Just so you know, this post is a nail-biter

Let's review the weekend.

Friday night - David went to a birthday party. John, Katherine and I had a nice home-cooked dinner and then John picked David up from the party (at a very cool looking resort/indoor swimming/slide place).

Saturday - we shopped. I would say we shopped until we dropped, but really, I'm not sure that's possible here. Not only is everything closed on Sunday, they aren't open very long on Saturday either, so by 4:00 just about everything is closed. Most stores close sometime between 1:30 and 4:00. However, at 4:00, we still needed a birthday present for a party that Katherine had on Sunday. John found a promising toy store close to TI and shock of shocks, Google told us they were open until 6:00. We got there and sure enough, they were open and it was actually a toy store - WIN!

In the US, Google maps is our go-to tool in unfamiliar territory. You can always type in whetever your looking for (clothing, mens, womens, kids, toys, etc) and Google will find it, give you the name of the store(s), location, hours, phone number, everything you can think of. Here, most of these stores are small and specialized, so a Google maps search doesn't show everything that's available. Combine that with the fact we're trying to search for things in English, so Google has to translate what we want into German and then try to find it - the results are often much less quality than we're used to seeing from Google. We're managing quite well, but it certainly takes more effort than it does in the US.

Saturday night - we had dinner with a guy I worked with in the US and his wife who were here on vacation. We ate at the "oldest brewery in the world" which just so happens to be in Freising. It's good food, good beer, and we had good company, so a good Saturday night!

Sunday was back to the normal Sundays here in Bavaria. It was quiet, John and I actually slept pretty late! Katherine's friend's birthday party was at 2:00, so about that time, I forced David (much against his will) to take a walk with me while John took Katherine to the party. We had a nice walk and picked up 2 "Butter Breze" on the way home. I was looking for more shopping locations and found a few (that of course, aren't on Google), so it was a productive walk! Oh, what's that, you don't know what a Butter Breze is?? Oh wow, you are missing out! This is the traditional Bavarian pretzel sliced long-ways in half and slathered in butter. Only the butter here is...well, I'm not sure how it's different, but it just is. Creamier maybe? I'm not sure. But yum!

Here is what a "butter breze" looks like. If you see one, eat it. Period. You won't be sorry.

While I'm on the subject of food, here's another local yumminess that John and I have discovered. I think John mentioned this at the end of our (very long) day of seeing the Neuschwanstein castle, but it bears repeating. Also right next to my office is a (I'm pretty sure it's a roach coach) food place with a Turkish traditional dish known here as a Döner kabob. We've decided that the meat is usually veal and it's roasted on a vertical spit and then shaved off with some electric contraption. Here's a picture from the internet:

And here are a couple of pictures from the place close to my office.

 And yes, this lady thought I was a total nutcase for asking if I could take her picture holding the yumminess she had just made for me! I don't think John was as impressed with this place as we both were with the place in Munich, but I'm not sure that's fair given that when we ate in Munich, it was after an 11 hour bus/bike/hike tour and we had not eaten in about 6 hours. Anyway, I think they're delish.

The food here is a nice mix of many types. In fact, my favorite food here is actually pizza! I know, it's strange, but apparently, Italians come to Bavaria quite often to open restaurants and wow - they can make pizza like you wouldn't believe. They're very thin, crispy crusts with the perfect ratio of sauce, cheese and toppings. Also, they are usually served in restuarants intended for a single person (i.e. about 6-8 in in diameter) and uncut. John and I wondered for a long time if they just don't have pizza cutters in Germany because every time we've ordered a pizza, it comes whole. You're supposed to use your knife and fork to eat it like you would a piece of fried chicken. I said this to someone at work (who has never been to the US) and he was shocked that they're served in the US cut into pie-like slices. He thought that was totally odd, so I guess it's just "how they do it" here!

What goes with pizza better than beer and a nice chianti?! Well, lucky for me, they have that here too. Here was a little present for me from John for the weekend. A new beer to try and a yummy bottle of Chianti which I'm enjoying as I type!

So, now do you all believe that there isn't enough going on to write so often? Are you bored to tears yet? I thought so. Here's more!

This week is a bit busy. There are quite a few people visiting the office from the US and tomorrow is jam packed with stuff going on for them, but it will be nice to see some familiar and friendly faces (and hear some American accents!). We're having dinner at the same old brewery in Freising, so I'm looking forward to that too.

Wednesday is our appointment to get the final residence visas for the family and you know how fun it is to visit governmental authorities, so we're totally looking forward to that. David has to miss school as he has to be there to get fingerprints and it took us 6 weeks to get this appointment, so we can't really reschedule it. So far, he's taking it quite well, but Wednesday might be a tough day for him - his first ever "missed day" of school. We're going to find out if there's any way around him being counted absent for the day. I'm know you're on baited breath waiting to find out, so we'll be sure to update you.

Thanks for continuing to read through this monotony. We'll try to make it more interesting at some point!