It's that time again...

American week at Lidl starts on Wednesday.

Although--since when do Americans eat hot dogs from a jar and sweet popcorn?

heather, where've you been?

"Making hay while the sun shines" - as my country family would say.
"Hustlin" - my city family would say.

Here's what I've been up to for fun:


I am very blessed to have a balcony with no overhead shade, so I get a full day of sun, from sunrise until about 18.30 these days, when the sun gets low enough to be blocked behind the building.

This photo was right before I repotted three of these fellows into larger pots.

If you're wondering about the fellow in the back. He's Dutch, from here. I bought two last year at my local Praktiker and had good success with them. This year, Praktiker didn't have them, so I had to go to two other local garden places before I found him.

They retail for around 5.99, so a little pricy, but it was the most (only?) productive item in my balkon garden last year, even with all the rain, so completely worth the cost.

A few secrets if you happen to buy one for yourself:
1. Replant it in the biggest pot you can find. It will be happier and thus give you more tomatos.
2. Trim often, as in every week. They say it will produce 40 cherry tomatos, I would say mine did double that last year. As long as you keep clipping, it will keep producing flowers, and then fruit. Due to its 'Dutch engineering', if it stops with either flowers or fruit, it dies off.
3. Water each evening, if it does not rain during the day.

grounded

My passport is 'in the shop' for my new Germany work permit (the fifth yearly sticker for those of you keeping track at home.) Normally this process takes a few days, and company J graciously takes care of the administrative aspects of it.

Prior to handing in my passport on Apr 1, I mentioned that I must travel to France on Apr 14, and I'm not taking the chance of leaving Germany without it. Yes, the chances are minimal that I would be checked. But have I been checked traveling between company J's Germany and France offices? Yes--so I refuse to chance it for work travel. Do I want to be stopped coming into Germany without appropriate ID? No way. I imagine vegetarian food in the Germany slammer isn't so great.

In the meantime, it appears 2 weeks is not possible. So the admin people who take care of this will retrieve my passport based on the company J letter I created which states why I need it back with a temporary extension so that I can go to a meeting in France next week.

And why Heather couldn't they get it back within two weeks as originally estimated?

My little corner of NRW is under a massive backup of paperwork processing. It was estimated to be completed 4-5 weeks (that's in addition to the 2 weeks it was already is sitting there.)

So I get a little extension paper to tuck in (no problems, I've previously traveled on one in the past), and then it goes back into the shop--for a month at least. Meaning--no shopping trips in Holland or Belgium, no last minute Lufthansa weekend flights, and no long holiday weekends outside Germany in May.

So much for German efficiency.

Sperrmüll it is!

Mausi is one smart cookie to figure that out the answer to this little quiz. Or maybe she just had a leg up on the topic since Mr. M is a flea market fan. A small prize is due to the lady, perhaps at the next Whiney Expat meetup.

(The answer would be 'trash-picking' for English readers. ;-))

I've tried to point out to D, it's not so bad, even the Wall Street Journal talks about this trend in Germany.

I happen to enjoy the selection in Wuppertal. I came out of Polish class just after 9 PM and it was 8 degrees and dark out. However, the streets were crawling like it was a warm summer day. People were hauling things out of the cellars and apartments, and people were going up and down the streets seeking the best prize from the curb offerings. Some had flashlights, some pull along carts, and some drove up in cars for precious big items.

I had some things to do and I don't plan to stay in Germany forever, so I really didn't need to acquire anything, except noticing the plant holders while walking past, I thought they'd be useful for my herbs, so I joined the mix sifting through the garganuan curbside mountains. If you're in the need of furniture, dishes, appliances, clothing, toys, absolutely anything in the world, find a good neighborhood in Germany and keep an eye open for the bulk trash day when everyone puts out anything and everything.

And more about the planters? I spent the week learning about the intricacies of West German pottery to figure out what I picked up. Seems my herbs will be in finer digs than I'd ever buy for them.

Mystery photo

I still owe a posting to answer the quiz I posted way back, as well as some answers to where I've been.
In the meantime, the plant pot fairy didn't bring these, so today's quiz:

Where/how did these lovely items sitting on Heather's floor come from?
(Hint: It involved Heather in some way, they didn't just magically appear. But what could be the source of such loveliness?)



For info on future use: they will be put to work shortly housing two plants in the office and the rest at home. The terra cotta ones in the back will hold tomato plants once spring really comes.

The two matching flower ones on the left are stamped 'West Germany' on the bottom and the one front and center is from Italy.

Put your answer in the comments if you think you know of the source/activity...