go up hopefully you can see a little bit more what I mean. Speaking of pics, I have around 70 from the trip, and most are just of different sites and so forth, so I'm not sure how enjoyable they'll be, but whatever. After the bus tour we had the rest of the day free, so a bunch of us just wandered around for hours. We saw Checkpoint Charlie, which was cool, but the souvenirs were cooler.

Tuesday we went to the Bundeskanzleramt, which is where people like Chancellor Schröder work, so naturally it was a very cool building. After that we went to the Haus der Wannsee Konferenz. Let me explain. This house is gorgeous, it's on a beautiful lake, there's a beautiful garden, etc. Lots of Nazis used to vacation there, Nazi officers and such. But the Wahnsee Konferenz was when the Nazis got together at the house and organized, planned, discussed the "Final Solution"--the final solution to exterminate all Jews. Needless to say, it was a disturbing and depressing place, while very interesting at the same time.

Anyway, after that we had free time again, which is how every day went. Coincidentally, Hennie was in Berlin for a couple of days, and of course Kay lives there. So around 6 PM Hennie came and picked me up. Hennie studied in Berlin for 3 years, so he's basically an expert on the city, at least the important stuff like bars and clubs. We drove around for hours, stopping at different places to check some stuff out and have a beer, and he gave me tips on places to go when I had the chance. It was pretty awesome to get a chance to see the city like that, driving around and seeing different places I would never have known about. Then at like 9:30 or something we met up with Kay and Carston for dinner at a pizza place, which had the huuugest pizzas I've ever seen or eaten in my life. One of them even had truffles on it--truffles are really expensive, and I had never tried them, but they were really interesting, in a good way. So, we ate and hung out for a while, which was really nice. Hennie left the next day, and Kay and I didn't get another chance to meet up, so I was glad I got to see them both, and Carston too, who's really cool.

Wednesday we went to some place where they have information about the Berlin Wall, and we had a tour which wasn't very good, and the whole thing actually wasn't very interesting--it was much more fun to see a different part of the Wall that's still standing elsewhere in the city, because it's still very long and completely graffittied and everything. After that we could go to Museum Island to check the Goya, but it was pouring out and the line was incredibly long (it's usually no less than 5 hours, I don't know exactly what it was then, but we weren't about to wait). So we went to the movies instead, which is a learning experience in German anyway! We saw Alles Auf Zucker, which was an awesome, hilarious movie. That night we went into Kreuzberg, which is the Turkish section of Berlin. Hennie explained to me that it's actually more like Turkey than Turkey is, these days. The people who immigrated in the past were less educated, poor, and so they clung to a lot of the old values and religion and so forth. Turkey, especially Istanbul, is more modernized now, so Hennie said that if people want to connect with their roots they actually travel to Kreuzberg a lot of the time. Pretty funny. It's a totally cool place, too.

Thursday we went to the place where they held the Potsdamer Konferenz, which is where Truman, Churchhill, and Stalin met to discuss war-related issues. It was an interesting, short tour, and it's a very beautiful place, especially the gardens. After that we went somewhere that I have no idea what it's called or anything, but it was some sort of castle slash art gallery deal, and it was pretty extravagant and sweet. The tour guide was really cool, and he also taught us a bit of Berliner dialect--they pronounce "gut" like "yout," if you say the word you with a t at the end. Also, to walk inside the place, we had to put these massive slippers over our shoes, and it was so slick that you could basically ice skate around the floors, which was wayyy too much fun.

Friday we went to the StaSi Gefängnis (prison). This was also a bit disturbing, but also really cool. We checked out the U-Boot (submarine), as they called the area below one building where they had built tons of cells ("they" being the DDR police force during the years of Berlin separation, and I use the term police force lightly, because they did horrible things and locked up everyone they could). The normal cells were bad enough, but they also had a few torture ones, such as the Chinese Water Torture room. They had tons and tons of interrogation rooms upstairs. There was even one open-air cell outside. Very unsettling stuff.

Saturday we had all day free, so we went to the Jüdische Museum (Jewish). It's not just a history of German Jews during the war, it's also like a comprehensive history of the Jewish people, so it was a massive museum. We were there for hours and couldn't process more than maybe half of it, probably less. There was some really cool and interesting stuff though.

And that's just the historical type stuff. We went out every afternoon and night. We had to buy lunch and dinner, but breakfast was provided for us (and was awesome). We were close to Oranienburger Strasse, which was a good place to be near, because it had tons and tons of places to eat, and also shops and whatnot, so we ate something different for every meal. We checked out news bars and and clubs every night too, but you can probably imagine what happened at those, so I'll refrain from detailing. A couple of bars were really cool though, especially one at the top of an art building. This building used to be where squatters lived, but now it's sort of a historical building that the government charges like €1 a year for. Artists get scholariships to go live in a room for a year and just create art, and they have to keep their doors open when they do so that people can always check out what they're doing. That's cool, and the building itself is 4 floors of absolute graffiti--there's not a non-graffitied surface to be found. At the very top there's a bar with one open wall that face behind the building. They project huge movies and stuff on a building back there--they were like weird homemade music videos. It was a sweet setup. There was also a secret bar that Hennie told me about--it had no markings to tell you what it was, and you had to ring a doorbell to be let in. He said there used to be passwords required, but that was a long time ago. It was a creepy place, but cool at the same time.

Okay, I'd better stop now. In (seriously this time) brief other news, classes started today. Yesterday was the holiday for the Berlin Wall coming down, so most things were closed, but we did go to the movies--we saw NVA, which is a comedy about the National Volks Army in East Berlin before the wall had come down, near the end of the 80's, so very fitting, and it was hilarious also. So far we're 2 for 3 with German films--Stadt Als Beute has been the only let down. My IPod has stopped working for some reason, but I do have warranty that covers all expenses still, so if I have to resort to that I will.

It's Opa's birthday today, so Happy Birthday Opa (although I doubt he reads this), but I'll be emailing him, and you should too, unless you're a friend of mine who has no connection to my grandfather, in which case maybe just don't. Well, it's been a long post. Maybe see ya tomorrow. And enjoy your amazing weather that everyone seems to be having, since it's dreary and dismal here.