it's inevitable.

One day soon, I'm going to wake up and be able only to communicate in a hybrid language of English and terrible German (Gerlish? Engman? what will we call it?). German is taking over my brain, people, but not to the extent that it's even remotely useful. I'm just confused all the time. Was? Wer? Are you asking me a question or making a statement? Who can even know that? This week (and last weekend) was an interesting experiment into exactly how many words I can cram into my brain (answer: 231, plus or minus) while simultaneously trying to learn prepositions, master the dative case, and use both to give directions. THIS. IS. NOT. EASY. And having taken a test today to demonstrate my ability to do just that, after having gotten approximately a 99% score on the last test, does not leave one feeling terribly confident. Gehen Sie geradeaus, people.

In other news, I truly love apricot/berry season, and will be extremely sad to see it go. But for now, I am stuffing my face with as much fruit as I can possibly stand. So at least I have that going for me.

And another thing. Why is Google always changing its user interface? I like the clean, white page with just the words in black and the logo in color. Why, with the black bar across the top, and the changing of the buttons, and whatnot? Varuuuuuuuum? I ask you.

And finally, I promised you Augsburg, so I give you Augsburg. Mike and I headed there two weekends ago on the bike (yaay!), discovering that not only is the shopping there quite good (especially compared to Zurich!!), but that you can, in fact, go more-or-less as fast as you want on the highways (die Autobahnen). (Yes...there's more than just "the" Autobahn.) Anyway. Another college town (albeit not so little), somewhat off the beaten path, with interesting architecture and GOOD food. (Is anyone sensing a theme here...?) The only thing I did not like about it was that it was oddly spread out; the main historic district was basically this loooong line, with two conjoined churches at one end and the cathedral at the other, with the big public square and the town hall (Rathaus) in the middle. The place definitely merits further exploration, not only for the shopping (they have clothes in our size! and, oddly enough, dirndls/lederhosen in their department stores!), but for the fact that we missed the big draw--the 12th-century painted glass windows, oldest in Europe--by forgetting our map at the hotel and going to the wrong end of the strip. Ah well,  we knew we'd be going back anyway.

This is actually in Memmingen, a town between here and Augsburg. We took a brief jaunt to stretch our legs.

Memmingen.

Pretty church with pretty yard and a unicorn statue in front. Yes. That is what you're seeing.

Ratskellar, where we had dinner. Fantastic vaulted ceiling, largest "digital" picture frame I've ever seen (ok, so a projector with a frame around the screen), and really good food! (We split some weisswurst and fresh cheese with dark bread for an app; Mike had a mustard-battered veal schnitzel with some fantastic roasted potatoes and I had the platter-o-meats [turkey, chicken "haunch", and three wee sausages] for main dishes; then he had some sort of delicious berry sundae and I had vanilla ice cream rolled in crushed Amaretti cookies with caramel sauce. YUMMMM. If you're in Augsburg, eat there.)

Main strip between Augsburg cathedral and the churches of St. Ulrich.

Augsburg Rathaus. Dates back to 1615, the symbol of the city. Pardon the wide angle...there was some sort of concert in the square in front of it the night before, and the temporary stage was still there, blocking the square. (But yaaaaaaaaay for our awesome wide-angle lens!)

Rathaus plus the old church (first iteration in 1067) next door.

Creepy tombstone in St. Peter am Perlach.

Interior of Rathaus.

Their clame to fame: the Goldener Saal (golden ceiling, to the layperson). Destroyed during the bombing of Augsburg in 1944, finally restored and opened to the public in 1985 as part of the town's 2000th anniversary. (Yup, you read that right.)

Actually, it's pretty impressive.

A little trompe l'oeil.

Central city hall door with NEAT iron work. Mike for scale.

St. Ulrich's churches (Protestant church with shorter dome in the foreground, Catholic in back.)

Plaster ceiling in the Protestant church. 

Interior of the Catholic church.

Interior of the Catholic church through a gate (Mike took this one and I like it.)

Maximilianstrasse, looking north towards the other end of the strip. This street is long.

Possibly, more photos to follow, depending on when we go back. Hopefully soon.  :)

What I'm reading: finished Lost in Shangri-La much sooner than expected, 'cause the last third of the book was footnotes, acknowledgements, etc., etc., etc. Boooo. While I appreciate that kind of attention to detail and documentation as a historian, as a reader, I wanted more. Fascinating story, well written and well paced. I recommend it. Next, however, I accidentally stumbled upon 'If a Pirate I Must Be...', the True Story of "Black Bart," King of the Caribbean Pirates in my search for something else to read. For those of you who don't know me so well, I LOVE PIRATES and everything to do with their lore, codes, history, etc., etc. Thus far--maybe a third of the way into the book--I am loving it. I can only assume that my next book will be something else about pirates.

What I'm watching: we broke down--ok, I broke down--and went to see the final installment of the Harry Potter series. Admittedly, it was in 3D, but that's only because that's all they're showing here in English. (Frankly, I can take or leave 3D. I think it's fairly lame.) The German and French subtitles were a bit distracting, but one does what one has to do. If you're a fan, go now. Don't miss it on the big screen. I'm not a Harry Potter nut by any stretch of the imagination, but I'm kinda sad for the saga to be over. Warning, though: the ending is a bit twee. I'm just saying. Still worth seeing, though.

Next up: I have no idea. Don't hold your breaths.