The city sleeps beneath me...

I'm the first person to admit being slack with this blog, but phwoarrrr, I've amazed even myself over these past few months. So, I'll try to recount some highlights, rather than boring any potential readers (ahem, Tash, pretty sure you're the only one still following this thing) with blow-by-blow accounts of my mediocre life. :)

Hm. Well, last Wednesday was the final seminar for the linguistics course. I talked about sport, showed some videos of footy and netball, and just generally got to be silly. Everyone seemed to be in a pretty good mood, which means I got a lot of laughs, even when I showed a picture of Tony Abbott in budgie smugglers. And talking about Surf Lifesaving and the Burquini... though at that point, I'm pretty sure everyone was giggling at my glee over the photo, because I was pointing to the burquini saying, "C'mon, HOW GOOD IS THAT?!" Burquinis are the best idea ever. Ahem, I digress.

After that I chatted with Manfred about the text he wanted me to proof-read, and then went to a small farewell gathering for another guy who worked in the department. Found out that he, too, was into Minor Threat in his youth. Funny stuff. I think it was the first time I've ever had champagne and orange juice mixed together. I thought only my nanna drank that. But it's a good way to deal with the fact that I don't especially like champagne. Ahem, sekt, I mean.

Over the weekend, and also early on Monday morning (6:30am kitchen hangouts with Steffi) I proof-read Steffi's final paper. She was writing about vampires in American literature, and how they've changed over time; essentially, from monster to human to superhuman. It was interesting stuff, but written in an entirely different style to one I'd have used. But I took Matt's advice (he'd explained how things here tend to be more narrative) and just made sure that Steffi took efforts to tie her information back to her argument, and corrected any strange-sounding grammar or tenses. She gave me a beautifully bound copy, which I'm going to send back to Mum, who requested to read it when Steffi was done writing. Oh, and I bought tulips for Steffi at the markets that Saturday; they were only 5 euro for a bunch of 20, and they're still hanging out in the kitchen, looking absolutely stunning. We needed some colour!

Last weekend I went to Muenster to hang out with Brangelina. Stress of concussions aside, the entire family (Hungarian neighbours included!) managed to get sick with a stomach bug. Poor guys. Matt gave me a call on Sunday night, which was a welcome heads-up about what could potentially follow. Monday night found me waking up at 3am to rush to the bathroom, dry retch for a while (I never throw up. Never! Not since early Jan '98. So I was luckier than they were) and then warm myself up with a shower. It was about -8 overnight, and our bathroom window is always open, so I needed to thaw out before going back to bed. So, I crawled back to bed at about 5am, and managed to get some sleep whilst only lying on one side, because the second I turned over, I felt nauseous. I'd used Mum's old trick of towels on the bed and over the pillow in case I was sick, but thankfully I wasn't. The stomach pain was pretty awful, though. I even had a bucket next to my bed, just in case. That's not something that happens too often, with me.

My alarm went off at 6:30am, and I turned it off, because its noise made me want to retch. Slept in until 10:30am, when I tried to ignore my pounding headache and function like a normal human being. I couldn't, so I just lay in bed for ages. Went back to sleep at about midday, and woke again at about two. Spent the rest of the time proof-reading the manuscript for the textbook, and generally wrote off the day as useless. The only thing I ate that day was some chia (my cereal) with berries, and a cup of tea, at about 8pm.

Oh, and I forgot to say, that whilst in Muenster, I went for a run with Matt. I mean, I'm certainly never going to be running around the Aasee again. Google maps informed me that it was 6km, which isn't bad. It was at least -4 when we went out (-6 by their backyard thermometer) so I was frozen, but in the end, I was probably overdressed. My foot didn't play up too much, and I managed to keep pace with Matt (who was probably bored with how slow I jog, haha) and I was pleased to have done it. It's been a running joke for a while that I'd run a lap of the Aasee, but of course, I never bring my running gear to Muenster, and always tell Matt that he's crazy when he goes for a run... so, it was nice to be just as crazy, just that one time.

Anyway, I discussed the textbook with Manfred on Wednesday. I was hesitant to be too bold, and knew that I couldn't change other people's voices, but did point out a few inconsistencies and spelling errors, etc. I also pointed out that two sections were quite incomprehensible, in that they'd clearly been written in a German style with too little regard for English structure. Every sentence had about 30 clauses (ok, slight exaggeration) with passive meaning. Too much written, but too little actually said. I'm sure it would have been beautiful in German, though. So, Manfred has his work cut out for him there. The book was supposed to be a collaboration, of his ex-PhD students etc, and everyone was writing a chapter. Manfred had already re-written a couple of chapters, by the time I read it. He wondered aloud at one point why he hadn't just written it himself, and I wanted to agree, but was being polite. Either way, it's not my problem. He did one of those, "Oh no, I couldn't expect you to re-write the chapter" type things and I was only too happy to agree. I wasn't going to volunteer for that one, not a chance! Also, I don't know shit about linguistics. heh. Let's keep it that way!

So, the other endurance of the week (proof-reading aside) was a class on Wednesday that I've managed to avoid until now because of the seminars... a "preparing to study" course that is compulsory for DSH-Kurs students to attend. NOT IMPRESSED. I watched one terrible Referat, and then sat around bored for another few hours while the group 'discussed' how to make contact with German students. On the bus? Not fucking likely. When someone tries to talk to me on the bus, I scowl and give them dirty looks, and monosyllabic answers. Get a life, UniPb, you're insulting my intelligence by giving me conversation outlines and wasting my fucking time. I'm going to draft a letter to Frau Ollech and have Steffi read over it (to make sure it's polite and with appropriate grammar), and see if anyone else wants to sign it. Especially as from this week, we have to go TWICE a week, with sessions from 1:30pm to 5pm. As if being at uni from 8:30am wasn't enough. The course is disgraceful.

So, whinges aside: life is pretty good. "Every day I'm alive is the best day of my life." Still want to get that tattooed somewhere, to always remind me. I'm getting steadily good marks in the German course, though I really need to work on my grammar, which sucks. I have a referat to write, and that will be given on 23 Feb. On 25th Feb, Steffi and I are hoping to go hang out at the North Sea Coast for a couple of days. Should be awesome. I've been collecting entire discographies of bands courtesy of Miro, and have been finding some great new music, too.

Oh, and despite my laziness with taking photos and blogging about it, I've been making some awesome meals. I guess they're not that interesting to write about because for several weeks, I've been craving green vegetables for every meal. I ignored that for breakfast, because I always eat chia/berries/banana, but lunch and dinner were generally involving kale, spinach, and the like. The urge to eat only green foods has receded, so I suppose whatever deficiency (sunlight!) caused that has also been fixed. Either way, I'm generally eating really healthily. Lots of fruit and veg, not too much of anything else. I've been feeling pretty good, accordingly. And while I haven't been running as much as I should (foot, snow on ground) I did jog on Friday and it was nice. I should go again today, while the weather is in positive-temperatures and not raining.

So, I figure that's about all I have to say at the moment. Might go see if Twitter needs me... ;)