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| Dawn. A frightening change from My Beach ;-( |
Still ONE WHOLE HOUR until breakfast ;-( What to do for so long? I might just arrive DRUNK at the breakfast table ;-)
7:00
Nope, I make it to breakfast without falling over. Again, I keep it light ... I'm fat enough already!
More sink laundry ...
I told Mother I'd meet her after 11:00. Might as well keep her busy then not only by eating but by accompanying me on some errands.
I'll find the housekeeping staff cleaning another room and call into the room "No need to clean room XY today or tomorrow". She comes out from cleaning the bathroom, looks at me and she remembers my NAME !
WTF? I wouldn't even have recognized her anywhere else but here in the hotel. STILL room for improvement !!!!
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| OH NO. Karl Lagerfeldesque bitch lip ! |
11:30
I find my mother in her room and she is even ready to go ! Fabulous!
A short walk into the pedestrian street we find the Italian restaurant I noticed on TripAdvisor. It's open. Fabulous !
We sit down and the waiter/owner approaches the table. And speaks Germalian-Italman, that HORRIBLE language that has as many Italian words in as possible but only so few that your regular German still knows exactly what is being said.
Germans LOVE it, they gobble it up, and sometimes even reply with a few words of Italian. It's the same in Italian restaurants all over Germany. Somehow eating and listening at an Italian restaurant seems to be the next best thing to actually travelling to Italy. NOT fabulous !There is a Sparkasse right next to the restaurant. This is where my mother has her account. It looks odd: There are a lot of ATMs distributed over the floor and a couple of counters with people behind them, but without the customary bulletproof glass.
My suspicions are confirmed when I ask to exchange some US$ to EUROs.
We don't do that anymore.
Another bank in the vicinity that does?
Nope.
NOT fabulous !!
Time to go for another bike ride ...
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| a Pumped-water-storage power plant !!!! When you have excess power: pump water up the hill to the reservoir When you need extra power: switch the system to downhill flow with generators BRILLIANT ! |
Total cycling kilometers: 30
Total eliminated bus/taxi rides: 2
It's a holiday today. All retail & grocery stores are closed. Jesus has left the building. (It's Ascension Day today).
It starts drizzling when I get to MomTown. Mom is depressed. EVERYONE is out to get her and to put her down. When I inquire into the matter, I realize that the issue is a long-term but directly related issue that stems from February, when mother HID ALL her pants in an extremely good hiding spot and ran around the home telling EVERYONE (I heard about this in Canada by e-mail) that she had NOTHING to wear and that she needed MONEY for new pants this very moment.
At the ripe old age of 76, Mother still has not figured out that every action has a reaction (a consequence). But then she never knew that before and instead chose to blame the EVIL OTHERS for any misfortune that befell her. Same Same Same.
Is it any wonder that I love to hang out in a place where I am separated from BOTH my Grandmother and my Mother by one third of the circumference of the planet?
It's Father's Day in Germany. What that means for most German men is to get together with about 10 other guys, load a rolling contraption with a keg of beer, and to drag said contraption to a park nearby where they do their best and worst to empty said keg of beer. Sometimes, these clubs take their keg on a train. It might be fun if you're part of the group, but as an outsider I must admit that I rarely have seen anything more appalling.
Eating with my mother also has given way to a bit of a depressed feeling. I realized that the dementia hasn't really changed the egocentric borderline-sociopath being who my mother used to be. It's still very evident. Normally I wouldn't care but this time her sociopath behaviour touches on the subject of George, so it HURT somewhere deep inside.
It's 13:45. What am I going to do with the rest of the day? I'm going to see my mother again tomorrow and that's early enough. Riding a bike later with the banged-up knee is questionable. Thank God for Netflix and Wine, LOL.
AT 20:00 I barely have the energy to get up the stairs again after an outside cigarette.
Total cycling kilometers: 20
Total eliminated bus/taxi rides: 2
A nice breakfast with a soft-boiled egg, and ...
OK, enough sleep. Time to check out at 9:15 because the monastery I'm moving to promised me an early check-in of 9:00 today.
Nothing better than moving all my belongings on a bicycle ;-)
The Monastery isn't really a monastery, but a Catholic Seminary Centre. It's right at the edge of the forest, far removed from the already quiet road and the architecture reminds one of a medieval castle.
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| Monastery with bicycle |
If this isn't a nice work desk, I don't know what is (including cemetery view ;-)
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| no monastery room without one of these ... |
11:00
Oops, almost time to visit mother again ! I've known my mother for 52 years now. WHY do I always expect her to change and to act normal at the next meeting?
Ah well .....
I pick up Mother from her home and because we're early for the restaurant opening, I try to exchange US$ for Euros in THREE different banks.
"We don't do that anymore", is what I hear THREE times.
WTF is WRONG with you people ? ..... I am told that ONLY their main branches in the next Big City exchange currencies now. What a SAD state of affairs ! But it's a sign of times to come. Because once they have taken CASH out of people's hands and replaced it with CARDS linked to accounts, there simply is NO WAY to cheat on your taxes anymore. There is more..... Heard of negative interest rates before? If there is no more cash (and don't kid yourself, they're working on it, because it's every government's Wet Dream), so if there is no more cash and all your money is in an account, those negative interest rates will NOT only apply to banks depositing money at other banks. NO, they apply to everyone. And guess what negative interest rates do ! The will take money for keeping your money even though you don't have a choice. It will be just like any other TAX ;-)Anyhoo, enough ranting. I'm carrying US$ with me, but I can't exchange them, so I'm forced to pillage my Canadian checking account via an ATM. NOT happy!
Lunch with mom seems strangely familiar. She orders the same thing that she ate and loved yesterday, but today she hates it. Same Same Same ... I meet her caretaker on the street and chat with her out there because she refuses to eat with us. I understand why ;-)
Time to cycle back along that horribly trafficky street to reach the solitude of my nunnery ...
I've had enough of Germany. Either I've picked up a cold or my age-old arch enemy Hay Fever has returned to torment me. My tan is leaving my skin in scale-like flakes, leaving me look mottled like a dying salmon. There are too many ever-complaining Germans here (And I'm turning into one of them,LOL). But maybe it's just hanging around my mother for 3 days ;-(
SNAP OUT OF IT. It's sunny. Go for a quick bike ride !
TOO early to go to bed. I'm not really that hungry and my hip cushions already have grown again here in Germany, but I cycle to a restaurant I passed earlier to eat.
Back at the monastery, I have a "The Shining" moment.
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