Thursday, November 29, 2007

Dresden 1996

The my little family is going to Germany for Christmas. It's been 11 years now since my first trip to Dresden, during Christmas break from Iowa State. How young I was then. Just look at the picture. I could be 12. Anyway, I was going to visit this girl I had only met four times. How insane was that? My heart had been crushed and battered around 6 months previous to meeting the cute girl in the fall. She was something and she really liked me. She made no doubt that I knew that, which was something I had never really experienced before. So I was going to go visit her for Christmas. Being young and dumb really paid off in that instance. I had these thoughts of, what if we don't get along when I get there and she kicks me out? I'll have to wander the streets of Dresden alone for two weeks until my return flight! As I think back now, it's patently ridiculous, but I did have that thought. It just happened to work out.

It was bloody cold when I got there. A cold snap had started the day I arrived. It hung around zero Fahrenheit most of the time and the temperature never reached above freezing until the day I had to fly home. Which is really odd for Germany, the weather there is generally milder than the Midwest. No one there could recall such a long cold, cold spell. At the time Anke was living in this old apartment building that had yet to be modernized. The place had a coal stove to heat it! And being a poor college student she was frugal with her coal. It was bloody cold!

The neighborhood she lived in was cool and trendy. We would go to these little bars that were only lit by candles. Another one was in the basement of an old castle. We met up with Maurice one evening while he was there visiting his Anke, and had tandoori chicken and many beers. We went camping in a cave up in the mountains with some of her friends one night. Had Christmas with her family and New Years in Prague. I'll tell you about Prague later in another post, but I love Prague.

The visit went mostly well and she never did kick me out. I never had to sleep on a park bench by a frozen fountain. Who'd have thought that I'd end up marrying the old roommate of Maurice's girlfriend at the time? That I'd be visiting again almost exactly 11 years later with Anke flying with me and our two very small children in tow? I was too young to have thoughts and dreams like that.

Friday, November 23, 2007

Thanksgiving

Thanks- giving this year was nice. We had dinner here in Anke's and my new house. We had feared that it would be a stressful event, but it wasn't. We had cleaned the house last weekend, but the little hurricane known as Corwin struck during the week. So we recleaned Thursday morning. So the house looked fairly good (aside from us not getting around to hanging any pictures yet.) But it was only Mom, Dad, Maurice and Bernie coming, so even if everything wouldn't be perfect they would understand. But weather aside, everything turned out damn near perfect. Maurice fried the turkey in the back yard which turned out scrumptious, and he didn't burn my house down in a ball of fire. We filled the table out with fruit salad, lettuce salad, mashed potatoes, stuffing, and bread. For dessert Anke made possibly the best cheese cake ever the night before. Her cheese cake is always top notch, but this one was even a step above. It was all pretty low key, and just really nice.

As I was running around trying to organize the house and Anke was cooking we didn't get many pictures taken. So thanks to Mom for these two.

Happy Thanksgiving all. And to the few of you who are reading this, I assure you that you have enriched my life in one way or anther. And for that I thank you.

Sunday, November 04, 2007

Halloween

This was Corwin's 1 year old costume, but it's still great so we recycled.

Corwin the Pirate after a few too many grogs.

Off to ravish the neighbor girl I'm sure.

Saturday, November 03, 2007

Gnome

Doesn't he look just like a little gnome?

Friday, November 02, 2007