So I got home from Paris yesterday about an hour later than I was supposed to. There were "technical difficulties" that delayed our departure from Paris by 40 minutes, so I got back to the house at 11:30 instead of 10:30. Not a big deal, though, because the kids were going to be gone either way and there was still plenty of time for me to take Amelie and do everything else I needed to do. But I didn't miss my train this time, so all is well.

Sunday in Paris was a lot of fun. When I first left my hotel in the morning I decided to head to le Sacre Coeur, which wasn't very far from my hotel. I had been to Paris twice already but never had the chance to actually go inside of the church, so I figured why not. You can't take pictures inside the church, so I don't have any, but it was cool to be able to go inside. It's beautiful, of course, and since it was Sunday the organs were playing and the nuns were doing their thing up at the alter. After seeing the inside I decided it would be a good idea to climb the tower and check out the crypt. The crypt wasn't open yet and wasn't going to be until 12:30 but I didn't want to wait that long, so I just went up the tower. It was 300 steps up a narrow spiral staircase. I absolutely love climbing these ancient cathedrals because they're just so old and it makes me think about what it might have been like back in the day. The view from the top was amazing, too. It was a totally new experience to look at the Eiffel Tower from the top of another building as opposed to looking at everything from the top of the Eiffel Tower. And it wasn't raining, so that was new for me, too.

After I was done checking out the cathedral I was going to head to the Champs Elysees, but there was one little problem; my camera battery was dead, again. Not my fault this time, because I actually remembered to charge it the night before. Either it didn't charge properly, or it's just a worthless battery because it's only a cheap camera. I was not happy. Luckily it was still only about 11:30 in the morning, and the Tour wasn't going to be arriving in Paris until at least 3:30, so I went back to the hotel to charge my camera a little bit. While it was charging I walked down the street to buy a phone card, since I had also managed to blow through 30 Euro in my cell phone within 24 hours. Apparently roaming charges are really expensive, and since I was roaming I was also being charged for incoming calls. Who knew.

With phone card in hand a freshly (partially) charged camera battery I headed out again to make my way to the Champs Elysees. I had hoped to be there earlier so that I could get a decent spot to watch the race, but I think that even if I didn't have to charge my battery it wouldn't have made much difference. It was pretty crowded, but not nearly as bad as I had expected. I had time to go into a shop to get some food, eat, walk up and down the avenue, and still find a reasonable spot where I could see pretty well. As time went on and I stood there waiting with everyone else for the riders to come through, my spot gradually improved as well. The family that had been standing in front of me left their post one by one, I think because they didn't like being crowded by everyone else that had gathered around them. As peepholes opened up I offered them to the 2 little boys in the family that was standing behind/next to me. They were so cute. It was a family from Holland (which I figured out because I was listening very closely when they were speaking to each other, and then I had a little conversation with the mom) and they just happened to be in Paris on vacation without even knowing that the tour was going on. The little boys were so sweet and polite, though. Even as space had started to open up they were hesitant to take advantage of it, so I told them to go ahead. It didn't make any difference to me because the oldest one was still a full head shorter than me, so they didn't block my view at all. He said, "Thank you very much," with the cutest little accent. It was adorable. But eventually even they left, and after the riders had made their 5th round on the Champs Elysees I was right up front with a perfect view. It was actually kind of hard to keep track of how many rounds they did, though. I only counted 6 rounds, and then people started walking away and it was over. I actually really wanted to see if I could manage to score an autograph (preferably from Lance Armstrong, Andy Schleck, Mark Cavendish and/or Alberto Contador) but there were so many people and everything was kind of crazy, so I didn't know where to go or what to do or if it was even possible. Maybe next year.

As I was standing and watching the race I met a couple of guys that were from San Francisco and Australia. They were in Paris for 8 days to plug into the music scene. Anyway, they invited me to hang out with them after the race, so we headed to a convention center to see a performance. I call it a performance because I don't really know what else to call it. It was a really artsy, contemporary, interpretive-dance sort of thing that involved about 8 girls dressed up like Snow White hanging around a long table and carrying machine guns. It was really interesting. Anyway, they had met a girl the night before who was part of this performance and told her they'd check it out, so we did. Then we went to get something to eat. In the typical French style, we bought a bottle of wine (which we didn't even drink because they took it back to their hostel, where you're not allowed to have alcohol), a baguette, and some cheese. It was absolutely delicious. Afterward we were on our way to go see a band play somewhere, and then to go dancing, but I got hit by a major food comma and went back to my hotel instead. It was definitely the right idea, especially since I had to get up at 4:30 in the morning to make sure I caught my train on time. So I bought some cookies and a bottle of water and hung out in my room for a little bit before I went to sleep.

All in all it was a pretty good trip. It wasn't too bad that I was there by myself because at least I didn't get lost. And when people tried talking to me but I didn't want to talk to them I would just tell them I didn't speak French and pretend that I only spoke German. It worked pretty well, actually. It would definitely have been better to have someone with me, though, especially if that person spoke French. Oh well. Other than that, and the fact that the trip was so short (I was in Paris for less than 36 hours), I have no complaints.

Today was actually my recovery day. After I dropped off the kids and took Amelie for a walk, I came home and slept for 3 hours. I started fasting again yesterday (Esther and Olaf started on the weekend) and I was still worn down from my travels, so I really needed the extra sleep. Tomorrow I think I'm going to try running again. We'll see if I'm able to get up early enough for that.

Bonjour!

I'm actually sitting in a hotel room in Paris right now while I'm writing this. I want to see the Tour de France, so here I am. Originally my mom had made the suggestion that I go to Belgium to see the race, since it's so close to where I live, but that didn't work out because of the timing. So, instead, I decided that it would be pretty cool to come to Paris to see the finale on the Champs Elysees. Unfortunately, I'm actually here by myself because nobody would come with me. I tried really hard to get my friend from France to come along, but it just wasn't happening, even though I offered to pay for it. Oh well. Like I told my mom: It's just another new adventure.

I must say that it has already been quite and interesting weekend. Yesterday afternoon was a going away party for the Italian girl from the last language course, so Elena and I went to that. We didn't stay very long because it wasn't at all what we were expecting. It wasn't specifically for this girl as we had thought, but rather a festival for the entire medical program at the university. We never even saw Rosaria. Afterward Elena's friend wanted to go to a disco, but I had no desire to go to one. Clubs generally aren't my thing because I like the more relaxed atmosphere of bars, where you can simply sit and talk and hang out. I had suggested this place in Altstadt that's a bar but also has a dance floor, but that wasn't good enough. So they went there way and I headed toward the Rhein by myself. I was actually really hungry, so I went to the Haxenhaus to get dinner (even though I hate going to bars or restaurants alone). I had been talking on the phone before my food came, and when I hung up this guy from the table in front of me came over and sat down at my table to talk to me. It probably sounds a little creepy or intrusive, but it wasn't. He's an Iranian who's been living and working in Germany for 18 years, and he's taking an English course right now. Since he heard me speaking in English, he wanted to come over and talk to me. After a little bit his 2 colleagues (a woman from Ireland who's been here so long that she now speaks broken English and a man from Guatemala) came and joined us, and they ordered a yard of Kölsch and hung out with me while I ate. Then they invited me to go with them to Flanagan's, an Irish pub/club in Altstadt, so I did. It was a lot of fun. After a while I left Altstadt to head toward Ehrenfeld to meet up with Frederic at a party there. I think it was about 2 in the morning when I got there, and when he and I left it was already broad daylight. A little ridiculous, but tons of fun.

Today was whole different kind of interesting. I actually missed my train to Paris. It was my own fault, too, which I think makes it worse. When shit happens, shit happens and it sucks. But when shit happens because you're a jackass and screwed things up, you suck. I was so angry with myself. I hadn't eaten anything all day (since I was out until who knows when and then went to sleep for a few hours when I finally got back home) and I was starving, so I decided to use the extra 15 minutes I had to run into McDonald's and grab something to take onto the train with me. Bad idea. The guy working the register was slow, and even though it was busy he kept stopping to do things that either weren't that important, or that he could have asked someone else to do for him. Then, the guy 2 people ahead of me ordered enough food for a football team, and that took forever. When I finally got to the counter it was 5 minutes before my train was supposed to leave, and the guy walked away. Oh, so pissed! I left, because there wasn't any time to wait for him, and by the time I got to the train it was just starting to pull away. Great. Then it was a hassle trying to find out if and how I could change my ticket or get on the next train to Paris. In the end I had to wait 2 hours for the next train, ask the train manager what I could do about my ticket, and then go from there. I only had to pay the difference in the price between the ticket I had and the one I needed for this train, instead of having to buy a whole new ticket. Unfortunately, a ticket for this later train was almost twice as expensive as the one that I bought, so it was essentially like having to buy a new ticket, anyway. Kind of a bummer. At least I managed to pick a seat that was unreserved for the whole trip and I was able to relax and nap without anyone bothering me or kicking me out. Once I got to Paris, finding the hotel was actually quite easy. I was smart and studied a map and the Metro routes before I left the house, so I knew exactly where I had to go and how to get there. At least I did something right today.

Man, what a weekend! Friday my friends and I met up in Köln at Aachener Weiher (the pond where we had our little party at the end of the language course) to hang out and grill. I got there really early because the weather was so nice and I knew it was going to be crowded. I just put down my blanket and laid down for about an hour before Gleyson showed up with the grill. After a little while Frederic showed up, too, and later Elena and Aljona showed up with sparkling wine to celebrate Elena's birthday. Fred had to leave at some point to go home and to find his friends, who were here visiting from France for the weekend. He was supposed to be gone for about an hour or so, but he ended up never coming back because things got complicated. Rosaria was there for a little while, too.

At about 10 or 10:30 at night we were out of beer, so they sent me to the Kiosk down the street to buy some. There were 4 people in our group at the time, and we were still expecting Fred to come back with his friends, so I figured the best thing to do was to buy a case of beer so that we didn't have to go back and buy more later. So I'm walking back to the park with this case of beer, and it started raining. I mean, really raining. When I got back to where all of our stuff was, the girls had left and it was just Geu standing there with a really sweet woman that he had started talking to when she came by to collect our empty bottles. That's when the full force of the thunderstorm kicked in, and we had to quickly pack up all of our stuff and drag it to the bar that was really close to where we were so that we could huddle under one of their umbrellas. Everything was completely soaked! My hair was dripping wet, my clothes were wet (and I was wearing white shorts, which is awesome), and I was wrapped up in my blanket, which was also wet. Good thing it was a summer storm, because it would really have sucked if it was cold. Once the rain stopped, we just went home. There wasn't really any point in staying there, and we were exhausted, so we called it a night.

Yesterday was a good day, too. I went into Köln again to meet up with Frederic and his friends at the same place we were on Friday. I brought all of the beers (minus the one that shattered when the bike fell over) and the rest of the grill meat/vegetables with me for them to grill because today was supposed to be the start of our fast and I needed to get rid of everything. One of Fred's friends at one point declared that I was "the perfect woman" because I showed up with beer and a soccer ball. I thought that was pretty funny. Anyway, we hung out there for a while, played soccer, attempted to walk across a tight rope (which is really freaking hard!) and just had a good time. Then late last night we went to Fred's apartment to eat some dinner and watch the fireworks. Last night was the Köllner Lichte, which is a fireworks show on the Rhein basically for the sake of having fireworks. They do it every year in July. Afterward we headed to Altstadt to hang out at an Irish pub. We had to take a taxi, and it probably wasn't so smart for Fred and I to stick together in one taxi and send the 4 non-German speakers in the other one, but it all worked out ok. We were at the pub until almost 5 in the morning. It was about 5:30 when we got back to Frederic's apartment, and we all just crashed. Everyone was so tired. This morning (or rather afternoon) we all headed back to the river to get something to eat before they had to go back to the airport to head home.

The next part of my day today actually kind of sucked. I got off the train here in Königsdorf and went to go get the bike to ride home, only to find that the bike wasn't actually there. Yeah, someone stole the bike from the train station last night. Freaking awesome. So now we need to replace the adapter to hold the child seat on the back of the bike because it was on this bike when it was stolen, and we need to replace the bike and/or fix the other broken old one. And by we I mean me, because I'm the jackass that left the bike over night at the station. Good times.

Even though nothing particularly out of the ordinary happened, I must say that I've had a great birthday. I got to talk to my parents on Skype right at midnight so that they could tell me Happy Birthday, and my mom told me my story (which she does for all of us every year on our birthdays). It was a nice start to my birthday. Then Esther and I had breakfast together yesterday morning before Esther went to her office, and then she picked me up at around 12 to go to the Altes Brauhaus for lunch. That was the first time I've had a baked potato since I left the States, and it was delicious. Esther also gave me a gift card to the cosmetic store here in Königsdorf, where they not only sell cosmetic goods but also do facials and that sort of thing. Then I picked up Zaynep and Pauline at Maria's and we all went home to walk Amelie and play in the garden.

Yesterday was also the first day of my new language course. It's a little disappointing because I was hoping to take the C1 course so that I could prepare for the big C1 language test in September, which I was told I would need to pass before I would be allowed to enroll at the university. But, just my luck, they cancelled the C1 class and now I have to take the B2 instead, which doesn't really help as far as the test goes. Plus, when I mentioned that my goal was to take the C1 test in September, the instructor basically told me that there was almost no possibility that I would pass it. It could be worse, though. At least Frederic is in the class with me, so I already know somebody there and have someone I can hang out with.

After class was when the birthday celebration really started. Frederic and I called Geu and then went to meet up with him for a beer. When we met him at the train stop, he suggested that we went to his apartment instead to just relax and start up the grill and have our own little mini party. So we bought some drinks at Rewe on the way and then spent the rest of the night hanging out in Geu's apartment. He actually had a raclette grill, which was awesome. I think we ended up leaving his apartment at around 3 in the morning or so. I had to take a taxi home because I didn't feel like waiting for the train; I was too tired and that would've taken too long. Like I said, it wasn't necessarily anything spectacular but it was still a lot of fun. To top off the evening, there was a beautiful flower bouquet waiting for me just outside my bedroom door when I got home. My mom had managed to find a florist in the area and ordered these flowers for me, along with a little teddy bear and a huge bar of chocolate. At first we thought that one of the kids had stolen the bear, because I didn't see it with the bouquet, but then this morning I realized that it was because the bear is only about 2 inches tall and was in amongst the flowers. Oops. They really are gorgeous, though.

The birthday celebration continued today, too. I spent most of the day baking (or doing tasks like shopping in preparation for baking) for the little party we had this afternoon. I baked apple-hazelnut muffins, chocolate Eierlikör muffins (Eierlikör is a liqueur made of eggs, sugar and brandy) and a strawberry tart. It was a lot of work, but also a lot of fun. At 4 in the afternoon is when the guests started showing up. Britta came with Jette and Malte, Güner was there with Zaynep and Elif, Jörg brought David and Fabio, and Nina came over from next door after she got home from work. We all sat outside on the patio drinking coffee/tea and eating all the stuff that I had baked. I, of course, got to play with the kids and the baby, which always makes it a good day. I also got gifts from everyone who came. Güner gave me a bouquet of roses and jasmine, Britta gave me a beautiful necklace that happened to match what I was wearing, so I put it on immediately, Nina and Jan gave me a keychain of the Kölner Dom, and Jörg and Barbra gave me lotion with a little lawn gnome charm (freaking cute!) and some nail polish. Later on the evening Jörg and Olaf fired up the grill for dinner. Needless to say, dinner was fantastic. Then I sat in the yard playing with the 6 kids (Güner had already gone home with the girls). All of the parents had been sitting at the table talking and watching as I played with the kids and Amelie. At one point Esther said that, if the plan to stay here as a student should fall through, they know exactly what I could do; I could offer a daycare service where I instruct the children in English, so that they all have a background in the language before they ever even go to school. That would actually be the perfect job for me, if we could make that happen. Now we have a new mission...

Last night was a sad night. I went with Alex, Tommy and Steffi to Liblarersee to have our own little "Public Viewing" on the lifeguard dock. It was actually pretty cool and a lot of fun. We pulled out the grill and Tommy and Steffi brought a TV from home which we set up in the hut to watch the game. But then Germany lost. It was a major bummer, but it was no surprise from the way they were playing. Spain was simply the better team, and they deserved the win last night. Needless to say, we weren't exactly in a celebratory mood after the game, so we went swimming in the lake for a little bit and then went home.

Since I'm already on the subject of soccer, I guess I should just wrap up the last 2 weeks worth of World Cup adventures. Although I had plans to go to Public Viewings for all of the Germany games, I actually ended up watching the games against England and Argentina at home. For the England game the kids and I went next door to Jan and Nina's because Esther and Olaf had to drive to Bielefeld (more on that in a moment). We went over at around 3 for barbecue and then watched the first half of the game there. At half time we switched over to our house so that the kids would have something to do besides pester Jan and Nina during the game, and Esther and Olaf got home at the same time, so they watched the end of the game with us. Man, was that a good game! For the game against Argentina, I just simply didn't have the energy to go to a viewing. The night before I had met up with a friend from my language course, Gleyson, to watch the Brazil:Netherlands game. He's from Brazil, so he invited me to go with him to a Brazilian bar in Köln to watch the game. That was another sad day, and since we didn't feel like celebrating then, either, we went to this little lake in the city to have a beer and hang out. We called Elena and she brought another friend to come join us. We just sat around for a while, talking and having a good time, before we left and went to Gleyson's. That's where I passed out because I was so freaking tired, and I didn't wake up until about 10 or so the next morning. So I got home at around 12:30, and then I would have needed to change from my Brazilian gear into my German gear and head straight back into town to meet up with friends for the Germany game. I simply didn't have the energy, so I took a nap and stayed home to watch the game with the family. Less than 5 minutes before the kick off, the satellite signal went out because of the thunderstorm we were having. We practically shit bricks. Luckily Esther knew where we could watch live feed of the game on the internet, so we opened up Olaf's computer and I brought mine down to the family room so that we could all gather around the little screens to watch the game. We literally got the live feed running just as Müller scored the first goal. Talk about perfect timing! It was kind of funny to see us all huddled around the computer, but you do what you have to in an emergency. About 30 minutes into the game the signal came back, so at least we didn't have to watch the whole thing on the computer, either.

Ok, so back to Esther and Olaf's trip to Bielefeld. Esther got a phone call from her sister on Saturday (the 26th) saying that their mother had just been checked into the hospital. Then there was another call on Sunday morning saying that she had passed away. Esther and Olaf had to drive to Bielefeld to be with the sisters and so that Esther could see her mother one last time. It was going to be stressful enough as it was, so they didn't want to take the kids with them and asked if I would be able to stay and watch over them. We went to Pulheim with Britta and Markus and their 2 kids to go swimming, and then watched the game with Jan and Nina, as I mentioned earlier. Esther was definitely glad to have me around, because their last au pair wouldn't have even been around on a Sunday morning to help out if they needed her. Esther spent a good part of last week in Bielefeld, as well. She was there Tuesday and Wednesday to help her sisters make all of the funeral arrangements, and then the whole family went back on Friday for the funeral. It was a pretty rough week for Esther, but she's doing ok.

My language course ended last week, too. We all had agreed that it would be more fun to have a barbecue than to go to class (duh) so we made plans to meet at a park in Köln instead of going to the school, and everybody brought stuff for everyone else to eat and drink. The teacher was in on the plans, too, so we didn't just abandon her on the last day of class or anything. We also bought her a card and gift card as a thank you, because she was really awesome and made the class a lot of fun. We all had such a great time. Someone had brought a soccer ball, which I definitely enjoyed. Believe it or not, though, I was the only one there who had ever really played soccer. It felt good to be able to run around and play soccer, even if I was in a dress. Anyway, we all had such a good time that we're going to make plans to do it again just for the hell of it.

Last Sunday I went to the lake again with Alex, Tommy and Steffi. There were fewer people there on the dock this time than the first time, but it was still a lot of fun. And the water was really warm, which was pleasant. I really like going to the lake.

Before I forget, I need to mention something really adorable about Pauline. A few days ago I was getting ready to deliver the kids in the morning and I opened the cabinet by the front door to get my key. My key wasn't there, so I put my shoes on and, without saying a word about it, went to go look for my keys. Just as I was about to walk away Pauline, who was standing right next to the front door, looks up at me and says, "Amanda, hier ist deine Keys." Too freaking cute! I hadn't even mentioned the word keys, which means that, not only did she remember what they were called completely on her own, but she also was intuitive enough to recognize that I needed my keys. She is so damn smart, it's ridiculous. I love it when she throws English words into her daily language. "Hot" is another one that she uses all the time.

I think that's really all that I have for now. It's been a long time since I've updated this thing, and on the one hand I feel like a lot has happened in the past 2 weeks, but at the same time I feel like I have nothing to talk about. It's almost like too much has happened and I can't organize it all in my brain to talk about it. Plus, since the sun never seems to go down around here, the days all just kind of run together. I hate that about summer.