What Is Carole Up To Now?

Carole is wandering the world. Having had a couple successful careers, as a software engineer then a technical marketer, it's time to take a sabbatical and plan for the next big thing. New philosphy: "Life is a banquet, and most poor suckers are starving to death."

Monday, August 29, 2005

Sunny!

Beautiful weather today so this will be short. Am in an Internet Cafe in Schwabing, as we have no phone/Internet service yet. They say tomorrow, I hope it's true.

Moved last Tuesday. There is much to be said about hiring professionals to do this kind of work, all of it good. I can wholeheartedly recommend Huntcrest Services to anyone in the Munich area. They do handy stuff - flooring, painting, small moving jobs. Showed up when they said they would and got the job done.

Have been assembling IKEA furniture and trying to put away our 20 cubic feet of stuff (That's the size of the boxes that we moved over from the States.) Problem is that there's only space for 10 cubic feet of it. I swear, people over here have access to a portal in another dimension, and they put their stuff in it!

Going out into the sunshine. More when I can do this in the non-daylight hours from home.

Monday, August 22, 2005

Moving again

I am once again packing up boxes. This time it’s easier: much less stuff, and all of it’s going, except for the things that were in the apartment when we got here. Tomorrow afternoon a lovely man with a van is coming to load & move the boxes. Tuesday night we’ll be in! Then I can get settled in the new place, unpack all the boxes, see my stuff that I haven’t seen in 3+ months.

NOTE: the phone & Internet lines are not yet turned on in the new place. It may be a few days before I am back in touch.

If you have a few minutes and a high-speed connection, check out the new place: Ungererstrasse 74 Note that the pictures make it look bigger than it is, but it is a lovely old building with high ceilings.

The apartment won’t look that lovely with us in it; we spent time Saturday at IKEA buying storage furniture – shelves for the hall, a butcher block table for the kitchen, etc. I hope to have the place looking similar to the pics within a month of us landing there, it will take some time to figure out how to put everything away. For example, the lovely roll-front piece in the living room is stuffed full of bedding! We laughed – thought it would be electric components and a stereo system. So we’ll put the bedding in boxes under the beds and free up those shelves for books.

I’ve also heard from brother Greg, our parents are settling in to their new place too. A visiting nurse had mentioned a place to Dad 3 weeks ago, they went and saw it a couple weeks ago and everyone liked it. So last week Greg & Andrea moved the folks in. Over the weekend, they got furniture from their house and brought it over to the place – it’s big, 900 square feet which is as big as the ground floor of the folk’s house. So lots of their familiar things fit.

One of the hardest things about this transition for my folks is that they feel they were forced into it. In reality, they were having a harder time keeping up with the day-to-day chores and spending all their waking hours clothing, caring for & feeding themselves – they are just moving that slowly. If Dad hadn’t landed in the hospital, they would have eventually been found out. But it might have been an even worse circumstance. For example, Mom has put on some weight as she’s getting 3 meals a day, and the aides check on that. (Mom often insists that she has no need of dinner – but if it’s put in front of her, she eats.) I talked with Greg last night to catch up; he said that it’s clear that Mom is done with cooking. The folk’s new place has a kitchenette, but other than having drinks in the fridge and snacks, we think the folks won’t really use it.

So, lesson learned is to really think about where you want to be if you get old and slow down. Check on places well before you have to go anywhere – because it has been extremely upsetting and disorienting for the folks to be whisked into a place, and then move to another one in the space of 6 weeks. And they are often a bit cranky about it. Not how you want to be when someone else is caring for you – charm is the key to the best service and someone making exceptions, say, for someone with very bad memory problems (Mom) staying in a non-memory care unit (with Dad) as long as possible.

Logan was in Sweden last week – Stockholm. He’ll probably go back in mid-September, and I’ll go with him then. On one of their projects, Saab is the prime contractor & they’re doing testing at their site in Stockholm. I can’t wait – I visited Stockholm for 2 ½ days in January years ago and I look forward to seeing it in more summer weather. They actually have summer there, as opposed to Germany, where it’s been 60 – 70 degrees. Overcast & rainy for several days a week all summer so far. The leaves are changing color already.

Hope to be back on-line soon! Enjoy your weeks, wherever you are.

Monday, August 15, 2005

Busy weekend, and finally some local sightseeing

Before we went back to the States, I had signed up to go to a Toytown event Friday 12th in the evening. Toytown is an on-line forum, where English speakers living in Munich can ask questions, get advice, etc. The group also arranges lots of activities like dinners and meeting for drinks and members post the current happenings so that we can find out what’s going on in Munich. Friday was dinner for the ‘over 30’s’ at Arabesque, a restaurant in the neighborhood of Schwabing. We went out early, went to our new apartment on Ungererstrasse and watered the plants, then walked down to the restaurant. It was a nice place, had good food and we met some new people and chatted all evening. The jet lag caught up with us though, so we left around 10:30 and made our way back to Unterhaching.

We are making progress on actually moving; Logan has arranged for the phone and internet service to get turned on in the new place – on Friday they told him 7 to 10 working days. I found a moving service, recommended by other Toytown folks and they’re coming over on Friday the 19th to do an estimate. We hope to be out of this place by August 24th, another coworker’s family is coming over & they could stay here until their house is available on September first. We could do the move ourselves with help from friends, but the thought of carrying all those boxes up 2 floors daunts me. It was hard enough helping get the boxes off the pallets, into the elevator and out into the corporate apartment. I’m sure with some hired help and a small truck we can do it complete in about 4 hours.

On Saturday morning we joined another Toytown group on a trip to the Andechs brewery. We rode the S-bahn line 5 to the end, in the town of Herrshing. Hiked up the byways to the top of a hill, through neighborhoods then woods. (It reminded me a bit of hiking in Rancho San Antonio, with the stream still running.) At the top of the hill, after about a 45 minute hike, is the Kloster monastery and beergarden. It is quite the tourist attraction, the place was hopping. The weather was good: low 70s, overcast but no rain. We had beers & pretzels, then got lunch. Talked the whole afternoon with the group, which included a couple young guys in the Air Force who are friends of the organizer, and were down to Munich for a weekend visit.

The group up the tables from us was well into their beer when we sat down, and they did the traditional ‘Prost’ toast and we all clanked mugs. But we did no singing – no ‘Ein Prosit’ song, the place had ‘No Singing’ signs posted! I was making fun of that – “Give me food or I’ll sing at you in a threatening way” and one of the Air Force guys said that he’s been in Germany so long that he didn’t think twice about the sign. (There are many many rules here. For example, I learned from one of the guys that to be able to fish here, you take a year-long course and pay 1,000 Euros before you’re granted a license.) I guess people have been getting rowdy and forbidding singing has reined it in. All in all, it was a great day – hiking, beer, food, good companionship and more hiking. We got back home around 8:30.

Sunday we slept in – no construction to shake us awake at 7 a.m. We did stuff around the apartment; I caught up on email and Logan did some work reading. In the late afternoon we drove out to the new apartment with a small load of things, and took measurements there for some storage-type furniture. We know we’ll need some more bookshelves, and we think we can store the bedding under the beds and free up an existing closet. (In Germany, closets in apartments are free-standing, there are no built-ins.) We do have access to the basement storage room, but have been warned that it is very damp and not a place to store clothes or books.

We also put our names on the mailbox at the new apartment. We left & drove around to find the local Wal-Mart – there are 2 in Munich and I think I’m going to become a Wal-Mart shopper here. The convenience will be great, for a car trip there. I know there’s a supermarket much closer to the apartment where I’ll shop for the majority of the groceries.

That evening, we went to the Twisted Bavarian for an English-language book swap and dinner. Again, found it through Toytown. Dory, the restaurant owner, is an active TTer and we met her a month or so ago. Twice a month she advertises the book swap and people show up to refresh their reading collection. The library has over a thousand books now, and it was just started last November through people’s donations. A great idea and it helps save me $$. Dinner was enchiladas for me and chicken mole for Logan – very good and even spicy! That’s unusual in Germany. But Dory grew up in Mobile, and lived in Texas so she knows how Tex-Mex should taste.

Met another new friend during this evening, a lovely woman who’s come over from Ireland about a month ago. She was a nurse in Ireland, also does aromatherapy and Rieki healing. Her boyfriend works at EADS, where Logan works, and she’s got a 5-year old cat. So we traded cat stories, got talking about “What the Bleep” and made a promise to get in touch & get together. Now I just need to get on line & follow up.

I woke up at about 5 this morning; still jet lag I guess. It’s cold & rainy, a nice day to hang about the house with a new book. I hope we have some weeks of good weather soon, it’s mostly been a cold rainy summer. Locals say it’s unusual. I sure have saved on sunscreen this year.

Friday, August 12, 2005

Rochester Visit Recap

Back from the visit to Rochester. It’s a beautiful Friday and I’m trying to multi-task: catch up on the blog while I get some sun! Apparently it rained just about the whole time we were in the states. Logan says “The rain in Spain falls mainly on Bavaria” – Spain & France are in a drought and it’s been pouring buckets here most of the summer.

So. Family. The visit was great, the reunion fun. Mostly spent the time sitting around talking and sharing meals. We got in on Wednesday the 3rd, we had booked at different times so got different flights. I flew into Dulles, then to Rochester. Got in around 6:30 that night. Logan went through Chicago, he got in around 12:30 a.m. Brother Greg picked me up at the airport, we had dinner, I took a nap then went to get Logan – in what used to be my car. As I was leaving in May, I shipped it to Greg. So it was pretty cool to have my old car to drive. They have been using it a lot, it’s their only vehicle with AC, and it’s been hot in Rochester this summer.

On Thursday, we stopped over & visited my parents. They are on a ‘respite stay’ in an assisted living facility near Greg & Andrea. The stay is for 6 weeks (started when Dad was released from the hospital on July 8th). The place is nice, clean and bright and no smells or beeping machines; the other residents seem nice, everyone calls out a greeting as you enter. The rooms are small, and are designed that way so that people don’t hibernate in the room. This facility also has an enclosed inner courtyard, with patios off the rooms, and birdfeeders that the staff will fill, and a couple large raised planting beds for the residents.

We had lunch there with them, and the food that day was pretty good. Mushroom veggie soup, and then chicken wraps with green beans and a pasta salad. 3 meals a day are served, and the staff check to make sure that everyone has come to the dining room to eat.

After lunch, I zoomed to a dermatologist appointment. I had meant to do that in California before I left but ran out of time. Afterwards, Logan & I shopped Wegmans for some items we have not been able to find yet in Munich. (Wegmans is like a combination of Whole Foods & Draegers. Plus they make great sub sandwiches.) We bought some vitamins, tea, toiletries and Frank’s Hot Sauce – the only, authentic chicken wing sauce. I may ask for more for Christmas! That night we had subs for dinner – wonderful. I really miss good deli sandwiches in Munich. (Have heard about a place called ‘American Sandwich’ which I will need to check out.)

Friday morning we sent Logan out for a bike ride with nephew Gavin, while Andrea & I reviewed the folks finances. Dad was in the middle of moving money when he had his stroke (which is now what the docs are calling it, they didn’t mention this while he was actually in the hospital.) Everything is in pretty good shape, now we just need to have Dad continue what he was doing, and then create a trust to put all the accounts in. It also turns out that Mom has a couple separate accounts, those need to get put in the trust too. It was great to feel like we have a handle on the finances, and we know the folks can afford assisted living on their income – social security and a few pensions. So their savings, invested well, can be there if they need more care. Assisted living will only do so much. If you’re not ambulatory, or have a high level of medication needs, you need to hire additional help or move to more of a nursing facility.

Anyone out there who hasn’t pierced the veil of parental silence, please make an effort! It is really hard to figure out someone else’s finances even if the records are well kept. Power of Attorney is key, in case someone is incapacitated.

Friday night it was pizza and wings at Greg & Andrea’s, as the out-of-town visitors rolled in. First was Logan’s Mom Wanda, we did not get to see her before we left. Then Dad’s brothers and families showed up, and my brother John & his wife Amy. Not everyone could make it, but we had a great crowd anyhow.

Saturday was the actual reunion. Spent the day chatting, helping and just enjoying everything.

Sunday we all met at a Bob Evans for breakfast, and people peeled off one by one to head home. After the folks had lunch, me and my brothers Greg & John scooped them up and took them to see another assisted living facility. Nice place, but 30 minutes from Greg & Andrea, which would make it impossible to keep running stuff over to the folks as Andrea is doing now. (Have I mentioned that I think Andrea qualifies for sainthood? After Dad landed in the hospital, and Mom was so disoriented, Andrea worked the phones to get the docs on the case, and also find a place for Dad to stay that could also take Mom. I’m so grateful for all that she’s done and is doing. Plus in the middle of all this, she is in a clinical trial for a new MS drug, so she’s taking care of herself too.)

Monday I hung around the house, did some watering while Andrea worked inside. Greg had taken the day off, first thing we showed him the progress we’d made with the folk’s finances and he made a couple calls to move along the transfers (that Dad had started). Then the boyz went off to Seabreeze, a local amusement and waterpark. I didn’t go because the dermatologist took a cyst off my leg, and told me not to immerse it for a couple weeks. Boo.

Tuesday morning, Logan & I went off to visit the folks. Then we got to the airport and headed back to Munich.

It had been great to get on the first flight, I took United, and loved hearing the English and feeling like I was in the States just by boarding the plane. I really enjoyed cruising the bookstores in the airport between flights, and chatting with people.

Oddly, I am also OK with being back in Germany. That the weather has been beautiful helps. I am also planning to go back to Rochester sometime in the fall, which probably also helps.

Now, I just need to get on with the chore of getting us moved into the new apartment! We signed the lease 2 days before we left, and need to get moving. We’re going over tonight to water the plants, and then have dinner in the area. I may have found a moving company that will do the job, but they haven’t gotten back to my inquiry yet. Of course, it’s high vacation season and there’s a state holiday Monday, so they may be out. Hope to hear from them soon, because I really don’t want to have us carry 30 heavy boxes up 2 flights of stairs.

I have learned why Germany takes August off – the kids were in school through July 23rd this year, and they go back the beginning of September. So they have 5 – 6 weeks off, and everyone goes on vacation then. Some of the smaller shops & restaurants close down during this time too.

We have some fun planned for this weekend, too. Hope the weather cooperates.

Wednesday, August 03, 2005

Family visit, here I come

We’re heading off to the airport to go to Rochester for a family visit. I should be able to get online a couple times while there and will describe what’s going on. Hope you all are having a wonderful summer.

I have been able to get some more pictures up on the Flickr site. The link is to the left on this page.