ammogirl

So, 2006 is coming to a close, and since I have nothing else to write about today, I thought I’d make up some New Year’s Resolutions to share.

All of these start with "In the fabulous year 2007, I absolutely resolve to…" by the way.  I don’t feel like typing it, but you totally have to say it.  Out loud.  Yes, I will know.

1.  Correspond better with my family and friends.  Those of you who I should be corresponding with know this is a big problem for me, and certainly less likely to be upheld than…well, any other resolution.  In my defense, I will say it’s totally not my fault!  I just…don’t ever have anything to say.

2.  Study every night until I test for Master, and then finish up my CCAF (it’s the stupid associates for the military – worthless in real life, necessary in this one) directly after that.  Once that’s done (I can have three part resolutions, can’t I?) two classes a quarter until I get my bachelors.

3.  Drink more wine!  The red kind is good for you!

4.  Decorate my home so it doesn’t look like a hotel room.  Spending money on things for the wall is reeeeeeallly hard for me to do.  I call it "minimalist" but you would probably say (to yourself) "holy non-decorated house".  What can I say?  I’m not a knick-knacky type o’ girl.

5.  More adventurey stuff!

6.  Learn how to load a dishwasher so my husband doesn’t get his "I am disgusted" face whenever he unloads the clean dishes.  Look.  I guess I was spoiled or something when I grew up because I just did not have to do that kind of stuff.  If I wanted to, I could, but c’mon. Do you really think I ever wanted to? 

7.  The older I get, the lazier I get, exponentially.  Somehow, I need that to not happen.

8.  Um…I think that’s it.

That’s not very exciting, is it?  How boring am I that I can’t even come up with fun resolutions?  I should say "Skydive" (no), or "Run a marathon" (no).  At the very least, I should say "Lose weight" because I’m pretty sure that’s a mandatory resolution.  Instead, how about if I resolve to try and keep my resolutions?  And then, if I fail, I can’t feel bad, because I’ll have tried, right?  I smell success, you guys!

Friday overnight trip plans were changed because every hotel we checked in every city in the entire country of Germany is booked.  And we don’t have international driver’s licenses yet, so jaunting off to France or Belgium or any other country that I can’t think of (hi, Oregon public school geography class!) is out of the question, unless we sneak.  Oh, I kid.  I know of at least one other country in Europe:  India.  Ha ha ha.  Instead, we’re taking another day trip to…wherever we end up.  Did I ever mention I’m really bad about making plans even though I desperately NEED them to prevent the crankypants?  Hmm.  Actually, upon conducting a search through my archives, I see I have, and that I actually gave it a name: Obsessive Compulsive Procrastination Disorder.  Anyway, tomorrow I’m running errands instead (Lindsey desperately needs! shoes! NOW! or she might die)(but I can’t really make too much fun because…well, shoes).  Somehow…I doubt I’ll be posting.

Tschuss!!

"We’re leaving at 8am tomorrow."  "That means we have to wake up at 6." "…Let’s leave at 9."

And believe it or not, we did.  Okay, 9:16, actually, but the point is ADVENTURE!  Made possible only by the purchase of a navigation system, since Germany has absolutely no directional signs, just…signs. Like, if you want to go to Heidelberg, you better know if you want to head to Trier or Mannheim, or you’re screwed.  Instead, we now have a lovely disembodied female voice telling us every move to make.  Honestly, it’s the coolest thing.  Once, John even missed a turn on purpose just to see what would happen, and it recalculated the route automatically…best purchase ever. 

So we went to Heidelberg Castle today.  Now, I’m pretty sure I have not professed my absolute love of castles yet, but you guys, I LOVE CASTLES.  The amount of history in them is absolutely amazing.  So however much I complain about disengaging from this damn laptop, it actually doesn’t take much to get me going, if you promise me a castle at the end.  Heh.  I don’t ask for much.  Just give me a castle and I’ll be happy.

Anyway, this one was cool.  We came in through the back courtyard, so the first thing we saw was the totally awesome porn statue of a Greek god. With strategically placed leaves for modesty, of course, but porn statue all the same.  Seriously.  We could have probably left then and been totally fulfilled, but instead we bought tickets into the castle and took a little walky walk.  There wasn’t a whole lot to see at this one, but the view was absolutely incredible.  The castle sits up on a hill overlooking the city of Heidelberg, which is built along the Neckar River.  The whole backside of the castle is a patio, and from it you can see all this, panoramic style…the river, the bridges, the churches…it’s gorgeous.

And, they have a wine barrel that can hold 220,000 liters of wine downstairs.  I’m not sure if it’s the biggest barrel in the world, but…I mean, I certainly haven’t seen one bigger.  Regardless, giant barrels of wine are always a plus.  220,000 liters…I wonder if it was full at  one point?

I posted tons of pictures on my flickr from today’s schloss trip.  Up next is a overnighter to an undetermined location.  We were going to go to Cochem Castle but maybe not now…something about festivals in January or something.  John wants to check out Cologne, but I think it would be super to go see Neuschwanstein, the Sleeping Beauty castle.  We’re leaving Friday after John checks in at work.  I’d tell you to take bets on where we end up going but…I sort of don’t really care.  So.

Wait, can you hear that?  It’s the sound of pie.  Pecan pie.  It sounds so lonely…

I better go.

Tschuss!

Awww crap.  I just realized that my blogroll is broken, and not updating when the author posts.   That’s quite unfortunate, really.

Christmas Eve is going well.  We’ve watched every Christmas movie in existence, and made pies, and cranberry sauce, and devilled eggs, the girls are tracking Santa (Cairo!) and I just unmercifully beat John in a cutthroat game of Battleship.  The couch is comfy, the wine is tasty, the cookies for Santa are looking mighty fine…life is good.

Happy Season, everyone.  I hope you are with the people you want to be with.

Tschuss!