The Bright Idea

So we decided we'd go to the post building that wasn't an office today. Boyfriend and I disagreed on when would be the best time, but were quite sure there would be someone there today. 'Before nine am' is quite a wide spectrum of time. I wanted to go at four, Boyfriend at eight. I argued we might be able to stay up until four, but never wake up before eight on a Saturday morning. The compromise fell on 'sunup'.

Boyfriend sleeps better than me, so he was a bit surprised when I shook him on the sofa at five.

He was a bit fuzzy getting dressed, but got enthusiastic as soon as he was on his bike. Oh my GOD, so little people! Such safe streets! Only the squeaking of my bike to disturb the peaceful quiet of a Saturday morning. Sure, it was overcast and, sure, the streets were wet, but the weather was light and cool and delightful to bike through.

Arriving at the building, there was no entrance. We'd parked our bikes well out of any path the trucks bringing packages might take, so no one yelled at us, but it didn't take long for someone to notice the two twenty-somethings obviously not contractually obliged to wear day-glo yellow.

Why were we there? We explained. We got told that no one worked at five am on a Saturday unless they absolutely had to. So much for my illusions of German work ethic and efficiency. If we waited, however, the nice man would be able to tell us what to do next. I don't know if it's an exception to the rule, here, but German bureaucracy is starting to look a lot like Belgian bureaucracy, with the difference that you get told the same thing if you contact the same place, no matter at which day, hour or month.

Eventually, he got back with two phone numbers we could try. Gee. We've officially exhausted all actual people we can talk to, having been so annoying as to deserve punishment by waiting tune upon waiting tune until someone deems us cowed enough to talk to. Or that's what I'm assuming, anyway. My hope is a tiny speck in the distance. I'll be sending an e-mail to the website later, begging that, should they find the kindness in their hearts to send my order a third time, to please change my name for Boyfriend's. Things arrived when I did that.

By the time we'd crossed the parking lot back to our bikes, having managed to not be run over by trailers or trucks, we were both very much awake from the fresh morning air. And McDonald's was practically across the street, so we checked to see if it was open. Lucky for us, it wasn't. And even if it was, it doesn't have pancakes for breakfast. I stopped salivating as soon as I noticed this last tidbit.

So we rode home. Boyfriend was so delighted at the unnatural quiet in his town, as if an atomic blast had wiped out all the angry motorists, late drunks, noisy children and stressed adults. Not his words, but my view on things. True, it was a tempting sight, but I was tired at this point. Boyfriend was as energetic as only a two-year-old can be at a quarter past five in the morning. Let's go take a ride, he said, it'll be fun, he said. I declined. I'd had enough bright ideas for one morning.

Oh, and as I put away my bike, I noticed what's causing the squeaking to my bike. My rear wheel is either skewed or bent. Not enough to be a hazard, but enough to... Well, to rub against the frame and squeak like a rabbit caught in the jaws of a rabid fox. 

I'm not even going to think about how that can be solved until after I've had some sleep.

The Headache

You know how you wake up with a headache because you're still tired? I get that sometimes.

So when I got out of bed only ten minutes late, I thought it was one of those. I'd overslept, my body was tired, a bit of water would get me right back where I was again.

I showered and philosophised over my hair. It's too long. I still look like a Hitler Youth applicant when I comb it while it's wet, but it now has this fancy curl to the ends. It needs to be shortened at some point. Either that, or it needs to grow out more.

Then I had breakfast and got dressed, more than a little aware I was running late for my second day in the nail studio. I arrived on time, but still with wet hair. Luckily, there weren't any clients yet.

I've been promoted. From looking and dusting, I am now also the studio slave. Not that I mind. I learn from it. So now I can fill footbaths, find stamping plates and know where all the gels are kept. Oh, and I learned about short fingernails and nail stickers today. And a bit more about filing. There's several sizes in filing, from uselessly small to ridiculously big. As with most things, the one inbetween is considered better in most cases.

By half past ten, my stomach started acting up. Now, true, I hadn't eaten that big a breakfast, but the way it was dancing, I knew something was up. Also, my head was still weird. I threw back a hot cocoa and soldiered on.

It was quiet today. Not many customers, not much dusting. The high points included someone coming in with her dog and J. painting the nails of a coworker hot pink with black 80s print and silver accents. This was the most exciting nail design of the day so far.

At some point, someone ran out of cleaner fluid. Normally, no problem, get a new bottle, but the stuff hasn't been delivered yet. Perhaps it's hiding along with my package. Long story short, there's no new cleaner to be had. I don't know how they're going to solve it.

Oh, and I got to paint my first nails today. Granted, it were tips stuck to pots of gel and, yes, it were only two, but I learned from it. Mainly not to stick pots of gel in the UV tunnels and that it's hard to open and mix new pots of gel without getting the stuff over your fingers, but also how much gel I needed and how to apply it in the most effective fashion. I'm not winning any prizes just yet, but I improved, mess-wise, from my first to my second nail.

When J.'s last client before lunch came, my headache got worse. And my stomach was definitely not happy with me. I sat through it, observing how the woman had nails almost as short as mine, and tried to not give in to the urge to crawl away and huddle in on myself.

After the client had left, I begged off. I felt awful and my focus was wavering. J. didn't see any problem with it and let me go.

I'm almost done forcing my lunch down and am going to try and see if more sleep will fix things. Here's to hoping.

The Squeak

The Busy Day

Everything that didn't happen yesterday, we did today.

Writing the letters turned out to take up a lot less time than anticipated. I adapted one I'd already written, deleting and adding bits and pieces, until I got two similar letters in understandable German. The spelling checker seemed to think so, anyway, and Boyfriend agreed, so I rewarded my good behavior with a shower.

Then I tried to remember where I'd put my USB drive, which took about twice as long as writing the letters had taken. First, I turned my desk upside down. Found: one USB drive, but not the one I was looking for. Then I looked in my purse, remembering I'd used it for... Well, taking it downstairs. Cue panicky half minute where I thought I'd thrown it in with the washing. Then I scrambled through my purse with a bit more gusto, came up with nothing, so I emptied the thing on the couch. USB drive located. Thank God I'd hung a bunny on there.

I had gone from soaked to damp at this stage, so I loaded my letters and CV onto the drive and went across the street to see if I could get my bike to stop squeaking. I got some oil, Boyfriend a lock so we could both ride bikes independently, rather than his bike being either chained up to mine or prime bike-snatching material. Oiling a bike chain turns out to be easy, if a bit messy. I turned the bike's wheel and--it still squeaked. Go figure. I'm all out of ideas and I have no funds to let a professional take a look at it.

Biking reparation failed, we went to the city's post office. I got stamps and asked if they'd happened to have seen my package. They hadn't, but knew where we could ask what had happened to it, provided we got there before nine am. Gasp.

Then I got my picture taken. Photogenetic I am not. The photographer took about twenty pictures, two of which turned out okay. I picked my favorite and got a piece of paper and the news that I'd get a cd with all the pictures and four tiny prints of my pick in twenty minutes.

So we went to the printing shop. Well, I say we. Boyfriend went in, realised his orthodics needed picking up, and left after making sure I was linguistically able to take care of business. I was. The nice man in the store printed everything the way I wanted to, let me staple each letter to a copy of my CV and most graciously allowed me to pay what I suspect was the astronomical price of ten cents per sheet of paper printed. In greyscale.

By this time, it had started to rain, making not only my bike chain, but also my brakes squeal in agony. I felt acutely stared at as I went to the orthodics store. On the other hand, I didn't come close to riding into anyone, since anything alive and not completely deaf had ample warning of my coming in their general direction.

Boyfriend got hungry as we rode back. He got fish and chips. I went into a store selling mainly junk and got a solar happy flower. I later broke it as I opened it. Profound sadness.

At this point, my bike chain seemed to be squeaking even louder than before. I undid any alterations to screws I'd done before, without any effect whatsover.

We picked up my pictures and CD and went to the European equivalent of a dollar store. I got some envelopes, a notebook and some hooks with suction cups for the bathroom. I'm tired of almost showering on the towel meant to dry hands on, so from now on, the thing is hanging next to the washing machine. Boyfriend got some things he liked and off we...

Jesus Christ, let me please find a job soon. I need funds to have someone, anyone, with a clue to bikes fix whatever gave me the stuck-pig soundtrack I was moving through the city with. I'm not looking for stealth-biking here. I just want to not sound like I'm warning the world of my leprosy as I trundle my way to silly things like supermarkets, post offices and pharmancies.

At this point, I should point out I was parched and starving. That's what you get for saying no to bratwurst.

So when we got into the supermarket, I wasn't satisfied buying just bread. Even adding some fruit to the purchases didn't help. Like two cold-starved zombies, we made our way to the freezers. Ice cream, we wanted ice cream. We got some ice cream cones. Then another flavor ice cream cones. Then cheap popsicles. Yum.

We got out, and it had miraculously stopped raining. I'm sure the fact that we were about three hundred meters from being home had something to do with it. I resisted the urge to shake my fist at an intelligent creator and/or the universe and pedaled home with Boyfriend.

We each had an ice cream cone and relaxed a bit. Then I signed my letters, wrote addresses on the envelopes and looked for jobs. No job offers today, though if there's someone out there who drives forklift trucks and speaks passable German, come to Coburg. They're waiting for you.

By this time it was eight pm and we were hungry again. And, well, eight is late for cooking. And I needed to find a post box for my letters, right? And the nearest post box is, well... Oh, to heck with it, we went to McDondald's. Hard work, in the rain, in the heat, it deserves some calories.

Miracle of miracles, my bike had stopped squeaking its metallic little heart out after it dried up. Either that, or it's trying to give me hope that it doesn't need fixing. We got to the post box in relative silence.

I mailed my letters, we each had a burger with fries, followed by an ice cream and then went exploring. There's an electronics store looking for sales(wo)men, apparently, and I wanted to know where it was. And while we were looking, we looked at the place where the woman from the post office said we had to go to find out what had happened to my package.

Connecting the two destinations was... Well, a tad tricky. Both are basically 'follow road and turn', but neither road is the same and the turning is left one time and right the next. Hypothetically, this should describe a perfect 90 degree angle where both roads meet, but Coburg was built during the Middle Ages, when Greek theories of how perfect cities were only straight roads and perfect angles were heresy of the worst kind. And the houses that keep the roads from being straight now are probably UNESCO heritage sites or something, so you can't remodel the city.

Anyway, by the time I knew where we were again, Boyfriend got distracted by Munzees. I went home, he went 'to the old movie theater'. That was almost an hour ago. It's since turned dark and I don't know if he knows how to turn on his bike lights. Also, the internet isn't working, so I'm typing today's post in notepad, awaiting my knight in shining armor to come save me from being cut off from... Well... Killing monsters with double crossbows, but also contacting people in other country codes.

I could try restarting the modem... Okay, that worked.

The Unfinished Business

Boyfriend's grandfather had his birthday today. I'd been told this, but I assumed it'd be an evening-y thing. Silly me.

So my plan had been to get some chain oil, maybe convince Boyfriend to buy his own bike lock, see if my package had somehow ended up in the post office and gotten stuck there and get some pictures taken. Who knows, maybe I could even crank out those two application letters to HUK Coburg that are begging to be written. Oh, and our dark laundry still needs doing.

None of this was meant to be, however. The birthday celebration was a noony thing. I was informed of this late yesterday, but there was a faint hope that we'd be back on time to do at least some of it.

I got up around eleven. I know, too late at night, too late in the morning, all my therapists turning in their graves, etc., etc. I'll try and do better next time. Anyway, I showered, got dressed, woke up Boyfriend and had some breakfast. In my head, food and family only happen after at least an hour of idle chatter, and I did not want my first impression to be 'fat, greedy pig'.

Turns out, Boyfriend's family is more efficient than mine. We left a bit after twelve, drove and by the time we arrived, all the meat had been grilled, potato salad and veggies had been prepared, all that was needed was to set the table. Oops. I ate a bit of everything, then politely assured everyone that I was, in fact, full. Several times. Later came ice cream, of which I had one. I had some sparkling water while the rest had cake. I really wasn't hungry.

Boyfriend's grandparents are really nice. I'd met his grandmother before, but now I could actually understand her. We all talked about what was going on, occasionally touching upon the fact that I still have no job after two weeks of searching. I didn't know this was a reason for alarm, but I was once again reminded to apply at HUK Coburg, perhaps go to the apprenticeship-convention in Bamberg this weekend. Okay, I'll try.

After the food, we basked in the sun for another hour before going home. It was four. Okay, maybe the post office was open late, and the bike store is right across from the house. I could at least get some stuff done, right?

Wrong. J. and W. wanted to go look at houses. I don't know why they're looking at houses, Boyfriend doesn't know why they're looking at houses, but, against all logical explanation, they are. They moved last September, after overhauling the entire floor underneath our current apartment, and now want to rent a house with a garden for reasons unknown, and apparently move with one of their children. Unless it's Sis or Boyfriend has siblings he doesn't know about, the thing is confusing the heck out of both of us. So we sat in the car with the sun making us sleepy and the radio trying to keep us awake. In my case, the sun won and I dozed.

We arrived home five minutes after the bike shop closed. Oh, and the post office is not open late at all. Also, could Boyfriend help weed the apartments' parking spots tomorrow? Next, the phone rang. Could one of Boyfriend's friends come over? I didn't see any problem with the last one and no protest was allowed on the former, so I said sure.

My day, so carefully planned, had been methodically deconstructed. The only thing that we managed today was to load the dishwasher and turn it on. Oh well, I'll try again tomorrow.

The Laundry

Oh, dear, I'm almost late in updating. Let's all take a moment to flail and panic.
...
Done? Really? Okay!

The most exciting thing that happened today was Boyfriend gasping in front of his pc at an article on gay rights, or so I thought. Turned out, he just needed to sneeze.

We did laundry today. I fell asleep halfway through it. I sorted it, Boyfriend loaded the first load and hung it up, I loaded the second, took a nap and woke up to have it washed a second time due to washing machine failure and hung up as well.

It's currently still drying, because we don't have a dryer. Not out of environmental of financial beliefs, but mostly because a dryer doesn't really fit into the apartment without making us have to go to the toilet under a shower head or something equally ridiculous. So we stole borrowed a drying rack that folds up and is easily hidden behind the vacuum cleaner.

So yeah, we were lazy today. We didn't really get going until eight pm, at which point we decided it would be a good time to make dinner. It was lasagna. After dinner, Boyfriend started to study.

Study? Yes. He's making noises about taking his theoretic driving test soon. He's been doing so for over two years, but I'm still hopeful. The fact that his deadline to pass both practical and theoretical is coming up might have something to do with it. Also, my threat of no sex when he doesn't study has some clout for the first time in our relationship.

But he did study, so I got out a chocolate cake from the freezer to reward him. The fact that it's my favorite cake and I'll be getting some of it has nothing to do with it, I promise.

I was hoping the laundry would be dry by now, but we started too late on it, so it's not. Which means we'll have to do more tomorrow. In the mean while, I'm going to check if any interesting job offers came online.

The Look-See

So I got up early this morning. Well, I say early, it was a quarter to eight. I dragged myself into the shower and through breakfast and getting dressed. I was nervous. Very, very nervous. I'm a nervous kind of person when faced with new things.

I live next door to the nail studio and still arrived a bit late. No one minded. I was given a tour, everything was explained and a chair with wheels underneath was produced so I could peer over people's shoulders and ask questions.

I learned a lot today. I've got the order of taking care of nails firmly stuck in my head now, start to finish. I know that nail gel reeks. And it's sticky. I mean really sticky. You could put up wallpaper with it if you wanted to, but it'd never dry. And I learned about filing. God, there's a lot of filing involved. And there's not much pointers that you can get about it. 'Don't file into people's skin' seems to be the main part of it, but that one seemed sort of obvious to me.

So I sat through several full sessions of 'clean-file-gel-gel-file-color-gel-file some more'. Most were mainly filing, as I said before. One was mostly filing because someone wanted a different shape of nail, another because the client's nails had taken a turn for the worse. I didn't realise medical semi-emergencies were part of the job, but they are. Nails that start peeling back from skin need something to stick them together and strengthen them. I didn't ever think about that, but it turns out a few layers of clear gel do the trick. No fancy-pants painting on it, just a stern warning to keep an eye on that and inform the GP.

Because of the filing, there's a lot of dust in the shop. And I mean a lot of dust. There's the rule that free time means dusting, but you could dust day and night and still not be done. I gave it my best, knocked a few items to the ground and then stuck with dusting easy to reach surfaces before I bankrupted J. by breaking half the merchandise.

But Boyfriend's sister works there, too. She did as much filing as anyone else, but she also worked with pretty colors, which was fun to watch. Want to try pink? Want to try glitter? Want to try rhinestones? Whoa.

She also has nail stamps. She went nail-stamp crazy with one particular customer. Normally, it's forty minutes of filing and twenty, max, of colorwork. Sis nearly went one hour, colorwise, on this particular customer. She stated many times that she had no plan. She started out with 'okay, just a white slanted bit', which went from 'a little black perhaps' over 'a contrast color would be cool' to about three different colors in four patterns with several layers of gel inbetween. If she'd planned it out beforehand, it would have taken perhaps half an hour. But she experimented with colors, angles, stamp patterns and so on. The customer was a good sport about it, too. I was even allowed to put my two cents in when she got stuck, and she tried it out, even if it didn't work. I paid back her humoring me with putting away the oodles and oodles of different shades of green-blue she'd gotten in an attempt to match her stamping polish to the gel.

I got my hands covered in a shade called 'minty', because the pot was, well, dirty. A combination of congealed gel and dust make for an excellent glue. Luckily, it comes off with water and soap when you don't stick it under a UV-light.

I got asked a lot of questions by employees and customers alike. Did I have siblings? Did I have tattoos? Was I going to get fancy nails, too? I answered the last with a non-comittal 'not today'. I might someday at least give it a go, especially if I end up working in the studio, but so far, my nails are too short and long nails annoy the pee out of me.

Generally, everyone was very nice. I tried not to annoy anyone and not talk too much and look very closely, but I'm only human. Inbetween 'Is that nail abrasion agent or gel?' and 'The sealing agent is shiny, but are there people who want a matte finish?' there came a few less to the point questions like 'Can you cut yourself on gel tips?' and 'Sis, where did you get those awesome lobe spirals?'. I had brought the binder with the theory in case I got a quiet moment, but there wasn't really a moment where I couldn't learn more.

And the kitchen, the only place where I could study, was being monopolised by the smokers. Apparently, it's not like in Belgium where there is no smoking whatsoever allowed at the place of employment. At least they were nice enough to do it in the best ventilated and easily avoided area of the studio, rather than where everyone was working. Compromise, it's a wonderful thing sometimes.

By half past three, I said my goodbyes, went home and collapsed into bed. Lots of learning and talking a language I haven't yet fully mastered yet does that to me.

Eventually Boyfriend came home. He laughed when he saw I'd put a way-too-large ring in my septum piercing (just because) and kissed me. We're talking more German together now. It's not yet 100% English free, but dammit, we're trying. Neither of us knows how you say 'panty liner' in German and it's not always practical to go look it up. No matter what the rest of the world says, we get points for doing our best, at least in my book.

Oh, and the geocaching has sprouted a second head in the W.-and-Boyfriend Adventure Team. They both have cell phones with cameras and scanning software for something called Munzees. It's a simpler, quicker way of looking for things. It works with a point system or something, and the 'codes' are these matrix pictures you can also have links in on some advertisements... I don't understand all of it yet, but the guys are having fun, so I leave them to run around like happy toddlers going 'I've got seven more points than you, wha-hey!'. If they're happy, I'm happy.

At the moment, Boyfriend is downstairs, printing his very own Munzee for the casino. I think it's still a test run, but they're already talking about linking it to the casino. "You can scan it once every day, scan it X times and you get a coupon for Y euros at the casino" was the plan before I stopped eavesdropping on the conversation. I think they're going to test if people actually find it before setting up that system, but I wish them the best of luck.

Tomorrow, I'm being gloriously lazy doing laundry. Yes, doing laundry. Ahem.

The Procrastrination

I put things off. Studying is high on the list of things I don't do far enough in advance, but there's other things, too.

Take today, for example. It's been procrast-licious.

I woke up around eight and decided a bit more sleep couldn't possibly hurt. It was twelve before I rolled out of bed.

I did my computer things and... Well, I was going to play videogames for a bit, but I still hadn't tested out the sofa. Cue a three hour nap on a very comfy sofa.

Eventually, I made it back to the computer and for the first time in five years did a quest with a party. They've improved, but, well...

Eventually, I made it to the bit where I had to study. Boyfriend even came with me to offer quiet support. Or take a nap, I was studying in bed in case Boyfriend wanted to play on the Playstation. I got halfway before Boyfriend decided to get up and I decided I was thirsty.

I wanted to help Boyfriend do laundry, but... Well... I got distracted.

When he started taking pictures to sell something, I  realised I couldn't use Boyfriend to put off studying. He'd even loaded and turned on the dishwasher, the crafty little fox.

So I did the dishes waiting to be done by hand. And cleaned the sink. And got clean towels for the kitchen. Oh, and I organised the workspace. And put leftover cookies in an airtight container. And opened the peanut butter for scent testing. It smells delicious.

I still needed to go back to studying, but--oops--I'd turned on my computer. I didn't want to play videogames, so I looked around for peanut butter recipes. They were all too sugary for my tastes. Then again, maybe I could look into those peanut butter dog treats I'd wanted to make Lady when she was a puppy--five years ago. A bit of searching and there they were. They're even easy! We even have all the ingredients! But we don't have cookie cutters or a rolling pin, and, anyway, it's half past nine, so it's too late to go ask J. and W. if we can borrow some I should get back to studying.