April 2021 recap

Hello my lovelies! Can you believe I’m here for an April recap? What even is time and where is it going? I haven’t been around here much recently – sorry about that (why am I apologising? Nobody cares whether I blog!). You’ll soon see that I don’t really have much of a reason for that. As in I haven’t been too busy to post. Just not in the mood I guess. Anyway, on with the recap.

The month started with Easter. Actually Good Friday was 2nd April but I don’t have anything to say about the 1st. I was pleased to have a long weekend! Not that I did a lot. I went for 2 walks (Jan joined me for one) and I made hot cross buns. They took forever but turned out quite nice for a first attempt – maybe a bit dense.

ITV were showing all the Harry Potter films on Easter weekend and the following weekend and Jan decided her was going to watch then (if you know him in real life you’re probably rubbing your eyes in disbelief right now!). I watched with him and had fun spotting the scenes that were shot at Alnwick Castle and Durham Cathedral. I don’t normally watch that many films in such a short space of time unless it’s Christmas! We also watched a German film called Im Juli, which was weird, and I discovered Jan had never seen (or even heard of) The Lost Boys so we watched that. This discovery was make thanks to an answer on House of Games, which we’re still keeping up with, and I’ve also been enjoying Great British Menu. So much TV in April! This is very unusual for me!

I mentioned last month that my doctor had given me a referral for physiotherapy. I had my first session on the Wednesday after Easter. I chose a place that’s kind of opposite where I live which is so convenient! It literally takes me about 4 minutes from leaving my flat to being in the room. I’ve nearly finished my sessions now and my back is mostly better, although it still seems to play up at times.

It was not a good month for reading. I listened to an audiobook and it took dayssss. Me and audiobooks just don’t get on. Then on top that I only read 5 other books. I had hoped to finish another one but alas I only managed the first 130ish pages in April. I’m still working on it now almost a week into May!

Jan got his first dose of COVID vaccine. Yay! Our canton finally moved on from over-75s and “highest risk” to all chronic illnesses (Jan has type 1 diabetes. Since it’s well-controlled he isn’t considered high risk). He will get the second jab later this month. Vaccinations are still relatively slow here but starting to pick up now. And on the very last day of April the reported daily positive tests finally fell to below 2000 for the first time in weeks. Restaurants have been allowed to open their terraces since 19 April but I still haven’t been to one. And gyms also reopened on the same day but I haven’t set foot in one of those since I was about 16 😉 We did get take away a couple of times. One that lasted us for three nights in a row and one that we bought for lunch and had enough rice left over to reheat for tea. I made it without some frozen samosas (obviously I heated them) that I bought to try and turned out to be delicious so I will definitely get them again.

The last two months I have completely forgotten to mention that I’ve been trying to learn Ukrainian through Duolingo. I’m not great at it though – I can’t seem to get my head around the Cyrillic alphabet, especially since some of the letters that look similar to ours are pronounced (roughly) the same and some aren’t. So так is “yes” and it’s pronounced pretty much as you would expect (tak) but сестра (sister) is pronounced “sestra” because what my brain insists on viewing as a ‘p’ is pronounced similar to an ‘r’. And then the letter that does look like an r, albeit a backwards one, is pronounced ‘ya’, so моя сестра (my sister) is “moya sestra”. Aaargh!

I cannot think of anything else to tell you! I’ve still been going for my weekly walks, sometimes with Jan but most often alone. Here’s a photo of a squirrel we saw on one walk – it looks like it’s in a cage, but actually it’s some kind of structure that was apparently built to help it climb the tree. The tree was on the grounds of a school so we guessed the structure was probably part of some project there.

I hope you all had a good April. Check back on Tuesday if you want to know about the very few books I read last month.

Advertisement

A gathering of thoughts

Hello everyone! I hope you all had a nice Easter? I was home along for the long weekend – and still am, actually. Jan is away with one of his choirs on a trip that covers Vienna, Belgrade, Sofia, and Istanbul. Jealous? Me? No, not at all… Anyway, as you will have seen, the tag line of my blog is “Just a place to gather my thoughts” and occasionally I like to do just that, i.e. put together a list of random things that have occurred to me but don’t merit an entire blog post of their own.

Image from: https://openclipart.org/detail/263006/lost-in-thought

• Or building is being renovated next year and one of the things they’re doing is giving everyone a washer and dryer in their flat. I am way more excited about this than the new bathrooms they’re also planning on putting in… no more getting up early to put on a load of washing because certain people feel the need to reserve the evening washing machine slots months in advance so nobody else gets a chance! (Side note: most rental apartments in Switzerland have a shared laundry room and you either have an assigned day, a specific slot (e.g. Monday mornings) a sign-up sheet or, in some cases, it’s a free-for-all. In our case, it’s a sign-up sheet).
• Sort of related to the above… if I’m not allowed to do laundry or hoover on a Sunday does that mean it’s also illegal to dry my hair?
• After two whole delivery-free days in a row (Sunday followed by Easter Monday, which is a holiday), how is it possible that I had no mail today? The post person had obviously been because Jan had a letter from his health insurance, so where was my post? I want my books and I want them now!
• Speaking of books… I picked one up today that had been on my shelf for a while and realised that someone had ripped out a page in the middle (I buy almost all my books second hand). It’s an ex-library copy and is otherwise in good condition, so I can only assume the seller didn’t know. Who on Earth does that? I’m really annoyed now because I finally felt like reading that book and now I have to wait for another copy to arrive. Also, I’m going to have to throw the book away and I hate throwing books away, but with a missing page it’s no longer any use to anyone.
• I have two acquaintances who are currently pregnant with their fourth child. How?! (I mean, I know physically how but a) what are the chances of two people I know announcing this within a week and b) how do other people manage to have four children at the drop of a hat when I don’t even have one?)

Hmm, I thought I had more than that but I seem to have run out of steam, so that’s it. Not the most exciting post, but if I can’t talk to an actual human being I’ll just have to throw my random thoughts out into the universe instead 😉 And now I need to go and cook tea (by which I mean let the oven cook it for me). Have a great evening, friends.

35 Before 35: Mini Egg Easter Cookies

After nearly two years in Switzerland I still hadn’t baked anything for Jan’s colleagues, so this weekend I decided that needed to change! With Easter coming up, something relating to that seemed appropriate, so I found this recipe, bought Cadbury’s Mini Eggs and got to work.

The dough looked pretty with all the colourful bits of shell:

I didn’t have brown sugar so I used ordinary granulated sugar. It seemed to work okay. Here are some cookies waiting to go in the oven:

And here they all are, cooling on a rack:

There weren’t enough for me to try one and for most of Jan’s colleagues to get 2 each, so I couldn’t tell you how they taste. They looked good though and my entire flat still smells yummy even as I type this (after the cookies have already left the building). At least there were a few Mini Eggs left over for me to munch on 😉

And that makes biscuit number 8 for my 35 before 35 challenge!

Chocolate Easter Nests

I first wanted to make Easter nests for my colleagues two years ago, but sadly I was unable to find any equivalent of Cadbury’s Mini Eggs. Last year I failed to find any such thing again… I even tried the English shop in Heidelberg, but they had run out. So when I was in England in February, I grabbed two large bags of Mini Eggs. Arriving back in Germany, I discovered that Milka have now released their own version of Mini Eggs… this is the law of sod in action!

There are probably a million recipes for these Easter nests on the Internet, but I’m going to share mine with you anyway… I tell you how to make them in Germany, so my version is totally different, obviously 😉

You will need:
Cupcake cases
A box of plain Shredded Wheat – in Germany, use the “Original” Toppas. They’re covered in icing sugar, but that doesn’t seem to hurt the nests
Plain or milk chocolate – enough to cover your Shredded Wheat – I used roughly 150g chocolate to 100 g Toppas (guessing as I didn’t actually do any weighing…)
Cadbury’s or Milka Mini Eggs (or your country’s equivalent of chocolate eggs in a colourful sugar shell)

What to do:
1. Break the chocolate up and melt it in a bowl over a pan of water. Or I suppose you could use the microwave… I don’t have one!

2. While the chocolate is melting, in a large mixing bowl break the Shredded Wheat/Toppas into bits. If you’re using Toppas, the ones with most icing sugar might be a little harder to crush – don’t worry if there are some slightly larger bits in there a this point.

3. Ad the melted chocolate to the mixing bowl and stir the Shredded Wheat/Toppas and the chocolate together until the Shredded Wheat is completely coated. While stirring, you can crush any larger bits of Toppas that didn’t crush earlier.

4. Place roughly a dessert spoon of the mixture into each of your cupcake cases and use a teaspoon to push some of the mixture up the sides, leaving a dent in the middle. Be careful not to make a hole in the bottom though!

5. Place 2-3 Mini Eggs in each of the nests. If you think your nests are too dry for the eggs to stick to, you can use a bit of melted chocolate as glue.

6. Place the Easter nests in the fridge for at least half an hour to set. Once they’re ready, you’ll be able to take the cakes out of their cases and they’ll look just like miniature bird’s nests!

Aren’t they cute?

Now go and check out Manda’s recipe post for a different take on edible Easter nests!

Friday Letters & Daily Diaries: 5–11 April 2014

Work-wise, this week has been just as full as the two before it, but somehow it’s still managed to go by quickly – probably because of all the deadlines! I’ve spent a lot of time worrying that I wasn’t going to get things finished when I was meant to, but somehow everything was ready by it’s due date. Go me! Anyway, have some letters and some more detail about my week. Apologies for the huge blocks of text without photos – I’m typing this from work, so I only have access to those that are already uploaded.

Dear temperature. How am I supposed to know what to wear when it’s 7°C in the morning and 22°C by the time I leave work? Sort it out!

Dear large groups of women on trains. You have your reserved seats, so please just sit in them and let the rest of us pass, instead of standing next to your seats clucking away!

Dear Easter. This time next week, you will be here! (Well, Good Friday will be). I’m sooo looking forward to my four-day weekend.

Dear stomach. I’m not sure whether the doctor’s pills are working or you would have got better now anyway, but I must say I’m thoroughly enjoying actually being hungry again!

And now for the week that was…

The weekend. As I mentioned in last week’s Friday letters, I wanted a fairly relaxing weekend after the stress of the week before, so on Saturday I actually slept in til 11 a.m! I then had a cup of tea and did some cross stitch before jumping in the shower and then heading out to do some shopping – I purposely decided not to watch the Newcastle United match and I’m very glad I didn’! When I came home, Jan and I made tea together (pumpkin and pasta) then watched an episode of Farscape before heading to bed, where we read aloud to each other from Terry Pratchett’s Snuff.
There was an Easter market going on in Karlsruhe at the weekend, so on Sunday we decided to go and have a look at it. As it turned out, there wasn’t much there… mostly food stands. It claimed to be an “Easter and Gastronomy Market”, but most of the stalls were just from local cafés or the sausage/langos/crepe vans that are at every single event in Karlsruhe ever. However, it was also a verkaufsoffener Sonntag (a Sunday on which the shops are open – towns are only allowed to do this about twice a year!), so we headed to T.K. Maxx because Jan had never been. I managed to get a wooden letter holder thingy, so it worked out pretty well. Instead of going straight home, we stopped off at Bratar for yummy burgers – at this point my stomach was actually feeling fine! Then, back at home, I made practice Easter nests just to make sure I still remembered how (I’ll be making more this weekend for my colleagues). I ate precisely one Easter nest, but by bedtime my stomach felt uncomfortably full and bloated, although not sore. Gah!

Monday. I woke up feeling okay, but by the time I arrived at work my stomach was blown up like a balloon (I honestly looked pregnant!) and I had no appetite. It was 11 o’clock by the time the bloating went down and I could actually eat my yoghurt. By 1:30 p.m., I was slightly hungry but afraid to eat what I’d brought with me (it was curry), so lunch ended up being three rice crackers. I also had a sensation of acid in my throat all afternoon, which wasn’t fun! I had promised Jan toad in the hole for tea, and by the time it was cooked I’d managed to get rid of the acid and feld quite hungry. I only managed a small portion though. Apart from cooking, all I did on Monday night was watch an episode of E.R and wash the dishes.

Tuesday.  The acid reflux and bloating were back when I woke up, so I decided it was time for a trip to the doctor.  I informed my colleagues that I would be working from home and called the docs for an appointment (Jan wouldn’t do it for me and I still have no idea what the receptionist actually wrote in the appointments book – I highly doibt it had anything to do with my actual name though!). I managed to get an appointment for 3:30, so I worked til just before 3 then headed out. The doctor’s verdict was hyperacidity of the stomach, probably caused by stress. So he gave me some stomach drops and some tablets to stop my stomach from producting as much acid then sent me on my way, telling me to eat light foods for a few days and come back in 14 days if I wasn’t feeling better. After picking up my prescription, I headed home to carry on working for a while. It was my grandpa’s 80th birthday on Tuesday, so in the evening I phoned by dad while he was at the hospital so I could talk to my grandpa. His voice was very weak, but I could just about hear him say “Thank you for calling” and “Love you”. Wishing him a happy birthday was bittersweet – he always said he would live to be 80, and now he’s achieved it. That night was pub quiz, in which my team came second. YAY!

Wednesday. I went into work on Wednesday, armed with my medicine. This week was our intern’s last week with us and we were having pizza for his leaving meal on Wednesday. I didn’t think pizza counted as 2light food”, so I ordered Pizzabrötchen instead – little bread rolls made from the same dough as the pizza. The ones I chose had spinach and a small amount of goat’s cheese on, and were apparantly plain enough for my stomach – at least it didn’t protest. I had wanted to get an early night on Wednesday, but I ended up coming home, watching E.R then getting back on the computer and working til 20 past 8 before finally getting round to cooking tea. We ate fishfingers with croquettes and frozen peas because it was quick, easy and at least fairly plain.

Thursday. I woke up feeling incredibly hungry and had to buy a couple of muesli bars for breakfast on the way to work – usually breakfast is a yoghurt, but I’m avoiding those til I’m sure my stomach has settled down. The morning was pretty stressful with deadlines galore, but by 3 p.m. I’d finished everything I had to do and was able to move on to a translation that I technically wouldn’t have needed to start til next week. I worked precisely 8 hours for the first time in ages, then went home to sort out the living room ready for Jan’s choir coming over to practice (they’re a double quartet  – so 8 people when everyone’s there, which they never are at my place because they only come to us when the person whose flat they normally practice at is away). I then quickly made us a meal of gnocchi with creamed spinach. Once the choir arrived, I retreated to the spare room where I worked on some cross stitch – it’s an Easter card so I really need to get it finished ready to send off! I also uploaded some photos ready to use in a blog post about Colmar. The choir finally left at just before 11 and, after taking my medicine, I basically went straight to bed.

Friday. And that brings us to today. So far, I have worked a bit on next week’s translation and entered the corrections from proofreaders for two jobs due today. Now I’m on my lunch break and as soon as I’ve posted this, I’ll be reading the news before getting back to work. It’s looking like I should be able to leave on time today, so I’ll be out of here by 5 p.m. Then tonight I’m off to watch my quiz master’s band perform – the first time I’ve seen them this year (although we saw him play solo on St. Patrick’s Day). As for the weekend, other than making Easter nests for mine and Jan’s colleagues, I have no real plans as yet…

And that’s what I’ve been up to. Why not join in with Kate’s link up on Diaries of an Essex Girl and tell us all about your week. Just click the button below…

Friday letters: bye bye March

This is the last Friday in March. Monday is the 31st and on Tuesday we enter April. The thought that the year is already a whole three months old makes me want to cry… how could I have done so little in three entire months?! Not cool! Oh well, at least I have a few things planned for this weekend. In the meantime, have some letters….

Dear Spring.  According to the weather forecast, you are set to return. Please hang around this time… I don’t want to have to wear my winter coat all through April again!

Dear scales. Since I had to move you to hoover, I can no longer trust anything you say. Curse you, uneven floors! How am I supposed to track my progress now? *sobs*

Dear boyfriend. I will probably be out when you get back from Turkey on Saturday night, but I’m looking forward to spending some time with you on Sunday!

Dear mam. Your Mother’s Day card will be late because I’m an idiot and didn’t leave myself enough time to stitch it and get it posted in time, but I hope you like it anyway (once it arrives…)

Dear Green Day. I read yesterday that your American Idiot album will be ten years old later this year. How is that possible?! I’m sure I only received it as a gift a year or two ago… (and yes, I was given it the year it came out).

Dear Easter. Why are you so late this year? I want my long weekend already!

That’s all from me for today. Happy Friday! I hope you all have a wonderful weekend.

*Note: I am entering this post for Kate’s Daily Diaries linkup. Technically, the idea is to write a post about what’s been going on with you over the past week, which I haven’t really done here, but if you read between the lines it sort of is about what’s happening right now soooo into the linkup it goes. To find out more about the linkup or join in yourself, click the button below.*

Bad Dürkheim

Römerplatz, Bad Dürkheim

The weather forecast for yesterday wasn’t toooo bad (at least it didn’t mention rain), so we decided to take advantage of that and the fact that it was still the four-day Easter weekend and go to Bad Dürkheim for the afternoon.

Our first stop was in Hardenburg, a Stadtteil (district or quarter) of Bad Dürkheim, where the ruins of the Hardenburg castle are. Again, Hardenburg castle was on our Museumscard (actually, it’s officially the Museumspass in case anyone’s looking for it). Without the card, the entrance fee would have been €3. The castle was originally the seat of the Counts of Leiningen, but after it was destroyed by the French they moved to Bavaria. Here are some photos.

 

The houses you can see in the background of the last picture are in Hardenburg itself. It looks like a cute little village.

Bad Dürkheim Hardenburg

Once we’d had enough of the castle, it was time to head in to Bad Dürkheim proper. And the first thing I saw there was a red telephone box!

Sadly, there’s no phone in it. A sign next to it explains that it was donated to Bad Dürkheim in the ’80s by British Telecom and the town of Wells, one of Bad Dürkheim’s partner towns.

Here are some other things we saw on our walk around Bad Dürkheim.
The Rathaus (Town Hall)

A church – Catholic I think.

A stone tortoise (or possibly turtle?), complete with rider.

Another church – the Burgkirche. This one is protestant (Evangelical), but if I’ve understood the Internet correctly it’s no longer used as a church, but more of a community centre for the protestant community.

The building in front of it is a very cute half-timbered building, but I couldn’t manage to get the whole thing in with my camera.

By this time, we were freezing, so we decided to go and find something to eat. This is the place we chose:

It’s called Petersilie, which means Parsley (as in the herb). I ate the home-made Frikadellen with potato salad, which was delicious, and Jan had Saumagen (Sow’s stomach). I tried a bit of his and it was much less salty than I remembered. We both drank wine, because that’s what you do in Rheinland-Pfalz! Bad Dürkheim is on the German wine route.

After dinner, we stopped by Bad Dürkheim’s famous giant wine barrel. It’s apparantly the world’s largest, but it was built purely as an advertising gimmick – there has never actually been wine in it! Instead, it contains a restaurant and always has.

We didn’t go in, but through the window the restaurant looked nice.

Side view

Restaurant in a wine barrel

Bad Dürkheim is not the prettiest town I’ve ever visited, although it does have one or two nice buildings and squares scattered around. I also think it will look a lot nicer once the winter weather finally goes away and the spring flowers have a chance to come out! The few daffodils I saw scattered around looked decidedly sorry for themselves! As I’ve mentioned, Bad Dürkheim is on the German wine route, and as well as having the world’s largest wine barrel, it is also host to the world’s largest wine festival. The Wurstmarkt (which literally means Sausage Market) is held in the second and third week of September each year. We drove to Bad Dürkheim, but for a wine festival you’d be better of taking the train! From Mannheim, there’s a direct regional train that goes via Neustadt an der Weinstraße. Coming from anywhere else, you’ll need to change trains in either Mannheim or Neustadt.

Happy Easter!

It’s chocolate egg day today! I hope you all have lots of goodies to savour.
Here’s what I got Jan:

I didn’t get anything so he’s letting me have one of the chocolate bunnies.

We’re hopefully going out for the afternoon now, so keep your fingers crossed for sunshine!

Happy chocolate bunny day!

(Good) Friday letters

It’s Friday again! But this time it’s not just any Friday… it’s Good Friday, which means I get the day off work. Thank you Germany for your insane love of Feiertage! Now for the Good Friday edition of Friday’s letters…

Photo credit: davidbonting

Dear Easter. I mentioned last year why you’re one of my favourite holidays, and nothing has changed since then. Four-day weekend? YES PLEASE!

Dear Eddie Izzard. One more week! I’m so excited!

Dear housework fairy. I need you to come and clean my kitchen, please. I am sick of doing it only to turn around (what feels like) 5 minutes later to find it looking like a bomb’s hit it. Ugh!

Dear weather. Please could you be nice tomorrow so we can go out for the day? I would be ever so grateful!

Dear new shoes. I hope to be able to wear you outdoors soon. Please be patient!

Dear self. You really need to drink more water! And the fact that work provides you with large bottles of Volvic for free there is really no excuse for how little you’ve been drinking recently!

Happy Easter everyone! Enjoy your chocolate.

Return of the snow

I thought Karlsruhe had managed to escape the latest round of snow. Berlin has been ankle deep in it for ages and Frankfurt Airport was recently closed because of it (again!), but until now, every time the white stuff was forecast for Karlsruhe, we got rain instead. Our time, it appears, has now come. Here’s what I woke up to this morning:

I wouldn’t even mind the snow so much – despite the fact that it is now officially spring and I want daffodils – if it hadn’t brought freezing wind with it. My gloves did absolutely nothing for me this morning!

Thank goodness I only have four days at work this week. After that it’s Easter, and since practically everything is closed on Good Friday I have an excellent excuse to hide in the house and drink endless cups of tea!