The new house so far

Our internet & phone service won't be set up until Monday, but for today I'm in the USO working on my resume.  I figured while I was here I'd provide an update since the last post.

We moved into the new house this past Saturday and were ecstatic to be out of the hotel.  After getting to the house, and letting the dogs explore & get comfortable, we put them in their crates and headed to the PX.  We had done a walk through and figured out the essentials we'd need to tide us over until mid June.  Things like sheets, pillows, trash cans, trash bags, etc..  After we loaded up there, we went to the Commissary.  I used to HATE Commissary runs as a kid, but now I was ecstatic.  Finally, after 5 weeks of eating out for breakfast, lunch & dinner, we were going to have home cooked meals.  One thing that's hard to find (as in, we haven't found one yet) in the Stuttgart area is good Mexican food, so needless to say that was on the top of our list for things to cook.

The loaner furniture wasn't going to arrive until Monday, but Shanna found out about loaner utensils, pots, pans, cups, & other kitchen items that we could pick up Saturday, so that's what we did.  Below is a picture of our first meal in the new house, using the box that our kitchen gear came in.  It might not have been the most comfortable setup, but it was home, and the food was great.

That night Shanna set up our air mattresses with our new sheets...it was better then sleeping on the floor, but we were counting down the hours until the loaner beds arrived.

Sunday was relatively uneventful.  Our washing machine is the smallest one I've ever seen, so you'd think it would wash clothes quickly...quite the opposite.  It's also the slowest washing machine I've ever used.  The first load I put in took an hour and 45 minutes.  Shanna discovered a "rapid" setting that shaves about 40 minutes off, but it still takes forever.  So Sunday Shanna washed clothes all day while I went to the PX to get things we hadn't thought of the day before.

Monday was a day off for Shanna, and it was a beautiful day.  The rail on the deck is the perfect height for the dogs to stand up and look over the city...below is a picture of Milo doing just that.

I know there are two readers who are going to love this next part...since it was such a nice day, and our yard hadn't been mowed in months, I cut the grass.  It took FOREVER.  The yard size isn't large, and going forward shouldn't take more then 10-15 minutes, but this first run took me 40 minutes.  I didn't think to take a "before" & "after" picture, but here is a pic of Milo in the grass before it was cut.

I don't have an "after" picture yet because the grass was so wet that I had to mulch it instead of bagging it, so it still doesn't look very good.  It's supposed to be beautiful this weekend (and dry too), so I'm going to run the lawn mower again & bag the grass this time.  I'll post the "after" picture next week when we have internet set up.  While I was cutting the grass, Shanna was busy scrubbing the moss that had built up over time on the stone steps that lead down from the back porch to the grass area. 

That evening I put together the new grill and we cooked out burgers!  Nothing beats grilling out on a warm evening in the summer...

Tuesday was an interesting day.  Shanna went back to work, and I went to the Stuttgart New Comer's orientation on base.  I wasn't quite sure what to expect, but it was really interesting.  The lady who ran it talked all about basic German history & culture, how to use public transportation, and went over basic phrases to use in stores, at restaurants, etc..  We learned numbers, common greetings, and various things about German's we might not know.  For example, she told us never to ask a German something we don't actually want to know the answer too.  In the U.S. it's common to greet some one with "How are you doing" and you get the typical "Good" response or something along those lines.  Germans will tell you EXACTLY how they are doing, in detail.  She also said once you move in to your house, it's custom to invite your neighbors over.  It doesn't have to be dinner, just something simple like tea & crackers, or something along those lines.  But she said when you do that, make sure you set a specific start time & end time.  If you invite them over at 4pm, they could easily still be there at midnight because Germans like to just sit & talk.

There's not much planned for today...the car is in the shop for an oil change, and if they finish early enough I'm heading downtown to apply for my International Driver's license.  There's no extra testing involved, all it is is a translation of our German license in a bunch of different languages.  It's only required if you want to drive in Austria, Greece, Spain, or the Middle East, but it's a good thing to have if you're pulled over in a country outside of Germany in a small town where the police officer might not speak German or English.

The next post should be next Monday when the internet is set up at home...I'll tell you all about the second part of the New Comer's orientation that happens tomorrow when we tour parts of the city.

In closing, I'll leave you with what the New Comer's orientation teacher left us with.  She advised us not to form opinions of Germans, Europeans, or people in general based on what we've heard or read, and instead to form opinions based on our own experience, for, to quote her, " as my English book as a little girl told us, all British people stop at 5pm exactly to drink tea, and all Americans are rich because they have an Uncle who owns an oil well in Texas".