I'll begin where I left off with my blog on Friday... After I finished writing, I packed up my computer and headed downtown to go to the Cable company to find out what was taking so long to hook up our internet and phone line. Luckily, the guy working was able to speak a little English, so it made the process go much smoother. :) After I asked him what the hold up was, he called a few different people, and of course spoke to them in German, so I had no idea what he was saying... Lovely! After waiting for about 15 minutes, he hung up and informed me that they wouldn't be able to get out to our apartment to hook up the internet/phone line until.... are you ready for this... October 7th! Now, I don't know about you, but I never realized it took 6 -7 weeks to simply hook up an internet and phone connection! As the words came out of his mouth, I simply stared at him, completely dumbfounded. When I asked him why it would take so long, he explained that the company apparently tried to call me one day early in September (Brian and I looked up the date he gave me and it was on a Saturday... they aren't even open on Saturday... nice! :)). Apparently they wanted to hook it up on that day, but since I didn't answer (it's hard to answer the phone when no one actually calls...) they didn't hook it up. He then informed me that we would just have to wait until October 7th... At that point, I thought about how long we had already waited, and how tired I was of walking to McDonald's to use the internet everyday, and how I just wanted to be able to pick up a phone to call people... and I did the only thing I could do at the moment... I burst into tears... Lovely! :) However, it did seem to startle the guy and he immediately tried to make me feel better (either he wanted to make me feel better or he just wanted to get me to stop crying and out of his store as quickly as possible... :)) He then made a few more calls. After he hung up, he told me that he had called his boss and they were going to see if they could get anyone out to our apartment any sooner than October 7th... He told me that they would call me with any information... After he informed me of that, I quickly apologized and left the store (completely embarassed I might add! :)) So, now we wait... Hopefully it'll get hooked up before October 7th, but based on how things have gone for us so far, I'm not going to hold my breath...
On Friday night, we celebrated the 40th birthday of one of our fellow American's over here. (Laura is from the U.S. and she's been working over here in Germany for the past 3 years). We went to her favorite bar, which is almost as American as you can find around here... It's a biker bar by the name of Motorcycles Rock Bar. :) I have to admit that it felt very American in there... it had extremely loud rock music playing, it was decorated with motorcycle pictures, and it had a Harley sitting up in the loft... Nice! :) We didn't stay very long, as it felt like our eardrums were going to burst after being in there for just a short time... plus, we didn't really look like we fit in with the rest of the clientel... I can't say that Brian and I really look like the "biker" type. :)
On Saturday, Brian and I decided to head to the gym. While we were there, we ran into another American. He's from Alaska and he's been over here for 7 years. He teaches English at a language school in the area. When he found out that I was a teacher, he informed me that finding a job teaching English here should not be a problem... so, that's definitely good to know. He and his friend gave us their contact information and told us to get ahold of them so that they could introduce us to some of the other Americans they work with... Just talking to him and realizing that there's other people from the U.S. here, made me feel a little more at ease... At least I know that there's other people over here that are in the same boat as Brian and I... :) I'm hoping that we get the chance to meet up with them at some point.
We went to Konstanz (we finally made it over there! :)) on Saturday night with Maike and her boyfriend, Norbert. We went to dinner at a restaurant that specializes in potatoes... Yum! :) We tried to wander around the city for a while, but it was raining, so we couldn't really see much. However, from what I did see, I do know that I'd like to go back to explore at some point. It's a very old city and some of the buildings are absolutely gorgeous!
While we were walking around, Maike told me that she wanted to take me to her favorite place, called LAGO... which I soon found out was the the local mall! YAY!! I was beginning to wonder if they had any malls around here... We walked into LAGO and I immediately felt like I was right at home! :) (I realized at that point how much I missed going to the mall... ) It reminded me of Water Tower Place in downtown Chicago... and we all know how much I love that place! While we were there, Maike introduced me to her favorite store, Mecca. It's almost identical to my favorite store, Express! Woohoo! Can I just tell you how happy I was at that point?! :) Brian watched me wander through the store, touching virtually everything in sight, and he simply shook his head and smiled. :) We only were able to stay for a short time, seeing as how it was almost closing time... However, Maike and I decided that we would try to make a trip back there sometime within the next two weeks... I can't wait!! I explained to Brian that my reason for going back was because it's starting to get cold here, and since our clothes are still sailing across the Atlantic Ocean, it's necessary for me to go buy some new fall clothes at the mall... hee, hee! :)
On Sunday, we woke up early and headed to the rock wall in Ravensburg with Maike and a friend of hers... Hilma. The rock wall there was pretty impressive, to say the least! We climbed for about 4 hours... until our fingers started to feel somewhat raw, which is never a good thing! :) Maike and I even tried bouldering while we were there... we'll just say that neither of us is very good at it, but it did prove to be very entertaining. :)
Overall, our weekend was pretty relaxing... We took advantage of it though, because it looks like we have a busier week in store for us this week. We've got our evenings pretty booked for the rest of the week, and then on Friday, we're heading to Munich with some of Brian's coworkers. I'm pretty excited about it too... because, not only do we get to see Munich, but we get to go to Oktoberfest as well!! Fun, fun! :) (Jason and Stacy, I'll make sure to take lots of pictures for you!)
Well, I have to run. I have some errands to run, groceries to buy, and a workout to get in before Brian gets home from work... Brian and I are meeting up with some of his coworkers from Detroit for dinner tonight... they're in town for the week. Yay! It'll be nice to have dinner and talk with some fellow Americans... :) Oh, and as promised, I've attached better pictures of our new car... Enjoy! :) I hope you all have a great Monday! Miss you much!
A side view of our new car... Don't you just love the MTU logo on the side? :)
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