This weekend was a blast!! I didn't have anything to do this weekend, so Saturday afternoon while there wasn't really anything going on here at home I decided to go into Cologne. I didn't really have any plans or destination, but it was snowing and I didn't want to be at home. I think it was about 2 or 2:30 in the afternoon when I finally left the house and I had intended to be home by dinner at 6:30, so it was just going to be a quick trip. Or so I thought.

When I got to the Hauptbahnhof I headed straight toward the U-Bahn so that I could purchase my monthly train pass for January. That was really my only set objective while I was in Cologne that day. I never ended up making it to the U-Bahn because on the way there I got distracted by a drunk guy in a chicken suit. He was running around the train station and in front of the Dom talking to people and his friends were all taking a bunch of pictures of him posing with random people that were passing by. There were 9 guys total, and they were trying to sell this little bottles of plum schnapps that they had a box full of. They tried to get me to buy one, but I gave it back to them and was getting ready to go about my business when the chicken wanted to take a picture. So I figured, whatever, it's harmless. I got to talking to them (mostly because they were trying to get me to drink this schnapps, although they weren't going to make me buy it) and it turns out that they were there celebrating the chicken's bachelor party. Needless to say, they celebrate that a little differently over here. They got excited when they found out that I was American, and then they immediately all wanted to speak to me in English (even though, for a few of them, their English wasn't any better than my German).

Anyway, they asked me if I was in a hurry or had anything to do, and since I didn't they invited me to go to dinner with them at this place called the Haxenhaus. It was basically my first opportunity to hang out with Germans since I arrived in Germany, so I couldn't say no. The Haxenhaus is this ancient building (established in 1231!) right along the Rhein and they serve really amazing authentic German food. So we hung out there for a couple of hours and they bought me dinner and everyone was drinking Koelsch and having a great time. The chicken (his name is Damir) ended up passing out for a little while at the table, and when he woke up he puked on his chicken suit, so he left it in the alley. It was kinda funny at dinner because most of them were slightly inebriated by the time we got there, so they kept asking me the same questions over and over again, like where I was from and why I was in Cologne and do I honestly like it in Germany, things like that. Some of them, including Damir, were from Croatia (though they all live in Frankfurt now) and aren't nearly as fond of Germany as I am. At one point a few of them got slightly concerned because they had forgotten how old I said I was, and I could hear them asking eachother in German and hoping that I wasn't 15. They apparently forgot that when I met them I was speaking to them in German and could understand a lot of what they were saying.

After dinner they asked me if I wanted to continue on with them to this pub called Keks. Again, I didn't have anything better to do and I had already called Esther to let her know I'd be out late, so I went along with them. Just around the corner from Keks was the ice skating rink at Huemarkt, so we decided to do that for a little bit before we went to the pub. Most of them had never even been ice skating before, and yet I was still the first one to fall on my ass. Awesome. We did that for about half an hour until the session ended and then we headed to Keks.

The pub was almost empty when we got there because it was still pretty early, only like 8:30 or 9. We staked out a nice spot in the back where we had a couple tables and a lot of room, and they immediately bought a minikeg. We ended up hanging out in Keks until about 3 in the morning, just dancing and hanging out and having a great time. I told them that if this had been a bachelor party in the states, everyone there would've thought I was a prostitute, or a stripper in the very least. That was really funny to them, because over here it's just so different. I haven't danced in a long time, so now my legs are exhausted and my knees are a little achey, but it really doesn't matter. It was so much fun.

When we left Keks it was snowing, and walking back to the Dom was the most beautiful and peaceful experience. I think they all think I'm a little crazy because I was so enthralled with the snow, but that's ok. At one point I actually sat down in the courtyard in front of the Dom and laid my head back to look up at it. I was still burning up from being in the club so it wasn't really that cold, but even if it was it wouldn't have mattered; it was too beautiful.

We had a while to wait for our trains once we got to the Hauptbahnhof, so we went to McDonalds (it was literally the only thing open) and hung out for about an hour before we had to leave. I ended up getting back to the house around 5 or 5:30 in the morning. I tried to be really quiet but Amelie got excited and knocked an empty water bottle down the stairs and into the cellar while she was dancing around in front of me. Once I got upstairs I got straight into bed and didn't get up (except to get a drink or go to the bathroom) until about 5:30 yesterday evening. I basically got out of bed, went downstairs for dinner, sat around in a stupor for a couple of hours, and then went back to bed. I couldn't sleep at first, though, because my knees and my right shoulder where so unbearably achy. I had to take some Tylenol pm just to stop it from hurting enough that I could fall asleep. Once that kicked in, everything was fine and I slept like a baby.

Today the kids had to go back to their usual routine, so they were gone all day, and Esther spent most of the day in her new office. Olaf doesn't go back to work until Thursday, so he's happy about that. And there's still a lot of snow outside so Olaf took the kids sledding when he picked them up this afternoon, and I taught them how to make snow angels in the back yard before dinner. They got a kick out of that one. Other than that, all I really did today was rearange some of the furniture in my room so that now my bed is near the window. I don't know why, but I always like to have my bed near a window if it's possible. It was kind of a pain in the ass, though, because the bed is designed in a way that it has to fit a certain way in the corner or else it's like sleeping in a cage, so I had to rebuild the bed in order to move it where I did. I don't think I want to do that anymore, so I think the room's going to stay the way it is, and now I'm going to finish decorating.