Wow... that was a quick month

What happened to October? Seriously I swear that last week I got home from Octoberfest. Apparently this is not the case. I spent one weekend just chilling and partying. Which was great. And I spent one weekend being sick. Which was not so great. And last weekend I saw my sister in Heidelberg before she flew home to Canada. Which was fantastic!!!!!

I feel like at the same time so much and so little has happened to me. I don't know how exactly that works out. But let's just say that I am in love with life right now.

Ten Good Things that have Happened Recently

1. I got a new flatmate this month. This probably would be less exciting if I didn't get along with my new flatmate like a house on fire.

2. I am now officially a resident of the Shengen zone. Europe, I am not sure why you decided to let me in. But I sure am happy about it. I mean look at that official document. Who could be bummed about that?





3. I have tickets for the Manu Chao concert tonight in Frankfurt. Seriously I have wanted to see this guy live for years.





4. I seem to be back in the saddle again with my knitting. I haven't said anything yet, but I am knitting Thermal by Laura Chow for my sister. It is holiday knitting but since a) my sister doesn't read my blog and b) she's already seen part of the sweater I think it's okay to talk about it. I have the body up to the armpits and one sleeve (almost) done. I am charmed by the wool I got here in Wolle Roedel to make it and I am charmed by the pattern. But really at this gauge I get the feeling that I could have made two sweaters by now. I have basically tricked myself into being forced to only knit thermal by putting pieces of it on basically all the needles that I have here in Germany with me. I can't cast on for anything new. This has been reasonably successful but has at certain points made me almost mad with the desire to yank out those needles, throw caution to the wind and cast on for anything else. Anything. I'd almost make a nose warmer. And that is saying something. But I am making progress and so I keep going with Thermal.

5. The Scandinavian Party.





























The vodka and sherbet shots were definitely forthcoming. Especially from the girls wearing flags. And then for fairly complex reasons Malin deicided to lick my face. Excellent.














It's alright though because we started this. In case you can't read my stomach (which I have apparently posted twice) it reads : "Avril knows what they say about Readheads". Yup. We're awesome. My friend Guro (who also knows what they say about redheads) had a really good time with her Elk T-shirt. So we decided to kiss her. She deserved it.





6. I saw my sister and Mimi this weekend. It was fantastic. They were in Heidelberg (which is right near here) to drop Maddy off at the airport in Frankfurt. I nearly plotzed when I saw them. We had dinner, we chilled we walked. The only regret there is that it wasn't nearly a long enough time to spend with those lovely ladies.

7. I've been doing much better at acquainting myself with the people in my classes. The German students are very nice. But they do seem to study a lot more than me. I think this is a by-product of the whole study abroad thing. I don't really mind though. I'm having fun. And I am trying to involve people.

8. I got a new phone to replace the one that died an unfortunate death. My new phone is beautiful. And it means that I am not really left out of the loop so much. This is good. In fact this is wicked awesome.

9. Last night I played dice with my flatmates. I don't know why I think this is so cool. Mostly because I actually saw my flatmates. Also because I think that it is so cool to say "I played dice". Makes me feel like some sort of old-timey gangster.

10. It's the weekend (okay not quite yet... but still yay!!)!!!!

I love making lists like this. It makes me realise just how good my life really is.

Oktoberfest may have killed me

Dear Oktoberfest,
I think you are fantastic. You made me have fun with friends and with strangers. But at the same time I think that you are just a little too much fun. You are the friend who gives me too much to drink at a party. Or the one who goes home with a different guy every time we go out. You are trouble. But at the same time you are so much fun it is just hard to resist you charm. The times we spent in the Beergarten were fantastic! I mean Hans and the underwear reading, the masses of beer, the 15 year olds in Dirndls, the strange german men and Allison. Really who could have asked for more amusement? The beer tent, dancing on tables and playing the find Evan a woman game as well as running away from crazy Bosnian waiters... You gave us an excellent time. The downside was the sleep deprevation that ended up in the very very cold München hbf. But at least I had Kate to spoon to keep me warm. The moral of the story is Oktoberfest, I like you but I don´t really want to see you again.
Love
Avril

Knitting helps

This is what I have learned today:
1) Mornings are bad. I would like to shoot the person in the head that invented them. I know that I have figured this one out before. It´s just that every morning this comes as a revelation to me.
2) Knitting helps. Just like it does with most things.
3) The European Union, though it is an unprecedented crazy foray into a new realm of interstate cooperation, and in principle seems really cool is very dull. Also very problematic because it has no mechanisms to ensure state cooperation.
4) Knitting helps with that too. Not with interstate cooperation. But with the fact that the class is very dull. I´d like to think though that if everyone in the European Parlement was knitting it might help interstae cooperation. People would be more mellow. Except when they dropped a bunch of stitches. Then maybe Luxembourg would invade Finnland or something.
5) German grammer is tricky. Also dull.
6) Knitting helps with that too.
7) I make really good cheese sauce.
8) The University of Mannheim has PC pools available for its students to use. They are filled with the latest equipment and are conveniantly located right beside the university. They are also conveniantly only open until 5:30 in the evening.
9) Despite the fact that the PC pools are closed to students, all the computers and the lights are left on.
10) I am very pissed off by this. Either they should let me use the computers to justify the fact that they are using that energy to run all those computers and those lights. Or they should turn them off.
11) I find the University of Mannheim´s policies about when things are open very frustrating. Except for the libraries. Those are allright.
12) Knitting helps to take away my frustration.
13) Alicia´s birthday present is coming along very nicely thanks to the amount of things that I have found boring or frustrating today.
14) I am a knitting addict.

Clem and Clem beat my head with hammers

Dear Germany,
I like you. I think we should hold hands at recess. You are a lot of fun. I mean, who could not have fun inventing things like the world´s largest wine festival?? I think that it was a blasty blast! I mean many countries like to celebrate good company, or the harvest or some sort of conquest. Nope. Not you. You like to celebrate the intake of copious amounts of alcohol in a dizzying and confusing environment. That is what it is all about.
Love
Avril
In case you have no idea what I am talking about, I went to the world´s largest wine festival in Bad Durkheim this weekend. It was intense. When you think of wine, you usually think of classy glasses and good food. Not at this festival. It was the tumblers and the celebration of wurst that was going on. I have to give the Germans props. They really do know how to party on a large scale. Unfortunatley that kind of partying always ends with two giant brothers named Clem pounding my head with their two giant hammers. Also named Clem.
That´s all, back to the preparation of my presentation for tomorrow.

Someone up there is trying to make the world a better place, one set of keys at a time

I still haven´t found my keys. This is proving to be less and less of a fruitful search. I am beginning to be convinced that I may never find my keys. This upsets me a little bit. Mostly because I will have to pay for new keys. Poop.
On the plus side though I found that the city of Mannheim has a lost and found. It´s a pretty cool place. Mostly because people lose the weirdest stuff! I mean who misplaces their steel-toed boots? Oh, it´s lunch time, I think that I will take a load off, eat my sandwich on this bench and take off my boots. Then I will forget to put my boots back on when I go to back to work. Seems like a logical scenario to me.
I was heartened by the fact that I am not alone in losing my keys. In the lost and found of the city of Mannheim there are cork board filled with keys for each month of the year that those keys are turned in. There are at least 30 sets of keys per month. And that is only the keys that have been turned in. There must be hundreds of sets of keys lost every month in Mannheim alone! Extrapolate with me for a bit... what about all the sets of keys that are lost in the entire world on a monthly basis. Let´s say Mannheim loses 200 sets of keys a month and that every city in the world does the same.... Millions of people the world over are locked out of their home and garages! Are causing their friends and family members inconveniance and annoyance!Essentially I think that it is time to change something here. We need to get rid of keys. Come on, I am sure we can think of SOMETHING that I would never lose! Come on! Let´s make the world a better place. Get rid of keys!

10 British things and my masochistic room

I have a bad luck place. Every time I go there terrible things happen to me. Things that are inconveniant at the time and occaisionally have larger repercussions. Things that if I had any sense I would avoid. And yet I go back there. Again and again. I think this is my own unique form of masochism.
My bad luck place is the popular Mannheim club Zimmer. Several times I have had to pull the I-have-to-go-to-the-bathroom-and-then-run-far-far-away-because-you-are-creepy maneuver. (In common speach this is know as ''ABORT! ABORT ABORT!'') And several times there have been bad face-eating kisses and last night I lost my keys. This is very inconveniant. I had to sleep over at Evan´s, ´cause he was kind enough to come back with me to Zimmer to help me look. I didn´t find them. Thank goodness today I went to the Hausmeister and got temporary keys until I get new ones made. I can get into my room so I am not homeless and without toothbrush and clean underwear. My room might not be the cleanest or the prettiest but it is mine. I am really sure that I lost my keys at Zimmer because I found one of my keychains there, the one that I had used to attach the keys to my waist. Clearly this plan did not work. I am hoping that during the clean-up after the club cleared out that someone found my keys and handed them in. The VISUM people are going there tonight when the club opens to see if they find them. I do so hope that they do. Good thing that my keys don´t say where I live I guess, ´cause this way no one can try to break in to my room and steal all of my left socks or something.
I thought that today I would get my courses sorted out. I was wrong. I was under the impression that this course on Game Theory that I am taking was boring and useless. I was wrong. I find the ideas interesting and at least reasonably pertinant. And I can see how it could be useful for me to know that sort of thing for later on my life. So instead I think that I will have to drop my Proseminar on Introduction to International Relations. Mostly because I have basically done the course before. And now my courses are just as messed up as before. Great.
I bought a USB key today. So that I can type at the library. It took me 20 minutes to find the darned things and no one in enormous Saturn wanted to help me. I was frustrated beyond my normal capacity for frustration. But I have to say this for my British friends who were waiting for me at the bank. The British certainly are expert waiters. Very patient.
Here are 10 more things I´ve found the British to be good at:
1) Queueing. Obsessively. All the time. You are just doing something normal like running onto a tram or something and there they are, forming an orderly queue. Then they express mild annoyance that ''The Germans don't queue!''
2) Being gentlemanly. This is something that is perhaps inculcated at a very very young age. I like it. However, conversely, it is rather hard to envision the man in a suit and bowler hat being a wild partier.
3) Being convinced that they know more about North American culture than they actually do. This is due to TV I think. And being surprised when North American culture/slang is different.
4) Student loans. Really they get a lot. Of course it would be better if they didn´t have to pay at all, but still it´s purty good.
5) Inventing very strange, niche products. Self-raising flour anyone?
6) Being self-depricating.
7) Saying ''Show them how the British do it!'' Then drinking.
8) Having a really fun sense of humour. But also quoting TV shows and movies that I have either never seen or never heard of.
9) Being confused about whether they are European or not. (Really, what continent do you think you are part of? South America?)
10) Making cracks about pants. Both kinds.
That was fun! Maybe I will do the same for some other nation another day.

I´m BAAAACK

So, the death of my beloved Maxwell, computer to the stars has caused some troubles for my blogging progress. I have been sad and uncomunicative for a while. And I have realised just how much I am dependant on my little silver box. I still don´t have a new one. I still don´t have an answer about how sick Maxwell is. I am in the library a lot. Unfortunately since MSN, Skype and the like are not considered academic I am uncommunicative. I have however found out that Facebook and blogger are ''academic'' sites. I am not quite so sure why. I am guessing because the library doesn´t really get a lot of people chilling on blogger. Just me then. So the moral of the story is, even if I am taking pictures (for the first time in my life) I am not able to post them. This makes me a little sad on the inside.
But I can share some of the weirdnesses of life in Mannheim!
For a moment contemplate a library. Good. Now contemplate the reference section of a library. Good. Now contemplate a library in which the entire thing is a reference section. Conveniant no?
That is how the library works at the university of Mannheim. I guess it has its pros and cons. The books I want are always available. But I can´t take them home and play with them. Realistically though I think that it´s probably a good idea. The books that I take home in Canada chill on my windowsill for a long time until they make me feel guilty enough that I actually read them. That is about how it usually goes. I feel that this system is much better.
I feel like I should talk about my weekend. I partied a little. Which was good. I contemplated the utter magnificance of the Wasserturm. Pride of Mannheim. Seriously the place is a water tower. Pretty I guess but I don´t understand the obssession with it. Atle, Hanna and Matt swam naked in the Verbindungs canal behind the Hafenstraße residence. During the middle of the party. I think they may have a very contageous form of super AIDS combined with hypothermia now. Seriously. That is so dirty. They have this thing for swimming naked though. It´s all good I guess because I am now harbouring a not so secret ambition to swim naked in the Wasserturm fountain.
My classes here at the university are MESSED UP! I don´t know if York is giving me credit for my language courses and I don´t know what International Relations courses I am allowed to take. It is a happy place of joy and fun. :P
I am really looking forward to tomorrow, for the VISUM pub crawl. Advertised as the best night you´ll never remember.
In other news I am not looking forward to Wednesday morning.
The Studentenwerk Mannheim has sent me confusing stuff about my rent. They have my bank details. They told me that they would withdraw my rent monthly. Nope. Not the case. I hate bureaucracy. Not true. I hate bureaucracy that doesn´t work.
I think that is all for this post. I am headed off to dinner with the international students. We are SUCH COOL KIDS. Kiss kiss.

Chocolate and Beer

So... today was essentially bureaucratic hell. The Summerakademie didn't know I existed because there had been an almighty screw-up in the coordination between them and the Auslandsamt (i.e. International Office) and so I was not registered for the summer course. Don't panic. Instead talk to a bajillion different people to make sure you are on the list for the start of classes tomorrow. Heave a small sigh of relief when, after the bajillion and first person you manage to sort it out. No this is not the reason this post is about chocolate and beer. Even though either one would probably have been helpful.

After my journey into the seedy underbelly of the bureaucracy of a German university I met up with some other canadians on the exchange and we went grocery shopping. (Note to self, deciding to buy large amounts of groceries at once when the grocery store is a good 15-20 minute walk from where you live is not so wise). And as Monica and I were going down the aisles of Lidl, the cheapest grocery store around, she turns around and says to me : "You know what's cheap in this country? Chocolate and beer." We contemplated a life based solely on chocolate and beer. We figured that we'd probably be very happy. And the fact that we seem to walk an hour a day would probably keep us thin enough at least to get through doorways. In the end though we decided against it. We thought that we would get scurvy.

On an unrelated note it was a nice day today, so of course I got a little sunburned. If anyone can think of a place where
a) I wouldn't get sunburned. Ever.
b) I wouldn't become vitamin D deficient or clinically depressed because of seasonal affective disorder
please let me know. Most appreciated.

I am still knitting! I have a nearly finished object. Aren't you excited???? Pictures soon.

Tomorrow, new obstacles to be faced, placement tests and more bureaucracy. But, did I mention that I am going to school in a castle? How cool is that?!?

So in addition to being alive I am also ...

-tired beyond all rational belief

-very confused by all the German

-also confused by various practices of the residences and particularly how to use my keys

On the plus side I:

-didn't have trouble getting through customs even though I thought that I would

-found that Mannheim is laid out in a consistent grid pattern that is labelled. I didn't get lost. This is a big deal. More for other people than for me though.

-met some nice people who live in my residence.

Here's my room

And the view from my window

Not dead yet.

Awww... come on now.

Really I just sat down for a minute and somehow I think that more than a week went by. Um... not sure how that happened. I am taking off for Germany in ten days!!
That is all.

Monkey Brains Are Used for Love and Smartness

Park day today with the camp. This means there was crazy amounts of the following : sewing, cleaning, food, games, swimming, hysteria. Combine 8 campers plus various hangers on and you have a really good recipe for churning out such useful sentences as "Monkey Brains are used for love and smartness." And also... "I am a cowboy, but I am not wearing any pants."

Breaking news from the crafty department... western costumes. The annual camping trip with the folks from the German school has been given a theme: western murder mystery. Maddy is hard at work making costumes because no good event can be without costumes. Check out me in my duds.

But the real highlight of the day was Sunfest, the world music festival that takes place in London every year. We saw the sweet sweet Japanese drummers, and some Cuban music and to end off the night Kathryn, Maddy, Dad and I danced like mad fools to Colombian music. Hours of dancing, curry, plus some time to work on the croc socs??? Sounds like an awesome night to me!

A dying day

Today was a dying day in the best and least morbid sense of the word. The craft for the first day of camp was Sundye. The kids started on purses and various stuffed creations by dying the fabric out of which their projects will be made. It went surprisingly without incident. Like that Monty Python sketch where there is NO severed head behind the bushes, NO torso and assorted limbs in the rhododendron and NO spots of blood on the collar of Mr. Percival's white shirt; there was NO splashing of dye, NO dyeing of our clothes unintentionally and NO long lasting trauma for today.

The kids' creations in dye in the backyard.

As always the first day of camp was exhausting. When you are a child you don't realise just how much work can be put into amusing you. Curiously enough the inverse is also true, when you are an adult you finally realise how (occaisionally) so little work was put into amusing you, and how much you loved it.

The highlight of the day was, of course, completing my socks. You all must revel in their incomparable glory. Look at them! Have you ever seen a more beautiful first pair of socks??? I don't think so. And even though I am aware that it is shameless self-flattery to go on about them so much I can't help myself. Look at them. And then they are so soft when you touch them and I made them myself..... okay okay enough with the socks. (I love them!!!!!!)

It's Fake Canada Day!!

So today is fake Canada Day, the day when even though it's not the day the country was founded most people get a day off work. Not me. It was the final set up day before swim and sew summer camp took wing. There will be eight kids in the house this week, which will be at the same time exhillerating and exhausting. That is why we love it. To perk things up, I got to make the welcome sign... yay!

Fortunately Maddy and Kathryn were around to make the day go by quickly.

Unfortunately the spreadsheet with all the information about the campers that my mom and I were filling out crashed. Doing for the second time made me want to poke my eyes with forks. Spreadsheet = BAD. That is the math for the day.

Fortunately we found all the necessary equipment for our crafts for the day.

Unfortunately we spent much time threading splitty thread through welsh weaving sticks. This also made me want to poke my eyes out with forks.

Now I don't usually have this obsession with forks but Kathryn and I watched this crazy crazy movie last night on CBC (note to self, midnight on the CBC is never good) called the ecstasy note about this guy who, when he got stabbed in his left hand with a fork and hit the fork with a knife he made everyone pass out in ecstasy. It was supposed to be all arty and deep. It was not. Just creepy. That is all.

And in other news I am reading Tristram Shandy with which I have quickly developped a rampant obsession. If you haven't read it, do. And then after see the movie. I usually don't advocate movies based on books because they are usually terrible. This one is not. It is fantastically wonderful. Any movie that puts an adult into a giant womb, where the main character isn't even born by the end of the movie and cannot decide how it should be made... excellent excellent stuff.

But most importantly of all, drum roll please, I am almost finished knitting my socks. They are my first pair and I am really really excited about them. So much so that I abandoned a lot of other really beautiful things to make them. The toe on the second sock is giving me quite a bit of trouble. This is the second time I've had to do it, but I am so determined. Next up Croc socs for that lovely sister of mine: MADDY!

Also I think I am in love with socks.

Hobbyhorses, travel and knitting.

Well, here goes nothing.
Inspired by my growing obsession with knitting and travel blogs as well as my own pending adventure in another country, I've decided to start my own blog. Hello cyberspace!