Hai

Right, that´s not a shark, it´s a seal, but "Hai" is pronounced like "Hi" in German :-)
Little Niece picked the card for me in her holiday :-)

She painted a heart (top, right), too, and remembered which card goes to whom when finally sending them off.

Wasn´t she just a baby a sec ago?

Don´t Make Yourself Smaller Than I Am

Video from this morning - ahhh, if I´d only known I´d slept with the window wide open! Not much to see, but turn on the sound, sooo nice!



I know, many really suffer from the rain in Germany right now - still I may enjoy it over here, no?

I saw a German comedy yesterday… was it a comedy, actually? Had a lot of truth in it.

A small toy-company with a very enthusiastic and friendly but incompetent boss was about to go bust.
He employed a guy for help.
That dude´s name was the same as mine, Mr. K, which was quite irritating – in Germany it´s in some places still quite common to use the family name and stick to the formal “Sie”.
Hence I heard my name throughout the entire thing all the time.

And he was an arrogant ##!

His secretary to be, J, was a friendly, caring but shy person (ummm, hello…), needed the job desperately cause she had a daughter to take care of.
She´d seen that Mr. K had an empty fish tank so, to make a good start, she went with her daughter to buy a fish.
The shop assistant was a-hem… growth-restricted? No, he was a dwarf and he asked what kind of a person that new boss of hers is.

She wasn´t absolutely sure yet (and too “well behaved” to tell the truth) but the shop assistant got a clue, grinned, looked at the fish to be, both, the man´s and the fishe´s eyes turned red.

Long story short, Mr. K suddenly found himself as small as the toy he wanted to invent.

J, who´d talked him finally off the day before, came back for an excuse to keep the job, found him, took care of him – end of the story is clear, they fell in love and with being less an ## he grew to his regular size (twice).

Gave me a lot of thinking of how he supported had to support her when she had his job to do and how she reacted to it.
Via cellphone he gave instructions, like tell the people off. But she did it her way and succeeded.

His “don´t make yourself smaller than I am” was what gave her the confidence to do the job.

Guess I need a Mr K as well at times. And yes, technically, at least for the guys at the bakery, I have one.
But instead of encouraging me he does for me…

Sadly, btw, the movie took place in October/November – not nice to see the bald trees, all the clothes you have to wear against the nasty weather, knowing you´ll be there sooner than you want again.

These days we happily complain about the “sauna” we have to work in, it´s hot up in the office (us advanced Germans don´t have aircon).
It´s grey outside, raining and smelling soooo good – I just love summer!



Way to my car - with a free hand I could´ve made him greet you, but, alas!

Is that a German saying, that rain makes you grow? This morning I accidentially caught some drops of rain, despite having my brolly :-)
My transparent-blue one to which my customer stopped, looked and me and grinned, "you always have a blue sky, do you!"
Yes, mostly :-)
And teamleader played around with it, too!

Nominative Determinism

Or as we say, Nomen est Omen. As wiki explains it “is the theory that a person's name can have a significant role in determining key aspects of job, profession or even character.”

Well. We have the year 2014. I am in Germany. I am German.
(This is a post about a beautiful, intelligent woman, btw…)
Certainly we get flooded with facts about WWI now – after all “we” played a major role in it, right?

We and the (in this case) darn technology.
We? Men?

Let me shortly just tell you:
At school we got more than flooded with infos about an Austrian man with a moustache and it was not Charlie Chaplin.
Actually, thinking of the school subject “history” this is more or less all I can remember from senior classes :-(.
And turn on the telly you have a good chance to see that man again.
War guilt… our war guilt….

WWI was no concern there. So… back to Nomen est Omen… and that beautiful woman.
Clara Immerwahr, have you ever heard of her? She was beautiful. She was smart. Born in 1870 she got her magna cum laude in chemistry (as first German woman) in 1900 – and killed herself 15 years later.
Clara… that´s clear. Immerwahr. Immer = always, wahr = true.

She killed herself after her husband, also a chemist, – his name was Haber (haben – have… and she didn´t take it) – generated and took responsibility for the use of lethal gas in WWI.

She called it openly “perversion of science” and shot herself – what did he do? Prepare for more lethal missions. And then he helped developing Zyklon B that “helped” getting rid of six million “ethnically not wanted” humans in WWII.
His wife was Jewish, btw, before marrying him.

Life can be an a###, huh? And Nomen est Omen, at times.

Sorry for this historical trip. But the story of this woman fascinated me... The story is here on pic 11 and "our" Charlie Caplin... puts himself in pic 26....
Would you kill yourself – being a role model for women (maybe?) – for something your husband/partner did?

How come they were a couple after all when their values were so darn different?

Their son emigrated to the US and killed himself later of shame for his father´s work, too. To top it off her and her husband´s ashes were buried together.

Now I truly wonder…. Will we get flooded with the subject WWI until 2018???

I may also add: My father´s father did not join the army in WWII. My father was a kid back then. My Mum´s family wasn´t German. So much for my “war guilt”.
(And one of my cousins was one of the first conscientious objectors in Germany.)

And Ingo´s Dad (to get back to this post´s title) once sent me a birthday-card that stated according to my name I am an honest person you can always rely on.
Just saying :-)

Dream On (But Something Nice!)

Sunday I woke up early (alone) and felt tense – what did I do? The floors, like on my knees – my muscles hurt today! ;-)

Guess Trapattoni ´s “Flasche leer” isn´t known out of Germany, but it describes quite how I feel.

Trapattoni was a soccer-trainer in Germany, an Italian with a very strong Italian accent and grammar. After a bad season he gave an interview pointing out his frustration and “Flasche leer” (bottle empty) quite brings it to the point.

Of one very much needed week of holiday I was actually 3 full days sick, like really sick, without going to the doc, means those days I felt bad and they count as holidays, too, stupid me.
Why I did this?
Dunno, I thought, aww, it´s just today, tomorrow you´ll be fine again.
And our doc is rather far away, too. And I really was in pain. Sitting position, waiting forever? Nahh…

I feel empty.



Trapattoni ended the interview with “ich habe fertig.”, which made many people laugh due to the wrong grammar – actually, despite it´s not really German, many still say it – not only as statement “I´m done”, but meaning “Flasche leer” as well.
Funny is also after all this yelling he ends with a dot not an exclamation mark...

With the prospect of 4 weeks without T but with # I was tense and Ingo was tired of it all, too – he´ll be alone at work, also, doing the work of two – we fought on and off but finally he ended up in bed and all was good – so it seemed.

I´m just a terrible person!

At around 03:00 I woke to check if the alarm clock was set properly to 04:40 (it certainly was – as was my back-up, the cellphone).
Some 20 minutes later I dreamed I get up, brush my teeth and get ready for work, woke and got angry about myself, thinking: dream something nice, dammit!

I mean… For all they care I could start at 10:00 am, if I wanted to, so why.do.I.worry?!

I´m terrible!
So now I´m so dang tired.

But then… look around the corner(s). Wars, people fleeing, accidents, murder…. Actually I´m off fine.

I really need to dream something nice and relax at night!
Brain, did you read me now?! Dream something nice! ;-)

Hi Says The Tiger, Bye Say The Lions

Wednesday we hopped in the tram and went to our little zoo.
And were greeted by a tiger in the City of Henry the Lion... hmmm. Homework, guys?

But it´s a nice, little zoo anyways and so much new stuff, too, look at this arty bench:

But certainly also animals like this cute raccoon:

These bunnies even have flowers on their "balcony":

Australian zebra finches:

And a very sad and silent not at all laughing kookaburra...

A wonderful carousel from the year 1894:

Oh and we´re really advanced now, too (sorry can´t stop ranting about this one!)....

A pager for when our food is ready, inviting us to visit the even smaller zoo Essehof.
Which would´ve been a great idea.
Just the food ...

...from this clean looking place:

... made us both very sick. So we couldn´t go.
It´s Saturday night now and I´m nearly back to feeling good again...

The only lions btw were these:

But we saw these cute storks:

Some chicken (yes, we´re in the city, kids don´t see these animals here anymore but in the zoo...):

... and after the sign saying ponies and donkeys may bite, we saw this one with a muzzle - never have I seen something like that -

...and petted a horse instead (with heaps of respect)...

The loos (I didn´t need to go in that heat):

This little zoo is made with so much love for detail, here a French-styled bench (too hot for me to sit down - metal in summer, huh?!):

A beautiful pot with flowers...

A (metal) swing:

And another beautiful French little place to sit down:

A nearly hidden King Frog:

A fairy...

A beautiful playground...

Here you can relax...

... the garden...

I took some 80 pics of this beautiful place.
Small, but really nice.

If you care about the salad-thingy, please read the comment to this post - thanks Grace, I am a happy salad now (still a tad afraid of Big´s words not coming true...)

The Lion is out!

I´m a so-called open book, right?
I love my city. The one I´ve chosen, not the one I grew up in.

And since this is the City of Henry the Lion I get a lion for a very late birthday-pressie:

Despite that lion coming from Düsseldorf - P maybe really saw we got him here in our kitchen?

Yuppsie, and the frog was there, too...

And guess what - I always claim I don´t like sweets... ummm... Lindt is different. Kinda... yum?

Why ever this, maybe I´m, supposed to share it with Niece?

"If you haven´t grown up by 40 you don´t have to."!

Kids btw and being advanced in Germany:

The neighbours in Aussie-style - and neighbours btw...

See? Lights on. They´re inside and here:

12 balconies around us, on a hot summer´s night - empty! And you hear TVs are on and all. Peeps are at home.
Summer is precious!
Well, to me, to us at least.

So precious Ingo took his knive:

And we got this:

Weird we never had one in Cuba!

Next: A Tiger was conquered - or befriended? The latter, pics are to come.

Really, it´s Thursday already? So sad!

If you care about the salad-thingy, please read the comment to this post - thanks Grace, I am a happy salad now (still a tad afraid of Big´s words not coming true...)

Das heißt SUPPE!

We´re still holidaying away in German heat and have difficulties to eat.

And guess what I made... and we ate it all up. Yes, lentil soup!

Friend P is 5 years younger than me but knows better than I, obviously!

Zoo-pics are to come, I´m just too lazy right now.
Guess we really needed a time-out, sad it´s Thursday already!

Off to the city soon to buy pressies for big Sis to be and second-time Mum (also for Bro? What could it be? Sleeping pills? Joke! Seriously - any suggestions?).

I will never forget our boss´s dumb glance (sorry, but true) to my screaming at teamleader "Das heißt Suppe!!!", according to the Simpson´s episode where the French waiter said "soupé".
Teamleader had soup and laughed his head off. Literally only, luckily.

And yes, one portion for the two of us - it´s hot, yay!!!

If you care about the salad-thingy, please read the comment to this post - thanks Grace, I am a happy salad now (still a tad afraid of Big´s words not coming true...)

Hot In The City

I think Ingo was lying when saying, awww, get the rose from the front - he just wanted to be in the picture! ;-)

It was hot today, by golly.
"Only" 33 C, but my, the sun was burning my skin (and I wore Banana Boat!).

We hurried through the non-shaded places, was like jogging for me! Phew.

Even in the shops it was (either freezing cold or) over 30C:

Ingo asked me to take this pic and asks you to have a guess what is sold here:

Yes. Cell/smart phones are called "handy" over here...

Hmmm, what do you think, will I be able to make Bro come over here for this kid´s event?

We always end up buying last and/or broken stuff, also today - this is the last giraffe that looks like a cow to me hence we call her "Kuhgiraffe":

One ear is full of yarn...

Weird was the family behind her.
Dunno if I have a strong German accent, the (white) woman in he pic had.
She spoke with that harsh accent to her (black) man - their kid several times asked something in (perfect) German and was answered either not at all or in that English-German accent.
Weird and I wonder what for? "I speak English"? Mind you...

I am now one of those peeps btw... I bought a calendar for next year today!

Last time we were too late - and here Henry is on front to look at for the rest of the year :-)

This mingles with my last pic for today:

A reflection, taken from Schadt´s.

Hmmm. Let´s reflect: So far it was a great year, no? :-)

If you care about the salad-thingy, please read the comment to this post - thanks Grace, I am a happy salad now (still a tad afraid of Big´s words not coming true...)