Something's Peekin'

So today I met Stuttgart's Dirty Old Man. I had had a lovely day of dyeing my hair, making videos, then going to eat sushi and watch the ducklings by the palace while eating ice cream. It was a very nice day.

While taking the sbahn home I was at the front of the car facing backwards. There were lots of people so there wasn't enough seats. This guy who was about 50-ish in age, was standing there by the doors holding onto one of the poles. I didn't notice anything unusual for the first few stops, then I noticed. In the three inch gap between his shirt and his pants where was some"thing" sticking out. No joke. At first I thought "Noooo. That's can't be his...." but honestly- it was. There's just.... it was. And the thing is- you know he had to know. He had to. He's just a Dirty Old Man. I'm sitting there smirking, grinning, and trying my best not to laugh my head off. No one else was noticing. There was this cute guy in a suit about my age sitting across from me. After a while he took his earphones out and I asked him if he can speak English. He said yes, so I asked him "How do you say 'can you please put your penis back into your pants?' in German?" He looked at me weird (to be expected) and I nodded to the Dirty Old Man. He cried out "Holy Shit!" Yep. That was my response too.

Here's what I figure. Every city, town and village has to have a Dirty Old Man. It's capitalized because it's a job title. I've already met Stuttgart's so the next time I see him, I know who to avoid. (It's worse when you can't tell and you get surprised.)

Happy Happy!

So I spent increasingly larger portions of Thursday, Friday and Saturday in Stuttgart shopping. *sigh* oh the joy to be had. I did good too. I got a long sleeve shirt, a short sleeve shirt, a tank top, two scarves, a shrug, a pair of jeans and a pair of shoes. And I got good prices too! Yay me! However what really irriates me is that I can't pick out clothes based one the styles I like. Nope, I have to choose my clothes based on if I can get the shirt to close. I really like the preppy button-up look. But I just can't find them in my size. I like the striped look- but I don't fancy looking like a watermelon. Ah well.

But I had fun anyways. The weather has been beautiful and sunny. There were so many people out the last few days that it was just crazy. But it was lovely with the sun, eating large amounts of ice cream, and going to this little sushi restaurant I found. That's right, I found sushi!!! I'm sooo happy. It's one of those sushi bars where the stuff goes around on a conveyor belt and you just take off what you want to eat. It was realllly good!

Let's sum it all up

Well, I've nearly been back in Germany for a week, so I figure I need to start back up with my blogging my experiences. I haven't yet put up pictures, so I need to get that done at some point. But first, let's hit the highlights:

1.) Okay, well, the flights sucked, I didn't get in until last Wednesday. Now you may be asking "wait, weren't you supposed to get back Tuesday?" Well, yes. I was supposed to fly from KC to Chicago to Frankfurt then take a train to Stuttgart. But... the weather was really bad in Chicago and was causing all sorts of problems so the guy at the ticket counter booked me through Dulles. Long story short- I got to Dulles- the plane was broken- stayed at Sheraton over night- out 24 hours later- in Frankfurt guy in KC had changed train ticket to plane ticket for last leg of journey and you can't do that- got run around for five hours- eventually landed on a train back to Stuttgart where the sight of Dorothee waiting for me was a wonderful sight to behold.

2.) The gifts I brought back for everyone have been a huge hit! This makes me happy. Now the girls can't wait to have bathtime with the new colored crayon soap I got them, Paula never lets go of her stuffed snowman, Carola pours over the Sweet Valley Kids books (though only the pictures at this point), neighbors were thrilled with the cupcake and circutboard Converse shoes for their twins, and Dorothee pronounced that I will have Alex's undying love for the sheerly obsurd amount of Hidden Valley Ranch dressing I brought back with me. So all in all a job well done.

3.) Bitchy Canadian showed her claws again the yesterday at Ballet- evidently she asked Dorothee at Ballet when I was gone "What? No more nanny?" Dorothee told her I had gone home for the holidays. And she just couldn't imagine why I would want to do that. (Evidently no one in Canada loves her and she's hiding out in Germany because she doesn't have a choice). Ugh.

4.) Cool thing. The girls attacked me when they saw me again for the first time. All I heard was the fast patter of little feet then a small pause then I was knocked to the floor by a full body slam. (okay, I'm exaggerating, but it's not far off.)

5.) Yeah, events are out of order in this count up (count down?) but I'm lazy and I'm not going to re-do it. So there! *sticks tounge out*

6.) I went with Irena into Stuttgart today, which was cool. We went to this fancy-schmancy department store. While there she asked me if I would like to get a store credit card. And as I looked around at the signs on the wall declaring that this store had brands like "Hugo Boss", "Juicy Couture" and "Ralph Lauren Polo", I looked back at her and explained that while someday that would be nice to drop the money the way she does, and that while some day it's in my future plans to be able to have a reason to get a credit card to a place that sells 329 Euro hippy dresses (I looked) and has jeans on sale for 169 Euros, My bank account is currently only stocked towards Target and thrift store -and even that is pushing it. I'm the kind of gal who is thrilled with H&M and C&A (normal department stores with "normal" prices") But thanks for asking.

Traveling Plans

Well, the family leaves on Thursday, I'm going to start traveling. I have plans to go to Hamburg fromAugust 1 to the third. Then August 8 through the 10th to Lake Constance, then round up the traveling with 11th through the 15th in Dresden. Wooo it's going to be crazy. I'll be taking lots of pictures. Don't worry, I will ... for the most part... be traveling with a group. Dresden, however, will just be me. I'm really excited. I'll have lots to tell.

This weekend I went to Stuttgart, explored, got lost, and found some really cool stuff. I'm putting together another video which I will be posting... some point this week. Well, Dorothee is due home with the girls any minute, I better go get ready. See ya'll later.

Day of a million errands and First Trip to Stuttgart

Here are some pictures of the girls and me. I like to call the swing we are in in the picture the "Big Bird Swing". I think if fits. How about you?

Today Dorothee and I went and opened a bank account, registered me in the village, went to the post office, and went to the market. Their market is awesome. (Jessica, you will LOVE their cheese selection! I told Dorothee as much.) It was a lot of fun. Sadly, Cheerios do not exist in Germany. I did find another cereal that looks sort of like Cheerios, but I haven't tried them yet. I'll let you know how they go.





FYI- The cool outfit I am wearing in the picture is one I bought today while in the city with two new friends, Lisa and Kyra. Lisa works at Paula's Kindergarten, and Kyra is a friend of Lisa's. It was a lot of fun. We went to Stuttgart where we walked down a road that is lined with fashion stores. Lots of fun. There were three H&M's along the road, and Kyra is obsessed with H&M. After a few minutes I could see why.

After we finished shopping we had to go back to Lisa's parents' house because she was going to babysit her brother's girlfriend's baby. I got to meet some really cool people and hang out. Lisa made me a tradition swabische ravioli like dish. It was really good. :)

And really cool tonight. My dad got his webcam up and running. Woo hoo! That was nice. So I got to have a nice long talk with dad. Here's a picture of him. The real him. (no, he's not playing with the camera, that's his real face ;))

I will be loading videos onto the site tomorrow as well as some pictures of where I'm staying.