Janingalina

Meet Picknick:



She's not a GTI, but I had to link these videos






this is her backside:



she's got backup sensors, heated mirrors, heated windshield squirts, heated seats.. she's all kinds of warm and quiet. her benzin (gas) motor runs a lot more quietly than the diesels i've had on longterm loan.

I asked that an MP3 input be built in special. turns out it's a direct iPod jack, and not just an Aux input.



so now i don't have to listen to scheiß german radio. woo, no more Wham! and the iPod is controlled by the cd player buttons when it's plugged in. Picknick's a clever gal.

she also likes to party. you can tell, because she comes with her own bottle opener, standard:


every good partygirl does.

speaking of parties! she came with an italian pasta-party in a basket



note the two bottles of wine. Why does a german car come with pasta? your guess would be as good as mine.

One more note on the cleverness of this car - VW wins points for best use of a logo badge. It works as the lift-gate handle. i stared at it for a couple minutes trying to figure out how one opens the trunk.


How's that for a cool unpimped Auto? Veedubz in the Hizzaus!

You may notice more pictures being posted lately, i've finally got my access sorted out and am trying to share more of what I see.

This is the view North from my doorstep. You can see 3 of the 4 towers of the King's Cathedral.

Looking South you can't see much, but to get to work I drive between the King's Cathedral and St. Michaelsberg, pictured below.



Keen observers will also notice i've added a link to the sidebar under my profile. I've started to keep a gallery in Smugmug where I just sort of dump the latest pics i've taken from in and around Bamberg. Sometimes something catches my eye and I want to share. It'll go in Smugmug, and if I'm not too lazy, i'll blog about it. :)

These are the opening times for the DMV in Bamberg.

I had to register my car and the license plates before i could pick it up. When did I go? 2pm on Friday. When do they close on Friday? 11:45am.

11:45?!

Yes. 11:45. it's very clearly marked there.

imagine how nice it would be to work in this office that is open just more than 50% of the normal work-hours. lovely.

i finally got in yesterday at 8:3o. it took me 20 minutes and cost 20€. no biggie.

I had the best bike ride Sunday. It stopped raining around 3. I kicked myself in the head, saying "You'll feel better once you're on the bike!" I loaded the iPod with my Ride It Like You Stole It mix, pulled on my lycra and had the most wonderful feeling, almost like putting on my own skin. ok, that sounds kind of weird, but it felt very Right.

I pumped the tires up to full pressure and nearly killed myself taking the bike down 2 flights of stone staircase in my hard-soled bike shoes. guess we aren't going to do that again.

I started down the hill, and turned at the bottom, taking a road with gentle but constant incline. I rode past the hospital, noted a little nature area that might be good for fat tire riding, and kept going.

I went screeeeeaming fast downhill into Bug, a little village. through Bug and I found a bike-lane that ran along the river, next to a forest and out into the farm fields through one hamlet - 10 houses, chickens scratching in the back yard, wood piled up next to the houses, tractor parked on the curb. sun breaking through clouds. it was perfect.

I was on the road by 4:30, home just after 6. My computer died on the boat ride over, so I have no idea how far I went. I looped around Bamberg, using street signs to find my way back. along the river into the city, past joggers and dogs, under bridges, back into the baroque/gothic/rococco of my new hometown.

With a "Gruß Gott" salutation to a passing neighbor, I scrambled the bike up the stone stairs in my slippery shoes.

I gulped down my Supertang recovery drink, happy as clams.

later, I put up my new-to-me bike-stand (thanks tim!). and this is what my front hall now looks like.


aren't they pretty? :) I'm dorkhappy to look at them every day, instead of having them exiled to the second bedroom, which functions as cold storage for the moment.

I'm a little embarassed. This picture comes from the local grocery store.

While Berliners are Jelly Donuts, Amerikaners are lemon-cakes that are frosted half-white and half-black.

This cake-mix + 10 minutes of baking will give you 14 mini-Amerikaners.

Segregation anyone?

the concert last week was fab. the short story is: good show, i yelled a request, but they didn't play it. instead they dedicated their live performance of this dance to me..



woo!

so that was pretty cool. i thanked them for it afterwards, and they were all really cool guys. we did some shots, and i got a ride home from the father of an indiekid i met. that was nice, because i totally missed the last train home.

since then, I've signed a lease on the Golf, ordered closets from Ikea, and figured out that you can go into the Beverage Markets and buy a mixed case of beer. So my newest science project is Hefeweizen tasting. I picked up 20 different kinds. heh. I love science.

Looking over my list of exciting things, it sounds like a lot of the fun is acquisition, but really it's more of getting comfortable and figuring out how to make life a little less strange here.

sunday i had a good exploratory adventure! i went to nürnberg to the Germanisches Nationalmuseum. Wow, they had cool stuff. pix soon.

this thursday i'll be headed back to Nürnberg for a Thunderbirds are Now! concert.

I was asked if i'd drive an hour to see these bands, or if i'm just going to get a good home-feeling. Even in MI i had to drive 45 min to an hour to get to these shows. So it's both for me. I like the bands/music (seen both before). I hadn't been to a show since the night before Thanksgiving. that's a really freakin long hiatus for a girl who would usually take in 2-3 shows per week. sometimes more..

So now i'm finding the scene here, keeping an eye on the papers, ordering subscriptions to the Who's Doing What Where magazines for Berlin, Nürnberg, München.. I like to keep busy.

Next weekend will probably have some bike riding. I want to do a little more exploring of the surrounds. But that's very weather-dependent. I might also go looking for a couch again.. It'll be nice to have some cushy lounge-surface that's not my bed. but it probably won't get here before the eames chair comes back from the shop :( *shrug* ah well.

it's going pretty well. tonight is middle eastern food with a friend from work and her bf, and a guy i met at the Foreigner Pubnite. I'm going to ride my bike to meet them. hooray for the little things!

Nothing huge has passed since Saturday, but there are lots of little things.

My HR dept is reading through a VW Golf lease agreement - I'm looking at 3 years in the Golf TOUR If it all goes well, I might be able to pick up the car on Monday. That is, if I sign the purchase papers and follow the 17 step dance to get insurance and license plates.

I'm crossing my fingers, but not holding my breath.

All of my ceiling light fixtures are up, so my wall switches are now more than decorative - they're functional! I still don't remember to turn the lights on when I walk into a room, but I'm sure I'll get used to having fixtures again.

I visited Ikea again. I picked up a few necessaries, and a couple things I just wanted, but mostly I did recon! I sat on couches and decided that Ikea does not have the couch for me. I hated them all with the exception of one leather sofa, but the only non black/brown/white color it comes in is an ugly burnt orange. so that won't work.

with that cleared up, I went on to research closet guts. there are no built-in closets here, so I have to buy some closets that will stand in my room. I figured out that I want real drawers which go on rollers, not the baskets that just slide in and out. I didn't have time to configure the whole thing, though. which turns out to be lucky! I can config it online, place the order, and save 30€ on delivery. whoa-ho! The closets are over 2meters high, and there's no way I'd be able to (or even want to) haul those boards out of Ikea, stuff them in my rental Golf, and then schlep them up 2 flights of stairs. Delivery is not a luxury, in this apt, it's a requirement. I've gotten soft.

the moving company picked up all the leftover boxes and packing material from my move, so now there's room just about everywhere, but especially in my front hall (where the bikes will live).

After the packing pickup I stopped by the Rathaus (city hall). The girl at the Infothek was able to give me Yellow Sacks! This is the special garbage bag you need for recycling plastics. The Germans call themselves Umweltschutzmeisters Or Masters of Environmental Protection. All of the garbage is separated here, plastics and metals in the Yellow Sacks, glass goes into green/brown/clear collection points on most streets, food waste goes into Biomüll, Compost. Old Paper is collected on the curb once a month, and everything else goes into Restmüll.

The garbage thing has been a great mystery to me, and with my Yellow Sacks I think I can do it right.

I went online and bought a train ticket to Nürnberg and printed it out! eeee! I'm learning! I used my discount card, and earned BahnPoints. Not sure what they're good for, but it can't hurt, right? (Imagine trying to navigate NWA.com in a foreign language and still managing to earn all your frequent flyer miles)

So tonight I'm going to Nürnberg. OK Go is playing. I hope they play Crash the Party.

You're not the prettiest girl in town
I'm not the only boy with sullied
clothes and a sullen frown,
To hell with Valentine's, to hell with perfume
To hell with chocolates and picnics
And Sinatra tunes

Cuz while
the rest of the girls are drowning in roses
and songs he composes
And
while the rest of the guys are all trying
All trying so hard

[Chorus]
Oh girl, let's crash the party!
El Dorado on the lawn
(hey, hey, hey)
Let's burn holes in the carpets
Kicking, shouting,
dancing on the tables all night long

that would make my day.

my plan for the next few days:

Wednesday: Ok Go in Nürnberg
Thursday: Auslander Stammtisch (Foreigner Pubnite)

For the weekend, I might just go back to Nürnberg, they've got a lot of shopping, a cool museum and a big castle. Someday I want to stay in the hostel there, it's actually in the castle walls.

oh, I also found a new way to get to work. Instead of skirting around the whole city, I head west, go up steep narrow one-way streets to the cathedral area, turn at the top of the hill. Then I get to ride down a long steep cobblestoned downhill that dumps me out closer to work. it's hilarious, it's all one way streets with huge mediaeval walls built on either side. sharp blind corners and the sort of thing we just don't have in the states. I'm a happy girl. It's a great daily reminder that I'm in Europe.

Today I bought a new bike, the red one. It's a Diamant Ubari, and i am madly in love. Diamant is a german brand, made in Chemnitz, i think.

It's a bike for riding around the city. You can tell because it's a girlybike with flat pedals and a kickstand. so i can wear a skirt and flipflops and ride it to the biergarten!

It's got the mandatory lights on the front and back, they're powered by the front hub (some kind of friction collector, thank you shimano!). Check out those fenders! I know, but don't be too jealous. just come visit me and i'll take you to the store so you can buy one of your own.



It's got Magura hydraulic rim brakes, and a bell that makes that scraping RINGARINGA sound. :D i'm a happy girl.

here they call a bike a Fahrrad (sounds like far-rod). Mine is going to be a Barrad. RINGARINGA!!

*eee* A coworker's boyfriend works for Siemens Legal. His department is going on a trip to Austria, and they had 2 extra seats. So I'm in!




We'll be staying here, and snowboarding here, in the St. Anton area.

Hopefully I'll make friends with some of the lawyers on the bus. They'll come in handy if any of my Shenanigans in Österreich land me in hock. :)

Here's how I want to spend the weekend:


and then like this:

It's what they do here!

The log-on info came today, i managed to get it into my DSL router, and convinced my computer to let me use this as an internet connection.

i'm turning mental cartwheels. ..but going to bed now. it's late.

well, on the 25th the internets didn't come. it has been a debacle.

it still is.

on the 24th, I received a second DSL splitter. I had yet to receive a DSL modem. knowing I had an installation appointment the next day, I marched myself right into the Telekom store, and asked for a modem. I took them some discussion, but in the end I walked out with a free modem. "Woo!" I thought, "Score 1 for me, being all prepared and shit." right.

The installation guy from Tkom came on the 25th when I expected him. He had to do something to the wires in the wall to make the phone work, but he assured me it would let the internets still work too. Ok. Well, I had hooked up my laptop to the Modem to try to get it ready for its big date with the internets. The first setup page went well, but the second asked me for some Username Password stuff. I looked through all of the papers Tkom has given me. Nothing that resembles the requested information.

I asked the installation guy. He tells me, "Oh, no, you need your Access data. It comes in a different kind of envelope, the kind that tears of both edges, and the back is all black so noone can look through it.."

"Oh," I say, with utmost dejection.

Next I called the Tkom hotline. Sweet. I managed to get through their automated menus to a real person. I asked them to speak slowly, please. I explained my situation, and asked for the Access Information like the installer told me.

"We've already sent it. But it came back to us.. Was your mailbox labelled correctly?"

My mailbox had just that day gotten the right name on it. "Ok, we'll send it again," they told me. "It should take 2-3 working days."

Understand, dear reader, that I have been hooked on the internets since my Mom was getting her Master's degree in 1992. She was hooked up with the University of Michigan on one of the earlier incarnations of the internet. I have been twitching and feverish in my last 2 months without a home internet connection. No kidding, there have been cramps, and sweating, even a little delirium.

It's how I'm going to stay in touch, you see, with my family, friends and loved ones on that other continent in that other hemisphere. At work I'm behind the Berlin Firewall, barely able to access personal email. Myspace is verboten, and web-camming is just a weird idea at the office...

I had to give back the company cell phone on the 31st, so no more free calls home. This is where I was counting on the internets to come in.. Well, my Access Info should have come last Tuesday/Wednesday, Jan 30/31. It did not. I figured the Deutsche Post system is a little wonky, maybe I'd give them another day or two. Thursday came and went, no security envelope. Friday, nothing, but I was caught in meetings all day. Today, finally, I called Telekom again.

The nice lady who answered found that a week and a half ago I requested Access Info. and they just didn't send it. She promises this time it's going to go in the mail. I swear, if I don't get it in 2 days, I'm going to be calling them up and using what the Germans call Schimpfworte. That's cuss words to most english speakers..

technology. where would I be without it? oh.. wait..