Day 2: Touring Cologne

The second day we were here, Dustin and Courtney treated us to a good, German-style breakfast (or so they said) -- bread, cheese, spreads, veggies, coffee, and tea. Then we walked around town, first stopping at the church of St. Gereon. It was neat. Gereon was a Roman soldier, and they had a statue of only his head on the ground outside (follow the link to see a picture). You can also see pictures of the church here.

Then we walked around town, saw a Roman wall, and walked downtown to see the cathedral (known here as the dome).

Here's a picture that Mark took. This cathedral is huge, and very decorated (gothic style). There are some pictures with a different perspective here.

Here's a picture from the inside.

We climbed 156 meters to the top of one of the spires. We climbed using a narrow stone spiral staircase. Our calves were not happy with us the next day. Otherwise, it was really neat. This is the view from the top.

We did some other things that day (ate lunch at a Lebanese restaurant, walked around the shopping district, went to a gestapo museum where there was also a special exhibit on stolpersteine, and then we had dinner at a traditional Cologne brauhaus (brew house) that serves the traditional beer for the town: Kolsch). This is a picture of Mark and Dustin having a Kolsch. We had brautwerst and sauerbraten. Courtney and Dustin had salad.

From our first night in Germany

We're sitting in Courtney and Dustin's apartment in Cologne; it's around midnight. We've been here a few days now. She said, "we're so glad to spend time with you in this time zone. You would definitely be asleep by now." Hmm, I guess so.

Here are a few pictures from our first night here, after we had a long, overnight flight to Frankfurt, a snowy train ride to Cologne (on a very fast train), a small train ride to our friends' neighborhood, and a walk to their apartment, we were ready to relax.

Courtney and Sarah sitting on their futon, in front of the kitchen.

Dustin is cooking us some pasta with butternut squash sauce.

Funny light switches here.

Merry Christmas

I am sitting at my old office here in State College, and the snow on the ground makes it feel like it is indeed Christmas. I check the icon, in the lower right hand corner of the laptop, and my suspicion is confirmed, it is Dec 21. So while it is not Christmas presently, it does appear that another season will come and go without us sending out cards. I do not feel that this makes us complete failures, but certainly partial failures. Over the last few weeks the cards we have gotten in the mail have reminded us of how far we have to go in the evolution into civilized adults. Maybe we need to have kids so we can have a family photo and an accompanying letter. But as I think about having kids so that we would send out cards, I think that is probably not a good idea.

So, in lieu of a card, we would like to wish all three of our loyal blog readers a Merry Christmas. Sarah, me and Millie love you all very much.

Lookout Mountain in the Fog

Mom sent us this picture that she took a few weeks ago. They were here in town, and we took a riverboat cruise on the Tennessee River. This is a picture of Lookout Mountain in the fog. Just to the left of the mountain is where our neighborhood is. The fog can get pretty thick here. Some mornings I'll wake up, look out the kitchen window, and not even see the top of the mountain. On days like that, campus can be pretty moody:

This is a picture off the webcam from today. The fog gets really thick, and often the building I'm walking to won't even be visible until I'm pretty close to it.

Some days, though, I'll wake up, look at the fog, groan about what it must be like at the top, and then find something entirely different up there. The fog will settle down around the mountains and ridges, and when I get to the part of my drive when I'm at the top of the mountain and there's a big overlook, I can't believe how beautiful it is. I've never managed to get a picture (something about driving 40 mph while turning quite close to a cliff doesn't scream "take a picture..."), but I did find a school blog that had a few pictures:

Goodbye summer

Tomorrow is November first, and I think we're going to be turning the heat on soon. The trees are starting to turn (though, with the drought we had this summer, we're not sure that they'll put on much of a show), and there are trick or treaters screaming at the "haunted house" down the block. I wore a scarf on our walk this morning.

In other words, it's fall.

But here are a few pictures from this summer.

I took this picture this summer because it seemed like an essential summer cooking moment:

We had a lot of people over for dinner this summer:

My friend Gwen came over and cooked with me. We wore matching Anthropologie aprons (thanks Mom and Duncans!):

No more long summer evenings for projects at the house:

Hope your summer was as great as ours, and I hope the fall is just as great...

The last few months

• We went to a very nice wedding in South Carolina and watched two good friends get hitched.
• We visited Sarah's parents in Fl and watched the Gators beat Tennessee.
• We hired a new person to work in recruitment with me who starts tomorrow.
• I bought and successfully used a table saw.
• Sarah started her second year at the college.
• We went and heard the archbishop of Uganda speak.
• Sarah is supposed to have an essay published in a few months.
  

This is how it turned out.

Getting the house painted...

What do you think about this color? Green body, tan trim, copper accents.

... and that's how we learned something new about plumbing

Q: Why won't our outdoor faucet let any water out?






A:
Ah ah. The guy at Ace said, "You haven't been drinking out of that, have you?"

A few pictures from a few weeks ago

Our good friends (http://www.houseofkee.blogspot.com/) came through Chattanooga a few weeks ago. We liked seeing them.



Walking bridge + ice cream = don't you want to come visit us, too?



"I see a Cardinal"





Waffles (picture from the rental, not the new house)

Weekend Surprise

This weekend Mark and I did a little yard work together. We put anti-weed plastic down in a few of the flower beds, trimmed back our invasive mimosa trees (our neighbor said: mimosas are so beautiful -- I'd like to have them fill the slope between our houses... It's not unlike saying she wants to cultivate kudzo, but whatever), and cleaned out the gutters. The gutter that runs along the front of our house goes down a drain pipe that goes into the ground. The pipe then runs about 12-15 feet underground and empties at the road. This weekend, we put a hose at the top of the pipe and noticed that no water was coming out the other end. Time to clear it out. So Mark cleared out some of the grass that had been growing in front of the opening and stuck his hand as far up the pipe as he could reach. He knocked loose some leaves and mud, but not much else.
"Sarah," he says, "come stick your hand in here and see what you can reach" (you see I have no muscles and therefore have skinny arms).
So I stuck my arm in the pipe and the tips of my fingers just grasped a root or two. I pulled. Out came not only the roots but some muck stuck to them:




I kept pulling. I guess the water had knocked some stuff loose because all of a sudden it was like that magic trick where the scarves keep coming out of the hat. The root-muck-rope kept coming. I kept pulling slowly and gently so it wouldn't break. It kept coming. Mark started yelling. Our neighbor came out to look.

Twelve feet later the rope ended:




Sick, huh?

projects are hard work

So dirty, it looks like he's still wearing socks...



So tired, he took a beer with him to the shower.


(these are pictures from the old house, while we were building the fence at the new house)

First Project

Although we're all moved in now, I thought I'd go ahead and post the projects as we've done them.

First project... building a fence.




Millie: "It's hot. I'm on a rope. I wish I could run free in my yard."



Lance and Mark figure out the complicated mathematical formual to get the pickets spaced and dropped evenly over a 75 foot span with a 3 foot drop in elevation. We had Lance write it down before he left.


All done! It still needs to be stained/ sealed (not painted).


Millie: "I'm so happy in here."

Closed

Ah... after a little bit of drama, we finally managed to close on our house yesterday!

Here's a picture. The current owners are moving next week, so we'll take possession then, but we'll probably do a few projects before we acutally move in.

4-Wheelin

On Sunday, my neighbor Dave and I went to a Rock Crawling competition about a half hour from Chattanooga. It was crazy. These pictures don't do it justice, but it was amazing the stuff they could go up and over.















I was thinking this doesn't look good...















...and then he flipped.















This is probably not good for trees.

Anyway Sarah and I are doing well. We are supposed to close on a house this week. So, we'll have lots of chores to do this summer, and anyone who wants to visit and help is welcome. We'll post some pictures of the house when we get it, and I'm sure we'll chronicle the renovation.

Two Pictures

Here are two pictures you might like:






















Our neighbor duct taped their mailbox to their tree. No need to mess with fancy posts here in TN. These are the same neighbors, by the way, who spray-painted their car.


















Here's a picture of two new favorite things -- roasted broccoli (so delicious, I think I ate a whole head of broccoli myself the other night) and Ellie's Brown Ale (rated #1 in a brown ale review by the New York Times, link below).

Brown Ale Review Link

And the Winners Are

After much delay. Here are the winners of the 2006 replace Mark's shirt contest.











The "Two Sizes Too Small" award goes to Alyson K.











The "Best Shirt With Snaps" award goes to Melissa B.












The "Timezone" award goes to Pearl B. since hers came from the farthest away










The "Someone just cleaned out their closet and didn't follow directions award" goes to Calvin H












The "Good recovery based on their first entry award" goes to Calvin H









The "Best purchase from a Chattanooga thrift store award" goes to Mary S

As you can see we had lots of entries and I appreciate them all. So, anyone who comes to visit us gets a tank of gas or cash if you would prefer. And I guess we owe our local contestant a drink(s).

Thanksgiving in Chattanooga

So, as you can see, we're a little behind on the updates. Thanksgiving is getting written about at Christmas, and perhaps well get Christmas up by New Year's.

As some of you already know, my parents came up to Chattanooga for Thanksgiving and brought their two dogs. After a big turkey lunch, we went for a hike at Cloudland Canyons State Park, saw some waterfalls, and then drove to a hang-gliding launch pad on top of Lookout Mountain. We saw someone jump off and hangglide down to the bottom. It was pretty cool/terrifying to see.







Family picture in front of the waterfall. Maybe next year we'll get a picture like this in time for family Christmas cards...




















Millie poses in front of the hang gliding launch pad.





















Millie rolls her eyes at her mom's picture taking skills.






Oh yeah, and we went to the Jack Daniel's distillery the Friday after Thanksgiving. I had the camera on some sort of weird setting so every single picture was really blurry, but I wanted you to see our tour guide (right -- in the overalls). He was some character.