Deutschland

Continuing with the trip recap: After a week in England we flew to Frankfurt. Anthony's Uncle Volker picked us up at the airport with a picnic lunch packed in the back of the rented van. He pulled over at a picnic table in a beautiful field. It was a clear sunny day and we ate one of the best picnic lunches ever - cheese and salami sandwiches on amazing dark bread, cold tea, sliced cucumber and radish, and small local apples that were so good and appley-appley-appley that Colin ate two.

The Rhine river is an ancient transportation route, still used today. Long ago, castle forts were built every few miles along the river to charge fees for going up or downstream with goods. There is still a steady stream of barges on the river - you can always see at least 2 at any given time. There are 2 train tracks on each side of the river also, moving cargo and people.

We stayed in a castle a steep hike above the town of Bacharach. It has been converted to a family hostel.

These were the views from our room:

The other thing the Rhine is known for is wine - notice all the vineyards in the background?

The hostel had a lovely terrace where people gathered to drink in the local wine and the views.

There was a school group of 13 year olds staying there. Their teacher was so pleased because, although they were too shy to speak English most of the time, they were happy to talk to Colin. "Hey, Colin!" they would all call to him. "How are you, Colin? How old are you? What do you like to do?" Colin was their little celebrity, and he was happy to run after the big boys on the massive stone steps.

Every day we'd take a train to meet Volker, then tour villages along the Rhine. Once we took a ferry across.

Literally every 5 minutes or so we'd see a train (sometimes two), and every time this was rail fan Colin's expression:

One day we hiked 45 minutes in the forest to arrive at the majestic Burg Eltz. We even managed to eat some miniscule but intensely flavored wild strawberries and raspberries on the way.

We also toured a lot of beautiful churches. In medieval times when the population was illiterate, the beautiful art served as a way to teach the bible stories. Anna and Colin demanded to have the stories told to them again and again. They both can see the imagery much better than I can as an adult.

Colin was fascinated by the thought of all the people buried in the church. Here we look at a gravestone under our feet.

Who is buried here, Mommy? What was their name? Why did they die? How many people are buried under that stone? Is that where Jesus is buried? I think its a king and a queen. Why did they bury them in the church? Is there someone buried in that statue? I think there is. No, Mommy, you're wrong, there has to be a man buried in that statue. If I crack this stone, I can look inside and see the bones. (over and over, in every church we visited for the next 2 weeks)

In addition to seeing dead people in churches, we saw lots of playgrounds. Sometimes I felt we were on a tour of European playgrounds. When traveling with kids, the playground is a place for them to be crazy and loud after being so restrained in the churches and castles. Plus, they have different stuff. "WHAT is THAT?" my kids asked.


Since they have been deemed unsafe, my children did not recognize the ubiquitous see-saw of my childhood. This one had a nice cushioning tire at the bottom. The park also had this cool swing that was like a bird's nest hammock.


I was sad to leave England, but I was so glad we went to Germany. The weather is glorious in the summer, the land is beautiful, everything is tidy and efficient, transportation is easy, and most of all it was good visiting with Volker. The only thing I didn't like was the lack of public bathrooms - you have to pay 50 cents to a dollar everytime you want to pee - in train stations, castles, town squares, etc. And those are few and hard to find. "How do people who are potty training their children do it?" I asked Volker. "They pay," he said.


If you missed pictures of Uncle Ken's birthday party, visit my dad's blog. Also, Anthony has a site with literally over a thousand pictures of our trip. Visit Uncle Ken's Party Pictures for the pictumentary of the event. More pictures of the beautiful Country of Germany (mainly the Rhine and Mosel Valleys) can be found here.

Next up: Italia.

Fine (as in the end, not fine, which would be 'bene')

Finally, FINALLY made it home late last night after over 24 hours of travel - our flight from New York was delayed, then they DOWNGRADED the plane to a 50% smaller one. If you were seated in row 14 or more, you were bumped, and we had row 15. Except they didn't really tell anyone this until about 10 minutes before boarding - we found out because Anthony went up to see if we could get onto another carrier and get home earlier. Since we didn't have seats, they wanted to fly us to Atlanta to spend the night there, then fly to Austin at 8 am the next morning. I could just imagine how well the kids would tolerate that. Staying in NY that night was not really an option since everything was full the next day. Anthony was very persistent and found the one agent who was willing to help us, and got us 4 seats on the tiny plane.

When we got on the plane, they told us it was too small to hold enough fuel for the whole trip to Austin, so we'd be stopping in Cincinnati for more fuel. Unbelievable. At least it was only a 20 minute stop, since no one was getting on or off. At least the kids slept the entire trip home. We heard lots of horror travel stories worse than ours.

Today was spent recovering, doing laundry, cleaning up the garden, and loving on the kitties. Tomorrow I go back to work and pick up Francesca. Tonight I cooked for the first time in weeks - grilled chicken with herbs, marinated red and yellow bell peppers (the first from the garden), insalata caprese - amazingly we still have some tomatoes on the vines. Anna and Colin are happy to be home in familiar surroundings, but already say they miss the ocean, the beautiful views, and the gelato. Me, too.

Photos, at last!
Here is the canal boat by the bridge in Evesham.


Here's me driving the boat with my dad.


The tour at Pembroke castle - a cold drizzly fun day.


Inside the castle keep. Can't you smell the damp and the history?


Nice pints of bitter in the pub garden.

More later...

Una cartolina da Italia

Ciao, amici! Sorry to be gone for so long. I actually have missed the internet, reading all your blogs etc. We gave the laptop to Anthony's uncle Volker when we got to Germany, and since then its been hard to get internet access. When you are staying with friends its kinda rude to monopolize their computer updating your blog, and anyway I'd rather talk to the Italians than be so antisocial.

We have spent the past 4 days on the Italian riviera - the vacation from the vacation - relaxing, eating lots of gelato, drinking lots of cappucino and vino, eating incredible handmade pesto, fish caught the night before... so sad to think tonight is our last night. We'll spend a night in Milano before our long journey home.

It has been the trip of a lifetime. The kids love Europe, love the trains, love the food, love the beauty of the countryside. Looking back at the photos of England -- it seems so long ago. We packed it all in and are ALMOST ready to go home.

So, ci vidiamo piu tardi (see you soon) - I'm sure I'll spend many hours posting pictures and details in the next week. Right now there's a train to catch to go to the beach in Monterosso. Ciao ciao ciao!!

Happy 90th Birthday!

Uncle Ken's 90th birthday party was a tremendous day long celebration. I think it was everything he wanted, and it certainly surpassed my expectations.

The roads in the countryside of Wales are not much bigger than your car - that's one small compact car - and are lined on either side with tall hedgerows. Unbelievably, these roads are for 2-way traffic, but you hardly ever meet another car. If you do, one of you has to back up to the nearest slight widening in the road, then both of you have to get up on the grassy banks to then pass within inches of each other.

Also, none of these roads are well signed. We had to navigate these little winding roads to get to my cousin Chris' sheep farm, and the written directions we had one important left turn described as "right." But we did find it eventually, and found the old man.

It was so great to see Uncle Ken. He looked the same as ever, just slightly thinner. He gave me a great long hug, and was very interested in meeting Anna and Colin. There were lots of other cousins to meet also, people from all branches of the family tree. Sometimes it was a bit boggling to figure out how we were all related, but everyone was so enjoyable.

The farm house is quaint and cozy, so the party was in a large white tent. Also in hilly Wales there's almost no space large enough and flat enough for such a tent, so Chris had crushed gravel poured for the floor. My heels sank into this substrate, making the balancing of myself and my champagne glass even more precarious than usual, but I was in good company, and anyway, Chris soon let me borrow a pair of Wellies (rubber farm boots) so I could go see his Black Welsh Mountain Sheep and short black Dexter cows.

The kids made fast friends with some children that were close in age - Chris' granddaughters Amelia and Hanna, and his step-grandson Roman. All day long they were tearing up and down the green hills, collecting moss (Colin is particularly fascinated with moss since he's never seen it before), finding slugs and nuts and old sheep horns, climbing the stone walls, and trying to set off the real cannon (blessedly, no ammunition). The little girls in their pastel party dresses, playing ring-around-the-rosey, London Bridge is falling down, and Duck-Duck-Goose looked like little fairies under the green mossy trees.

Ken had wanted all the family to sit at a long table with him at the head, and Chris really made that happen for him. Ken did look so pleased as he looked down the long table at the many generations present. We did miss having my sister Steph and her family there, and she was mentioned many times. After a lovely catered lunch, we toasted him and ate strawberries with cream and cake. Anna was brave enough to sing one of the songs she learned in school for him - which he loved, and my dad sang some of the old songs with him.

After a few hours we said a sad goodbye to many of our distant relatives/friends -- most of them had 2-5 hour drives to get back to their parts of England. Those of us who could stay moved to the glass conservatory by the house. While the kids continued to run up and down the hill, we sipped Gin and tonics. Simon got Uncle Ken to tell a few war stories - Ken was gone for 6 years in WWII, fighting in Northern Africa and Italy. He always tells war stories, and I've probably heard them all, but I loved hearing them again.

Chris and Val grilled some of their lamb, some beef burgers, and some free range chicken for a late supper. Then sun eventually did go down around 10 o'clock, and it was time to drag the tired children back to town to bed. We were so sad to see the long, lovely day end, even Anthony. We were all scheming to find a way to all get together again soon, for another happy celebration. We don't want to have to wait for Ken's 100th birthday! A few more rousing songs - America the Beautiful, Jerusalem, Home with the Armadillo, the Everly brothers' Dream - and we were off down the hedgerowed roads to our beds.

So far, very good

We're in Wales today, and its grey and cold (about 50), and we are loving it. Wales is full of tiny towns, green hills, and loads of sheep. We are at the Red Lion Inn, and its so old - timber and plaster walls, slightly crooked floors, BUT with all the modern amenities, like a large warm shower, big fluffy towels, soft beds, TV, and free WiFi. :-)

The flight over was pretty uneventful, smooth sailing, except try as hard as they might, the kids did not sleep at all on the flight. They were bickering bitterly as soon as they got into the back seat of our rental car. 5 miles later, both of them were asleep, slack jawed, and stayed that way until we got to Tewkesbury. Its a little village on the River Avon, and we easily found my parents and their "long boat". As I've mentioned before, its a skinny long boat, like an RV on the water. The kids did pretty well with just their backseat cat nap, and enjoyed steering the boat up the river.

The boat is a great way to see the English countryside. Anna and Colin loved feeding the geese, swans, and ducks. The second day we had some terrific Cornish Pasties for lunch, and a fabulous Indian meal for dinner. However, when we sat down for the Indian meal, Colin started eating pompadums, but soon looked like a slowly deflating balloon, until eventually his head was rolling on the table. He fell sound asleep on his Grandad's lap and didn't get to eat any of his lovely Biriyani. Well, he did go to the great park on the riverside THREE times, as well as walking all over town, and spending all morning boating in the sunshine and fresh air. I even got a slight sunburn!

Today we drove to Pembroke (as in P. Welsh Corgi - didn't see any, but I did see a mutt with suspiciously short legs). There is a huge castle there built in the 1100s. It was drizzly but the kids spent hours climbing up and down every tiny spiral staircase up every tower. The history is palpable in these old stones.

Tonight we're going to eat fish & chips, and tomorrow is the big birthday luncheon. Hopefully I'll be able to post again before leave this wonderful pub.

And, they're off!

This morning we're off on our big trip! We managed to all pack in 1 large carryon and 1 small backpack each. The iPods are charged and full of movies. I gave everyone a haircut yesterday. I took Francesca on a 3-mile jog yesterday and said goodbye; she's staying alternately with Fran, Julio, and Stacy. The manny is staying here to watch the cats, hens, toad, and fish; he's taking us to the airport today.

We are so excited! Of course, today is just a travel day, but when we wake up, we'll be landing in London. I'll try to post from the road.

Ci vidiamo a piu tardi! (see ya later)

(PS on a sad note, the bulldog puppy got much worse and had to be euthanized. I'm glad you tried, Alissa.)

Adorable Pediatric Patients

We spent a lot of time this morning oohing and aahing over this adorable bundle of wrinkles. He's a bulldog puppy with immune mediated polyarthritis and anemia. Poor guy, all his joints are inflammed and hurt so much he won't even walk. We aren't sure why he's anemic, too, but its probably from parasites. He didn't initially respond to treatment, and his owners lost heart and decided to euthanize him before they got any further attached. But Alissa couldn't do it, and convinced them to sign him over to our clinic. He was marginally better today, so several staff members are jockeying to adopt him. Bulldogs are infamous at vet clinics for having tons of medical problems, but this one is SO CUTE, we can't stop cuddling him and kissing him and wishing he was ours.


A really good client of mine feeds a colony of stray cats by the college, and told me about this little guy who wasn't using one of his front legs. He was completely wild and untouchable. However, feeding and talking to him every night, she eventually tamed him enough to pet him. Finally she scooped him up and brought him in to me.

He was scared but no longer feral. His little left arm was slightly contracted with large abrasions on the top of his paw and the tip of his toes. He had no voluntary muscle control, the muscles were all atrophied, and when I clamped down on his toes with a hemostat he just blinked at me -- no feeling, either. He must have had some severe injury to the brachial plexus - the bundle of nerves that supply his forearm. While a person would keep a "dead" arm for cosmetic reasons, a cat or dog eventually traumatizes it enough that it gets infected, then they start chewing on it... it's gruesome. This guy had been getting along without his arm for weeks, so I knew he wouldn't miss it.

Today I amputated his leg and neutered him (might as well as long as I'm removing superfluous body parts). The picture above is actually him post-op. One of our new receptionists is going to adopt him, so I'll get to see him grow up. SO CUTE!

Yuck

At the grocery store today, Colin asked the lady sampling yogurt smoothies, "May I please have a pina colada one?"

"Good job asking so politely!" I told him. Then he turned around in the cart to take the little Dixie cup, bobbled it, then spilled the entire contents into my open purse.

I freaked out a little (!), but the sample lady was so nice and insisted I use her table to clean up the mess. So, I emptied the contents of my purse onto her cart, and wiped yogurt off my cell phone, checkbook, tampons, pens, lipstick, etc. It even got into my wallet and onto my credit cards. It's going to smell great in a few days.

"Oh, no, Mommy, I'm so sorry that happened to you," said conscientious Anna. "I am SO GLAD I didn't do it!"

Colin said, "Can I have more smoothie?"

Visiting Waco (with photos, wait for it!)

A week from today we leave on our trip! There's loads to do, but the kids and I made a road trip to Waco today to visit my Grandmother and Great Aunt Sudie. These sisters have lived together for years now, and recently moved within their assisted living facility from a "bungalow" to an apartment in the "big house." This move was precipitated by Aunt Sudie's health problems and physical decline, and my grandmother's progressive loss of vision due to macular degeneration. It felt like a priority to visit before our big trip.

However, you should know that my grandmother is known to be a force of nature, a woman who takes French lessons and line dancing, who is the life of every party. She is not frail. And I am pleased to report their new digs are not a step down. In fact, they have more living space than before, and now it is lined with windows. The only thing they gave up was their small kitchen. Now they have a tiny area (kinda like a wet bar) with a microwave, coffee maker, and mini fridge. The whole place is like a nice dorm room with two handicap-accessible bathrooms.

"I don't cook anymore!" my Grandma said, liberated, showing me her abbreviated kitchen. It is sad, because she was a legendary Southern cook. However, she seems happy with the change, and now the meals in the dining hall are a focus and purpose for their day.

Shortly after we arrived, Anna the ballerina changed into her ballet costumes. Grandma loves ballet but could not make it to the recital; plus she likely could not have been able to tell which one was her great-granddaughter on stage. A private performance was much better. I brought Anna's recital music on CD, and she performed the "Kite Dance," then immediately gave an encore (the audience was very persuasive), then did some of her exam exercises, then a bunch of freestyle dancing, to much applause. Colin built a track with blocks for his cars.


We also told Sudie (a former Spanish professor and linguist) that we had been listening to our Italian language CDs on the drive up. Boy, her eyes lit up when Anna and I repeated our simple sentences! "Mi piace ballare e cantare." (I like to dance and sing, Anna said). Other than that, Sudie did seem very pale and a little detached from the present. She was wearing a bulky sweater (over 100 degrees today), and was concerned Anna would be too cold in her skimpy costume. "She doesn't have thin blood like you!" Grandma told Sudie.



Grandma Dulce insisted that Anna wear her beautiful costume to lunch. Well, why not, the recital is over. So many elderly people gazed at Principessa Anna first with delight, then with warm smiles. My grandmother introduced us to half the residents.

First up at lunch was the salad course. There was a choice of jello, cottage cheese, or green salad. My kids were delighted that they were serving Red! Jello! and ate with gusto. For the main course we had chicken fried steak with gravy, mashed potatoes, and green beans. Also there were wonderful warm yeast rolls which we spread with real butter - my kids ate 2 each. We don't eat this kind of food at home, but my kids loved it. Sudie was mightily impressed with their appetites. "Colin ate more than me!" she said. For dessert was New York Cheesecake. "Is it from New York?" Anna said, and I could tell she was thinking of my sister, Auntie Emily. "No, it's New York style," I told her. It was obviously made in house and was very good (not too sweet).


After lunch Anna danced a little bit for some residents and got up on the little stage and sang a school song (without amplification) for the few people left. "She has a little bit of her great grandmother in her, doesn't she?" their caretaker wisely said.

About that Triathlon

I did complete my 4th Danskin Triathlon on Sunday. It was hot and grueling, as always. Don't I look beat in this photo as I approach the finish?

But then I saw my support crew - Anthony, Anna, Colin, Kareen, Leah, and Cole - and perked up to sprint across the line.

This year wasn't nearly as fun in previous years. The past 2 times I got to do it with Emily (and boy was I missing her). Last year I found it so inspirational to do it with Kareen and Leah, but they were too busy this time around. Really, it's something you have to dig deep and do on your own anyway - that's part of what makes finishing so inspiring and confidence building. It's just more fun with buddies.

Also I guess I was bummed to be slower this year than the last 2 years. Previously I always improved my time each year by a few minutes. It took me exactly 2 hours this year.

But! I did see the oldest competitor on the course. They write your age on the back of your calf. It was her 3rd time, and this year she had 80 on her leg. "Go Phyllis!" I shouted when I saw her. She is my inspiration to keep doing it every year.

Hopefully next year some of you will join me. It's just a 1/2 mile swim, 12 mile bike, and 3 mile run (or walk). Read about my race in 2007, 2006, and 2005.