es regnet, vielleicht.

hmm. where are we? last friday i think i went to the playground? that would be my guess. i rowed on both saturday and sunday. saturday night my friend from the netherlands, marije, had people over for her birthday. i think there were ten or so people and oddly enough, i had randomly met two of them before when i was out with other friends. small world. so this week, the weather called for rain everyday. on monday, i ride my bike, all goes well. on tuesday, the weather man calls for rain, so i take the bus. yeah, it doesn't rain. on wednesday, i blow off the weather report and take my bike. yes, it most definitely rained. on thursday, i once again take the bus to school. no rain. friday, i take the bus again. there was a little rain. i was happy to see this. last night i was with my friends ricardo, julie, juan, und ana. i am the only one that speaks english as a first language. so, i'm getting some practice with german or spanish. this is good. i don't like speaking german with nils and sabine. especially with nils. it is a little too indimidating because he speaks perfectly in both german and english and is equally comfortable in each. sabine at least has questions about certain phrases every once in a while. i finish class at the end of november. i'm both glad and not so glad about this. i am definitely learning things, and my teacher said i am doing well, but it will be nice to have a little more free time. i need to force myself to study on my own. i flip back and forth between being really determined to learn and not caring in the least. next week i have to give a 10 minute presentation on the US. super. sidenote: beethoven 2 is on tv in german right now. haha. they are really not so up-to-date on tv here. and yes, i am watching. oh yeah, and this morning i went to row. it was windy. i erged. for the first time in months. and man the girls locker room has a stench more manly than i could have ever imagined. some of the rowing girls here make me look petite. and yes, i rode my bike and got rained on on the way home. on thursday night, we went to kindergarten for St. Martin's. it is a tradition here where all of the kids in kindergarten make lanterns and walk through the street singing some song. there was also a horse. and then back at kindergarten there was a bonfire and gluhwein (this is warm wine with some spices. it isn't too bad...considering i don't like wine so much). moritz und xandric (my 3 year old friends) ran out of the gate that surrounds the playground. i went chasing after them. moritz was just laughing at me. he has difficulty following rules. i laid down the law...in german. ich habe gesagt, "moritz, stop. das ist kein spiel. wann du hast kein mommy kannst du nicht die tur aufmachen." (english: i said, "moritz, stop. this is not a game. when you have no mommy, you cannot open the door.) he laughed. i thought it was because my german was bad, but that is more or less correct. it is at least understandable. when his mum was lecturing him he also laughed, so it isn't just me. he is cute, but i think he is going to be a handful. this entry is completly jumbled together in no chronological order. sorry about that. oh, and after last night, i find i am thinking "ich kann, ich kann nicht, ich glaube, ich denke" rather than: i can, i can not, i think. and i keep using "aber" instead of but. i'm getting on my own nerves. two times this week in the afternoon we went to rewe, the grocery store, to go shopping because it gets dark so early and the weather has been so gross. the german language does not distinguish between the word for friend and boyfriend/girlfriend. this is confusing. and last night when i was talking to my teacher, ana, i said something about my friend. and she said um how long have ya'll been together. oops. if i say, "mein freund" this means a boyfriend. if i say, "ein freund von mir" this means my friend that is a guy. i need to remember this, it could be important. okay, ich denke das ist alles. (i think that is all). oh and the title means: it's raining, maybe. and sorry, i have no new photos for you.

noch mehr photos.

at the playground:

day three of the lion costume.

tom. digging.

both digging. i didn't really understand the game.

i've got the halloween photos. :)

here are some more:

clearly not halloween, but some other day of playing. max in blue. tom in green.

cookies backen. max on the left. tom on the right.

max. he completely loves this thing. he wore it all day today as well.

checking out the goods. tom on the left. max on the right.

look at the tails. haha. max has the pumpkin.

tom and sabine.

not halloween. this is my class from the first month. one of those days i was dressed very american.

a few photos.

okay, so here are a few photos. but it always seems that everyone else winds up taking more. i will try to get them soon.

the spanish speaking contingency: ricardo, juan, carmen, another ricardo, and the other juan is missing. the 3 on the left from spain and the one on the right from chile.

she's fabulous. this is tzuning from taiwan. and we traded glasses. yeah, i still look the same for all of those complaining you haven't seen my face in a while.

pumpkin carving day. hannah and max at the table. tom under the table. probably growling like a lion. i need to get halloween photos from nils.

heidelberger ruderklub. they let me row boats here.

hmmmmm.

oh wow, this blog is ridiculous behind. i can't even remember exactly what i have done since the last time. max and tom are still adorable and very funny. and we still battle terrible two incidents on a fairly regular basis. the favorite sayings of late are "ich will nicht" and "du darfst nicht". these respectively mean, "i will not" (typically said at meal times) and "you are not" allowed (typically said to kids at the playground). tom is the "ich will nicht" guy and max is the "du darfst nicht" guy. one of them is outside of my door now and i can hear them saying uhoh, uhoh, uhoh. on monday last week, we made cookies. chocolate chip cookies. not as good as american ones, but good. they were for my friend ricardo's geburtstag (birthday). everyone thought i was some baking superstar, and was shocked that i made them myself. do i really seem this un-domestic? i mean, i am a nanny for a living. tom is completely obsessed with cooking. it is really cute, but sometimes makes accomplishing things in the kitchen slightly more difficult. on tuesday, i think it was, wir sind im hallenbad geschwommen. we went swimming in a hallenbad (indoor pool). they both really love the water, but sabine does not love it so much...this is where i come in handy. tuesday night, i went to ricardo's flat for ein gerburtstag party. i really should have paid more attention in spanish class. going out with them is usually like one big headache. everything is in either german or spanish. the good news is i can cheat, because almost everyone also speaks a little english, or can at least understand it. i think the rest of the week was more or less a normal one. saturday i rowed. in a 5. for all of you rowing people, yes this is strange. oh yeah, and the sunday before, i rowed in a 3. it is sort of funny, they call the boats the achter. which literally means eight-er. hey, let's take out the eighter. oh yeah, and i drink hot tea on a regular basis now. i still don't like coffee. i'm having tea right now. i've narrowed it down the 4 schools to which i will apply for urban planning. they are university of minnesota, vcu (this is in richmond, va), university of illinois at chicago, and portland state. i have even found three people willing to say nice things about me. my mum was quick to point out these are mostly far from home. yes, this is true, but they are at least in the same country. and it isn't as if there is some thriving metropolis with a good planning school in the vicinity of mocksville. this is probably more or less all i will tell you about the school because i don't want everyone asking a bunch of questions if no schools let me in. on sunday, i traveled to wiesbaden. navigating the train by myself makes me feel like a grown up. i kind of like it. wiesbaden is about one hour and a half by train. i went to meet another family with whom i had spoken about being an aupair. they have an aupair from australia and invited to visit with her. this aupair speaks almost perfect german. i've quickly thinking i may never accomplish that. claudia, the mum, is very sweet. there is a seven year old boy, niklas, who attends international school and therefore speaks english, and also a 4 year old girl, julia, who only speaks german. i didn't see so so much of wiesbaden, but it was very nice to go visit someone. on monday of this week, we went to the playground and met our friends toddeous und aujoehnie. i have about a 6% clue of how to spell these names. one boy and one girl. i have spelled them phonetically. i'm sure that in reality, they look much nicer than that. they speak french and german and are so so cute. it is now more or less black outside here by 5.30pm. yay winter. on tuesday, we made massive amounts of cookies for kindergarten. two batches of oatmeal cookies and one of chocolate chip. however, kindergarten was quite adament that max and tom were not allowed to wear their halloween costumes on wednesday. catholic school party poopers. after we made cookies, i built a fort/cave in max and tom's room. however, there aren't so many good ways to build it. so i was looking around and said, "hmmm". max said hmmm. hmm. maybe you have to meet him in person (yes, visitors are more than welcome) but he makes so many funny facial expressions and has such funny little body language. a bit later we were reading a book in the cave. me, sabine, max, und tom. it was a bit of a squeeze. and max is looking at the page, and he said "hmmm, comisch." this mean exactly what you think: comical or funny. i guess probably you needed to be here, but it was really funny coming out of a 2 year old. yesterday, we trick-or-treated. and courtesy of jade, the roommate i had in spain, we even had a little pumpkin bag for the candy. i think max has officially claimed it. tom could have cared less about carrying the pumpkin, he just wanted to eat the candy from it. i can understand this. we also went to visit moritz, and walked around town a bit in our costumes. we got a lot of smiles. i saw my friend juan when we were walking. (don't try to keep up too much with who is who. i know two juans and two ricardos.) anyway, it is just nice to see friends in public. and i, for a change, was able to introduce someone to sabine. germany is not really very good at halloween, but they make up for it because today is a public holiday. i can't honestly remember why, but it equals no work and no school for me. that is how i am having time to write this now. however, i'm still 30 deep in emails that need to be answered. so hold your horses. i haven't forgotten about you, and i most likely think of you very often. last night i went to ricardo's again. there was one chinese speaker, one japanese speaker, two americans, two germans, and four spanish speakers to start the night off with. by the end of the night...4 spanish speakers, me, and the german wife of one of these spanish speakers. her spanish is pretty good. i thought my head might explode. it was good fun though. the other american guy has looked at some of my fotos from facebook and was laughing about them. things like tailgating, and a toga party and such. he is from new york, but lived in georgia for a little while, so seeing all these photos of the southern culture make him laugh. i literally have more spanish friends now than i did when i lived in spain. i kind of wonder if i had aupaired in spain, would i be hanging out with germans? okay, i need to accomplish things...like my overabundance of homework since i have the day off of school. and ali, i think this blog is sufficiently long enough to win our contest. love you all. happy late halloween. happy november. i'm working on being in a few photos. i've heard complaints that you would like to see my face. i guess this is a good thing. ahh, it won't let me load photos. i will try later.