Computer Problems, Deep Frozen Hot Dogs, Mushy Stuff, & Weimar

Well, I haven't updated this thing in awhile, mostly because my computer has been out of commission for the past three weeks. I had given a presentation for my comics course and used my computer for a Power Point presentation. It started to freak out in the middle of the presentation (to which I muttered, "Fuck!" Not good.) and then it just stopped working. The screen would remain black while the rest of the computer whirred normally. I had to take it to the Apple Center here and damn, they suck in comparison to the service in the U.S. Just a tip, kids: If you want stuff done here in Germany, it'll take a long time. "Service is a desert" (Dienst ist eine Wüste) is one of the sayings they have here that Christian told me. I concur.

Anyhow, that's the first part of the update. To explain the "deep frozen hot dogs" part really quickly: Pablo bought these deep frozen hot dogs from Plus two weeks ago. They're disgusting. It's a frozen hot dog on a frozen bun with ketchup, cheese, bacon, pickles, and possibly some sauerkraut frozen on top of it. I was in disbelief that he would actually eat it and his reasoning was, "But I want to try it at least once!" (They came in packs of two.) I know the picture is blurry, but I had to take it without a flash, otherwise you wouldn't be able to see the glory of the disgusting frozen hot dog. I also told Pablo, "Man, Americans put a lot of junk into their bodies, but you wouldn't be able to pay me to eat that!" To top it off, he threw it into the microwave to heat it up. Microwaved stuff is always mushier than if you put it into the oven.

Speaking of mushy...My embarassing moment of the week. I had made a tiramisu this past weekend using a recipe from my sister and it turned out really well. We ate it only after it sat in the refrigerator for an hour or two and put the rest back into the fridge. The next day, there was enough that Christian and I were just like, "Well, we'll just eat the rest out of the pan." (Actually, there was a lot, which I, the fat ass that I am, mostly ate.) I pulled the pan out of the fridge and said to him, "Hey, the tiramisu is firmer as yesterday. It's not as mushy." He looked at me and said, "What did you say?" I replied in German, "Die Tiramisu ist stärker heute. Es ist nicht so....um, mushy. Wie sagt man 'mushy' auf deutsch?" He started snickering at me and said, "Weisst du, was 'mushy' auf deutsch bedeutet?" I probably looked utterly confused because he started cracking up. I repeated myself, "The tiramisu isn't so mushy today!" He laughed even more and through his laughing, managed out the reason why it was so funny: "Mushy in German is slang for a woman's vagina!" I was so embarrassed, but hey, how am I supposed to know that? So to make things better, I just repeated myself. "The tiramisu isn't mushy....auf deutsch oder auf englisch!"

Statue of Goethe and Schiller in front of the theater in Weimar

The last order of business to tell about is our little trip to Weimar two and a half weeks ago. It was the trip to hell. Seriously. Weimar is a cute little city as you can see by the many, many photos I took there. However, there is nothing to do after 4 pm when the museums close. There is no nightlife whatsoever, probably because Weimar is filled with little old German people. And even with the museums open during the day, they're tiny. Devin and I went to the Bauhaus and Schloss Museums and we managed to go through both of them in their entireties (is that a word?) in about 4 hours total.

I have to say, though, that the highlight of the trip was Friday night dinner in a restaurant with almost the entire program there, including those from Mainz (meaning, one student and Oliver Strauss, our TA from freshmen year). We sat at these round tables that were brought together and it was a bit strange because down at one end of the table, Kevin, Zoey, Meredith, Alex, and I were having a very nice conversation. In the middle, Oliver, Franziska, and Devin were having a nice chat. Then at the other end, it was just awkwardly silent. Dessert came around, and while reaching for her dessert from the waitress, the Mainz student knocked over Bill's tall half liter glass of beer which shattered and spilled beer onto Heike, the program director.

One other highlight of the excursion worth mentioning was that we went to Buchenwald, which was a concentration camp only 8 kilometers from Weimar. It was ridiculously miserable weather: cold, gray, cloudy, snow, and wind. We walked around while Heike told us some information, but pretty much everyone was miserable because of the weather (and the fact that it's not exactly a happy place to be). Devin, Zoey, Meredith, Alex, and I ran off as soon as we could so we could get back to Weimar and sit in a warm cafe. We felt a little guilty for leaving earlier than everyone else, but we were not pleased at all to be standing around in the cold. I think Meredith was the only one who had two pairs of pants on, too.

Alex, Meredith, Zoey, Devin, and me looking miserable after spending too much time outside at Buchenwald.

So now it is nearing the end of the (first) semester and I am definitely looking forward to it. I've finished writing one paper, which I actually wrote by hand because I didn't have my computer. I have to see one more film for film history and write my paper for my French Revolution course. (And frankly this paper is going to kill me. It just doesn't want to be written.) At the end of it all, I will be going to Turin, Italy for the 2006 Olympics (what what!) for a weekend, and then Ethel is coming. We're going to Düsseldorf and Köln (Cologne) for 3 days for Karneval, and then we're heading off to Prague. It'll be a busy month. Oh, and then Alex and Meredith are leaving next week. Time flies.

I also have a ton of pics up on Flickr from Weimar if you want to see more of them.

Frohes Neues Jahr!

First off, Happy New Year to everyone, even though this is a little late in the well wishing. It's still a new year and will be for another 359 days and hopefully, 2006 will be a better year than 2005.

Lannie and Chris arrived in Berlin on Silvester (December 31), but there wasn't much to do since it was a holiday. They came by my apartment later in the evening, as did Marisa, Liso, and of course Alex. Brad, a grad student in my program, also came because I had invited him. Anyway, we all managed to get one game of beer pong in and it was really great because I got Lannie to play. But whenever Liso or Alex got a ball into our cups, Lannie took a shot of tequila instead of drinking the beer because she doesn't like beer. Hardcore. I'll be getting those pictures from her that Chris took later and I must say, although we lost, it was pretty funny playing beer pong with Lannie.

I wasn't the only person who had people over; Pablo had 3 friends staying over for a few days and then for the party, there were countless others. They stayed in the living room while we were in my room (Americans vs. Germans, I guess?), but then at around 11:20 pm we all left the apartment to go to the Oberbaum Brücke for fireworks.

All I have to say is that it was frickin CRAZY. First off, people were setting fireworks off in the middle of the street because they're legal here. You could just buy them in the local supermarket and set them off anywhere. Walking over, I felt like I was going to get my head blown off by someone. Pablo had suggested that we go on the bank of the river rather than going on the actual bridge because the view would be better and he was completely right. There were fewer people, less smoke from fireworks, and way more room to scream "Happy New Year!" to each other. It was pretty incredible and I have to say, it was probably by far the best New Year's I've ever had. Sure, I've been in Times Square to ring in the new year with Dan, but that sort of sucked because we had to wait out in the cold for God knows how long without any sort of reassurance that we could go pee and find each other again. This was just awesome how you could just go out 40 minutes before the new year and get a great spot. Lannie and Chris went back to their hotel since their flight had arrived really early that day and wanted to get some rest, but everyone else stayed for a little while longer.

Much sekt (champagne not from Champagne, France) was drank on my part because I had bought two cheap bottles for everyone. Unfortunately nobody was drinking them, so I drank practically an entire bottle to myself and Brad drank the other. Alex, Liso, Marisa, and I returned to my apartment with Brad and two German guys (a friend of Pablo, Julian, and a friend of his, Mathias). We didn't do too much, though I did make a few drunken calls to wish Dan, Jenny, and Ken happy new years. Liso, Marisa, and Brad left soon afterward and Julian and Mathias convinced Alex and me to go clubbing over in Görlitzer Park, which is about 2 blocks away from me. I didn't want to go, but Alex convinced me to go and paid for my entry fee.
To make a long story short, I came back to my apartment at 7 in the morning really drunk, so that when I woke up, I was still slightly drunk and then had my first hangover ever. Weirdest part of the night was when a girl in the club was dancing behind me and pawing on my Fair Lawn PD sweatshirt that Chris had given to me for Christmas. She was looking at the tag for some reason, whether it was because she lost her own jacket and was looking for it or because she thought it was a cool-looking sweatshirt, I'm not entirely sure.

So all in all, it was a very good start to the New Year. The rest of the week I was busy showing Lannie and Chris around Berlin. I think I gave them a pretty good variety of stuff to see and they went on their Trabi Safari, which I thought was pretty funny and cheesy. I hope they had fun, even though poor Chris was sick most of the time. It was really great to see someone from home and the next person who will be coming from home is Jackie, though I won't see her for long, and then Ethel. Then the entire month will just be busy with her and then Alexandra (from Fair Lawn) coming, and then I'm off to Japan and then maybe my parents will come. (Wow, that was a horrible sentence I just wrote, but I'm sick with a cold and it's killing me.) I figured it out: During the month of March, I will have 6 days completely to myself. Time seriously flies.

Currently listening to OK Go's album Oh No with "A Million Ways" playing.