All Hail the Bowers

All hail our cool friends the Bowers. They arrived in Frankfurt at 0500 last weekend and much joy as had by all. Here's to a week of milestones.

--Most cheeseballs consumed in a day (don't ask).
--Most castle's visited in a week (OK some, technically, were really just palaces).
--Many laughs. A few tears. Copious fun. I can't wait to do it again.

In a final bit of organizational judo that still astounds me 12 hours later, they managed to get 4 people and 150 pounds of luggage out the door to leave exactly on time at 6:00 am this morning.

Click photo for slideshow...

Quote of the Day

"We buy your debt, we own you..."

--a 10 year old Chinese classmate of my daughter speaking about China-US relations

Piper's early March update

Some fun things:

Great visit with Aunt and Uncle. We went to Sigmaringen, a jaunt to the castle there for a Saturday afternoon. Lovely, but cold inside. It has an amazing collection of medieval armor. Between that and the hunting room with more than 800 heads/antlers on the wall, Micah was beside himself wanting to play with the irreplaceable relics.
BTW, we saw our first just-go-and-get-yourself-a-glass-of-water fountain at a bakery there. Giddy! I had to take a picture.

MM opened an art gallery with the pieces she had worked on in the car ride. They were reasonably priced at "either a German or an American euro, which ever is easier."

We also went to an Easter market with friends. It was out in a farming village. Heavy on spring planting. Light on Easter. As I am garden-less this year, it threw me into a fit of depression and longing for mulch. Susan must have seen the look on my face. She and George bought me a basket of grape hyacinth.
Andy took them to the train at 5:30 this morning for their train to Paris... We miss them already.

Culture update

So I (Piper) just finished my second, much shorter language class as I struggle to speak the language. This one was less culturally fulfilling--all Americans-- but we actually worked on grammar instead of vocabulary. This way I can understand how sentences fit together, right?
Sure.
Did you know that prepositions determine the case of the noun? A car, for instance, is neither male nor female. It is neuter: das Auto. If you want something for the car, you say fur das Auto. But if you need something with the car, it changes to dem Auto. If you use one of the many prepositions that take either case, then you determine if it is accusative or dative if there is (are you ready for this one...) implied movement in the verb.
My brain jammed on this one. Implied movement? Are you kidding?
I am saved, however, by location. Apparently Southerners are mocked in Germany for their funny accent and bad grammar. We have a local dialect called Schwabisch that I love to listen to, though proper German speakers cringe. I did my homework at the swimming center while T and MM had swim practice. I would ask the people around me. It always came down to a majority vote because no one really knew which one or why.
One the positive side, I'm starting to pick up more and more vocabulary. I can now use, somewhat correctly, words like "die Tasche" "die Tuete" and "der Beutel" (translation: a bag, a bag, and a bag, but they hold different things).

The Uncle George Theme Song

Today marks the last day of Uncle George's visit to Stuttgart. Thus ends his 7 day mission to critically rank all the schnitzel in Southern Germany.

Nine Days (& other odds and ends)

Nine days until Maddie Bower arrives. Liquid joy is congealing in all the small spaces of our apartment as one member of teamfordham eagerly awaits her arrival.

Said member of teamfordham lost another tooth this week. This brings the total to 3 gone in the past 2 weeks. Tess lost one as well. Perhaps we should have the water checked.

Micah starts soccer in a few weeks. The little man has energy to burn. I pray that they help him burn it.

Tess is now reading book 2 of Harry Potter. I think she wants to be in Ravenclaw but I'm not sure. How did this happen? Who knew that they were covertly teaching her to read in that school of hers? We should have paid better attention.

Maddie read an entire book aloud today. She insists that she can't read--she merely sounds the words out loud one by one until the book is done.

Uncle George returns from Sienna (Italy) tomorrow night. I can only hope that he's not too giddy about what a great time he and Susan had. Scratch that. I can also hope that he brings back plenty of wine.

No episodes of "Lost" aired this week. How to feed my addiction until next week? The off-season is going to be really, really hard.

We're fine

For those who may have read about this tragedy, a teenage gunman opened fire in a school outside of Stuttgart. It was 44 kilometers away from us. We are all fine but please pray for the families involved.

Quote of the Day

"Daddy, are these touchable?"

Spoken by Micah while standing in a castle looking at a wall full of priceless antiques. (Alas, the photo below was in the gift shop. No photos allowed of the interior).

UPDATED (3-9-09): Click on Micah to view slideshow.

What I'm Doing This Summer

I haven't been to a movie theater since arriving in Germany last September. That said, I know what I'm going to be seeing this summer.

We're off to see another castle. Update to follow later this weekend.

More Twitter ranting

Good news. I may be a middle-aged crank but at least I'm not alone. Gary Trudeau doesn't get Twitter either.