Thanksgiving

Well. We managed to celebrate us some Thanksgiving. It started out small (two families) and ended up being a sort of accidental, last minute four family extravaganza. In the end, I am very happy with how it turned out. We managed to fit and feed 9 adults and 7 kids. In our little house. Quite comfortably as well. Sweet.

In other news, the littlest is growing like a weed. Well more like a pumpkin. Much more out lately and not so much up. She's finally getting some real weight on her. She's a cute little fatty. The middlest has just gone through a growth spurt, and she has lost (for the most part) her cute little pot belly. While it is nice to see her t-shirts staying near her pants, it's sad seeing that she has become a girl and won't continue being a little girl. Sniff. The biggest just keeps on staying stick thin. He continues to look like a concentration camp victim. And yet he eats like crazy. He gets the skinny little boy syndrome from his mom's side of the family.

This next part might come as a surprise to anyone who knows me. Or appreciates growing up in the south where it only rains in the winter with the occasional short freezes and maybe a sleet storm. We have succesfully kicked off our winter sport season. We (here I really mean "I") have vowed to stay as active as possible while it sucks outside. To that end, the kids and I all have new, cheap-o ice skates, and Sarah and I each have a set of used cross country skis. We bought the skis at a winter flea market, and I managed to get skis, boots, bindings, and poles for both of us for a total of €30. Sarah's boots are too small, though, so I will have to get her new boots and bindings once the season closes out and everything is getting clearanced. She won't be able to do much skiing, though, with C in tow. I'm not really sure I will be able to coax her out even then, since it is cold out where the snow is. See, she complains about the thought of going to sit in a ski lodge with a book and a baby, but I know for a fact that she would complain just as much should I be the one to sit there and let her out to ski. ;) She doesn't quite see eye to eye with cold.

So our true season opener was a trip to the ice rink up in Waldbronn (http://www.eistreff-waldbronn.de/eistreff_waldbronn_das_ultimative_eislaufvergnuegen) a couple of weeks ago. We rented skates and suffered through a couple of hours there. At that point I decided that I wasn't going to fight rental skates any more. Up until two years ago, I had only been on the ice two or three times, so owning ice skates never crossed my mind. Since we moved here, I have been skating eight or ten times (and it looks like it will only be getting more common). All of my previous sessions have sucked, though, because I have had crappy rental skates. I have decided that the risk to my body isn't worth it. To that end, I picked up some super cheap skates a the local Lidl (think Aldi, for those who know Aldi). I have dtermined that the cheapest of cheap, discount-market ice skates is roughly a factor of 100 times better than the best of rental skates, from my experience. Wow. My feet were comfortable. My feet were warm. The blades have edges and don't move side to side as well as (or in some cases better than) they move front to back. Incroyable!

We got to use the new skates at the open-air rink here in Karlsruhe on Saturday (http://www1.karlsruhe.de/bilderbogen/weihnachtsstadt_2009/index.html). It is the largest open-air, multi-use ice facility in Germany. It is also subsidized by the local utitliy, so the whole family can skate for a pittance. Unfortunately, last weekend was pretty warm and somewhat sunny, so that pittance included about 3/4" of standing water on the rink. That was an interesting experience. While it sucked for any who didn't happend to have water proof clothing on. There were some wet kids there. Fortunately, they didn't belong to me. We planned well this time around.

So, it turns out that really warm, wet ice is sticky. I have never encountered sticky ice. Sticky ice combined with brand new skates makes for a very controlled skating experience. It was much more like roller blading and much less like ice skating. To the point that even the middlest was able to wander around a little bit without her little helper penguin ice skating support. The biggest looked like he has always owned skate. I flailed around like I always do, but with much less side to side footing flinging. The littlest ended up going shopping with the mommiest, who grumbled about it but decided she might as well fight the crowds since we were in town. We are looking forward to more time there this season.

As a bonus, I got to explain the heat transfer process used to freeze the rink because the heat exchanger piping (this would typically be referred to as the chiller piping, I guess) runs along the ground at one end of the rink, and A asked why one pipe was frozen and the other wasn't. He doesn't really get as excited about that stuff as I do. He didn't want to hear about the Carnot cycle (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnot_cycle), though. I was kinda disappointed.

I'm a daddy!

I got a baby.

I like babies. Especially because they don't have to latch onto my boobies. Sweet.

I also gave my father in law some soy milk in a brown jar and told him it was some of Sarah's colostrum. He almost had a stroke. It was awesome.

It's Getting Hectic, It's Getting Crazy, It's Getting Hectic, It's Getting Wild

Well, the final countdown has started. First we got through A's birthday. Yesterday we made it through Sarah's birthday. Mom flies in on the 25th (this countdown is a branch from the main source, so to speak) . The baby comes on the 27th. It is pretty weird talking about the new baby like we're picking up a rental car. Hopefully we planned this C-Section early enough that we don't have any emergencies. Third time's a charm, right?

 

I am pretty excited about my mom coming to visit. She hasn't ever left the country before. This should pretty well blow her mind. I am thinking I will take back roads back from Frankfurt (once we're south of Mannheim) so she can see some of the countryside and the cool little villages that you miss on the autobahn. Assuming she can keep her eyes open. It will be a long day for her and an early one for us. I am hoping to get the kids out of the door before 6:00 AM so we can get parked and meet her at customs. The kids have committed, but they don't quite understand what I mean when I say that they have to get up at 05:30. Fun fun! This will (hopefully) give Sarah some time to rest up and sleep in before the big day.

 

We are slowly coming to terms with what to expect with the whole public social insurance rigamaroll. As peasants (I can't afford private insurance for the whole family), we are relagated to the peon ward with shared rooms. In the hospital we have chosen, that usually only means two people. For a €55/day premium, we can "rent" a whole room, and I can stay there with her. I will then get to partake in the breakfast buffet and hospital meals. From what we saw when A broke his leg, that will pretty much be bread and water. It's all of the fun of prison, but we get to pay for it. Yippee!!!!

 

This is a test

I am testing posting.

 

What a stressful weekend!

We finally had good weather this weekend. We got up early on Saturday to run into town to get our hairs cut (Sarah and I had appointments). Thanks to now having a car, we are able to accomplish that 35 minute trip in 12 minutes now. It is awesome. B got a complementary bang trim because she was looking shabby and the hairdresser thought she had pretty eyes that needed to on display.

We got back home, Sarah vacuumed out the car, I made plans with a friend for a barbecue, then I packed the kids back in the car and drove to a local, public skate park. I parked a little way away (60 yards or so) because I wasn't sure where I could park. I got the kids set up on the side of the park to watch a little while, and I moved the car right next to the park. I got the kids all safety-d up and sent B out on her little Laufrad and A out on his skateboard. I was about to pull out my cell phone to take some pictures when the boy fell down. I heard a LOUD pop, and he immediately started screaming, "I BROKE MY LEG! I BROKE MY LEG!" Sure enough. I was about 40 feet away when I heard it break. It was freaky. I got the kids into the car, called Sarah to let her know we were headed her way for passports, insurance cards and doctor papers. We picked her up and raced to the hospital. Fortunately, I have been looking at the hospital's web site in preparation for the new baby, so I actually knew where I was going. We got him into the the children's emergency room and spent the next 4 hours fighting him down so he could get x-rayed, sedated and casted. He didn't end up needing surgery, but he is in a cast from mid-thigh to his toes. He had to spend the night in hospital last night. Sarah stayed with him. That was pretty tough on the family. We made it through, though, and we have him back at home. We are all completley worn out now, and we are ready to pack it in and go to bed.

Helau!

I skipped out on work for a few hours today and met the family in town for the Fasching (Carnival/Mardi Gras) parade. It was cold. Fun, but cold. There was a lot of candy for the kids. And matches. That's right, there was a club throwing out small boxes of matches. A got one. B didn't. She was distraught. We let A help us light a fire in the wood stove tonight, then I took them away. Poor guy...

Oh, and we bought a car last week. After more than year and a half without one, we finally gave in. Well, we also found one that was dirt cheap. It is way smaller than we had planned, but we couldn't beat the price, and it gets us into a vehicle so we can better search for another, larger vehicle should that become critical. We want to see how long we can manage with this one, though, so we can get finances better in hand.

Either way, being able to hop in the car and drive to the store in the rain is amazing.

New Wheels: 2001 Fiat Seicento SX 1.1L


Wow. Perspective can make things in the background look really small.


It's even more effective when you have small things in the background.


But... It has a FULL LENGTH sliding sun roof.

Aaaahhhh... Good coffee

I have a confession. I find German coffee and beer only OK. Well, let me clarify that. Most Germans own $2000 coffee machines, but they buy $2 coffee which they store open on a bright counter. And, while, Tschibo makes pretty good coffee, the Germans do something strange when they roast it, and it is all flat and bitter. And I feel that I have given it a good go. I have bought tons of brands. I have tried brewing in a coffee maker, I have tried it in my coffee press, and I usually brew into a thermal carafe with a cup top cone filter (where you just pour the hot water in by hand). It is all very mediocre.

Now on to German beer. I like beer. A lot. I have years and years of experience automating breweries. I have done taste tests with brewing departments to determine quality. I am not an expert at it, and I will be the first to admit that I can't sit and pitch the pros and cons of Yakima hops over blah blah hops or the best pitch rate for a nice pils, but I understand beer. I also know what I like. I like ale. Very hoppy IPA's really get me going. Germans don't do that. They have three types of beer: Pilsner, Export, Wheat. And they are good. But they aren't ales. And the differences between brewers really aren't that big. Enough to pick a favorite, but not enough to pass when it isn't available.

I have, however, found a workaround. There is a little brewery here called Vogelbraeu. I love their beer. They brew a few other varieties, and the quality of the ingredients makes it taste great. I don't go there very often (only a handful of times a year, maybe), but it is quite tasty.

Last summer, I stumbled on a coffee roaster. It is nice. He makes coffee like it is supposed to be made. He drastically varies the roast based on the beans he is roasting, and he knows his stuff. His prices are reasonable as well. I mean, it ain't cheap, but since it is a pain for me to get there, it isn't a frequent expense. I picked up a kilo of coffee yesterday. I got an Ethiopian (I believe) and another one. Since I can't read German hand writing, I don't really know what I got. The one that I think is an Ehtiopian is a sorta dark roast, but not too dark. It is nice and mellow, a little grassy (like every Ethiopian I have had) and quite drinkable. I got another one that is super dark roasted. Very oily. It is a little over roasted, but I like that taste, so it suits me.

I brewed up a carafe of each today. I won't be sleeping tonight, but man oh man is it worth it.

You can't polish a turd if'n yer fixin' to head home

We have been looking at automating our testing at work. Yeah, I know, blah blah blah work. Either way, what it comes down to is that our software doesn't always do what I want when you look at it as an automated testing platform. Today I was able to use the phrase "crap in crap out" and then follow it with "you can't polish a turd". All while speaking German. It was pretty amazing.

Well, you need to sun if you are going to be snow blind...

I went skiing for the first time on Saturday. I have a friend who skates. His son has traditional cross country skis. I borrowed a classic set from a colleague, tossed the boy in the back seat and headed into the mountains with them. It was about an hour drive. It was also raining. I had some sunglasses with me to help keep my eyes right. I left them in the car. Not a lot of snow blindness to be had in a steady drizzle.

We rented skis for the boy. A whopping €7. Trail fees were€5. Nice.

Vojta and his boy clipped in and took off. A and I had to fumble around with getting him clipped in (he had different bindings than I did). Then we scooted off. We did ok for the first 100 meters or so. Then we had to cross the bottom of a ski slope. I found my self sliding sideways down the slope. I got that fixed. Barely. Aiden lost it on the far side of the slope. It took me a few minutes to figure out how to get my skis around him and stay upright while lifting him onto his feet. We got across the slope next to that one, and we were golden. From there on, it was groomed cross country track. And downhill for a couple of kilometers. At the bottom we turned around. About 200 meters from the turn around, A decided he was done. That carried on for the next kilometers and involved me carrying his poles for a while and him walking and carrying his skis. That part only lasted about 15 feet. He put the skis back on at that point, and starting "jogging" like he should have been doing and did great. 800 meters from the end of the trial, he took his poles back (after being scolded for being surley and not listening to advice) and put it all together. He did great.

The verdict this morning was "...half boring, half ok. I want to try it again, but I want to ride those things instead." That would translate to, it was ok, but I want to try skiing downhill next time and then riding the lifts uphill.

Sarah hit a car today

Sarah is bad ass. When she sees cars coming, she hits that shit. Well, sometimes she locks up her brakes on an ice patch, and B in the trailer makes her fall, and then she slides under the back of the car. But then she gets up and manages to hold off freaking out until the driver leaves, and I answer the phone. After that, though, she gets B to Kindergarten and then paints a freaking wall at a friend's house before getting A from school at lunch time.

Punk as fuck.

She isn't even whining now that I am home.

Hey, Gramps...

I am an old man. Sneaky, but old. I went over to a Hungarian colleague's house for dinner with most of my team from work on Saturday. To make sure I wouldn't get destroyed, I made sure to drink a big bottle (750ml) of water on the way there. Sure enough, as soon as I show up, they offer me a couple of samples of some native schnapps. One was a peach and honey schnapps. It was pretty good. Really smooth thanks to the honey (I think). The other was a kräuter liquor (think Jägermeister). It was spicy. I then talked a little smack and made fun of some people and got myself into a little more trouble with a couple of more shots. What they hadn't seen, though, was me gunning another liter and a half of water in between to help thin everything out. We then sat down to eat some really good gulasch on boiled potatoes. It was awesome. I ate two huge helpings because a) it was damn tastey and b) because it was a good road block to me being drunk. I don't like that situation as much as I used to. Even more so now that I have two kids that like me to get up early. So I managed to do a pretty good job of looking like a jaded, experienced drinker while actually having not had nearly as much to drink over the last year as was previously the case.

I also fixed their kitchen faucet while dinner was cooking, and we were all standing in the kitchen drinking beers and BS-ing. Really. I get fidgety. It seemed to be a good way to use up some energy.

Then we went dancing. That is funny business. I really am not much of a dancer. I am way too emo. I tap my hand on my chest or my leg and nod my head when I go see a show. But by golly I danced Saturday. It's easy when you are in a club full of fools. As a rule, the average joe can't dance. At all.

I managed to get home without having done too much damage to myself. Outside of getting to bed really late, I was in good shape today. I also managed to survive that weird situation of hanging out and having fun with a bunch of people who work for me. I haven't tried that yet. And I am by no means that guy who makes sure people know who is the boss. I try to stay out of the way of their work until I have to get involved and approve a vacation or intervene with a personality problem or something. It worked, though. A good dose of humility and a willingness to try new things seemed to be the answer.

Who are you?

This is going to be short. Live with it.

After three months, I have decided to give this a go again. I don't know how it will turn out. I figure that the crappy weather outside and a desire to not be riding my bike on a trainer in the living room will help.

I have started playing my guitars again. I took a week off last week while the boy was on fall break. I picked a couple of songs that he likes to learn and went from there. He is really keen on For The Widows In Paradise, For The Fatherless In Ypsilanti by Sufjan Stevens.



He also came across a game online with Rock You Like a Hurricane by the Scorpions as the theme song. So I had to learn that as well. I am afraid I didn't go with the solo. I felt it was enough to crush out that rhythm and watch the kids run around singing along with me. That right there is why you have kids.

Freetime

We've been swimming at the local lake lately. Not the one with naked people this year. We found a better one with more beach, fewer naked old ladies, and lots of kid-friendly shallow water. Here are some pics.






The caravan coming back to shore.






Here's a shot of Aiden at the park near one of our favorite restaurants. He's in his usual water feature attire. Notice the sweet new haircut.

Friseur

I gave Aiden his first hohawk [sic] today. I caught crazy Hell for it, but if you saw how happy it made him, you would have done it, too. I will post pictures soon. The batteries in the camera died today, and I had to recharge our backups. We've apparently misplaced the two other sets that I made sure to buy as well.

We went for a swim today. There's a lake a few miles from here that has a nice little beach and is shallow for about 75 or 100 feet out or so. The kids cleaned their room up today, and I thought that that would be a nice reward. So I hooked the trailer up to the bike and towed them there. Sarah got home from shopping just in time to go with us as well. Aiden learned to float and kick today. He is floundering a little less each time we go. And a week of sun has made a world of difference in the temperature of the water. Fo' real. After my ride next weekend, we should have a lot more time to lounge at the lake in the evenings. I am quite excited about the prospect.

Josh is dead. Long live Josh!

Well, I have pretty much laid the old Josh to rest. He simply isn't here anymore.

I rode my first century today. Yep. 100 miles. And I did it alone and unsupported. Somewhat unplanned actually. Not in the sense the I was lost and had to do it, but in the sense that I haven't been training for it, but realized that I could probably pull it off anyway. So I got up at 5:30 this morning, ate a bowl of oatmeal with a banana and 3 huge scoops of sugar in it, loaded up a bunch of energy bars and gels, filled up some bottles with sports drinks, grabbed a 100 oz. Camel Back and headed out around 6:45. I rode down tons of gravel roads. I don't really like that on my road bike, but you gotta do what you gotta do. It went well, though. Of course, 40 of the last 50 miles was all crazy headwind. I also had to tool around Neureut some because I was about 5 miles short of the goal as I rolled back into town. That was annoying. And insanely boring. I toughed it out, though. I am unbelievably proud of myself.



A shot down Grabener Allee. This dude runs for dozens of miles from the castle north to Graben. And it is mostly gravel after the first few miles. That equals friction.



There are about a bazillion storks around here. There's actually a family of them right around the corner from our house as well. The "storklings" are now old enough to fly, and we see them flying around in a group overhead at the park a lot.



There's my big boy and my, uhhh... Navy SEAL? It's hard to figure out what that little freak show is going to bring whenever she comes through that door.

OK. I feel unbelievably good for 7 hours in the saddle and a hundred miles under my wheels, but my ass is packing up to an early evening in bed.

Holy crap is it hard to sleep here

It is mid-June. We've been lucky, and it has been mild, so the lack of A/C hasn't been too much of a liability for sleep. The sun, however, is killing me. Briana got up this morning to go to the bathroom around 5:45. It was full daylight outside. Turns out, the sun had been up for about 20 minutes or so. That is pretty typical, though. It is only about 15 minutes earlier than in St. Louis this time of year. The end of the day, however, is much later. The sun is setting around 9:34 right now. St. Louis says the sun is sinking around 8:28. That's right. That comes to almost an hour and a half more daylight. It doesn't really sound like much, but it is a pain in the ass to get wound down and fall asleep when it is still light enough to read by sunlight at 10:00 PM. In a month or so it will be light late enough that Sarah and I will be able to each separately do our training after I get off of work. We'll have enough light that I can ride my bike until 10:15 or 10:30 without lights and not have to worry about getting hit or pulled over by the police. I can't imagine how people survive any further north.

Wow. One whole year.

Well, as of today, we've been in Germany for a year now. It sure doesn't feel like it. Not like the last time, at least. I think we owe a lot of that to the kids. They make time here a lot easier. We also have a lot more to do. We are always going to play somewhere or going to someone's house to visit. We have also picked up some personal goals for ourselves that make the time go by. We are working our way back towards financial freedom, so each huge payment comes way too quickly. Sarah has been busting ass learning a new language. She has spent a lot of time towards that goal. I have been training so I can keep up with a friend who is competing in the Iron Man this year. That makes weeks whiz by for sure.

So what else has this year seen? Aiden can pretty much speak German without any issues. I would say his German is about 70 to 80% as good as his English. He is managing complex sentences and expressions now, but his verb conjugation still suffers. Of course, it's the same with his English. He has gotten good enough that I have started picking up how to say things from him. He has also gotten to the point where he A) doesn't get upset when people come over that he might have to speak German to and B) he readily switches to German with bilingual kids who don't want to speak English. Briana has finally begun to speak German to a point. That was quite a hurdle. She is using German about 10 to 15% of the time at home, I would say, and almost all of the time in Kindergarten. Around us, she is still just inserting German words into her English for the most part, but she has begun to throw simple German sentences in as well. Her comprehension is just about 100%. She has finally quit getting angry with me when I speak German to her. And she will respond (albeit in English) or act accordingly to boot. There is a rumor floating around that Sarah can speak German, too. I actually witnessed it last week. I was quite impressed. I figure that she is just a couple of months of practice away from being fairly comfortable. Now all she has to do is find someone who will quit switching immediately to English when she speaks (I am just as guilty simply because I forget to keep speaking German when I am at home).

Both kids have been growing like weeds. I am expecting another growth spurt soon. They have begun eating as much as I eat during a day. That is pretty impressive for their little tummies. Aiden has gotten pretty soild on his bike. His stamina and enjoyment skyrocketed once he got stable enough for me to raise the seat up and get his form a little better. It makes me cringe to watch kids learning to ride with their knees all up their noses. We are going to start working on bike handling skills once I get a new seat post for my single speed. We have done some test rides with B on Aiden's bike (before I raised the seat), and she's close. She rode a block or two before finally veering into some bushes as she realized that I was actually lying to her and not really holding on any more. So we are looking to make that happen in the near future. I have also seen some really cool "hang your kid's bike on yours" solution here. I bought a cheap one as a test. The device sucks, but the concept is sound. Aiden and I can really move along and we can go a lot further. More importantly, when we need to maneuver through or around people on the bike paths, I just let him pedal so we don't move too fast. It's sneaky yet surprisingly effective.

Other than that, things are pretty routine. It is amazing how quickly you adapt to a foreign place. Outside of all of the walking and biking and the foreigners ;), it's a hell of a lot like living at home...

The kids are becoming more German

Well, it is starting to happen. The kids are becoming more German by the day. We went to a restaurant last night to have dinner and some beers with some friends (one of them had a birthday Wednesday). The plan was to sit outside in the Biergarten and let the kids play at the park across the bike path. Unfortunately, we have a weather front tormenting us, and it started storming like crazy right before we left. We got to the restaurant (after arguing with Briana about whether or not the last tram we were on, which was one of the really old ones, was actually a bus. She wouldn't buy in to it being a tram). We were trying to decide what to get the kids to eat. We were talking to Aiden about getting him some fish sticks. He said yes, and then looked at me quizzically and asked me what fish sticks were. So I said "Fischstäbchen". Which brought an obvious look of comprehension and an, "Oh, I love fish sticks." That is really weird.

It quit raining by the time we had finished dinner, but the restaurant didn't want to start service outside, so we paid up and took the rest of our beer out with us to chit chat where it was much cooler (gotta love a country without A/C) and we could keep an eye on the kids. My friend Michael had brought his son (who is about to be 10, but is pretty small for his age) with him. Now that Aiden is speaking German, they get along quite well. We were able to have a pretty relaxing end to the day. We are planning on meeting them there again on Sunday afternoon. It is supposed to be dry tomorrow, so it should make for a nice afternoon/evening.

I went and got a haircut today. My hair is finally long enough that Sarah couldn't really tell it had been cut. I can. The back grows pretty fast. Or at least, the back is the most noticeably in need of cutting first. I had gone to a cheap place the last couple of times, but they just weren't quite cutting it. Pun intended. I paid a little over twice as much today, but she seems to have done exactly what I wanted. Which is pretty impressive considering my pathetic command of hair cutting German. The most important part was keeping everything long while trying to make it look like the back half of my head was part of the rest of my head. I was getting powerful close to looking like I had a mullet while having long hair all over. That is quite a feat, I admit, but not really one I want to be known for. We'll see how it turns out over the next few days. Hopefully it is good enough. I only get my hair cut once every few months, so I am hoping I have found someone who has done a good enough job that I can go even longer.

To continue on the hair cut front, I bought some clippers today. Sarah has been using my beard trimmer to cut Aiden's hair. My beard trimmer sucks. So I got something that is better designed for it. Aiden was pretty insistent that we cut his hair like his friend Patrice's. We can't go quite that short (he apparently has none), but I did go over it enough to get him into the army at the least. He is pretty stoked.

OK, to finish this off, here are some pictures. Enjoy it, Mom.



Here's Aiden jumping on a trampoline at a festival.



This is another one from our visit to the castle park while Sarah's folks were in town. This is the water feature the kids can play with.



This is another one of the visit to the castle park. These ping pong tables are all over Karlsruhe. They are at enough of the parks that we go to that I broke down and bought some paddles and balls. We have actually had quite a lot of fun playing.



This is a shot of the kids with their friends Vojta (behind B) and Michelle, Vojta's little peanut of a sister.



Here's a shot of us sitting around the table after the races. That's Vojta, the guy who makes me ride so much, in the white Iron Man cap.

Didn't need the dead people today...

We went for our ride. We rode about 50 miles. I got a flat. I haven't flatted in 6 years. Fortunately, I had a new tube and a quickflate cartridge. That is a really good thing, because we were somewhere in France, and I don't speak me a lot of French anymore. I mean, I can conjugate when I need to, but I'm not real good at building sentences, and I recently discovered that whenever I get hung up in French, I tend to inadvertently substitute German. Sometimes that works in Alsace, but you can't count on it. The new tube lasted until I got home. So did the water bottles I took with me. I'll have to hunt for deadpeoplewater next time.

Aiden helps me compose songs. I was wandering around singing a song about going poop yesterday. I got hung up at one point, and he suggested using the words "plop plop." Yes indeed. I mean, you know he's got to be awesome. He's got half of my genetic material. He and B are shaping up nicely. I am very proud of myself and my übergenes.

And lastly, here some pics from my cell phone.

These are of the wild poppies that are in bloom.




Here's a shot of the kids watching some people play bocce by the castle. Notice that B has her elbows propped on her bars like a pro.



Here's a shot of Sarah and the kids walking along a river in Strasbourg, France.

Silly man, you get water from dead people.

Not too long ago, I was complaining about the one downside to riding in Germany on Sunday. Everything is closed. As in, everything. About 30% of the gas stations are open. Usually a convenience store at a train station. That is about it. That means that it is crazy hard to, say, find a gas station where you can find water while on a bike, since you aren't usually on a main highway. That is important when you only have 1.5 liters of water, and you are on a 6 hour bike ride. I was complaining about this to my landlord and his wife. They are part of a triathlon club (yes, I seem to have surrounded myself with triathletes who also happen to be training for Iron Man races). After lamenting the fact that on a recent ride I got really dehydrated and almost didn't make it home because I couldn't find an open gas station where I could buy more water, my neighbor's wife looks at me and says, "we always stop at graveyards." I just looked at her quizzically. My first thought was, "OK, that's creepy." After a delayed, uncomfortable pause (during which I was reviewing my translation of the sentence), she followed up with, "There are faucets in almost all cemeteries where you can get drinking water." Who would have thought. Turns out, she's right. I was out on a 75 mile ride on Friday (we had a holiday). We had ridden about 25 miles, and we were facing about 10 miles of ugly climbing, and I had two empty bottles. We stopped at a bus stop to eat some energy gel, and I happened to notice a very manicured, vine covered stone wall across the street. Sure enough, it was a cemetery. Now, I don't know if this is an American thing or if it is a me thing, but I feel pretty weird about this kind of situation. But, I feel even worse about passing out 40 miles from home in a foreign country. And, as they say, when in Rome... Now, she also warned me that I needed to make sure it was drinking water. As a rule, when you can't drink running water that you find in Germany it is posted as such. I, personally, am not a fan of the safety concept of mark it unsafe. I think that things that aren't marked should be assumed unsafe. That way, you aren't drinking unsafe water because the sign fell off. And to make it more confusing, sometimes drinking water is explicitly marked. Anyway, I go into the cemetery, and sure enough, off to the left of the gate was a faucet with a row of watering cans. Unmarked of course. I decided that a few weeks of beaver fever would be better than dying by a ski resort in Germany, so I filled 'er up, as it were. I am still not dead. I haven't spent the whole day on the toilet. So I guess she was right.

I felt it so inspiring that I am going to follow Friday's 75 mile ride with 50 or so tomorrow. Hopefully the rule holds true in France. We'll find out.