I came across these interesting little lines on hotel websites:

“When you arrive at Peckham Lodge, you could easily be fooled into thinking that this is a grand and expensive hotel because of the impressiveness of its facade. As soon as you step inside you’ll find the basic and inexpensive hotel you were expecting.”

“Belgrove Hotel offers you cheap rooms with unfashionable decor in Kings Cross.”

Today we walked along the lakeside promenade and saw all the stuff set up. They had a big stage in the main square surrounded by all sorts of booths with crafts, food and of course…many beer gardens. Then on the outskirts of the beer gardens were several first aid stations and with paramedics standing by. These stations may seem like overkill but but as Marshall and I are all too familiar….we know they are actually quite necessary. All day Saturday and Sunday horse-drawn carriages were also going through the streets, right under our window.

Every weekday morning, including Saturday morning, we wake up to the wonderful sound of construction. Very loud and very close.

This Saturday morning though, I had a craving for a big breakfast. So we ran down to the grocery store and got some eggs, bread, a small and expensive bottle of maple syrup (ahornsirup) that was imported from Kanada, and even some bacon! I made us a big feast of french toast with bacon and smooties. It was awfully tasty. We also just recently discovered a pancake mix that they even call “American Style” that can be bought from the grocery store. They are pretty close. It comes in this bottle and you add a bunch of milk, shake and the plop into a pan.

Next weekend I’m going to see if I can get some things from the Saturday morning market like fresh jam and some of the amazing parmesan from the little Italian family that have a cart with imported stuff from Italy. It is so good that you can break off chunks and just eat it. I got a sandwich at the cart once and they put chunks of it inside the sandwich with fresh sliced meat and sun dried tomatoes on amazing bread. I don’t even like sundried tomatoes but these were amazing and soaked in the best tasting olive oil. Italians definitely know a thing or two about food.

Now it’s time to go get all of our errands done before everything closes at 1:00!

Last Thursday, Dieter (my boss and one of the partners at my office) invited me to go with him to Neu Ulm, a city about 2 hours from here, to check out the state garden show and one of their projects they have built there. We live in the state of Baden-Wurttemberg and Neu Ulm is in the state of Bavaria, just right over the border. Each state in Germany holds a garden show once every two years that is usually centered around some sort of town planning where part of it is a permanent installation which will become part of a park or plaza space for the city and the rest is temporary and would be taken out after the show.

Dieter was giving a presentation there on the use of water in urban spaces and so while he was doing that, I wandered all over the grounds. I got to see tons of neat new materials, techniques, designs and even got some food in the meal tent and watched a show in the new performance area where they were doing some sort of traditional German dancing with a comedy twist. Also there were all these trails going through the forest with these strange arts and craft type things all over.

It was unfortunate that it was raining the majority of the time and the whole event was outside but at least it stopped raing long enough for me to see the plaza that the office designed in full swing. It was full of people, from all ages and they were enjoying all parts of the square. It is one of my favorite projects that the office has done and even after three years after installation, it is still in great shape and the city obviously loves it. Plus the water features are just plain cool.

Is is interesting living on a lake. We’ve both always lived near water but never close enough that we walk along it multiple times every single day. It changes so much. The color really fluctuates with the temperatures and storms are quite frequent here. When a storm is brewing, orange lights along the lake flicker and the water turns dark blue. On a sunny day, it turns greenish aqua. It is also cool to witness the bird families. Last week we saw a little group of mallard duck babies. All super fuzzy and making funny cheaping noises and they swam furiously behind their mom.

As far as our swan family, we see them every day. They hang out along the trail and lake edge on the path to my work. Sometimes they are in the water or lounging in the grass, and other times they sit right by the trail and the mom and dad hiss at everyone walking by with their dogs, warning them not to step off the path. The two babies are getting really big, now the size of full grown ducks. But they are still “ugly” with fuzzy gray furrishenss.

Technically, it’s my battery. I had a spare, but it kind of exploded. So I am on my last battery and it is now swelling up too. I first noticed because my mouse button on the computer would no longer work. It wouldn’t press because the battery was swelling up and pushing on it from underneath. I quickly moved all of my files to my external hard drive and am waiting to hear back from the mac store. I found out that they have recalled the batteries for the 15″ MacBook Pro’s that were bought during the same time I bought my 17″ but they haven”t recalled the 17″ batteries yet. Although there is plenty of people all over the internet with pictures and complaints about swollen batteries. They were apparently ticking time bombs, just waiting till I went out of the country. But I don’t know, what do you think? Does this look like something that should be recalled to you?

Needless to say, this could be my last post for awhile…

Today we had our summer grill at the office. I had been craving some bbq steak so I was pretty happy!! It was a nice day and they turned on the nifty water feature outside to chill the drinks. And one of the principals won the game they were holding where people bet on the teams playing throughout the Euro 2008 games. Here’s a few pictures…..

Last week sometime, I think it was Monday morning, I went to give Marshall a kiss on the head just after my alarm went off just as he sat up. His head and my face collided and my teeth went through my lip. For those of you that are counting, that’s the fifth time I’ve had a tooth-lip collision in my lifetime. Now I’ve gone international.

So it hurt and stuff but I figured the hole would heal up with time just as the others have. Except that it didn’t. It went from being a gouge to a gaping hole in my lip that hurt so much it woke me up several nights. I hate going to the doctor but going to a German doctor sounded even less fun. So I just kept hoping it would eventually heal but it kept hurting and turned white. Finally I gave in and called an office where I got a referral from another English-speaking person at my office. Going through the VISA process and setting up an insurance policy with people that didn’t speak English wasn’t so fun but going to a doctor that didn’t speak any English was a bit more scary. What if I said the wrong German word for my problem and then I got the wrong prescription? Although I guess it would be kind of hard to misunderstand the white-colored open wound on my lip. Yes I know, it’s kinda icky.

So the receptionist I called didn’t speak any English but I spoke my best broken German and got an appointment for the afternoon. It’s so funny how doctors around here either don’t take appointments at all or can get you in no problem with just a few hours notice. I wonder if this is normal across Germany and possibly Europe or if it’s just because this is a small town. But then again, I always had to wait whenever I set up an appointment in Port Angeles. So who knows.

I called at 1:30 and had an appointment at 3:00. I went back to work for all of an hour before leaving again for my appointment. It was just up the hill from my office so I walked up there, found it no problem and when I headed for the door a lady came out, grabbed a bike and kind of looked at me funny but then peddled away. “I hope that isn’t my doctor”, I thought.

The building was an old house, like most small businesses in Überlingen and the inside didn’t really give me the feeling that sanitation was their top priority. It wasn’t dirty by any means, in fact it was clean but it felt dark, kinda damp and a bit dusty. Like going to a really clean grandparents house where the house had been built in the early 1900’s, except that I’m guessing this house was older. Since the receptionist didn’t speak English, she asked for my insurance card by silently making the shape of a rectangle with her hands. I love how so many of my conversations with people ends up in some sort of game of hand signals. Watch out, I’m going to be really good at charades when I get back!

In Germany the way health insurance works here is not that different from the states as in there is sort of a co-pay type system. Each quarter, you pay 10 euro and you can see the general doctor as many times as you want. If you don’t see the doctor for a quarter then you don’t have to pay your 10 euro. But if you see the doctor twice or more within a quarter, you still only have to pay the 10 euro. If you want to go to a specialist then you can get a referral from your general doctor and you can see the specialist without paying a fee to see them. But, if you do not get a referral from your general doctor, then you have to pay them 10 euro. However, if you have paid the specialist 10 euro but then you want to see the general doctor afterward, you have to pay the general doctor another 10 euro. Got it?

So I paid the receptionist my 10 euro and she pointed to the waiting room where I sat for a half hour. Mostly I just stared out the little window at the tree outside. Now and then I would look over at the pile of magazines, wishing at least one of them were in English. Finally the lady that had left on the bike when I got there came back and sure enough, she was the doctor. She seemed surprised that I was there. The started speaking German to me until I told her that I didn’t speak much German. And then she said “Well if only I knew you were coming in here I wouldn’t have left to do errands”. Apparently my appointment had done a lot of good. I would’ve thought the fact that they were closed for two hours at lunch and not open past noon any day except for Monday would be plenty of time for errands, but what do I know.

She led me back to a small room that was fully carpeted with a big old desk, tons of papers all over it and an old stained glass lamp, a big bookshelf full of books and kind of looked like an old lawyers office, except for the exam table in the corner and little cabinet full bottles and such medical-looking supplies. Where’s the sink, box of gloves, soap? Again, sanitation not the priority. There were two chairs opposite hers at the desk and she asked me to sit down. She got right to business and asked me why I was here. While I was glad not to have to fill out a bunch of paperwork in German, I was also surprised that they didn’t ask me to fill out a single piece of paper nor ask me about family history, care to do an exam or anything. I showed her my lip and explained what happened and she said, “It may have been a cut, but now it’s an infection”. She said I would need something to treat it like “maybe a cream”. And she pulled out a big book and started flipping through it, looking for a good prescription to give me. She mumbled a bunch of stuff to herself in German and kept stopping on pages then flipping furiously around. She would find one she liked and then say something like “oh no, that one isn’t for the mouth” or “no, I don’t think this will work”. I couldn’t help but wonder how hard it is for people to become doctors in Germany.

Finally she decided on one and wrote me a prescription to take to the Apoteke (pharmacy) in town. She said “anything else?” and then I asked for a referral to the dermatologist in town so I could see about getting a large mole removed (because a friend and work had some removed by lazer from them and they did a good job). She looked at me and said “why?” and gave me a funny look as if I’d said something wrong. I told her about the mole, then she wrote some stuff on a piece of paper to give me. I think I am supposed to give it to the dermatologist so they know I’ve already paid my 10 euro. Then she says “do you have a doctor here in Überlingen?” My mind said “uh….you?” but I just said “no”. And she just sorta shrugged then got up to shake my hand and show me the door.

I then went downtown to the Apoteke to get my prescription. I handed a lady behind the counter my paper and she read then turned around and grabbed a little box off the shelf and handed it to me. It kinda seemed less like a prescription and more just like a shopping list. I wonder if I could’ve just gone in and asked for it without a prescription. Oh well, I had my cream and now I am on my way to healing.

I’m just glad I didn’t have to have my blood drawn. The girl from Colombia had her blood drawn there and she was totally shocked that they didn’t use alcohol to clean the spot on the arm before putting in the needle, nor use gloves or anything. She also told me horror stories about the dentist. Apparently they don’t use gloves. Imagine, non-gloved hands in your mouth. Ewww! Why don’t people use gloves around here? Same thing goes for the bakery, no gloves. It truly is a different world here sometimes.

Did you know that Europe has hedgehogs and that there isn’t a single place in North America that they live? We didn’t until just recently! And Überlingen has tons of them! It’s possible even that I may have crossed the path of one or two since I have been here but just never thought about taking a closer look at something brown and moving, thinking it might have been a squirrel or something. Although the squirrels here are quite different than the ones back home. But once I realized they were here, I knew that I HAD to see one!

Marshall and I went out on a walk tonight and we took a new route. We went up this little cobble path that winds straight up the hill behind our apartment and around this little community garden. There was a little bench at the top and since the sunset over the lake was a gorgeous deep red, we decided to sit down and watch it for awhile. I kept an eye out because we were surround by forest on one side and a garden on the other, a perfect place to see a hog. And sure enough, after not too long one walked out of the garden and across the path!

We ran down to look at it wander clumsily through the forest and sit for awhile. It was about the size of Cody’s hog toy and pretty cute. We watched him for awhile before he disappeared into the forest. After that we walked a bit further up the path and discovered this little break in the wall that opened up onto this little overlook and a good view of the lake and sunset. I think now that sunsets and hog watching will become a nightly event!

The picture at the top is of my adorable Steiff hog (made in Germany) that Marshall’s Mom got me for my birthday from the toy store here in town. Isn’t he cute? Hogs are totally the coolest.