Victory is mine!

Well, at least a small one:

The groundwork for my permanent residency permit has been laid. thanks to my awesome boss. It's not signed or sealed yet, but she's agreed to help me out in a major way. So yeah. Thank heavens for that. It's a huge load off my mind and leaves me with more energy to deal with the rest of my insane to do list (uni application, wedding whatever and the basic chaos of my day-to-day).

My whole positivity mission isn't really working out, but I'm trying. I'm looking forward to spending some time resting and recharging this summer, as well as making major headway on the aforementioned epic lists.

Next week I'll be out in the Brandenburger countryside with a group of 6 monkeys from work and said awesome boss. It should be a pretty relaxed time, if last year was any indication.

Tomorrow's another obscure protestant holiday here (the Ascension) and the Monday after we come back is another one (Whit Monday), so I'm looking forward to some fun walks through Berlin in the sunshine with the Schatz. Speaking of whom, his final exams start on Friday. Please do wish him luck.

So, I hope y'all enjoyed your Memorial Day. I'll drink a cold one for you tomorrow.

Keep fighting.

Failed Photo Uploads, etc...

The last time I posted, I immediately tried to upload photos from my camera and then in turn to das Blog. However...it didn't work. I was supposed to go meet some people (for Tapas at the fantastic Spanish vinoria across the street) and I got frustrated and stopped. Now as it turns out, the photos didn't even make it from my camera to my computer. The question is whether or not my originals got deleted after the so-called upload. Don't know and because Stephan's hidden birthday presents for me in our chest of drawers, I can't go looking for my camera to check. 

Since the move finding things here has been complete trial-and-error. There's something incredibly disorienting about a posse of extremely motivated, hyper-clean German women unpacking and organizing your kitchen. And all the rest of your apartment. Seriously folks, if you ever move, make German friends. They wiped out my cupboards, put away my silverware, my tupperware, my plates...and not a single thing got broken. It was great, especially for a little chaot like me. However, it remains at times, difficult to find certain things. 

Anyhow, last weekend was the kindergarten overnight. Unlike last year, the kids didn't sleep much, which meant that I didn't sleep much. They did seem to be quite impressed though. The kids, that is. After all, that was the aim of the game. However, it became abundantly clear to me that I am in no way ready to be woken at 1:15 am by a screaming child. Everyone I work with tells me it's different when they're yours...but my sleep is sacred. Anyone who's related to, chohabitated or slept with me at one point or another knows that. It also seems to be getting worse as I age. This Friday (aka tomorrow) is the Sommerfest. Kind of an end of the year sort of thing where all the kids and their parents are invited and we've got all kinds of games, etc. This year, Julianita decided she wanted to have the kids perform a short theater piece. It's called the little black sheep. After having gone through somewhere between three and five different black sheep, I think she's regretting it. I for my part am ambivelantly counting down the days until we close for the summer. This means on the one hand four weeks of paid vacation for moi--and no children, but also the epic organizational feat that is the Americana Extravaganza. I get panicky when I think about it. I mean, I can't effing wait to get back to the states and see everyone I've been missing for ever--living abroad consists mostly of balancing your adventure/wanderlust with varying degrees of homesickness and longing. Oftentimes, though, it's more satisfying to long for something than it is to actually have it. I basically just have to cowboy up and start planning some shit and I think once I've actually gotten started, it won't be so bad. 

Anyhow, I'm sure there will be more details on that subject whenever I do manage to get my shit together and start making real plans. In the meantime, I've got a birthday/housewarming party to throw. That's going to be lovely. I hope. We shall see. Hope you all are well, I'm going to contain the chaos in the kitchen leftover from my steamed pangasius in white herb-dijon sauce with carrots and get to bed. Or something. Tomorrow's going to be a long day.

Be safe.

What you missed...

Ach, Kinders...

Sorry about that. The month of March really threw me for a loop and things just kept going from there. The early childhood ed program I'm doing also kicked it up a notch and two of my colleagues had some serious mental and physical health problems (respectively) that kept me doing overtime and away from regular updates. 

But I'm back. I hope to keep y'all amused with some amusing tidbits more regularly from now on. 

So here's a rundown of what all's happened since I last updated. 

March:

-Gramps died. That was a rough one, folks. I haven't lost enough people close to me to be good at grieving yet. I'm still working on it.

-Angie seperated from her partner of almost ten years. Also rough--a real readjustment for all of us--and a lot of crisis management.

-The apartment search was also intensified in March because we realized that we had to be out of the old place by May.

April:

-Found and proceeded to not get a series of lovely apartments.

-Found, almost lost but did in the end sign on a really lovely apartment.

-Packed like a crazy person while working ridiculous overtime for 2 impaired colleagues.

-MOVED IN in a germanically organized move of epic proportions.

-Bought tickets for the Americana Extravaganza (coming to a city near you starting 07.19.09)

May:

-Intensive period of nestling, settling and socializing with all the new kids in the neighborhood.

-Un-packed like a crazy person.

-Enjoyed the obscene number of bank holidays Germany and Western Europe have on offer in May.

June:

-Wrote and handed in an idiotic number of small assignments for school. In German. Which turns a small idiotic assignment into a somewhat larger undertaking.

-Started going through the motions of planning the Birthday/Warming Party 

-Ditto on the Americana Extravaganza

-Got a guilt trip and FINALLY updated my blog.

Sooooooooooo, time for a funny tidbit of the day.

Yesterday, my colleague Julianita (name changed for comedic/germans are discovering facebook purposes) started freaking out because my other colleague Mattholomew apparently has a habit of not being germanically cleanly. It'd be damn hard for him to, seeing as he's Australian. Anyway, Julianita is going on and on about how much it bothers her that he left his shoes laying around, etc. etc. What does she decide to do? 

Hide them. 

Yaaay for adult problem solving skills! 

So this morning, Mattholomew comes to work and looks for his work shoes. Can't find 'em anywhere...which I admit was pretty funny. Everyone kept referring him to Julianita, but he doesn't take the bait and starts walking around in Uggs in June. Julianita can't keep a punchline to herself, so she starts trying to take the piss a bit to cover up for the fact that she well...actually cares. Except you could blatanly tell that she really cared, and it actually wasn't all that funny. Mattholomew was kind of like, 'well, eat me'--for good reason, if you ask me...I mean, she ain't his Mama and it ain't his problem that she has to clean up after her husband and sons at home all the time. I mean...I have to admit, I enjoyed the viewing/free worktime entertainment, but really folks--there are things WORTH getting upset about, and there are things that aren't. 

Moral of the story: Take it easy. This sometimes means taking the easy way out, but you know...it keeps your blood pressure low and keeps you from turning into a semicrazed, shoe hiding Julianita.

Older and Wiser?

Hey folks,
hope this post finds you all in great health and spirits. Here in Berlin, we're enjoying temperatures warmer than those in Rio and I'm lucky enough to have collected enough overtime at work to have had the majority of this week off. It was a great chance to recover from the stressful yet utterly fantastic combination of my parent's visit, my uncle's wedding and my 25th birthday. Celine was here for a short visit, which consisted mostly of wandering through my neighborhood and drinking tea on my terrasse. Next week, I've been tapped to take the four and five year olds on a week-long trip with Markus, my sometimes difficult colleague. I'm mostly excited, we've checked out the accommodations, and our intern Linda will be coming too (she's pretty cool) and I've got some pretty great stuff planned. My only worry is that Markus is going to somehow manage to botch the packing (because I'm not there this week) or somehow otherwise submarine my input. We'll see. I'll actually only be staying until Thursday evening because our negotiation hearing in court is on Friday. I'm hoping that we'll get the issue with our ridiculous landlord and his cohorts settled once and for all. Our lawyer is also of the opinion that we have nothing to negotiate, as we have done nothing wrong. Our demands--to put it frankly--our pretty basic. Our landlord needs to stop treating us like idiots, reduce our rent and preferably (my addition here) apologize for their ridiculous behavior.
We'll see...keep your fingers crossed for us.
My parents were here, like I mentioned--and I think things went swimmingly. No one got food poisioning or any other strange diseases, everyone tried new things, my parents got to meet Stephan, Stephan got to meet a big chunk of my family at Steve's wedding and we got to spend a lovely few days in an utterly charming Czech hamlet. I can only reccomend it. The people are friendly, the castles are imposing and beautiful, the landscape is breathtaking and the exchange rate is favorable for the dollar (places like that are getting few and far between these days). My only tip: do not drive through Poland. The roads are being renewed from the center of the country out to the boarders. This is unfortunate if you don't plan to drive through the center of the country. I thought the rental was going to bust an axle on some of those craters! Stephan narrowly escaped getting charged an exorbitant five euro for a sausage (polish sausage is good, but not that good), my sister got chased after for stiffing the bathroom watchman twenty euro cents and we got our windows forcibly washed by some cracked out guys with squeegees...while it was raining. A very colorful trip. I don't think any of the parties involved will forget it any time soon.
The rest of their visit was relatively uneventful--except that my Mum's bank card didn't want to work and the hotel reservations got botched somehow. It was a bit stressful...but rewarding.
However, all these events left me no time to plan my quarter-century birthday party. I managed to send some chaotic texts to a few friends, and Stephan did what he does best (shopping like he invented it) and when I came home from the kindergarten overnight (a preparatory measure for our trip next week) I had a fantastic birthday breakfast waiting for me--complete with my very own kiwi plant. A bunch of people came over in the evening for grilling and whatnot and it wound up being quite nice, despite the lack of planning. One of the coolest things I got, other than the kiwi plant of course, was a dvd box set of all the James Bond films with Sean Connery in them. I've already managed to watch From Russia With Love, and while I'm writing this, You Only Live Twice is running. I was ecstatic when I got them. All in all, I got to celebrate four times--once with my parents before they left, once with my kids at the overnight, once with Stephan and once with all my German friends. All in all, I can't complain.
The only bummer in recent weeks has been my bad spell with my bike. I bit it twice in as many weeks, hitting the exact same places on me and my bike. The last time was with substantial speed and I've gone through that from having nine speeds to having three...and because it's my own fault, there's no way it's going to be covered by my warantee, no matter how nice my bike guys are. So I'm hoping to get there either today or tomorrow and get things straightened out so I don't have to buy a transport pass for this month.

Anyway, I'm going to get started on dinner and whatnot. Hope everyone's doing well. Keep fighting the good fight.