No, it's true, we are still alive and thriving.

Am I the worst blogger in History? Quite possibly.

Je suis vraiment desole. (With accents.)

Right, now you can guess that I'm trying to pick up a bit of French. Italian is in the queue, and if I can understand basic questions and provide elementary responses by the time we leave for vacation in four weeks I'll be overjoyed.

But to business; and explanation is in order I suppose. Not an excuse, just the honest reasons I haven't been writing.

1. We moved. I don't know if I've written since that fiasco, but I'll just say that the Process of Moving is awful. An international move was somehow easier than the trip from an apartment to a house fifteen minutes away. This is probably because someone else paid for everything to be packed and shipped and loaded and unloaded in the first situation; this time we ended up frantically moving heavy boxes and cleaning for 20 hours a day, several days in a row.

2. We had a party. A housewarming barbecue, to be exact. Obviously it took a lot of effort to get our home to look comfortable and presentable for our guests. The party was really fun and I'm glad we were able to throw it prior to the departure of some of our friends from Germany to the states.

3. We had to watch our shows because when you have a DVD full of action-filled goodness you can't stop watching. Friends was nearing the end, Smallville had all kinds of crazy stuff going on, and of course there was So You Think You Can Dance. So yeah, television ate our brains and free time... of which there was little due to point FOUR.

4. Work. My job is honestly fabulous; a little chaotic just now, but great. We just opened a new branch and I'm feeling quite useful and much more knowledgeable than in the past. Also, co-workers are fun. May I just stress how pleased I am that Josh is finally back on the day schedule? I would like to especially emphasize this point: shift work is for the birds. No, actually, birds are too nice to deal with the crap of shift work. Shift work is for arachnids.

5. Oh speaking of arachnids, did you know that they can grow to be AS BIG AS MY HAND? Because they can, and then they can find their way into my house and cause me to lose my mind in a constant panic-stricken, nauseated, fearful state of being. Yes, it's that bad. Even now as I type, I check for spiders every few lines. I need therapy, but those spiders need to die.

I believe this should clear up some of the reasons for my absence, although I do have one last confession: the log-in page for Blogger is all in German and for some reason that bothers me immensely. I can read the simple instructions, but seriously... it's just not inviting right now. I'm so silly sometimes.

As soon as I find my media reader card (or alternatively the cord to connect the camera to the Mac), I will update with some photos of recent events. And I really will work on writing more frequently. I can probably pull myself away from re-watching the new DVD releases of Scrubs, Smallville, and The Big Bang Theory. Hah!

A short list of things accomplished in one week:

- Successfully completed 25 years of life. Began undertaking of 26th year.
- Wrote essays on a topic I've never studied, received high marks regardless of knowledge deficit.
- Sang ABBA songs in France and Belgium.
- Walked well over ten thousand steps per day while visiting the major tourist attractions of Paris.
- Ate a genuine Belgium waffle. Subsequently obsessed over potential frequency of visits to Belgium to consume aforementioned waffles.
- Photographed my father posed as Napoleon in front of the Butte du Lion at Waterloo.
- Saw Luxembourg while the sun was shining.
- Spent so much energy remembering French phrases that, upon return to Germany, I am still saying "oui".
- Bathed two rambunctious, unappreciative dogs.
- Discovered location of a portrait taken of my great-great-great grandfather. Potential for family history research suddenly multiplied by about one thousand percent.
- Came to realization that I'm probably too old to continue watching America's Next Top Model; also realized that I need not stop because I love reading Four Four too much to give up on the show altogether.

I will actually review our fabulous vacation, perhaps even in a timely manner, but for now I'm off to bed so I can be a productive and reliable member of society tomorrow. Being an adult has some lame points.

Learning to Say NO -- Again.

Wow! I got the latest copy of the Wooster alumni magazine today, and to my surprise, my blog URL was listed in the Class of 2006 updates! Sadly, the information I recall submitting was not included (the fact that I've moved, my wedding photo, etc.); however, if you're joining because you found the site in the magazine, welcome! I hope you'll stop by periodically. If anyone has suggestions for topics they'd enjoy learning about- German customs in this region or daily cultural experiences, for example- please make a suggestion in the comments section!

Today I'll record one major linguistic difference that I notice on a daily basis. When I learned German in Austria (according to the Germans I learned "Austrian"), and when I continued my studies in the classrooms of Herr Figge and Professor Mullner, I was consistently told to decline by saying "nein". Of course, to have "no" as in "nothing" is a different word altogether, but if I didn't want to marry the man following me down the street I could tell him NEIN. If I hadn't completed my excessively long homework assignment, nein- ich hab' keine Antwort.

Things are different here.

It's a small difference, but goodness, it threw me off track for a while. I expected to arrive in my new home and at least be able to manage a negative reply. Nope. I mean, "ne". Like a horse neighing. Everyone here says "ne" constantly! At first I didn't understand- where did "nein" go? I checked the dictionaries and "ne" is not listed. It's a regional idiom, I'm assuming. I've found that I say it now, even when I'm talking to friends in English I'll change my usual "no" or "nah" into a subtle-but-firm NE. Try it out, you might like it.

Of course I'll continue my observations and let you all know if it's used more widely than the Rhineland-Pfalz. Perhaps some readers have personal experience with NE? I'm sure you're dying to know its roots. I know I am. ;o)

The pieces fit

We've kept ourselves quite busy in the last few weeks. We had a wonderful Fourth of July, including a barbecue with friends and co-workers, and plenty of Rock Band for all involved. (No more Metallica, please!) Last Saturday, we experienced the Altstadtfest downtown with Kara and Steve.
We ate (too much) wonderful food, perused many handmade goods, and even saw a doner kebap stand with a little special "something".


After a grueling working set, Josh spent the next few days off... helping me to deep-clean our apartment. We've been working almost non-stop to get the place looking better than ever before. We're finally hanging things on the walls!


This past "weekend," we also managed to get a new radio for Josh's car. His old one went missing in the move, so we've been without music. The new head unit is going to be great- it has iPod jacks, Blue Tooth so that you can talk on speaker phone through the radio, and will pick up HD radio when we are back in the states. It was a great deal! We found a local American who will install it for a really reasonable price, and I'm sure that Josh can't wait to set up an appointment. Beyond the car situation, we fixed our bedroom curtains so that we can sleep (it's light here for about 18 hours a day), I got an official job offer (which I accepted), I made some headway in learning to drive the manual car, and we finally created a digital version of the monogram that I designed for our wedding. I just put the finishing touches on it and created copies in multiple colors. I used it to make return address labels, but it will be nice to have for all sorts of correspondence and online media.

Lastly, we're hoping to take our first trip to France next week! We have got to pick up an International Driving Permit to accompany Josh's license... it's basically a paper that translates proof of a license into multiple languages. We're hoping to visit Strasbourg, which should be less than two hours' drive. I'm very excited, but a bit nervous due to the reputation of French attitudes toward Americans who cannot speak French. We don't speak French at all... they could cut me a break, I do speak passably well in three languages, but I doubt that it will matter much! :o) Hopefully it will be a fun experience, regardless of the language barrier.