Friday Shuffle - Don't Promise What You Can't Deliver Edition

Once in a while I have to remind myself yet again that there's a reason why I don't knit things as gifts for others. Let me correct that. I knit virtually everything as a gift for another - I just don't knit them as a specific gift for a specific event or holiday. That's because I'm almost always doomed to either not finishing it on time or picking a project that's so irksome to knit that I'll give up in the middle of it.

B's aunt - the one that I switch from being very grateful for to her being the one I'd like to strangle - is one hell of a hint dropper. The other week when she was here visiting she gave me a wink wink, nudge nudge that she's not only like a pair of hand knit socks but she'd like a cowl. Or snood. Or wimple. Or smoke ring. Whatever you prefer to call it. One of those tube-like scarves you wear around your neck and then can pull up over your head like a hood.

Socks are easy to dole out. I tend to have a supply of hand knit socks at the ready. A cowl is different. I didn't let on like me knitting a cowl for her would be possible but after she left and after I kicked around the idea a little I thought that I'd have enough time to knit for her a simple lace cowl for Christmas. She's a pain in the ass to find a gift for anyway so this project would save me all sort of frustrating and fruitless shopping trips.

I found a simple pattern I like. I ordered the yarn - very nice, high end yarn. Even ordered new circular needles because A. I didn't have circular needles short enough for the project and B. I never know where in the hell my circular needles get off to anyway.

I've started twice now to knit this cowl and twice now I've ripped it out. It's not a difficult pattern to knit but it's one that can be easily screwed up by failing to do one increase or one decrease. And goodness knows I despise fixing an error in lace knitting. I despise it even more when I've got 132 stitches in a round to hunt through to find the error.

Finding another pattern to knit - one that's not a lace pattern - seems to be a good alternative but it's got to be one that's going to be able to use this yarn with these needles. I could go with other yarn but these needles will be a must since I really don't have any circular needles that aren't too long to accommodate a cowl that's about 22 inches in diameter. So far I'm not having any luck so the other alternative - make 22 stitch markers, stop whimpering and just knit the lace - seems more likely.

On to other things.

It's likely passe and cheesy to do an iPod shuffle on Fridays but my friend, Jane, likes it. And if I can't give Aunt Annoying her cowl for Christmas the least I can do is give Jane her Friday Shuffles. Plus y'all need to meet my new iPod, Bastian. Let's go.

1. She's A Beauty - The Tubes
2. Fallin' & Flyin' - Jeff Bridges and Colin Farrell
3. Affection - The Lost Boys
4. I Drive All Night - Roy Orbison
5. The Belgian Tune - Blackbeard's Tea Party
6. Queen Bitch - David Bowie
7. Mrs. Vandebilt - Paul McCartney & Wings
8. (What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love And Understanding - Die Toten Hosen
9. Town Without Pity - Gene Pitney
10. Selfmachine - I Blame Coco
    

Friday Shuffle - Foiled Again Edition

I was all revved up to show you pictures of the flat I won't be moving to but that fell through for today. The lady from the rental company was short handed at the office and couldn't leave so we're rescheduled for early Monday morning. I realize it seems ridiculous to be all hepped up about seeing a flat I won't live in but there is a bit of logic to my madness. First I'll get to see what the flats in that style of building are like in case one becomes free in a building where B can access the elevator. Second I need to talk to the rental company lady about getting me on any waiting lists for suitable buildings. And third, I'm a masochist. I want to see how nice this flat is and then whine about it for a few hours. Certainly not longer than a day. Honest.

Let's shuffle.

1. No Reply - The Beatles
2. For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her - Simon & Garfunkel
3. Sing - Travis
4. The Loving - XTC
5. Hold On - Sarah McLachlan
6. Man On The Moon - REM
7. Lyla - Oasis
8. The Pharoahs - Neko Case
9. I Want To Know - The Mavericks
10. Swoon - Maria Doyle Kennedy
    

Friday Shuffle - Lifesize and Orange Edition

I'm sure I've mentioned a couple seventy-jillion times that I absolutely dig Abraham Lincoln. While he was flawed and did some things during his life and during his presidency that could and did raise eyebrows, he was a master politician and accomplished the feat of preserving the union. We think the United States is polarized now? At least half of us hasn't broken off and declared itself to be a sovereign nation.

And macabre as it is, Abraham Lincoln also had a...well...an interesting death. Of course I believe it was a terrible tragedy for his family and for the nation because who knows how far back his death set back the south (Welcome to Revenge! I mean, Reconstruction!) but I'm pretty good at compartmentalizing and I can look at the assassination of Lincoln on its own. It fascinates me no end and always will.

Abraham Lincoln during his life was intelligent, determined, witty, eloquent, compassionate and a brilliant politician. However there was one thing he wasn't - Lincoln was never a giant block of Wisconsin cheddar cheese. At least he wasn't until today:



My friend, Mary Ann, who knows of my love of all things presidential and my special fascination with Lincoln pointed me yesterday to an article in the Washington Post that said a sculpture of Lincoln made entirely of cheddar cheese would be on display in Washington on, I believe, Constitution Avenue. For just three hours because cheese in Washington in July gets pretty skanky pretty fast and this cheese would later be divided up and given away. It was then that I began to lament that I no longer lived outside of DC and could not go see the Abe-as-Commander-in-Cheese sculpture. But I happen to have amazing friends. One of my amazing friends, Lorrie, who is so thoughtful and generous and who also is fortunate enough to live in DC, took a bit of time this afternoon to go see this (literally) cheesy sculpture and get me a few photos. Tell me that's not a great friend.

One time of year that I get homesick is when the 4th of July rolls around. The 4th is one of my favorite holidays. I dig all those parades and picnics and I really love the fireworks. I love my country. I may live abroad but I will never forget that I am an American and I am grateful for all that my country has provided me. Even presidents in cheddar.

On to the shuffle.

1. Reflections - Diana Ross & The Supremes
   
2. To Be Young (Is To Be Sad, Is To Be High) - Ryan Adams
3. Bright Young Thing - Albert Hammond, Jr.
4. Creep - Radiohead
5. Panic Switch - Silversun Pickups
6. Two Halves - My Morning Jacket
7. Angel - Adam Ant
8. All Over You - Live
9. Daughter - Loudon Wainwright III
10. Swoon - Maria Doyle Kennedy

Friday Shuffle - Already Said My Goodbyes Edition

Like many of you I've been watching a lot of coverage of the death of Michael Jackson. I was shocked but not particularly surprised. Actually it would have been surprising for Michael Jackson to not die before becoming an old man. I don't think many could really feature a seventy-five year-old Michael Jackson.

I loved the Jackson 5 starting back when I was just a little kid. I loved Michael when he released Off the Wall and I thought Thriller was brilliant. And it's at that point where I stop. To me his subsequent music didn't have the same quality. Every song seemed to be filled with that hiccupy phrasing he used and all those annoying "Heehee!"s he'd throw in. Each album would be just a pale copy of the last pale copy. After Thriller I never spent another penny on his music except to replace in CD or MP3 what I'd lost in vinyl. Michael Jackson stopped being relevant to me sometime in 1984.

So when I heard that Michael Jackson had passed I didn't have the reaction that I'd miss him or his music. I have his music - the music he made that mattered to me. And the Michael Jackson I grew up with and loved faded from view about twenty-five years ago. I'd already lost an icon of my youth back in my youth.

I'm not sure what to think of the post-Thriller Michael. The duality of his personality is hard for me to understand. He seems to have been used by his family and yet remained close to them. He talked about how he didn't have a normal childhood but didn't seem to be letting his own children have a normal one either. He was known for being a kindhearted man who was compassionate and caring and yet he was accused of doing heinous things to young kids. If what he was accused of doing is true then it's repugnant and yet he truly didn't seem to get that anything he did was wrong. I don't mean that he was deep-down evil or he didn't care about consequences. I mean he just didn't get it. He just didn't seem to get what the real world was like. I have pity for the man while at the same time I have irritation at him.

I'm sorry for those fans of Michael Jackson who are mourning now. I'm sorry for his family and I'm sorry for his friends who will miss him. I wish I could feel sadder about this but I don't. I suppose it's because I did my mourning decades ago and the Michael Jackson who passed yesterday was a stranger to me.

Let's shuffle.

1. Heavy Cross - Gossip
2. Guitar Town - Steve Earle
3. You Never Know - Wilco
4. Her Diamonds - Rob Thomas
5. Sundown - Gordon Lightfoot
6. Constructive Summer - The Hold Steady
7. Golden Skans - Klaxons
8. This Ole House - Bette Midler
9. Leaving On A Jet Plane - Peter, Paul & Mary
10. Somebody To Love - Queen
    

Friday Shuffle - Music from Unexpected Sources Edition

I'd planned on letting y'all in on what I've been doing for the past three weeks but since it's Friday let's just stick to a musical theme. I'll bear my soul next week.

I live smack in the middle of the city and my flat is very close to the university. It's the tradition here that when someone earns their doctorate degree that the person being honored rides on a barrel being pulled on a wagon while someone beats a drum and the honoree's friends parade along behind. We hear the drum beating fairly often and when we do either I or B will comment to the other, "There's a new doctor in town!".

When I heard the drum beats today I noticed that they were just a bit too rhythmic to be a regular new doctor's parade and there were some definite sounds of brass instruments being played so I tugged on some shoes, grabbed my camera and went outside to investigate and found this:



It was a jazz band from the Sax'n Anhalt music school (the state I live in is Sachsen-Anhalt so you can appreciate the play on the spelling) out across the street from my flat. They were out in front of a cabaret - I don't know if they were hired by the cabaret or it was just providence that brought them there but they were excellent. I sat there on a bench across the street from them as they played to the gathered crowd. They'd walk around the people as they played and get down on the level with the little kids and everyone loved them. I sat with my downstairs neighbor and her two little girls and watched the kids dance. Know what's so great about living in the middle of the city? A mini jazz concert can break out at any time.

My other tale of music today took me back in time about thirty-five years. A few years ago I wrote about elementary school and the fantastic music teacher we had who taught a bunch of kids to sing everything from Peter, Paul and Mary to the Cowsills to Manfred Mann to the music of Jesus Christ Superstar and Fiddler on the Roof. A few of us who went to school together have found one another again on Facebook and joined a group for those who attended our elementary school. Naturally a big part of the conversation within that group has centered on our beloved music teacher and she found us again as well and joined us. Those of us she taught were anxious to friend her and on her Facebook wall are lots of messages from folks who remember her fondly. Virtually every one of them thanks her for making music into something that has stayed an important part of their lives. Mrs. A is 70 years old now, lives in New England and still plays piano in a hotel lounge on weekends. She reports that many of those songs she taught us are part of her play list and the patrons often tell her they have their own fond memories of those tunes.

Our elemenary school choruses made a couple albums and I remember we were so proud of them. I'd lost mine years ago - in fact the hundreds of vinyl albums I had are gone forever...don't ask - but my old friend, Elaine, wrote to me and said she still had hers and she'd put the parts our class' chorus sang on CD for me. It arrived today and I played it immediately. Some of the songs I ddin't remember especially well but some are so burned into my brain that I could sing along with them without missing a word even though I haven't heard those songs in thirty years. The performances didn't sound perfect - the record was recored in the school's cafeteria so you can imagine what the acoustics were like - and there were all sorts of notes we didn't quite reach. I laughed at how crummy we sounded sometimes but we really weren't all that bad. And for what we may have lacked in pitch sometimes we made up for in enthusiasm. I remember that making these records was one of the highlights of our elementary school years and rehearing them now brings back memories I forgot I had.

Time to shuffle.

1. Clerkenwell Polka - Madness
2. Over It - Dinosaur Jr.
3. Relax - Frankie Goes to Hollywood
4. Rock Lobster - The B-52's
5. Heavy Cross - Gossip
6. For Emma - Bon Iver
7. Tiger Mountain Peasant Song - Fleet Foxes
8. One Day Like This - Elbow
9. Summertime Blues - Alan Jackson
10. Loreley - Blackmore's Night
    

Friday Shuffle - Swing and Sway Edition

Oops! You caught me. I was absolutely not paying attention and didn't realize how late in the evening it is. Y'all were expecting a shuffle and I was busy listening out the window to the folks on the street coming from the beer tent that's set up at the end of our block. That only means one thing - it's Pentecost weekend and that means it's Magdeburg's annual Stadtfest - city festival.

I look forward to Stadtfest every year. It's a bit like the Christmas market without all the Christmassy thing so it satisfies me until the actual Christmas market opens. There are shows on various stages spread around the downtown area where I live. There are rides and sale stands and of course lots and lots of yummy food that you probably shouldn't eat but do anyway because it's a festival, dang it all! I believe the root of the word "festival" is Latin and means "eat lots o' crap". And of course the Stadtfest wouldn't be complete without the beer tent - an enormous tent set up with tables and benches where folks gather to drink beer, eat more junk and listen to an enormous amount of German Volksmusik from a band from Bavaria. Music that's so hokey and ridiculous sounding when you first enter the tent but becomes fabulous and you find yourself clapping along or linking arms and swaying with your seatmates as you drink more and more beer. For years the beer tent's location would change. Some years it was down near the cathedral. Some years it was down by the river. Finally they figured out where it worked best and as luck would have it, the place it works best is at the end of my block. Just a few hundred meters walk and I'm there. Even better, just a few hundred meters walk and I'm back home to a clean bathroom.

How much one enjoys the Stadtfest depends a lot on how the weather is. The worst thunderstorm I've ever seen since I've lived here occurred when I was at the Stadtfest. One minute it was a warm, muggy late afternoon and the next minute the winds howled, the clouds puked rain and I was in fear of being electrocuted or having a tree limb whack me on the head. Three years ago when my sister and her family were visiting it was dreadfully damp and much too cool. It didn't slow us down any though. We hung out in the beer tent and drank and sang and laughed. It was the year when the band played "My Way" and my sister gave us a stunning (read: drunken) vocal interpretation of that song. I wish my sister remembered it because it's burned into my brain. I've never seen her so uninhibited but that's what happens when you're a little plowed and you're in a country where you don't live.

It's supposed to be somewhat warm this weekend - in the upper 60's - and hopefully not rainy so we're planning on getting Burkhard outside and down the street to the Stadtfest. We'll weave our way through the crowds, maybe watch a stage show or two, get some junk to eat and then we'll make our way to the beer tent. 'Cause it just ain't Stadtfest unless you hear the music.

Speaking of - let's shuffle.

1. Hungry Heart - Bruce Springsteen
2. Hidden Shame - Elvis Costello
3. Kiss And Tell - Alexander Rybak
4. That Look You Give That Guy - Eels
5. Build Me Up Buttercup - The Foundations
   
6. C'mon C'mon - Von Bondies
7. For What It's Worth - Placebo
8. Come And Get Your Love - Redbone
9. Cruel To Be Kind - Nick Lowe
10. She's A Rainbow - The Rolling Stones
    

Friday Shuffle - Not What I Expected Edition

I was up to my elbows in taking a grilled chicken off the bone. It's a job that fairly grosses me out and I try not to think of what exactly I'm doing less I lose my appetite for chicken completely. Anyway, there I was with my hands covered in chicken grease, seasoning from the chicken beneath my nails, fairly nauseated from performing this rather disgusting task when I could hear B holler from the living room something that sounded like "fire" and "Fernseher" - the German word for television.

There were a couple things that caught my attention immediately. B nearly never mixes English and German words together in the same sentence - I'm the one that pulls that stunt. Second, B was hollering pretty loud which is very seldom. He has little control over his diaphragm so yelling is very difficult for him and he saves it for emergencies only. It can literally exhaust him to scream. The whole combination of yelling and mixing languages and of course hearing the word "fire" told me that I had to move and right now. As fast as I could I scurried from the kitchen to the living room to see the flames I'd find shooting from the television we've had for three weeks.

No flames. Just the regional news.

"What's going on?"

"I told you. Freya's on TV. Look! There she is again."

I stood there with grease coated hands and watched Freya tell the reporter why she as a young person wanted to run for political office now. Freya is the 22 year old daughter of our friend Kirsten and Freya is running for city council. She's been involved with the CDU political party for a few years now and this is her first time running for office. Anyway, when the report was over I turned to B and said "You know you really scared the daylights out of me! I thought the TV was on fire!"

"No, no! I was saying Freya was on the Fernseher."

"And you know what I was thinking when I was rushing in here thinking the TV was on fire? Not that you were in danger or that the TV was only three weeks old. I wasn't even thinking that it likely wouldn't be possible for the sound to be on the TV. I'm actually embarrassed to tell you what I was thinking as I ran in here."

"What?"

"All I could think was 'I'm going to ruin the TV touching it with my chicken grease covered hands'."

"We all have our priorities."

Time to shuffle.

1. Words Of Love - The Beatles
2. Night By Night - Michael Stanley Band
3. Katherine Hit Me - Franz Ferdinand
4. Hard To Beat - Hard-Fi
5. Burnin' For You - Blue Öyster Cult
6. I Was Zapped By The Lucky Super Rainbow - The Flaming Lips
7. Your Rocky Spine - Great Lake Swimmers
8. The Loving - XTC
9. Hey Now - Tenfold Loadstar
10. The Lark Ascending - Sir Adrian Boult, Hugh Bean & New Philharmonia Orchestra
    

Friday Shuffle - Who Needs a Calendar? Edition

Hmmmm. Nearly forgot to write today as all day I've thought it was Saturday. B and I tend to live on a pretty regular schedule so when anything pops up to throw off that schedule, I'm hopeless to remember what day of the week it is. Have an unexpected appointment crop up or cancel a weekly event and I'm screwed. All day yesterday I thought it was Tuesday and all day today I've thought it was Saturday. Even flipped on the TV mid-afternoon to watch the soccer matches. It's not going to get any better next week either since the doctor's appointment we normally have every fourth Thursday will be on Tuesday instead and Thursday is a holiday here so I'm sure that day I'll think it's Sunday.

And that, my friends, is what's passing this week as current events.

You shuffle. I'm going to go have a Magnum bar. Ice cream doesn't care what day it is.

1. Peeled Apples - Manic Street Preachers
2. Spaceman - The Killers
3. Baby I'm A Fool - Melody Gardot
4. Gracie - Ben Folds
5. Sadness Soot - Grant-Lee Phillips
6. Silent Sigh - Badly Drawn Boy
7. See No Evil - Television
8. Everybody Loves You Now - Billy Joel
9. Pictures Of Lily - The Who
10. There Goes My Heart - The Mavericks

Friday Shuffle - 800 Years Edition

I love Magdeburg's cathedral. It sits in the middle of the city and Magdeburg is so flat that regardless of what direction you enter the city you can see it.

Today at the cathedral was the beginning of months of scheduled celebrations to commemorate the 800th anniversary of the laying of its cornerstone. On the same spot was originally an abbey built of wood which later became the city's cathedral but it was destroyed in a fire in 1207. Two years later in 1209 they began to rebuild the cathedral and it took about 300 years to complete.

In the summer when it's horribly hot outside it's lovely to go into the cathedral. The walls are all thick stone and it's always cool inside and I always feel comforted when I'm there, regardless of the time of year. There's a new pipe organ - the original had been completely destroyed during the 1945 bombing of Magdeburg - that's absolutely gorgeous. The baptismal font is huge - I understand it likely was originally to be a fountain or was a fountain - and is said to be thousands of years old. In one corner of the cathedral is an Ehrenmal - an honor memorial - that depicts the sadness and misery of war and candles for peace are lit at its base. The graves of Holy Roman Emperor Otto I and his first wife, Editha are there. And one of my favorite things at the cathedral is outside of the north entrance to the transept - the sculptures of the ten virgins from the Bible - five wise virgins who are smiling and happy because they brought their lamp oil to the wedding and five foolish virgins who are miserable and crying because they didn't bring their oil and have to miss the wedding feast. Their expressions are so compelling and I could study them for hours.

Over the centuries the cathedral has seen many changes and uses. Originally it was a Catholic cathedral but years after Martin Luther preached at other churches in Magdeburg, the priests at the cathedral coverted to Protestantism and it's still a Protestant cathedral. During the Thirty Years War the virtually only survivors of the slaughter of Magdeburg in 1631 were the the 4000 people who hid out in the cathedral and survived because the head priest of the cathedral, on his knees, begged General Tilly for the people to be spared. For a while the cathedral was used as a fortress and even for a time as a horse barn and sheep pen. It's been looted, had all it's windows smashed, been bombed and caught on fire, but 800 years after its construction began, it's still there. The renovation and repair of the cathedral is almost unending. I moved to Magdeburg in late 1997 and it wasn't until a couple months ago that I had ever seen the cathedral without one or the other of its towers covered in scaffolding.

And its bells. They're named Susanne, Apostolica and Dominica. I love their voices and if I happen to be close enough at noontime to hear them ring I pause what I'm doing until they stop.

During the time that Magdeburg was part of East Germany, most people here weren't religious but it never stopped the cathedral from being the heart of the city. It was a natural meeting place for folks to gather in 1989 to begin the Monday protest marches that were so instrumental in the demise of communism in East Germany. I think for a lot of people in Magdeburg the cathedral is their favorite building in the city and when they've been away for a while they get a feeling of being home again when they can see its towers in the distance. Even when I am in my flat I like to stand out on my balcony and look southward and see the cathedral. It gives me a feeling of being home even though my home is really thousands of miles away.

Let's shuffle.

1. Here In The Real World - Alan Jackson
2. Morning Star - Blackmore's Night
3. There Are No Goodbyes - Sophia
4. I Want You Now - The Feeling
   
5. I Wanna - The All-American Rejects
6. Spring Released - Grant-Lee Phillips
7. In The Mood - Glenn Miller Orchestra
8. Cecilia - Simon & Garfunkel
9. You Wanted More - Tonic
10. Spanish Flea - Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass

Have a great weekend. Go somewhere you love to be.

Friday Shuffle - You're the Greatest! Edition

I love you people. I love that you still show up here to read my meager offerings even when I start to blather on about the same topics over and over. You're awesomely awesome.

I figured I'd give y'all the love early because I've not got much else to offer. The wheelchair delivery was the high point. Oh. And that little stabilizing wheel the driver said was not there? Upon getting down and giving the wheelchair a better look-see I found the stabilizing wheel was right where it was supposed to be. Stupid, stupid delivery driver. And still no call to pick up the old chair. I'm really considering squeezing it into my Starlet over the weekend and leaving it in their parking lot.

Enough whining. If I don't stop now I'll start up on how I've got a sneaking suspicion that my MIL's birthday party on Saturday evening is going to turn into a cluster fuck. Don't get me started on that.

Better shuffle while I've got the opportunity.

1. Whiskey In The Jar - Metallica
2. Middle Man - The Bottle Rockets
3. A Matter Of Trust - Billy Joel
4. Hold On, Hold On - Neko Case
5. Southern Manners - The Watson Twins
6. Riot In Cell Block Number Nine - Wanda Jackson
7. Operator (That's Not The Way It Feels) - Jim Croce
8. Racing In The Street - Bruce Springsteen
9. Hell In A Bucket - Grateful Dead
10. Black Dog - Led Zeppelin
    

Friday Shuffle - In the Biblical Way Edition

So far today I've watched on TV Spartacus, Ben-Hur and now I'm watching The Ten Commandments. If before Easter is over I can manage to catch a viewing of The Robe, King of Kings (distracting because in this one Jesus is kinda hot) and The Greatest Story Ever Told (who doesn't love a Swedish Jesus?), I'll have hit all the holy highlights.

In the meantime, let's shuffle.

1. Does Your Mother Know - ABBA
2. Said & Done - Kilians
3. She's Rather Be With Me - The Turtles
4. Beware Your Only Friend - Bonnie "Prince" Billy
5. Corduroy - Pearl Jam
6. Love Is Everywhere I Go - Sam Phillips
7. Chick Habit - April March
8. Radio Nowhere - Bruce Springsteen
9. Lil' Jack Slade - Dixie Chicks
10. Long Cool Woman - The Hollies

Have a great weekend. Get out and enjoy the spring. Score half-price chocolate bunnies on Monday.

Friday Shuffle - Diverted Edition

I'm not the first to have noticed it. Recently Angela and Poppy have mentioned their noticing a decline in blogging popularity for the immediacy of Twitter and Facebook. And I'll admit that over the past few months I've found myself writing tweets and giving status updates on Facebook. Well, not so much tweet writing. I never did cotton to Twitter all that well. Facebook, however, is a whole different story. It's not so much my need to update folks on what I'm doing at that moment as much as my need to play those dopey games. I have a definite need to gather my folks and fight other Mafia crews in Mafia Wars, harvest and sell my crops on Farm Town and redecorate my flat in YoVille. It's the one flat I live in that's not grimy with dust. And those quizzes. What Greek God Are You? (Apollo) What Shakespearean Character Are You? (Viola) What TV-Sitcom Mom Are You? (Carol Brady. I was so disappointed with that!) What Swear Word Are You? (Shit) When B took that same quiz his result was "crap". That struck me as hilarious because it's dead-on accurate. He's a little bad, just not too bad. In reality I don't care what the results of these quizzes are but I take them compulsively just to satisfy my curiosity. At any rate - when I'm not here writing blog entries like I should be you can guess that I'm over there getting updated as to what my friends around the world are up to, catching up with folks I haven't seen since I graduated from high school nearly twenty-nine years ago (that may be one of the best parts of Facebook), tending to my farm, blackmailing cops, buying yet another rug and finding out what Gone With the Wind character I am. But don't give up on me completely. I'm not closing up shop here. And go read Angela's and Poppy's stuff as well. It's worth the detour.

I haven't made the complete plunge into the virtual life world just yet. On Thursday I had a human, face-to-face lunch with my new speaks-English-and-actually-lives-in-Magdeburg friend, Kerry. Fun, fun, fun. I'm a sucker for going out to lunch anyway and it's even better when it's with someone who is so enjoyable to talk with you have to keep checking your watch, not out of boredom but out of precaution - else you'll completely forget about time and she'll have kids abandoned at the Kindergarten and I'll have a husband at home dying for a simple drink of water. Really - Kerry is just lovely. She's got a terrific, friendly smile and she exudes this sort of confidence and ease that is very charming. And she loves to read. That thrilled me no end. Now I have someone with whom to share books with.

But no one tell her that the Gone With the Wind character I am most like is Scarlett O'Hara, okay?

Regardless of how much I Facebook and Twitter, the Friday Shuffle is an exclusive of my blog. Let's hit it.

1. Stranglehold - Ted Nugent
2. Kingdom Of Rust - Doves
3. Welcome To The Fold - Filter
4. The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song - The Flaming Lips
5. 1969 Again - Adam Ant
6. Mad About You - Belinda Carlisle
7. You Just May Be The One - The Monkees
8. Middle Cyclone - Neko Case
9. Where Is My Mind? - Pixies
10. Bicycle Race - Queen
    

Friday Shuffle - Wrap It Up Edition

I can't think about that stupid wheelchair fiasco another day so until they call to have it delivered, I'm putting it out of my mind. Instead, let's just consider the rather unimportant and infinitely more pleasant things to think about.

I'm looking forward to turning the clocks an hour forward this weekend. Not only do I need the extra hours of daylight but my flat needs it as well. We're going to finally get a genuine spring day and I'm going to find an amazing amount of dust I've overlooked for months. I'm at the point where I'm all giddy to start the really gritty parts of spring cleaning. Shame that the giddy feeling won't last until I actually do the cleaning.

My husband bought me a surprise today. It should be delivered tomorrow. He has the crappy week and I get the gift. Tell me I didn't luck out in the spouse department.

Here's what I'm currently knitting:



That's the stitch detail of the leg of a sock I'm knitting. Best part of it? It's the easiest sort of two-color knitting there is short of getting someone else to do it for you.

I'm taking a Flat Stanley for a tour of Magdeburg early next week so I'll have pictures for you. I'd have done it this week but high winds, rain, sleet and snow and a boy made of paper aren't a good mix.

That's it. 'Cept for the shuffle. Hit it, Fletcher.

1. Satellite Mind - Metric
2. For Your Love - The Yardbirds
3. And She Was - Talking Heads
4. Go Out Tonight - Mando Diao
5. The Hazards of Love, Part 1 (The Prettiest Whistles Won't Wrestle The Thistles Undone) - The Decemberists
6. Oh Yoko! - John Lennon
7. Here She Comes Again - Sasha
8. Chelsea Dagger - The Fratellis
9. Mercury Blues - Alan Jackson
   

Friday Shuffle - A Penny Saved Edition

My MIL came over yesterday and during the course of the visit she told us of going to her bank to have some money invested. The money had been in an account at one of the banks B and I use - an account that allows her to get the money at any time and the account is guaranteed but like most savings accounts these days it doesn't pay very much.

B and I don't interfere with how my MIL spends her money or invests it but we do try to keep an eye on where she's putting her money and lend advice when necessary. Late last summer she got the idea to close the checking account she had at the bank she'd used for decades to put it in the same bank that Gerd used. This new checking account would pay her interest and she insists that she doesn't pay any monthly fees for it but I'm not sure that's the case. B and I didn't like the idea of her doing that but hey - it's her money.

We haven't said anything else about her financial decisions until she told us she was going to close the one savings account she had and invest it with the bank where she's got her checking account. B really gave her a look and she quickly said she wouldn't take all of it out but most of it. My MIL told us that she had an appointment with an investment adviser and he was going to help her put this money in a place that would keep it safe, give her ready access to the funds and pay her a little interest - essentially the same damn thing where the money was but whatever.

When my MIL was visiting yesterday she told us the appointment didn't go as she had planned and she didn't think that she would be investing with them after all. First, when she arrived for the appointment she was told that the man with whom she'd made the appointment wasn't there. Instead they had her see some man who my MIL described as looking as though he'd just started shaving yesterday.

Let me break in at this point to describe my last experience with seeing an investment adviser from our bank. It's not possible for B to get to the branch where she works so she comes to visit us at home. A particular investment account's time had run its course and therefore the funds needed to be reinvested so when she came for the appointment she was armed with information about different investment options that would fit our needs - about six different accounts. She had pamphlets and details all printed out, all with little folders - everything tidy and thorough. Our adviser knows our financial situation and our investment goals and so she brought information only for options that would fit within those bounds. In short - she knows what she's doing and when we speak with her I don't become panicky.

Compare this with the experience my MIL had. Her adviser thought it would be a good idea for her to put the money - money where there will not be additional funds added - in an account where most of it would be put into stocks. She'd definitely get more return on her investment if she put most of it in stocks.

I suppose Junior Investment Adviser failed to notice that my MIL will turn 75 years old in about three weeks. Oh yeah. She's got plenty of time to let that fund just grow and grow.

My MIL was also given some written information to take home with her to, one assumes, assist her in making her final decision. It was a piece of paper with part of a corner raggedly torn off. One one side were some figures and percentages scribbled along with some illegible names of some funds. The other side was covered in doodles, presumably made by Junior Investment Adviser - lots of large U-shaped figures with dots or vertical lines covering them. They somewhat resembled wings or perhaps they depicted saggy, poxy breasts.

You know when I'm at home looking over financial information given to me by my banker, nothing instills confidence in my bank more than a doodle strewn piece of scrap paper.

My MIL told Junior that she would like to speak first with her son before making a final decision and after leaving she went around the corner to another bank to make an appointment with them. It's one of the banks B and I use. It's the bank where up until last year my MIL had her checking account and one of her savings accounts. B and I were gracious and refrained from telling her "I told you so!".

Obviously it takes more than one person or even one branch to plunge a bank into financial disarray, especially when that bank has accounts in dozens of countries and hundreds of millions in assets. However, Citibank, in the future you may not want to have employees who disregard appointments and instead send barely-pubescent youngsters out to sell stocks to old women who cannot take any sort of risk of losing their initial investment and who will be pushing up daisies before they make back any money they lose in the stock market - the one that plunges downward every single day, especially since your company name is already mud in every language in which it does business. And Citibank, I know you're hurting for money right now, but could you please buy your employees some paper on which to write serious investment offers? I'm fairly sure that even the worst school of business and economics would tell you that giving financial advice coupled with semi-pornographic doodlings is not the best way to sell your products.

Let's shuffle.

1. Society's Child - Janis Ian
2. Lukey - Great Big Sea
3. Night By Night - Michael Stanley Band
4. I Wish The Best For You - Emerson Hart
5. C'mon, C'mon - The Von Bondies
6. Scenes From An Italian Restaurant - Billy Joel
7. Southern Cross - Crosby, Stills & Nash
8. Devoted To You - Everly Brothers
9. Something's Gone Wrong Again - The Buzzcocks
10. Family Tree - Loretta Lynn
    

Friday Shuffle - Progress! Edition

The wheelchair thing! The endless saga of the new wheelchair! We may finally be reaching the end. Is that light I see?

On Tuesday B called the insurance company's state headquarters in Stendal to speak with the lady who's been trying to get a hold of Mr. Medical Supply. She would call and leave messages for him to call her back and he wouldn't. One thing I'll say for Mr. Medical - he's consistently negligent. This time, however, we gave her the number for his cell phone and I'm sure when she finally reached him it was a conversation to be savored. At any rate, on Wednesday we got a call from the local office of the insurance company to make an appointment to come see B and find out just why he needed a new push wheelchair and why he needed a more expensive than normal one.

Shortly after 9:00am on Thursday the representative from the local insurance office came to our flat and I'll say it now. She was the weirdest woman I've come across in ages. For those of you who live in Germany, I can give you a bit of an idea of what she was like: I opened the door and for a moment I thought she was Cindy aus Marzahn. She wasn't, of course, but dang. And she sounded like her too. Anyway, she came in and B explained to her his reasons for needed this particular wheelchair, which she dutifully wrote down - and then proceeded to start some conversation about fishing for eels on the Baltic Sea. B and I both were sitting there with stuck on smiles and laughing when appropriate but I knew from the look in his eyes and he knew from mine that on the inside all we were thinking was "What in the hell is she going on about? And could she please just leave?". I didn't dare give any indication in any way that I thought she was batshit crazy because hey - we needed her to say to the office in Stendal that they should approve the request.

We must have been convincing because today when B called the lady in Stendal, she said the woman who visited us on Thursday sent the report and it was approved and notification of it had been sent to both us and the medical supply company. All that's left is for them order the wheelchair and have it delivered.

I'm secretly hoping that Mr. Medical Supply will be the one to deliver the wheelchair because making him squirm would absolutely thrill me no end but I don't think he's got a pair big enough to make him show up. In any case, he's not off the hook with us yet. Writing letters to companies to discuss their customer service is something at which I excell and I believe this will be no exception.

There's one last thing I should mention before we drop the subject of this push wheelchair and that's this: we can't get a chest belt for this wheelchair without getting a notarized statement from B that a chest belt for this wheelchair will be put on him with his permission. This chest belt is important because if we're on, say, a streetcar where there could be sudden stops that could make his body go out of balance it would keep him from sliding dangerously from side to side. Or if I'm pulling him up a curb or pushing him over cobblestone - you get the picture. There's one on B's electric wheelchair. However the insurance company told us one can't be put on the new one without this notarized request (and for those of you who don't know this - in Germany only lawyers are notaries) because things like wheelchair seatbelts/chest restraints and side rails on beds can trap in a person against their will and their need to be free superceeds their need to be safe. I then remembered our doctor telling us last year that her MIL slid out of a wheelchair and broke her leg but since she hadn't signed to be restrained in her wheelchair, the nursing home couldn't do anything about it and she would be free to fall out on the floor again. Let's think about this. People in wheelchairs - people who can't walk - need the freedom to get up out of their wheelchairs whenever they want. Okay! So if B wants this chest belt we're going to have truck him down to a lawyer's office to get a notarized statement - and pay a lawyer's hourly fee for it. The upside is that he'll have a new wheelchair to roll down there in. The downside is that he may fall out in the middle of the street while getting there.

We need to shuffle.

1. Zero - Yeah Yeah Yeahs
2. Under The Blacklight - Rilo Kiley
3. Somebody To Love - Queen
4. The Game Of Love - The Mindbenders
5. Come And Get Your Love - Redbone
6. Standing In The Way Of Control - Gossip
7. This Tornado Loves You - Neko Case
8. Seven More Times - Maria Doyle Kennedy
9. Tonight - Shooting Star
10. Leaving On A Jet Plane - Peter, Paul & Mary

Dig all those girls singing.

Friday Shuffle - La-Dee-Dah Edition

My, my...a whole week has slipped by without me bothering to update you on the ins and outs of my life. You didn't miss much. The highlight would have been on Wednesday when I made pancakes for breakfast. Pancakes! On a Wednesday! And it wasn't even a holiday! Unheard of behavior in my house. All hell is breaking loose!

Else not much was different than in other weeks. The Great Wheelchair Replacement Adventure progressed not a lick. There will be a cure for paralysis before B gets this wheelchair.

I want to ride on a boat. I live along a major river. I should just go down to the pier, take one of those river tour cruises that cost fifteen bucks and you can sit there and look at the river and eat bockwurst and drink beer for three hours. Maybe that would cure my malaise. Maybe it would get B his wheelchair faster.

In the meantime, let's shuffle.

1. A Whiter Shade Of Pale - Annie Lennox
2. I Love Being Here With You - Queen Latifah
3. Semi Automatic - The Boxer Rebellion
4. Sundown - Gordon Lightfoot
5. Irgendwas Bleibt - Silbermond
6. Drown - Son Volt
7. Go All The Way - Raspberries
8. Working Again - Michael Stanley Band
9. Old Enough - The Raconteurs
10. Every Little Thing - Carlene Carter
    

Friday Shuffle - Getting Nowhere Fast Edition

We still haven't gotten anywhere with the new wheelchair for B thing. Remember how Mr. Medical Supply promised he'd call by the end of the week to let us know what was going on after he had an opportunity to give the health insurance company the information they'd requested? Information like how old B's current push wheelchair is? I'm sure you won't be surprised to hear that he didn't call by by the end of last week. And as of yesterday he still hadn't called so B called Mr. Medical once again. This guy hasn't called us back ever. If he says he'll call back you can be sure he won't.

Anyway Mr. Medical said he still hadn't heard anything from the insurance company and when B suggested that he'd like to call the insurance company's state headquarters, Mr. Medical said that B should call the local branch here in Magdeburg. B did call the office here and I wasn't even vaguely surprised to hear the clerk say that there was no file on record for B requesting a new push wheelchair. While we waited she tried to reach another person at the state headquarters office to see if there was a file for B there and the lady who would handle it wasn't there. We got the number for the lady at the headquarters and called her this morning. And I doubt you'll be surprised to hear that she didn't have a file for this case either. I was, however, mildly shocked when, after giving this woman a rundown of all that's been going on since September she replied that the insurance company wouldn't even ask how old B's current push wheelchair is. Mr. Medical had told us more than once that it was one the primary pieces of information that he needed to supply to the insurance company.

Right now I can't decide on what irks me the most - the fact that Mr. Medical Supply has done nothing to get B his wheelchair or the fact that he repetedly lies to us. He's lied to us about when he'll be in touch with us again, he lies about what sort of contact he's had with the insurance and he lies about why things are taking so long. Why lie about anything? Why not just get B his wheelchair?

The lady at the insurance company said she'd call the medical supply company herself to see what is going on and that if the supply company didn't call us by the end of Monday that we should call her Tuesday.

I know it's not good to wish ill upon others but to me it wouldn't be wishing ill as much as saving others from being jerked around if at the end of all this Mr. Medical Supply got fired. I'd say that he perhaps should become Mr. Ditch Digger but why have an incompetent liar make the other ditch diggers look bad?

Let's shuffle.

1. Magnificent - U2
2. Far Pavillions - ...And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead
3. Good Lovin' - The Rascals
   
4. The Ballad Of John Henry - Joe Bonamassa
5. Fingertips, Part 2 - Stevie Wonder
6. Laisse tomber les filles - April March
7. Sleepless - The Decemberists
8. Oh No - Andrew Bird
9. The Song Remains The Same - Led Zeppelin
10. There's A Place - The Beatles
    

Friday Shuffle - Low Battery Edition

B was sick during the night. Some stomach ailment - it's better now but I wasn't able to get to sleep until nearly 5am. I can't ever sleep when he's very sick. I get worried that he'll need me and not be able to wake me up so when he's sick I sit up with him until I'm certain he's sleeping okay or he's feeling better. Last night had me curled up next to him listening to podcasts. I'm sleep deprived but am much more knowledgeable about Franklin Roosevelt, precocious puberty and how one becomes a squatter.

Fletcher the iPod and I are low on energy so let's get on with the shuffle.

1. Wandering By - The Bishops
2. Around Again - Five Way Friday
3. Gloria - Them
4. In The Morning - Razorlight
5. Streets of Bakersfield - Dwight Yoakam with Buck Owens
6. Hold Tight! - Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick and Tich (The best part of watching Death Proof)
   
7. I Wanna Be Sedated - The Ramones
8. Consoler Of The Lonely - The Raconteurs
9. Send Her An Angel - Jackson Waters
10. Heavy - Collective Soul
    

Friday Shuffle - Flowers and Music Edition

At the risk of pissing off some of you, I have to say that I don't understand folks who foam at the mouth at the mere mention of Valentine's Day. It's an optional day. Celebrate it or don't but if you don't celebrate it or feel any sort of need to be especially romantic with your partner on that day or if you don't have a partner at all, why get hacked off at the rest of us who like Valentine's Day? Why tell us we're wasting our time, wasting our money, and are being slaves to the candy, flower, and greeting card companies? Some of us like to do something a little extra for our sweethearts on that particular day. There's no need for y'all to be pissing in our Wheaties. I never got to be a mother and never will. Is that an excuse for me to get all wound up about Mother's Day and throw a wet blanket on the celebrations others are having? Of course not. If you don't celebrate Valentine's Day because you just don't care for it or because you don't have anyone with whom to celebrate it that's fine, but if you begrudge the rest of us enjoying that day, please unknot your underpants before they become wedged in your colon.

Wow. I don't know where that came from. I didn't start out with that little rant in mind but I have to say that I feel better for having let it out. Thank you for indulging me!

Time for some picture magic. The daffodils I bought today here seen at about 2pm. Roll your cursor over them to see them as they appeared at 8pm.



They're the flowers B instructed me to get for myself for Valentine's Day. I think he had something a little more fancy and traditional for Valentine's Day in mind but I liked the price tag on these - three euro. Hey - I'd rather take the money I saved and spend and hour poking around the iTunes store. I may be romantic but I'm also practical.

Speaking of iTunes, it's time for Fletcher to shuffle.

1. Atlantic City - The Hold Steady
2. Use Somebody - Kings of Leon
3. Whip In My Valise - Adam Ant
4. Thunder Island - Jay Ferguson
5. I Made A Mess Of This Town - Scott Miller & The Commonwealth
6. The Rake's Song - The Decemberists (Fletcher shuffled this up out of habit - I haven't been able to stop listening to this song for a week now.)
7. While You Wait - Mark McAdam
8. Satisfaction Guaranteed - The Firm
9. Crazy Little Thing Called Love - Queen
10. Instant Karma! - John Lennon
    

Friday Shuffle - Honesty Can Be Brutal Edition

One of the best things about a friendship is that you build a bond of trust. When you feel close with someone you feel as if you can trust them with a very important question: "Do you like it?". Your friend can mean "Do you like this dress?" or "Do you like this wine?" or "Do you like my new haircut?" or "Do you like this cake?". I'd like to believe that for the most part our friends give us an honest answer when we ask that question. They'll let us know if the cut of that dress doesn't flatter our figure but sometimes they won't. Sometimes they just don't have the heart to say your new haircut makes you look like a yeti or that the maple walnut cake you baked tastes like something you scraped off your shoe.

Now one would think that when it comes to family one would have even more freedom to be absolutely honest because, after all, they're family and you're stuck with each other but that's not always the case. Sometimes you can't find it in your heart to say to your sibling or your mother that what they like is, to you, a complete horror and that's when you've got to start getting creative. Or start lying like a rug.

This is the new wallpaper my MIL has put up in her livingroom:



Yeah, I know it's got fold lines in it. She had brought over this sample last weekend and it had been folded up in her purse. Still, I don't believe the fold lines detract from the shiny, peachy-colored background and the raised, poop brown pattern. My MIL brought it over last weekend so she could show it to B and she said "Do you like it?". I kept saying "Oh! Wow!". B was more non-committal and would only grunt "Hmmm!". My MIL didn't seem to really notice our lack of enthusiasm but did say that I would need to get a picture of it the next time I was over at her place so B could see the full effect on the walls.

I did have to go over there the other day to fetch something and unfortunately I forgot my camera so I can't show you the aforementioned "full effect" but let me just say this. Ho-lee-shit. I can't begin to describe what a horror this wallpaper is. First, my MIL's living room is fairly small and it is stuffed full of furniture. A huge cabinet that covers an entire sixteen foot long wall save for about six inches on each side. A three seater sofa and two large upholstered chairs. An enormous aquarium. A sideboard that covers most of an four foot long wall. I reckon my MIL and Gerd (and I'm blaming this all on him) didn't feel hemmed in enough and thought that slapping up that wallpaper would give visitors a more cozy feeling - that is if being in an MRI machine is your idea of cozy. I've been in that room a jillion times but this time it felt like the walls were going to move in and squeeze me to death before the visit was over.

And naturally my MIL wanted to know how I liked it. Being completely honest and saying "Are you kidding? It's awful! Tackiest thing I've ever seen. This room looks like a combination of a tunnel and the waiting area in a bordello!" was out of the question but saying "Ohhh! Nice! Very nice!" was equally out of the question so it was time to get creative. At first I said "Wow! It's something, isn't it? Very impressive!" and then when she kept on about how nice this wallpaper was I switched to saying "It's certainly unique!" and finally had to start giving the truth a beating by saying "It really is elegant!"

My claustrophobia was starting to kick in so I grabbed what I came to get in the first place and got out of there before I had to start complimenting the great job Gerd did with hanging the wallpaper. He didn't. He left the old wallpaper up - textured wall paper - and you can see the texture through the new stuff. Any non-offensive comments I might make about his handiwork would be out-and-out lies. I gotta draw the line somewhere.

Time to shuffle.

1. Oh No - Andrew Bird
2. Problems - Alter Me
3. My Way - The Sex Pistols
4. My Girls - Animal Collective
5. Standing On The Moon - Grateful Dead (Can we just pause here a moment to marvel at the fact that a Grateful Dead song is on my iPod?! I have three of them now, as a matter of fact. The impossible may not be impossible after all!)
6. Books From Boxes - Maximo Park
7. That Certain Party - Dean Martin & Jerry Lewis
8. Itchycoo Park - The Small Faces
9. Dance With Somebody - Mando Diao
10. Goodnight (I'm So Sorry) - Christopher Jak