And life goes on.

Wrote this on Tuesday,  and of course didn't get to the cafe at all....then of course Wednesday was Three Kings Day,  which is a Bank holiday and the place was closed.
I'm happy to report that my new battery is performing wonderfully....

....read on.


As most of you who follow along most likely already know, we came back to Wienerland on the weekend. I'm now finally starting to get over that dragged out feeling that comes along with jet-lag.

It's a term that sounds somewhat pretentious, but I can't think of any other expression for that hollowed out feeling.

In what I now believe to be typical fashion, Austrian Air once again met my rather low expectations, in just about every aspect of the flight. Now don't get me wrong here, it was probably better than some of the charter flights one might encounter, or some of the experiences I've heard about on an airline like Ryanair. Having said that though, it wasn't the best experience. Hate to admit it, but I miss flying with KLM. After over eight hours in what eventually turns into a smelly crampted sauna, I'm ready to get out.

Traveller's tip: Boeings are not the best ventilated planes.

I'm usually pretty patient, but the fuse almost blew when we got to the gate (at which time everyone but us undid their seatbelts before the plane had even stopped) and the otherwise inocuous young man across the aisle from me almost ended up having to go to the emergency to have his carry-on removed from his hind end. See, if you're going to throw it over your shoulder, you'd best mind that I'm not within swinging room.

I didn't quite shove him completely head first back into his seat, but I think he got the idea.

Meanwhile, all is well here in La-la land.

We now have our second set of keys back in our possession, since they had been on loan to some visitors who came down from the Netherlands over the Christmas break. This is one of Gabe's associates who took a little trip first to Venice, then on to Vienna with his wife and two kids. With perhaps the exception of the full case of beer left in the closet, we were hard pressed to even tell they were here.

Pretty close to the pinnacle in the “perfect guest” department.

Heard back from our relocation lady, who phoned Monday morning to tell me she had been in contact with Telecom Austria to see about our installation. I got the call this moring as I was standing in line at the checkout at Merkur. They'll be here on the 19^th. I ain't holdin' my breath.

Well OK, there wasn't a problem with the last appointment, except for the fact that no installation took place.

Just a minor detail.

That's the week that Gabe is going up to Munich, so for me to be here for eight a.m. won't be a problem.

The other small matter that needs to be dealt with concerns a lamp in the dining area that has no juice going to it. Not my deal to try and fix these things, so I'm expecting a call from an electrician at some point.

Of course the thing with these calls that I get out of the blue is, it usually takes me a couple seconds to get my ear trumpet tuned to just what the heck the person on the other end is talking about (it's German, OK?) plus it's usually in the morning, and if I happen to be somewhere stationary, that's pretty much just a stroke of luck. I'm either in the car, or some place where it's not that easy to talk.

That's fine I suppose. It's all good practise. Getting so even the relocation lady is using mostly German with me. Can't I just be a dumb tourist?

Anyway, hopefully this will now tie up all the loose ends.

Pretty sure we're now also done with any financial commitments in the Netherlands. Had a bill for electricity and gas that was a bit of a whopper, but that was to be expected since they were using the previous year's usage as a guide for the monthly remittance, and there hadn't been anyone in the house the previous year. Suffice to say, there was some catching up to do.

That kinda hurt.

But at least now we can transfer the rest of the money down to Bank Austria and close our account with ABM-Amro.

I've also been on a bit of a shopping rampage over the last couple days. First of all there's that whole notion of stocking up again after having pretty much cleaned out the fridge over Christmas, plus I've been trying to find a couple things that we never did have, but would like to add to the larder. Managed to find thyme after about the third store. Billa, Merkur and Euro-Spar all carry the same line of spices, but thyme was missing from the first two. Just one of those things that I don't quite comprehend. Did it get used up? Some sort of marketting strategy?

In addition to that little issue, I was trying to find barley. Don't ask. It's in some recipe or other that Gabe wants to try. Either that or she's making stuffed animals. Not sure.

Well, that was also fun. Dictionaries can be sometimes rather entertaining, since quite often there's more than one term for a given word. I did manage to find the right word, after realising yesterday I was getting nowhere with the ladies at Billa, just down the street from our front door.

Um, had to revisit the dictionary on that one.

I'm sure they thought I was a bit of a nut job, but at least I had been in there often enough before so there was at least a hint of familiarlity.

I found it with no problem this morning in a completely different store. This is usually the case when I'm NOT looking for something. That's the moment to strike. Whether you think you need it or not, just buy it, 'cause you might never find it again.

I'm just saying.

Since I'm currently unplugged and trying out my new battery, I may head down to the cafe later this afternoon and post this. I'm much happier with what I see now, since I've been at this for maybe a half hour or so, and I see I still have three more hours of usage. Sure beats the 20 minutes or so that I was getting out of the old one.  (um....I didn't bother changing that part....just so you know)

Keep yer sticks on the ice.