. . .and the vacation saga continues. . .

Man, what a weekend! On Friday I was absolutely exhausted all day while I was taking care of Pauline, largely because I had a reasonable amount of sinus congestion and was obviously starting to come down with something. What I did not expect is what happened on Saturday.

I was so tired on Saturday morning that, even though the kids' screaming woke me up early, I was absolutely unable to get out of bed or even open my eyes until Gustav came to get me for breakfast. I got out of bed and went downstairs, still in my pajamas, to join the family at the table. Esther poured me some tea, I took half of a roll, cut it in half again, and spread some mett on it. Then I immediately had to put my head down in my hands because I thought I was going to pass out. I got so light headed, and everything started to get dark, and my ears were ringing, so it was no joke. When I felt stable enough to move my head, I got up to go lay on the sofa but decided on my room instead so that I wouldn't have to get up to move again. I was on my way up the stairs when I realized, nope, not gonna make it. I threw up in my hands on the stairs, and had to make it to the bathroom as soon as possible before I either vomited everywhere or passed out while trying to get there. Esther had said that while I was sitting at the table my face had turned green, and she was right. After I finished in the bathroom and was cleaning myself up, I looked in the mirror and my face was green and my lips were this weird, palish purply white color. I basically looked like death, or like Mischa Barton in The Sixth Sense. Either way, it wasn't good. I stayed in bed all day on Saturday and Sunday, and I slept for over 4 hours during the day yesterday, just trying to get rid of the fever/lightheadedness/diarrhea that I've had for 4 days now. I had to miss meeting some friends (the 2 guys from London that we met on the pub crawl) in Dusseldorf, as well as Fabio's 4th birthday party at the pony farm because of it. I haven't been this sick since I got salmonella from a chicken quesadilla at Rubio's a few years ago, and I hope it doesn't happen again any time soon.

Today Gustav peed on me when I went to pick him up at the Kindergarten. I got there just as they were about to sit down to read a story and Gustav wanted to stay, but we couldn't wait because it was already 4 and we had to pick up Pauline. So he started crying and I picked him up to comfort him a little bit, since he was obviously really tired. When I put my hand under his butt I felt that his pants were wet. I asked him if he did that earlier or if he just peed his pants (I asked in German because that's not exactly something he hears very often in English) and he said it just happened, that moment. Awesome. But I got to give the kids a bath for the first time tonight, so that was fun. It actually went really well, and they didn't fuss or fight with me at all. Esther was surprised when she came upstairs that we were already done and that nobody was screaming of crying.

So now that we're all caught up on the awesomeness of my weekend, let's get back to the vacation once again.

Sunday, Mar. 7
We got relatively early because we wanted to make sure we didn't miss breakfast, which ended at 9:30. It was a pretty typical European breakfast, mostly meat, cheese, rolls, croissants, butter and jam, plus they had a few different types of sausages, some cooked potatoes, and hard boiled eggs. It was pretty good, and definitely enough to fill you up.
After breakfast we braced ourselves for the cold and headed toward the old city. It was its own little mini adventure because, as I said before, we couldn't read or understand Czech, so we had to use our dictionary, careful listening skills, common sense and a map to make sure we took the right tram to the right location and didn't get completely lost. I'd say we did a pretty good job. We got off the tram right next to this really cool tower, the Powder Tower, and we just used our map to wander around.
There is really no way to describe how gorgeous the architecture is in this city, not to mention how ancient it is. I mean, really ancient. Countless drunk Americans have probably puked and/or pissed on lampposts that were erected before our country was even "discovered," and that's not a joke or exaggeration. Coming from a country that's so young, where you're hard-pressed to find anything older than 300 years old at most, it's almost impossible to fully comprehend what it means when you walk into a restaurant that was established in 1253. Seriously?! It's not only a portion of a wall, or a new building erected on the site of some ancient ruins, but actually an ancient restaurant. It's the most ridiculous and awesome feeling to be in a place like this.
Anyway, I could go on and on forever about how magical it all was, and how ancient all the buildings were without ever getting into any of the details of our trip, I better stop before I really get going. Since it was Sunday and most places throughout Europe are closed on Sundays (although Prague wasn't nearly as dead as many other places I've been) most of what we did consisted of looking at cool buildings and sort of getting acquainted with the city a little bit. We made our way past the central train station and the National Museum toward the center of the old city, taking pictures of as many cool churches, statues, museums and other various buildings as we could. When we found a postcard that we really liked, we took it to the post office to buy a stamp and mail it to Sheryl back home. We promised her a postcard from every city we visited, and we mailed them from the same city so that she got a cool little postal stamp to go with it. The post office was definitely the most elaborately decorated post office I've ever seen. Lee took a picture of the wall/ceiling because it was magnificent, and then the security guard basically tried to kick us out for taking a picture inside. He didn't really kick us out, just made us put the camera away, but it was still weird, and security forces seem to be pretty hardcore in Prague (more on that later).
We also stopped to buy Lee a Russian hat, because it was seriously cold and his ears were going to fall off. Even I wasn't prepared for how cold it was. The temperature was the same as it had been in Köln, but it felt like it had to be 5 degrees colder. I couldn't feel my toes (except for the occasional tingling feeling) and Lee was just warm enough to know that he was freezing to death. The hat helped, but I think what we really needed was windproof goose-down jumpsuits wrapped in electric blankets. It was that cold. There were a couple times where we had to find someplace that we could go inside for a few minutes just so we could thaw out a little bit. Ideally we found a place that sold cocoa (delicious, European style hot cocoa) and sat there.
On the way back to the hotel we stumbled upon something that looked like another shopping mall (I actually just looked it up on the internet and it's called the Palladium, and it's the Czech Republic's largest mall), so we went there both to find food and to get warm. We didn't eat crap American fast-food this time, we actually went to a Lebanese restaurant in the mall. Still not Czech food, but delicious and satisfying nonetheless. It was a pretty interesting mall, too. They had an escalator which went up 2 floors and completely skipped over the one in the middle, and there a bar waiting to serve you booze at the top of it. And, I'm still shocked by this, there was a freaking archaeological site inside the mall! Apparently before they built it they conducted an excavation and discovered the foundations of 12th century buildings that had been constructed even before the city walls. So they marked off a small area to show off some cool archaeological remains and then built the mall around it. Sure, why not?

Monday, Mar. 8
This was a really fun, but unbearably cold day. We took a tram up to the high part of the city where the Prague Castle is and basically spent the whole day there. We got tickets to go into certain parts of the castle grounds (though, unfortunately, a few things that would have been cool to see where closed that day due to "technical reasons," whatever that means) and we paid for an audio tour so that we could learn all kinds of cool stuff while we were there. Unfortunately nobody told us that we had to turn in our audio tour things by 4 pm, which we learned ourselves by reading a map at about 3 pm, so we had to hurry through a few things, but all in all I think it was a good investment.
To start the day off, I got yelled at by a Prague police officer who was on guard duty at the castle. It was kinda scary, but mostly startling. I suppose it was my own fault, really. There were these really ginormous flagpoles outside of the castle and Lee wanted to take a picture of me next to one as sort of a size comparison. There was a square marble base around it, not quite up to my knees, that kept me about a meter away from the pole itself. So, wanting to get closer to the flagpole, I simply stepped up onto the marble base. Ooops. This guy immediately came charging out of nowhere (he was behind the giant pole and we didn't know he was there until he started yelling) and we were slightly surprised that he didn't have his gun drawn, mostly because he was just so serious. So it wasn't quite a Matt-Salmi-moment, but I definitely pissed off a Czech guard.
Moving on, we headed first to the massive cathedral (St. Vitus's Cathedral) once we actually went in to where the castle was. This church was amazing. In addition to being just absolutely massive (though I don't think it's as big as the Kölner Dom) at was extremely intricate and ornate inside. Along the walls were over 30 nooks, almost all of which were chapels dedicated to different saints and at least 2 of which had actual skeletal remains on display in glass tombs. Lee and I were so enthralled by everything that we actually toured the cathedral twice, once to listen to the audio and a second time to take pictures of everything. This proved to be unusually difficult for 2 reasons: we were so cold that we couldn't hold a camera still to save our lives; and we ran out of memory on the SD card that was in our camera. Son of a... Lee even had a 32 GB drive in his suitcase to put in my camera so that I basically could never run out of memory if I tried, and we forgot to switch them. So once that happened we spent the next half hour or so standing inside this inexplicably cold church deleting any and all photos that were either blurry/not really worth keeping, or that were of things we could take more pictures of later, after we switched out the memory cards. I think we ended up deleting over 100 pictures, most of which we would have deleted anyway when we actually took the time to go through all of them. Then, since we didn't have time to get the other memory card, we spent the rest of the day making sure we got one good picture of everything.
When we were finished with the cathedral (and after we ducked into a cafe to defrost with another cocoa) we headed to the royal quarters of the castle grounds. Once again we were overwhelmed with the amount of history behind everything we were seeing. We got to walk through a great entertainment hall where they once had jousting tournaments (inside!) and where they occasionally still hold royal/official celebrations, the room where the Defenestration of Prague occurred in 1618 (leading to the 30 Years' War), and the private royal church (as if they needed another one when they had a private covered bridge leading directly to their royal seating in the cathedral).
After visiting the royal quarters we continued through the rest of the grounds to see the Golden Lane, which consists of the 24 smallest houses in all of Prague (one of which was formerly inhabited by Kafka) as well as the torture dungeon. We really wanted to see the armory because they have all kinds of cool medieval weapons and stuff there, but either we missed it somehow or they had already closed the entrance when we got there, because we never found the place to go in. Kind of a bummer, but the torture dungeon was really cool.
Once we were done at the castle we headed back toward city center to find a traditional Czech restaurant where we could have dinner. We decided to go to a place that was noted on the map we picked up at our hotel, and I think it was a good choice. I got this goulash dish with dumplings and Lee got chicken in a yummy cream sauce with potatoes. We also tried some of their beer, since it was also a brewery and Prague is supposed to have really amazing beer. It was pretty good. And, either we were there during happy hour (not likely) or the waitress added up our total wrong because they only ended up charging us a little more than half of what we had calculated it to be. So it was delicious and cheap, and delicious.
After dinner we headed over to the Astronomical Clock to waste some time because we were going to be taking a Ghost Tour of the city that night. It sounded creepy and fun, so we thought it would be a good idea. Luckily we got there just as a tour (not the one we were going to take, but a different ghost tour) was about to start. We went with them because we wanted to go back to the hotel and get warm, and it didn't make sense to wait another hour and half for no real reason. The tour was a lot of fun. It was more about history and architecture than about ghosts, which was cool, and our guide was really funny. He told us about some of the interesting tour groups he's had before, like the Spanish girl who knew perfect English but refused to speak it until she pointed out to him that "the lion has balls," referring to a painting of the lion on the crest of the city. It's totally true, by the way. Everywhere you see a painting or statue or anything depicting this lion, it has balls. The guy was really cool, and since the cost of his tour was 100 CZK less than the one we were planning to take, we gave that to him as a tip instead. Then it was straight back to the hotel and into bed before we lost body parts due to frostbite.

To be continued. . .

. . . Continued

This week has been a little too crazy for me to take the time to sit down and continue about my vacation. On Monday Gustav was sick, so I had to pick him up from the Kindergarten at 1:30 instead of 4. Then on Tuesday I had to go to the customs office (AGAIN) to retrieve a package that was being ransomed. That was a big waste of time because it was something that I had ordered on the internet before Christmas, and it never came so I told them to forget it and they gave me my money back. Now here it shows up, and because I had no idea what could possibly be in the package (they don't tell you who it's from, just that you have to go get it) I didn't have an invoice from the original purchase. So I went all the way there, opened it, told them I didn't know what it was about and made them send it back. So there went Tuesday. Yesterday I had to get the kids early again because Esther needed the car to drive to a seminar. Instead of being able to update my blog I spent the afternoon watching the kids play in the garden (kind of forcing them to play in the garden, because it was a nice day and I didn't want to have them inside all afternoon) and baking pumpkin pie and chocolate chip cookies for my language class. Last night was our last meeting, and I told them I would bake something and bring it in. Someone else brought beer, so when we finished with all the stuff we needed to do, we just sat around eating pie and drinking beer until the time class was supposed to end and everyone was ready to go home. Nobody ate the cookies there, but they all took some for the road. Esther said that these cookies are by far the best thing that I've made since I got here. Way to go Crisco! The pie crust was much better than last time because of the Crisco, too. Anyway, today it was way too beautiful outside to sit at my computer all day, so instead I played/slept outside in the garden with Amelie. Then I picked up Esther and the kids at 3 and brought everyone home to play in the garden. By 6 it started raining, and it should be raining for the next few days, so it's a good thing we enjoyed the nice spring weather today.

So now I'm caught up on this week, and the kids are in bed, and I can try once again to catch up on my vacation.

Thursday, Mar. 4
It was a pretty easy day, not really a whole lot going on. I had an appointment at around noon to get my nails done one last time before we left on vacation, so Lee and I just hung around Königsdorf all day. First we went to the market, just to kind of check it out and show Lee what it's like when I say "I went to the market today." There really wasn't much to see; it's a small market. But we bought a pastry that Lee feels was inappropriately labeled as "Schokokuchen" (chocolate cake) because it definitely wasn't what Americans think of when they think of chocolate cake.
We ran out of stuff to do about an hour before my appointment (like I said, it's a small market) so we went to see if there was any way she could take me in early. That wasn't a problem because she didn't have any other clients until later in the afternoon. While she was doing my nails I realized that I didn't have any cash, so I sent Lee to the bank down the street to pull some out for me.
After my nail appointment Lee and I went across the street to the Chinese restaurant next to the train station. I had never been there before, but I've been wanting to try it for a long time, so we thought it would be a good idea to check out their lunch buffet. We were right; it was cheap and delicious!! I'm going to have to go back there again sometime.
There really wasn't much going on after lunch. I think Lee and I just hung out at home with Amelie and then later with the kids. Like I said, it was an easy day.

Friday, Mar. 5
Lee came along with me and Pauline to join us in our weekly routine. After dropping off Esther and Gustav and taking Amelie for a walk, the 3 of us headed to Frechen to go to the market. We didn't really need all that much, just some aufschnitt (coldcuts/deli meat) for the next week, some lettuce, and some meat for dinner. We also bought some mett (just like me, Lee could not get enough of that stuff) and some rolls and had breakfast in the bakery there next to the market. Then we went home, and Lee played with Pauline all day while I did the little bit of housework that I needed to do. I think they wore each other out, which was a good thing.
After Olaf got home and we put the kids to bed, we had raclette for dinner. It was so delicious! I wasn't sure at first if it was necessarily going to be as enjoyable for Lee as it is for me, but like he said, you can cover just about anything with melted cheese and it will be delicious. We all had a really good time just hanging out, talking and eating all sorts of yumminess. It was kind of a farewell dinner before Lee and I left on our adventure.
And so much for the idea of not having any more snow this year! It started snowing in the evening and kept going (though not very hard) all night. It was beautiful, and I was glad Lee was there to see, but I don't think he was as excited about the cold as I was.

Saturday, Mar. 6
Since Lee and I were going to be flying to Prague, we all got up in the morning and had an early breakfast. Our flight didn't leave until 11:40 am, and you don't need to be at the airport an ungodly 4 hours before your flight leaves over here, so it wasn't all that early, just earlier than usual for a Saturday.
After breakfast Lee and I finished packing what we were going to be taking with us for the next week, and then Olaf and the kids drove us to the airport. We went to the observation deck so that Gustav and Pauline could watch the planes take off for a little bit before Lee and I had to leave. They actually have a terrace for people to go sit outside and watch the planes take off, kind of like I remember you used to be able to do in America before they got all anal about security. It was snowing, though, so the terrace was closed and we had to watch from the inside.
The flight to Prague was fast and easy. It was kind of like flying from LA to San Francisco, but I still managed to sleep a little bit despite the short duration because I was so tired. When we landed in Prague we got our luggage and headed toward customs only to find that there really was no customs. There's nobody there checking passports or anything. It was really shocking, and kind of a bummer because we both wanted stamps in our passports. The next step was to get some money. There was a Sparkasse ATM in the airport where I could pull money out, but we had absolutely no idea how much. We looked at the sign for the money exchange stand and thought we were missunderstanding something because it just didn't seem right. Turns out we were right: the conversion rate was 26 Czech koruna to every 1 Euro!!! The smallest amount I could withdraw from the ATM was 500 CZK. I decided to take out 2000 CZK (a little less than 80 EUR) and it actually gave me a 2000 CZK bill. It was a little rediculous.
After we got our enormous bill changed for some not-so-ridiculous ones, we went to get a taxi to take us to our hotel (since taxi is the only way to get to and from the airport). The taxi cost 640 CZK. We were really excited to get to the hotel, partly because it was freezing balls outside, and partly because we were excited to experience a 4-star hotel. I found it on a German hotel booking website (like hotels.com) and was stoked because it cost less than 100 EUR for us to stay there for 4 nights, and it was a 4-star hotel. Everyone said that Prague was cheap, but this was amazing. We quickly discovered, however, that the rating system in Eastern Europe is a little different ( or, as Lee put it, they must mean Communist Red stars). The first thing we noticed when we opened the door to our room was a strange odor that smelled kind of sweet, but definitely not in a good way. Then we looked down, and saw the huge patch of black mold in the carpet next to the bathroom door. Nevermind the fact that the room itself was incredibly small, the carpet was not so much carpet as a sisal rug covering the whole floor, the TV was about a 15" that I'm surprised had color, and the "king-size bed" was 2 small beds pushed together, there is no way that a 4-star hotel would have rooms so horribly infested with mold that you could practically feel it in your lungs. We basically went straight to the front desk and told them we needed another room because that just wasn't happening. I refuse to get a lung infection from breathing mold spore filled air on my vacation.
The new room was just like the other one, but without the mold, which is really the only problem we had with it anyway. It doesn't really matter if you get a 2 star hotel when you only pay a 2 star price, so there were really no complaints.
After we got settled into our room, we decided to head out and wander the area a little bit, particularly in search of food. We were a little way outside of city center so there weren't exactly things to do and see and eat everywhere you looked, plus neither of us can read or understand a word of Czech, so we basically walked along the tram lines so we didn't get lost. We were so hungry and so tired that all we really wanted was something easy and familiar. What we found was a shopping mall equipped with a McDonalds and a Sbarro (the very best of American culture that has been imported by Europeans). There were other things to eat there, too, but as I said, we wanted easy and familiar. Part of me is a little ashamed to admit that we ate that crap on our vacation, but at the time it was the greatest thing we could have hoped for.
After recovering with some fatty, delicious food, we bought a Czech-English dictionary in the bookstore so that we could attempt to figure out some signs when we needed directions, or to find food, and then made the long trek back to the hotel. It was kind of early, but we were tired and it was freezing, so we went to bed to get some rest before facing a long day on Sunday.

To Be Continued. . .

I'm still alive, I promise

Man, do I have a lot to catch up on!! This month has been crazy so far because Lee came to visit for 2 weeks, and then I've spent the past week just resting up and getting back into the routine. My little vacation was amazing, though, and I don't want to leave out anything particularly important or interesting, so I'm just going to separate it by day, starting with where I left off in February.

Friday, Feb. 26
My train left Köln headed for Frankfurt at 5:53 pm. I was already really tired from my long day with Pauline, and my seat reservation wasn't printed on my ticket, so I was really happy that I was able to sit in one of the enclosed cabins with only one other woman. It made for a very comfortable and peaceful train ride.
When I got to the Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof the first thing that I did was buy a book about the city that came with a pocket sized fold-out map. I learned in Köln that it's very important to have one of these in a new city (although, ironically, I still don't have a map of Köln) and it's always the first thing I get when I go someplace new, especially if I'm by myself.
I made my way to the U-Bahn to go to the Lokalbahnhof, which is the closest station to the hotel we were staying at. In the station I met a girl from Brazil who was going the same direction that I was (which we discovered by looking at my map) so we walked together and had a nice conversation until she had to head in a different direction. She's been living in Frankfurt for a couple years and doesn't speak English, so of course we spoke to each other in German. It was kind of cool.
At the hotel things went really smooth. The guy who checked me in sounded like he had an American accent, so I asked him where he was from. Turns out he's Iranian. It was weird, because when he spoke German it sounded like he had an American accent, but when he spoke English he had an Iranian accent. Anyway, he was a really nice guy, and he told me where I could go just down the street to get something to eat, because it was late and I was starving. I took a long, hot shower (I miss having a sufficient supply of hot water at home) and threw on a pair of jeans and a sweater to go get something to eat. The guy was amazed that I didn't have on a jacket or scarf or anything, especially since my hair was still wet, but it was actually pretty nice outside and I wasn't that cold. I'm still amazed at how much people here bundle up when it's cool out. Anyway, I got myself a Döner and a bottle of Coke and took it back to my room to eat before I went to bed.

Saturday, Feb. 27
I got up relatively early in the morning to make sure that I had time to eat breakfast and wake up before I went to pick up Lee at the airport. I hadn't seen him in 5 months, so I didn't exactly want to meet him half asleep and looking like crap, though I'm sure it wouldn't have mattered to him anyway. The plane had been delayed leaving Houston, and Lee's luggage was literally the last bag off the plane, so it ended up being about an hour later than expected when I finally saw him. It was so nice to have him here to visit me.
Lee and I went straight back to the hotel to drop off his luggage and relax a little bit. He's not exactly accustomed to international travel, and that flight is exhausting, so the rest was definitely necessary. After a few hours we walked a few doors down to have a late lunch at this little restaurant. We had some Äpfelwein, which is the regional drink of Frankfurt (kind of like how we drink Kölsch here) and some delicious German food.
After lunch we wandered around the area a little bit just to check it out. I had bitten down on my lip ring while I was eating and the little ball went flying, so we wanted to find a piercing shop or someplace that I could buy a new ring. Lee said he had seen a tattoo place on the way to the hotel from the train station so we went back to go find it. As it turns out, it wasn't a tattoo parlor at all, it was a cosmetology center that did laser tattoo removal. Lee saw the word "Tattoo" and wasn't paying attention to anything else when he saw the sign. So we just got some ice cream instead and went back to the hotel until we heard from Lee's friend Fred. Fred's been living in Germany for a little while longer than I have, working as a civilian contractor at Rammstein, so we made plans to meet up with him while Lee was here.
Fred showed up to the hotel at around 6:30 or so and then we pretty much headed straight to the Hauptbahnhof where we were going to join a pub crawl. We didn't do this with the intention to get wasted, just to hang out with potentially cool people and see some of the local pubs and clubs. We ended up having a blast! We were at the station way before we needed to be, so we just hung out talking to the guy who was running it for a while. We met a lot of really cool people, too. There were 2 guys from London, Russel and Mike, who were a lot of fun to talk to, and this guy from Spain who was really rad. He speaks at least 4 languages fluently (seriously, as if any one of them could be his first language) and he can speak at least 2 more well enough to get by. He's really sharp and witty, too. Plus, he lived in Munich for 3 years, so he gave us a couple tips and suggestions for while we were there. I was able to exchange information with quite a few people, and hopefully I'll be able to hook up with them again while I'm still living here.

Sunday, Feb. 28
Trying to get back to Köln from Frankfurt ended up being a huge hassle. Originally Lee and I had intended to store our luggage in a locker at the Hauptbahnhof so we could roam around the city for a while, and then go home in the evening. We weren't able to find any available lockers (we found a bunch of them when we returned to Frankfurt to send Lee home, but that was too late), so we decided to just go home early. I was a little bummed, but it turns out to have worked in our favor. We went to the track where the train we wanted was supposed to be, and there was no train and message on the screen saying what the next train was supposed to be. I found a guy who worked for DB to find out what was going on, because all the trains were delayed. It turns out that there were no trains leaving the Hauptbahnhof for Köln that day, and we had to go to the airport instead. So we went to the airport and had a hell of a time trying to follow the signs to the right trains, and when we found them we were told we had to go back to where we had come from (the regional trains instead of the long-distance ones) because all trains were being rerouted through there. Since none of these trains were supposed to come through this station at all, no one was really able to tell us what track to go to or what time, we just had to pay attention to all the trains and signs until we found a train that would take us to Köln. Luckily we picked the right track and the right time, and were able to hop on and leave almost right away.
We learned that the reason for all of the problems was that there was a huge wind storm, and the winds were so strong that they were affecting trains all over Germany. That's why there were so many delays, and why the trains were being rerouted; they couldn't go to the elevated tracks. We overheard someone explaining that the biggest problem is the trees that fall onto the tracks, which could have been avoided if not for the Green Party pitching a huge fit about cutting the trees down. So the trees stay and the rail system suffers for it. Anyway, when we got to Köln we found out that all trains had been cancelled, so we had to get a taxi to drive us home instead of taking the S-Bahn. It cost almost 30 Euro, which kinda sucked. But if we hadn't left Frankfurt when we did, we wouldn't have been able to leave at all, so it's a good thing we couldn't find a locker.
To welcome Lee, Esther and Olaf made dinner. Olaf made his cutlet, which is absolutely freaking amazing, and we had potatoes and sauteed onions to go with it. It was a nice welcome. Also, we were home early enough that the kids weren't in bed yet, so they got to meet Lee right when we got there. They were both slightly shy and skittish at first, and Pauline was a little reluctant to accept the Minnie Mouse that he brought for her, but I think they were still excited to have him here. Amelie, on the other hand, was all over him from the moment he walked in the door, the way she was when she first saw me. He immediately became her new best friend. After all, as Esther explained, she knows that he's important to me, and that makes him important to her.

Monday, Mar. 1
Monday was pretty uneventful. Lee was feeling sick, probably mostly because of the travel and lack of sleep. He went down into the cellar to relax in bed a little bit and ended up sleeping the whole day. I let him sleep because I knew he'd feel better, and he needed to be OK for his adventure on Tuesday. Lee had intended to go to my language course with me, just to sit and listen, but that obviously didn't happen.
When I picked Pauline up from Maria's that afternoon, Maria told me that Pauline hadn't stopped talking about Lee since she got there in the morning. Apparently she was rambling so much that Maria didn't even understand half of what she was saying, but she was talking about her new Minnie Mouse and the cup that Lee gave her, and how she had a new friend, and how excited she was. Freaking cute.

Tuesday, Mar. 2
As a surprise for Lee, I had planned a big adventure for him on Tuesday. I rented him a car at the Hauptbahnhof and was sending him to the Nürburgring, where I already purchased him a pass that was good for 4 laps around the Nordschleif. A dream come true, for anyone interested in cars or racing, at least.
In the morning while we were all getting dressed Pauline and Gustav both asked me if Lee was still sick. They were worried about him. It was kinda cute. They went downstairs to see him and play with him a little bit before we had to leave to drop them off. Lee came along to deliver everyone to their destinations in the morning, so he got to meet Maria, too. She was excited to be able to meet him, even though they couldn't really talk to each other without me translating. When we told her where Lee was going, she said, "Ahh! Alle Männer lieben Nürburgring!" which is so true.
After dropping off Esther and the kids, Lee and I took the train into Köln to pick up the rental car. It was a little Nissan Mikra, nothing special. Luckily it had a navigation system in it, because I've never driven all the way to the Hauptbahnhof before and I couldn't even begin to tell Lee how to get home, let alone give him directions to the Ring. After we got back home, I helped Lee plug in the address for the Ring into his navigation system and sent him on his way.
Early in the afternoon, before I went to pick up the kids, I got a phone call from Esther. Apparently Lee had called her (I gave him my cell phone in case he needed to call me) because the phone card was out of money and the person who helped him dial the pay phone called Esther's cell instead of the house. My phone wasn't out of money, by the way. It still had 13 Euro left on it, which we knew because I had checked it that morning, but unfortunately you get the same message when you are out of money that you get when you try to dial an invalid number. My phone started being picky about which digits should and shouldn't be included when dialing a German phone number, so that's why it wouldn't work. Anyway, Lee was calling to say that . . . the Ring was closed!! I could not believe it. I had contacted the people at the Ring prior to buying Lee's pass to be sure that it would be open, but apparently because of the storm they had to close it. So Lee drove all the way to the Ring, took a picture of the sign, bought a hat and a T-shirt, and then came home. I was so bummed. We just hung out here the rest of the day with the kids, and then we took the car back late at night.

Wednesday, Mar. 3
Olaf had to spend a few days in Spain on business, so I got up at 5:45 in the morning to drive him to the airport. It sucks having to get up that early, but it's not too bad. He always makes me coffee and then drives to the airport so that I have a chance to wake up before I have to drive back.
When I got back Esther was already up making herself some tea, and I double checked with her if it was alright for me to go back to bed and not help with the kids that morning (which is usually the arrangement on days when I have to take Olaf to the airport). She said it was fine, so I went back to bed for a few hours before Lee and I got up to head into Köln.
We didn't necessarily have anything big planned for the day, just to wander around a bit and let Lee see some of the city. The first thing we did, since it's the first thing you see when you get off the train, is check out the Dom. Lee was absolutely amazed by it, like I was (and still am). There really are no words to describe its magnificence. After we went inside the Dom we headed toward Altstadt and the Rhein for a little bit. I love this part of town. We went to the Haxenhaus (which is where I went with that bachelor party a few months ago) for lunch before we walked a little way along the river and then headed back home.
When we got back to Königsdorf, Lee and I headed straight over to Esther's office to pick up the car so we could go get the kids. Normally I just take the car and go, but luckily this time (largely thanks to Lee) I stopped to tell Esther first. It's a good thing, because Esther had been planning to pick all of the kids up. Some of Gustav's friends were going to be coming over to the house for the afternoon, and she was supposed to bring Jonathan and Domenic with her. So instead Lee and I picked up Pauline and then swung by to get Esther and go home. Esther took the car to get the boys while I vaccuumed the house and got the tea ready and Lee took Amelie for a walk.
It was a lot of fun having all of the kids over. It was the first time I'd seen little Florian since he broke his collarbone, so it was good to see that he's OK and doing better. And Jonathan is too cute in his little sweater vest. The kids all played really well together while Lee, Esther, Christina and I sat around talking and drinking tea. It was a peaceful, pleasant afternoon.

To Be Continued. . .