First Blog Post and First Week of School!!!

Hi everybody! This is my first blog post and first week of school . Sadly I don't have any pictures of the school but I do have words! So far every class I have: geography, music, math, religion, German, politics, and clarinet is in German, well except for English which is in English. My classmates speak very little English so it's kinda hard to communicate! We have lunch at 1:05 which is really late for me. At the cafeteria they at least have a kitchen to cook the food, but of course the food isn't that great. On the first day we had a pork dish with this bread crumb topping, some disgusting weird green vegtables and potatos. To drink was this really watered down fruit juice. On most days we're supposed to get out at 3:20 but this week almost all the teachers during the last period are gone and so we get out at 1:05. I have made a few friends and I am already am invited to someone's birthday party, hopefully my luck will keep up and I'll make as many friends as I did in California! The classes are impossible to understand and I have a really hard with the classes but luckily I'll have German classes so it'll be easier. I don't really have that much to say so I'm sorry if this post is short! Bye!

wait... are we back in Davis?

It seems like on any given drizzly morning in Davis one could step out as we did on Saturday to find a bike race going down the street.
...

Last week was all about getting basics set up (a bank account, residency established, at least one functioning cell phone, school registration, etc.).  This week there are more bureaucratic undertakings but most importantly, a house search.  We have a little less than two weeks to find something in a market that's naturally tight but made worse by a larger than normal incoming college freshman class.  Last year they switched from 13 to 12 years of schooling so that the high schools graduated two classes at once and now they're coming to college.

I'll be off looking at two places today and hope to find something quickly.  Can't wait for some degree of regularity.

There'll be a post soon with pictures of our walk in the woods and maybe even a first-day-of-school post if I can get Merlin to stop watching Spongebob Schwammkopf for a little.  She's living her tv-deprived childhood dream!

Where we've landed.

Hello everyone!  Guten Tag!

It's been a bit of a whirlwind week, but in a very nice way - so that it's not been stressful, just busy.

We're staying at a guesthouse near the city center which is convenient to Dan's office and Devin and Merlin's school.  We've been walking everywhere, sometimes more than once, and the weather has been cool but still comfortable.  I've not really been taking pictures, but that will come soon. 

Dan flew from Beijing and Devin, Merlin and I left from San Francisco, meeting at the Frankfurt airport, where we bought train tickets and stopped for a bite to eat.  Dan pulled two small wine glasses from his bag (how did he do that?) and bought a small bottle of champagne to toast the occasion of this new adventure.  Talk about romantic!

Here we are at the Frankfurt train station.

If I'd done my photojournalist duty I'd have taken pictures of the train, too - very clean and nice... but maybe I can be forgiven for my combination of travel-stupor and the fact that our hands were already full with far too much stuff.

Here's what our two bedroom guesthouse apartment looks like (and the view outside).

Photos of this lovely town will follow soon!

57 boxes later

A step in the right direction, from this















to this







It was lifted and rolled right out so quickly into the truck - the house felt weird after that. Now we're down to all that's left to put in the garage sale, the storage unit, and carry by suitcase to Germany.

Joking:  "Ha, there's no going back now!"

The countdown begins.  20 days.

Save Caspian and Quincy!

Two years ago we got Quincy at the pound and last year we found Caspian in the hope that the two could become good friends.  It didn't turn out as well as we'd hoped and now that we're moving to Germany, we need to find two separate homes for them. 

If you can adopt either of these cute guys, they, and we, would be so grateful.  We'd intended to give them a permanent home but hadn't figured another international move into the picture.

They're phenomenally cute and friendly as all get out.

Here's Quincy!  He has a hilarious full name, which is actually secret, but if you adopt him we'll let you in on it (though of course you're free to change it if you so desire)...

And then this is Caspian.  He's not quite full grown - or at least he's still a bit smaller than Quincy, though with all his hair he can fool you. 

We really have enjoyed these little guys and are so sad that we can't keep them and take them with us, however the fact that we won't have housing when we get to Germany (we'll be staying in a guesthouse until we find a place) makes this impossible.

The Yolo County Animal Shelter no longer adopts guinea pigs out to families and so there's no guarantee that they'd survive a stay there.

Can you help?