A few pics from last night's dinner!

Zach, trying to get the innards out...

Becca, our Brit

Playing cards while dinner's being cooked...

FINALLY, dinner!

Rainy Sunday

Freitag ist der beste Tag!

Guten Morgen, ihr Liebe!

(I love how on Fridays, "morning" is approx. 11:30 am.)
So last night I had a Brit over for dinner. Her name is Becca and she's pretty much awesome. She, Zach, Harley and I hung out until 1 am, causing me to hibernate until 11. =]
For dinner, we made steak with caramelized onions and a garlic/soy sauce marinade and a side of green beans with almond. I could have made roasted herb potatoes as well, but I didn't realize potatoes don't have gluten (-Becca can't eat gluten). Not bad for a kitchen-challenged individual, eh?

I also had my first appointment with a trainer at the gym today. He was suuuper nice and really funny and patient with our communication problems. My back and shoulders have all kinds of things wrong with them, and I'm going to start doing some stretches and exercises to help build up those muscles and prevent back pain later in life. Woo!

(Later)

It's now 4:30 and I think I'm going to watch Elf and take a nap. Gotta be rested up for Manü's birthday party tonight =]

This is pretty much how I feel right now

My presentation this morning went AWEOME. My secret? Do the proper amount of research, but under no circumstances should you ever rehearse what you want to say. Totally worked. =] Also, my teacher adores me. I am without a doubt the darling of the class, haha. I really like her; she's very sweet and definitely a history dork like I am.

And! I have a presentation tomorrow in my EU class, and I just finished researching all the coolest news stories for it. I feel so edu-ma-cated! Since they're all auf Deutsch, I won't post it here, but here's what's up in Germany this last week:

1. Someone sent Chancelor Merkel a pipe bomb on Tuesday, but luckily it did not detonate. It said it came from the Greek Economic Ministry, but they're not positive of the origins of the bomb. This isn't the first time this has happened in recent history- just the day before four bombs were sent to various Embassies in Athens. Two detonated, and one man was minimally injured.

2. Merkel just passed legislation that extends the use of 17 nuclear power plants throughout Germany. The german hippies have their panties in a wad and there are massive demonstrations going on all over Germany. Most notably, a huge sign was hung from Merkel's party's headquarters a few days ago:

Directly translated, it doesn't make sense, but basically they're slamming her for catering to the desires of the nuclear companies, and putting Germany's safety on the back burner.

3. There was an integration conference in Berlin yesterday. This is by far Germany's biggest struggle/news story/problem (however you want to look at it). Originally it was believed that by living side-by-side, people would learn to accept each other and live in a multicultural (multi-kulti) world. Didn't work. Their plan now? Dish out about 400 billion euros for extra help for children of immigrants.
I am so for this. Go Germany! These poor kids stand very little chance of success without this aide. America is fairly immigrant/xenophobic, but Germany (historically speaking--not just the Nazi era) is much worse. I'm hoping things get better!

HEAR ME ROAR!

My eyes have not known 8 am for a while now, and let me tell you, they are not amused.

I've got class in two hours and I feel like I should practice my presentation. But I won't! I shant elaborate until I have successfully delivered the presentation...

What else?

The orchestra didn't work out; they already had enough drummers, unfortunately. I spent a good half hour trying to locate them, too. So ein Mist!

I've got my first appointment today with a trainer at the gym, so I'm really jazzed about that, and tonight, I've invited a Brit over for dinner. It should be a good day.

Except for the fact it's 8:11 am. Except for that. lol

Vielen Dank, Tante Nancy!

Thank you so much for the post card, I LOVED it! I think everyone I knew knew within 30 minutes that I had received a postcard from the States. Haha :)

Presentation about the Kaiserreich tomorrow. Still can't figure out what I'm talking about. Hopefully it'll somehow fall together.
I'm auditioning for the student orchestra tonight! I'm so excited, I can hardly stand it. I'll let you know how it goes. Gotta go study!

Um...

So apparently the Pope is going to visit Germany sometime in 2011...
As of right now it's all here-say, but they're pretty confident it's going to happen.
I get anxious on soccer gamedays with those crowds in the streets. If this happens while I'm here, I don't know what I'll do, lol. WAYYYY to clostrophobic for the kinds of crowds that guy will attract.