Hannover update

Its been a pretty busy couple of weeks, primarily with work, but also with headaches with the computer in general.

Last week I was in Munich for the entire week, and had a great time. As I alluded to before, Franz wound up just cooking ‘a little something to eat’ last Wednesday night. We originally had plans to go out to eat for Thursday, but I double-booked and he couldn’t get a reservation where he wanted, so he offered to cook. Little did I know what to expect. He started by opening a bottle of ’97 Tattinger for us to sip on while he finished the cooking. The salad course consisted of a plate of cantaloupe, lettuce, avocado, palm hearts, and two enormous king prawns, garnished with those yellow cherry fruits & a star fruit slice. The soup course was a spicy thai lemongrass soup with duck meat in it. As fish course, he lightly breaded & grilled some ray, and had some sweet potato basted in vanilla sauce. The main was a roasted duck served on saffron rice with raisins and cashews, with a side of cooked figs, plums, and dates. Dessert was an Austrian thick crepe with a cheese filling and served on a sauce of eggnog on one side and cherry sauce on the other side. 5 courses, wine, brandy, and all made by hand in his kitchen which isn’t much larger than my bathroom back home. It was quite a feast.

We went out as well a couple times during the week for dinner, and he fed me at the restaurant where he works last Sunday. The guy likes his food, and I have a feeling that if I hang around down there much, my efforts to lose a few pounds while over here may be in vain. As a matter of fact, he texted me yesterday saying “Are you sure you’re getting enough to eat up in Hannover?” Uh huh, he’s an encourager.

The unorganized one has been getting some tactical coaching, and is actually seeming to do a few things different, so maybe he’ll pay some attention to how things are going, and actually understand the impact of saying ‘ja’ all the time. Technically, I think the project is under control, there’s just lots of details that can and do get lost in the daily grind. I’ve spent a lot of time helping 2 other groups of people understand both the changes in the project and the way the EMEA team has changed the base product. Some of it is good, some of it is really confusing.

In general, this week in Hannover has been good, although its pissed down rain each day – not the flooding like Texas had, but just a non-stop heavy mist that gets you wet when walking around town. Monday night I got to the gym for cardio. Tuesday night I made swimming. Wednesday night I met a couple of the guys from Hannover at a ‘stammtisch’ or regular meeting at a cool little café near the theatre district, and Thursday night I got some laundry done and had a Chinese dinner to myself.

Charles takes off from Austin Friday afternoon, and arrives here Saturday morning at 7am or so. I’m going to take a train from Hannover to Frankfurt to pick him up at the airport. I was considering taking a car, but there’s a chance of snow, especially heading south to Munich.