Better put that Schnitzel back in the freezer there Hans.

If you somehow thought making large purchases in Schnitzel futures was a good retirement plan,  you may wish to rethink that investment strategy.
I think sales are going to take a slight dip this weekend.

As I look towards the West,  where I would normally see a line of aircraft streaming into Vienna airport,  the sky this afternoon is strangely empty.

This (below) is due west....

Nope.  No planes.

It does seem a tad hazy too,  doesn't it?

Apparently Austrian airspace has now been closed until further notice,  so no last minute spur of the moment flights to Paris or any such thing.
Oh well,  we'll just have to stay put.


Now,  in much the same way that certain economic events or acts of Mother Nature can cause grief to those who find themselves in the wrong place at the wrong time,   there are also examples where others may find themselves in for a wind fall.

Case in point,  the phone rang this morning (scaring the crap out of me as usual)  and it was my lovely travelling companion,  asking how I felt about going to dinner and a concert at the Schönbrunn Castle tomorrow night.

I said...well,  I'd think about it.

Pft!  Are you kidding?   Good tickets to this venue are almost always sold out, so my ticket buying strategy for this particular event was more or less in limbo,  since I just figured we'd have to order tickets months in advance and then hope the schedule was such that we'd actually get to go.

Until now.


See,  it turns out that,  since the tourists won't be flocking to Vienna this weekend by air,  there were now a few more tickets available.
Ha!
Should I feel bad that we're able to see a really fabulous performance as a result of the misfortune of others?

Once again,  let me think about that.

Um...No.


Do we feel bad about the bloke who looses a wad at the roulette table in Vegas?   No...he too could have stayed home.
I think we'll leave that whole philosophical discussion alone,  but I think you get my point.
We're not buying human hides that have been harvested from some near extinct pygmy tribe in South America here.
However,  if I do see any pygmy purses,  I'll be sure and let you know.


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Meanwhile in other news,  I once again bolstered my courage and pedalled my hind end down to the Naschmarkt for a couple slabs of salmon.   Gotta have that Omega three!   Besides,  it makes for a dead simple meal which,  since I'm probably the laziest cook you'd ever meet,  is really the hidden agenda.
I threw on a small saddle bag this time around,  which just happened to be the padded type,  the sole purpose of which is to transport one's lunch to work.
Wonder where that could have come from?
So just to keep the fish from cooking ahead of time,  I took along one of those nifty little frozen ice pack jobbies.  Then I don't feel like I have to race home.


I also made sure I took the small camera,  since there's bound to be a couple sights along the way.

I think I first saw this structure a few weeks back,  and what I didn't realise at the time was that I was looking at yet another piece of Viennese history.  Somewhere in my internet wanderings,  I had read about these "Flaktürme"  (singular is Flakturm,  or Flak Tower)  that had been build by the Nazis shortly after they had come to Vienna for a visit.   Apparently it was a handy place from which you could shoot at Allied aircraft.

There are three of them in the city.  The one above was in Berlin.

Now here's the thing.
 There had been some talk of trying to knock these suckers down back in the seventies,  since I guess everyone wanted to sort of turn a blind eye to what went on in the thirties and forties....but the damned things were built to withstand any kind of bomb or other incendiary device so it didn't take long to realise that they couldn't simply be "knocked down".   Plus,  there was another camp that felt they could be put to some use,  all the while serving as a rather glaring reminder of the past.


This one has been turned into an aquarium.




Must be all that concrete.



I also simply could not resist taking a picture of this one particular crane on Kirchengaße,  since I watched this one go up a few Sundays ago.

.
They do seem to end up in the darndest places.

I typically don't walk down Mariahilfer quite this far,  but the bike makes quick work of it.  Once again of course,  coming back up the hill from the Naschmarkt makes for a couple sweaty moments.
On the bright side,  I've discovered that since I've been trying to climb the stairs at least three or four times a day,  it's no longer the near death experience of a couple months ago.


I'm not quite to the stage where I can run up the stairs,  but time will tell.







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