Case of the Mundays!

Well not really, but since it is Monday I just thought I would say it! Today hasn't been too incredibly boring. Of course, it is still snowing here. Not enough to create havoc on the roads but just enough to make your car REALLY dirty and to make it nearly impossible to see out of your windshield. I can't wait for this to stop so we can get the cars washed! Somehow Deaner always seems to brush his dress pants against the car and arrive home with filthy pants.

Today has consisted of lot of laundry. It is amazing how much laundry accumulates in our house when I manage to ignore it for a solid week. I guess I thought that it would wash itself but it definitely did not! Along with the laundry I cleaned up our disasterously disorganized house and now it is to my standard. I'm sure Deaner will get home from work soon and mess it all up again! Speaking of, Deaner just called to say that he was on his way home from work. He went to the gym, got all the way to the locker room, opened his gym bag only to find out that he didn't bring his workout clothes!! HA!! I am sort of wondering what WAS in the bag that made him THINK he had his clothes!

So I also made a trip to the commissary today. I know I know, no day would be complete without going to the grocery store. I feel like I go there everyday. Anyways, I have always found it obnoxious that the commissary doesn't pay the baggers ANYTHING and that the patrons are supposed to supplement their wages. First of all, I have no problem tipping a bagger who carries my groceries out to the car. However, I resent the fact that my $2 or $3 dollar tip never seems like enough because it is the only money that these people make. I mean since I go to the grocery store all the time I never have that many bags and it takes the bagger all of about 2.5 minutes to get them bagged, out to the car, loaded and return to the store. Today took the cake. This dude was bagging my groceries and I had all of about 5 bags. We started towards the car in the snow and I made a comment to him about the snow just trying to be friendly. The guy just looked at me like I was retarded and made zero response. When we got to the car I picked up three bags and he picked up two and put them in the truck of the car. He then turned to me and held out his hand for his tip. I begrudgingly handed it over. He didn't thank me and he turned around and walked away not even closing the lid to my trunk!!!! HELLO??? I was totally put out and annoyed. I could have carried those dang bags myself and not tipped the mute a dime. I was really annoyed. From here on out, unless I have heavy drinks, I'm going thru self checkout!

I'm already looking forward to the long weekend coming up! Now I only have to get through the next four days! Next week we are going to England for the week. It's always pretty boring there but maybe this time I will be surprised! Alright, time to start dinner! Then we get to watch the new season of True Blood! Cannot wait!! I need to do a better job of taking pictures so that I can have some to post on here. I will try and do better tomorrow!!

Things that make you go, hmmmm.......

So, for the last six or so years, I have sponsored a child in Equador through a program called Children International. I have always had the same child and have always been in contact with him through letters etc. Each year I am sent an annual picture of my sponsor child as part of the program. Imagine my surprise when the picture of my sponsor child came this afternoon and he is wearing a LACOSTE SHIRT in it!!!!! WHAT? I think I might need to conduct an audit to figure out exactly how much money I am sending to this charity! At least I know they are clothing him, just hope he is being fed as well!

As promised, Deaner blew up the picture of his speeding ticket mug shot for me! He didn't do as good of a job as I might have hoped but I think you will get the drift.I wish he had managed to get a closer up of himself but the look on his face is still pretty funny. I got a good laugh out of it!

We are getting ready to head out to dinner in a little bit with Steph and Jon and this great German brewery. I can't wait to eat me some delicious food! I hope that everyone is ready for a nice relaxing weekend. I am!! Happy Friday!!

Winter Wonderland

This is what I woke up to this morning. The difference between the U.S. and Germany is that I didn't hear any sort of hype at all that it was going to snow. In the U.S. (well, particularly Atlanta) we would have heard about this inch or so of snow that was coming for days and days in advance. The grocery stores would have sold out of bread and milk (who even eats plain bread and drinks milk? I say go for the junk food and beer!) and people would have started to act a bit hysterical at the thought of a few inches of snow. Deaner and I have both heard rumors that starting tomorrow night we are supposed to get between 5 and 18 inches of snow. I know that is a big difference but the people around here just don't seem to care enough to make a better guess than that! So I did what any good American would have done and I went to the grocery store today to make sure we had enough food JUST IN CASE it did snow 18 inches! I don't think it will happen but you never can tell around here.

In other news, remember me telling y'all about Deaner getting flashed by all those speed cameras way back when? Well the first ticket came last week. It was for the Jeep and there was no picture attached so he has spent the greater part of the week lobbying that it COULD have been me that got the ticket. Nice try, I know it wasn't me. So yesterday the mail comes and there is ANOTHER ticket in the mail! For the Jeep again! And this time there is a picture of Deaner driving attached! SO FUNNY! I am going to try and get Deaner to blow it up and scan it for me but something tells me he won't be as into it as I am. He looks stunned and his mouth is hanging open!

Tomorrow I actually have a few things on my schedule! This has been a very boring and uneventful week for me! I am having lunch with a friend of mine and it will be nice to get out of the hosue. Then we are having dinner tomorrow night with Steph and Jon at one of our favorite places, Brauhaus Castel. Deaner's birthday is on Sunday and Jon's is today so I'm sure we will do some celebrating! Then hopefully we will catch up on some sleep this weekend and finally be back to normal!! What in the world are we going to do with no more college football? I swear, this is the saddest time of the year for me. Perhaps my husband will start coming to bed earlier than 5am now since there won't be any football games to stay up and watch! Happy Thursday to everyone! Friday is right around the corner!

Nothing to Say

When you don't do anything all day long, it is hard to blog about eventful things going on. I woke up early this morning to fetch Steph and Jon at the airport. That was pretty uneventful. I am happy to have them home! After dropping them off I picked up a few things at the commissary and then headed home. And that is pretty much all I did today. I took a nap, read my book, watched Gene Simmons and cooked dinner. Boring, boring, boring. Oh yeah, I did take a shower too. I need a project. I don't think that it has helped my productivity that I am exhausted from the jet lag. I don't remember it being this bad last time!

Perhaps when I start being productive again, I will have something to write about again. Wish me luck!

Jetlag Sucks

I can hardly keep my eyes open even though it is only 3:30pm here in Germany. I was up at 4:00am this morning and it was not pretty. I am hoping that tonight is better! I think that part of the problem might be that our room is FRIDGID at night. I am going to have to get Deaner to look at that tonight before bedtime! In other news, we are having some issues with the Jeep. Deaner and I drove it yesterday and couldn't figure out why the heat wasn't getting hot very fast. I probably wouldn't have thought about it again but when we pulled back in the driveway last night there was a weird dinging sound and we couldn't figure out what it meant. Thank god Deaner ended up taking the Jeep to work this morning or else the issue wouldn't have been apparent to us until I took it to pick up Steph and Jon at the airport in the morning, which would not have been good. Deaner said that by the time he got to work the Jeep was about to overheat. Not good. After thinking we wouldn't be able to get it fixed until Thursday Deaner found the part that we needed at the Jeep dealership in Wiesbaden and found someone to install it. Thank god that it worked and that it was actually the problem. I was getting really nervous that I wouldn't be able to fetch Steph and Jon at the airport tomorrow! Too bad we had to spend money on something stupid like that. That always seems to happen to us!

Today I have unpacked all six of our bags. Everything is put away and organized. Dinner is in the slow cooker. Now all I have to do is stay awake until bedtime. It is not going to be easy!

I know this is random, but we really need a coat rack. Any suggestions about where to look will be appreciated!! :)

Home Again Home Again

I think that this picture gives a basic idea of how much STUFF we brought home with us but the sad part is that you can't even see me carrying my pink LL Bean bag which is the same size as that green duffle that Deaner has thrown over his shoulder!! We had 4 suitcases, 2 duffle bags and 2 carry ons. Not pretty! The only thing that kept me from having a nervous breakdown when my parents dropped us off was the fact that my mother was foolishly snapping pictures of us trying to wheel all our luggage to the Skycap! Even I was appalled to find out that our biggest suitcase weighed 62 pounds! I mean, I thought there was no way we would be anywhere NEAR the 70 pound limit (thank you medallion status!) but apparently we managed to get closer than I thought we would!

When we arrived at our gate we were so early that they hadn't even turned the lights on yet! Guess it is better than being late! I noticed that there was a kid asleep on the floor by the window but I didn't think much of it until I saw something start moving underneath his sweatshirt. Turns out it was a tiny dog who then got up and drank out of its water dish that was set up by the window as well and then peed on it's pee pad that I hadn't noticed was there. Is it just me, or does anyone else think that this is totally uncalled for? I understand that the dog is small and I also understand that some people consider their dogs part of the family but this was a little over the top. A dog should not be allowed to pee on the floor at the airport even if it is on a mat. That just doesn't seem very hygenic to me. And where does the dog pee once it is on the airplane? What if it poops? I would be furious if I had to sit next to that dog and had to smell it's poop the whole flight!

The flight home was completely uneventful. We had no tailwind like we normally do so the flight wasn't as short as we were hoping. And neither of us could manage to fall asleep at all. George, our neighbor, picked us up at the airport (thank god we didn't have to navigate the trains with all those bags!) and we got home by 8:30am or so. There is snow everywhere here and it is super cold! Welcome back to Germany I guess! We took a 5 hour nap, showered, ate a small lunch, went to the grocery store and came back home. In order to stay awake, I took down the Christmas tree all by myself! It was a total pain in the ass but at least it is done and I don't have to worry about it tomorrow. Just have to worry about unpacking all the luggage! Now I am sitting here on the couch blogging with my new PINK snuggie keeping me warm. I'm not going to lie, I'll probably be asleep within the hour. Tomorrow I will work on my recap of 2009 and get to play with all my new toys, including my new camera! Sorry if this is rambly, I'm exhausted!!

Over Already?

Is it really possible that we have already been home for 17 days and that it is time to head back to Germany tomorrow? Time really does fly when we are here. There are enough things to do, people to see and family to entertain to keep us busy for months! It is too bad that two and a half weeks was all the time that we had. Time for Deaner to get back to work and for us to get back in our normal routine back in Germany. I'm still wondering how it is possible that we have 6 bags going back to Germany and I STILL have a GIANT box of clothes to ship back. I really thought that we would be able to make it back in our suitcases but no such luck.

This weekend has been really busy. Starting with New Year's Eve, we have been on the run ever since. We rang in the New Year by renting out the top floor of a beer brewery in town, Gordon Biersch, which also happens to be where we hosted the "after party" of our wedding. It was a good night with great friends and Deaner and I got to celebrate our 4th anniversary of being together. I realize that our wedding anniversary is now the "official" anniversary but New Years Eve will always be special to us. New Year's Day we spent at Deaner's Dad and Stepmom's house. They have an open house every year and we hung out all day visiting with family friends and watching football. Today we had lunch with one of my oldest friends and her family. It was nice to catch up and see her two children and husband. I got to watch Ole Miss win the Cotton Bowl today even though it wasn't a pretty win by any means! And tonight we had dinner at my Aunt and Uncle's house and I got to play with Baby Thomas, who was as cute as ever!

Now we have spent the past two hours trying to pack all our crap up into our suitcases! Hope it all makes it back to Germany! Deaner's parents are coming by in the morning to say goodbyes and then we are heading to the airport. Keep us in your thoughts tomorrow while we are making the transatlantic flight home. I'll be posting again once we are home and unpacked. I hope that everyone had a wonderful holiday season and here's to an exciting 2010!