Update

Guess what! I'm heading back to Munich on Thursday, and that means I'm going to start updating my blog again. Woot!

For now, I'll just say that I made 18 pints of jam and jellies today.

american sauce

On Saturday night, in a little town called Wiesen, Austria, we went to a pizza restaurant. Mostly we went because they had spare ribs on the menu. I ordered the "Spare Ribs American Style" and used my best German to say that I couldn't eat MSG. This totally confused the restaurant owners, so after lots of gesturing and such they showed me the bottle of "American Sauce." I'm not sure why it's American. Instead of BBQ sauce with tomato and honey or molasses, the sauce had cheese as the main ingredient. It sounded really weird, but after all the hubbub I would have felt bad to decline the sauce, so I had it. And, actually, it was okay!

Identity Crisis III

Since Rob didn't think it was all that silly for women to have cute little bows on all their tender little underthings, I decided to take a little revenge.

Identity Crisis I

So I've been wondering...why, oh why, do manufacturers/designers think that women need to have little tiny bows on the garments they purchase? Do they think bows will make us feel more feminine? Or maybe we'll forget we're female so the bows are there to remind us? And on bras? I mean, come on, isn't the fact that we're wearing a bra enough of a reminder? Bah. I hate bows.
Here's an idea. Do the same for menswear!

Identity Crisis II

Where is it from? It's got a Cuban plate, a Ukrainian plate (upper left) and a German plate (lower left).

Englischer Garten

Yesterday was a nice sunny day so we rode our bikes to Englischer Garten. Here are some photos. We rode 17.4 kilometers, or, about 10.5 miles. Woot! The last photo is of some surfers who "surf" in the Isar River where there are some rapids. It's really dangerous for them, they can easily hit their heads on either side of the riverbank where there are bricks piled up.

Alps

Yesterday when Rob, Stephanie and I were driving back to Munich via Italy and Austria, Rob offered up an interesting tidbit. He said that in German, Alptraum means nightmare. So, I know that in German "traum" means to dream, so does "alp" mean "bad" or "evil?" This afternoon I did some research on the roots of the word, and here is what I have learned. Some scholars think the "alp" comes from "albus," meaning "white," or "altus," meaning "high." Both these definitions say the word comes from the 16th century French and Latin. Websters 1828 dictionary offered this:

ALP, ALPS, n. [Gr. white; L. albus] A high mountain. The name, it is supposed, was originally given to mountains whose tops were covered with snow, and hence appropriately applied to the mountains of Swisserland; so that by Alps is generally understood the latter mountains. But geographers apply the name to any high mountains.

I thought the most interesting interpretation came from wikipedia. There, alps are related to elfs, and the female version of an alp is a mare. You can read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alp_(folklore). I think I like the wiki version best.