When Pigs (and Cows) Fly

Haven't spent much time outdoors lately-- it's just too darned cold out (tonight's low: 18 degrees F) to hit the town and take new photos, so here's an oldie from a slightly warmer time. This is the mural in the parking lot for the local Metzgerei (a combo of a butcher and deli) showing their 2 favorite ingredients floating adrift like some Pink Floyd album cover or something. Metzgerei are pretty handy because they usually have everything you need for snacks, lunch, and dinner from coffee to-go, ready-made sandwiches (most have a small sit-down area for eating), side dishes and in most cases, prepared and cooked food-- chickens, sausages, and the like in addition to the selection of meat and cold cuts. As with most specialty vendors here, you sort of bide your time and develop a relationship with your local shop, so my Metzgerei crew patiently (I hesitate to use the word "cheerfully") puts up with my abysmal Deutsch because I'm a regular.

Song In My Head Today

In honor of National Australia Day-- by the way, eat some lamb this evening mate...

(vocabulary: "bogan" in Australian slang is roughly comparable to "redneck")

... I decided to set the wayback machine to 1981 for this pop confection from Kiwi/Aussie band The Swingers. Here's "Counting the Beat," and it's a great example of what you can do with an empty building, a bunch of your friends and a $50 production budget. If this doesn't make you smile and tap your toes, there is seriously something wrong.

Only 2 months until Aussie Rules Football season begins!

Christmas Is Over

I took this a few weeks ago, but haven't gotten around to posting it yet-- though I believe this pile of Christmas trees is still there as of this writing. Here's a shot of the large statue of local hero, Renaissance artist and craftsman Albrecht Durer surrounded by discarded Christmas Trees near the downtown core. Tree pickup seems to be a bit late this year-- heck, the city is way behind on the glass bottle recycling from New Year's Eve as well, and the bins are stuffed to overflowing.

Bicenquinquagenary!

Quite by accident, I noticed the total number of blog posts here yesterday-- 250 since October 2008. Yes, a meaningless milestone. Looking back on the early stuff, it was all pretty pedestrian and we were working out how to use everything and composing it on my preferred (and mildly arcane) Opera web browser, which guaranteed a lousy looking blog when viewed on Internet Explorer-- at least initially. After 27 months and 251 posts, we're starting to get the hang of it. Be patient-- this is still a work in progress.

Thanks to everybody who continues to stop by to check out these assorted screeds and ramblings. It's both humbling and shocking that folks from all over the globe have checked this little outpost of ours out, and I know we have regular readers (via RSS and subscribers/followers) in places like Belgium, Vietnam, England, India, and France in addition to our friends and family in Germany and the USA. Truth be told, if it weren't for the fact that I know all of my aunts and uncles are checking in, this would have been a lot dirtier-- so please remember to thank them for keeping me honest, and for not pandering to the lowest common denominator by working blue... not too much anyways.

The term "Bicenquinquagenary" refers to the number 250, and is very much a lesser known term than the more common (or marginally less obscure, take your pick) "Sestercentennial," or "Semiquincentennial," all of which mean the same thing: 250th anniversary.

Only In Germany (Or Maybe Florida)

There was a recurring bit on the old radio program Love Line called "Germany or Florida?" where co-host Adam Carolla would read a fantastically weird-but-true news story, and callers had to guess if the story came out of... duh, Germany or Florida. Generally-- but not always-- the trashy stuff was from the Sunshine State, and the pervy stuff was Deutschland. So when reading these real news stories, my mind flitted back to that old radio program. You'll have to read them yourselves (the links go straight to the stories in The Local, a cheeky but still-reliable news source here).

Porn Star Suffers Heart Attack When Getting Breast Enlargement Surgery

Court Orders Female Workers To Wear Bras

Woman Publicly Pleasures Herself On Train; Wonders What The Fuss Is About

The picture is a photo of Ampelmännchen ("little traffic light men"), a staple in the old East Germany. The Ampelmann walk/don't walk traffic light symbol was one of the few East German items to pass through reunification intact, and they are seen with great fondness and nostalgia. If lost, it's actually easy to tell which part of Berlin you are in by the traffic signals-- "modern" west Berlin has the standard walk signs; former communist East Berlin has Ampelmännchen-- chunky figures wearing a large hat. In these enlightened unified times, some artist and communities have had some fun with the symbols and have come up with some interesting variations.

I Kid Because I Love

Looking back at the last batch of entries, perhaps I have been razzing my adoptive countrymen a bit harshly. It is the differences that make living in a different country so unique and, well, foreign, so I choose to write about them. I mean, if I went into multiple entries about subjects like how paying our phone bill is exactly like it was back home or how great the public transit system is, I think most people's eyes would glaze over. We came here (among other reasons) to experience a foreign culture; if we wanted to live in America lite we could have tried living near an Army base where local merchants attempt to cater to soldiers' families. There are a lot of things about German and European living that are unique and superior to North America, from the mundane (comprehensive recycling) to the major (the attitude towards driving as a solemn, serious privilege makes for predictable and incredibly safe traveling). So I kid because I love. Germans as a whole are a very proud and resilient people, and it's the quirks that I bring up here that makes them relatable to us folks from the colonies.

An Item In Dire Need Of A Focus Group

More supermarket follies-- Gaggli brand pasta. One can only wait for something named "Ranncid" brand cheese to follow.

Methinks The Fix Is In

After over 1 month of sub-freezing temps, Nuremberg was greeted with a most welcome blast of spring-like weather-- almost 50 degrees Fahrenheit today!! The remaining snowdrifts are almost gone, though I'm sure we'll have at least one more round of snow and cold before it's all said and done. That being said, just 3 days ago it was 8 degrees(?!) at 8:00am. And as usual, my German neighbors had their apartment windows flung wide open.

As you can see by the illustration (click on photo for larger version), it is considered a good thing to open your windows every day for a certain amount of time for up to 30 minutes; preferably several times each day. This is a prevalent phenomenon country-wide, though I have yet to hear a definitive reason as to why this is. Ostensibly, it's to let the damp air "out," and fresh air in. Fine, except the hole in that logic is that morning air can be quite damp (hence the phenomenon called "dew," plus German port cities like Hamburg for example, are basically always damp so you are in fact letting the dry air out), and you are letting mold spores into the house that way. Living in a semi-basement, we have the advantage of a certain degree of insulation year-round, and the place is drafty enough (our building was erected in 1899) where we never have a stale air problem, much less mold. It all seems a bit silly, particularly when you consider the exorbitant cost of energy here and there's the rub: look at that illustration again. It was created by an energy or gas company. I can't imagine anything that will increase one's heating bill in the winter and A/C or electric fan bill in the summer than opening the windows several times during the day. While I have no doubts that this sort of thing made complete sense before the advent of modern building materials, it seems hopelessly outdated now, and is being done largely on the wings of hidebound and passed-down behavior, and seemingly egged-on by the energy companies. Look, I'm not against opening windows, just against opening them for no better reason than "we've always done it that way."

Paris Photos Are Now Up!

It took a few days, but the Paris photos (with accompanying commentary) have now been posted. As I mentioned before, it was a memorable trip, and a wonderful city. I don't think we'll ever get bored with Paris. There were plenty of highlights, but a few stand out, to wit:

- The Claude Monet Exhibit at the Grand Palais (hurry, it closes on January 24) was an exhaustive collection of the seminal impressionist painter's art, and showed his works the way they were meant to be-- a series of paintings side-by side. His "impressions" of the same subject (mountain, seascape, building, etc.) from different times of the day, times of year, weather conditions and so forth have all been sold and have gone the way of the 4 winds, so to bring it all back under one roof-- works from the NY Met were next to works from the Melbourne Australia art museum, which were next to paintings from Budapest-- this exhibit required amazing coordination and cooperation from all major institutions, and it was a treat to see. The downside? Er, we did not buy tickets in advance, which meant standing outside in a line for 2+ hours. In 33 degree temps and howling wind. Not one but two people in front of us fainted(?!) while in line.

- This was very much a mix-and-match vacation, which gave us an incredible amount of freedom. So instead of running all over the city pell-mell on a rigid schedule, we worked off of a broad list of sights, shops, and restaurants that piqued our interests. If we didn't go to a certain place, well, we'd go there on another day or another visit. The list itself was compiled from multiple sources-- friends, co-workers, books and blogs-- and was full of insider-type tips. Going forward, this may well be the way we do things on our next vacation, wherever that may be. Special mention and credit goes to the excellent Keeping The Bear-Garden In The Background blog, written by an American expat student living in Paris-- more than a few of the places we visited were a direct result of this entertaining and extremely well-written example of the blogging arts-- it's so good, I've included a permanent link to it on the right hand of this page.

- What's all this talk about rude French people? In all my visits to Paris (and other parts of France as well), I have yet to see this attitude-- and the one time I -did- see it, it was clearly provoked, and the guy on the receiving end had it coming. Unlike the very direct Germans, all the Parisians we came into contact with (and remember, we went to non-touristy places) were unfailingly polite, and said the French versions of "please," "thank you," and "excuse me" far more than my fellow Nurembergers would in identical situations. Maybe we've just been extremely lucky in this realm, but that is my observation.

- I'll agree that the international terminals of Paris' Charles de Gaulle airport are amongst the most comically inefficient torture chambers in all of travel-dom. Imagine our surprise by going intra-Europe and touching down in the new Terminal 2G-- we were out of the airport and on our train to downtown Paris in about 20 minutes (check in for the return trip took far less time). The hopeful news for international connections is that the Paris Airport Authority was taking surveys of terminal 2G passengers, and looks to be implementing lessons learned from its newer, efficient, and comfortable terminals. Fingers crossed-- it's only a matter of time before we use this airport as a connector.

- Finally, a shout-out to my bride, the lovely B. Beyond taking awesome photographs per usual, she did so much more-- she has a much better grasp on the French language, and is equal parts GPS, Sherpa guide, homing pigeon and swashbuckler in one beautiful package. I'm extremely lucky to have someone like this as both my travel-- and life partner.

You can access the photos through the link on the right side of the page, or simply by clicking HERE. The Blue Melon photo site now includes a "slideshow" feature that allows you to set the timer (look for a triangle inside a circle on the upper right hand of the page). Would you believe I included a picture of camera-shy me in there? Head on over, take a look, and feel free to leave comments.