Showdown in the Kitchen

So last night I was suffering from what can only be described as one of the worst sinus headaches in the history of mankind.  It's much better today, but I think I should still probably take some ibuprofen just to be on the safe side.  I have a lot of friends who get migranes, and I don't know what a migrane feels like, but this was probably the sinus headache equivalent of a migrane.  It hurt my entire head to cough and though I was just laying in bed and breathing my head was pounding.

Anyway, because of the pain, and the fact that I have to get in just the right position to sleep with this head cold, I had some problems falling asleep.  I tried reading just before I went to bed, but the headache was too bad and focusing on the words and writing notes was too much.  This was at about 1:30 am.  I put a warm compress on my eyes and finally drifted off to sleep at what was probably around 2:00 am or so.  At 3:45 I was woken up by loud voices in the hallway.

Hunkering Down and the Putzplan

Having had a relapse of whatever it was I got about 2 weeks go, I've spend the last 2 1/2 days in my dorm - not really leaving my room except for showers, food, and other necessities.  It has afforded me the opportunity to finish up some reading for my Ph.D. exams and given the cold and the amount of rain that we've been having, it's actually been preferable to going outside.  Apparently, however, my absence has been noted as people have been asking about me.

Rather than this being a lengthy post about either my reading or my illness, I figured I would take this as an opportunity to tell you about the latest goings on in the 2nd floor of Prinz Karl.  The more responsible of the Brazilians decided that it would be a good idea to sit down on Tuesday evening and talk about our Putzplan.  Putzen is the German word for cleaning, and Plan - well, I think you can probably figure that one out.  Anyway, at 8pm we met in the kitchen and assigned weeks for cleaning and other responsibilities.

Basically, if it's your week, you must purchase toilet paper, make sure that the bathrooms are clean between visits from the Putzfrau, make sure that the garbage gets taken out, and clean any big things in the kitchen.  In addition, we agreed that if you make a mess you clean it up.  It is not the responsibility of the person on duty that week to clean up your dishes from making dinner for 10 people in the kitchen.

That was Tuesday.  This morning, I go into the kitchen and find it a disaster.  I almost took a picture.  I really should have because it would show you the level of filth that some people think is acceptable to force other people to live with.  Anyway, there were apparently about 8 people in our kitchen last night drinking, eating dinner, and having a good time, but nobody decided to clean up after themselves.  Now it's one of the Brazilian's job to clean this week, and let's just say that he is challenged when it comes to basic household maintenance and well anything else that takes place in a kitchen.  (As an aside, we were amazed that he cleaned his room last weekend, but then he has a girlfriend, and if he wanted his girlfriend to stay over, the room needed to be cleaned.)

Having talked to one of the Brazilians briefly in the kitchen today, he said that he cooked, but that the other Brazilian didn't get a chance to clean up.  I thought to myself - wait a minute - it's not his job to clean up your crap.  I mean, it's nice if the people for whom you cook help you clean up afterwards, and given the number of plates and glasses that were washed, I would suspect that someone did clean up after dinner.  But don't blame your friend and fellow countryman because your dirty pots and pans were scattered everywhere. OR because there were beer bottles everywhere in the kitchen.  OR because you were too drunk to take care of it.

Anyway, it's week one of the Putzplan and it's not going too well.  The German woman on our floor -  is up next week and I suspect it will be a little different with her.  Let's hope.

So much progress it's unbelievable!!!

I don't even know where to start.  But I'll begin with the first bit of news, and that is that I have my own login for the computer network.  I received my lovely username and password in the mail yesterday.  This opened up a lot of possibilities for me.  It meant that I now had a uni-tuebingen email address, that I could log into the system and get the readings for one of my classes, and that I could print out my proof of matriculation so that I could buy my semester bus pass.

This may not seem exciting for you, but there it means major progress on my end.  Now that I have a bus pass, I no longer have to pay 4 Euros every time I want to go visit my friends up in WHO (where most of the dorms are).  It also means that I can visit my family in Germany for the low, low price of 1.80.  My family lives just outside of the area that my Semesterticket covers, which means I have to pay for the bus on the last stretch.  It's not that bad really and to be honest, if I got all the way to Beuron, they would probably come pick me up instead of making me take the bus, but it's good to know I've got options. So all in all, things are looking up on the bureaucracy front.

My cold has progressed into an at times disgusting sounding cough.  Good thing I bought throat and cough tea - whatever the heck that is supposed to do.  At least it's no longer in my sinuses, which is a good thing.  AND, I'm able to sleep through the night without waking myself up coughing or unable to breath.

My foot - well it's definitely bruised and swollen. I would post pictures, but for some reason bruises don't show up well in pictures - who knew.  It feels better today, and since I'm going to spend the day inside reading, I would be aggravating the injury. I just feel like a bit of a moron.  Whatever.

Finally - it's cold here.  And I mean really cold.  Like winter jacket cold.  Like I'm wearing two sweaters and a jacket and tights under my jeans cold.  I do not want to see what winter is going to be like. I haven't lived in a cold place in a long time, but all I can say is that it's not normal for it to be below freezing in October.  NOT NORMAL.

Ok...back to reading.

8000 Rubber Duckies

Today was the Tuebinger Entenrennen which is basically a race of 8000 rubber duckies along the Neckar river.  People purchase entry into the race by buying a duck.  They don't get to keep the duck, but for the first 400 ducks there is some sort of prize, for the very first duck there is an even bigger prize.  The ducks - ie entry into the race - costs 3 Euros, and all of the money goes to help social programs in the area.

The photos aren't great, because it's hard to get good clear pictures of 8000 rubber ducks swimming down a river, but they will give you a sense of what the event was like.

In other news - I'm still sick.  My cold has moved into my sinuses - as they always do - but right now it's just pain and pressure, not an infection.  I tried to get the pharmacist to give me some sort of decongestant today, but she said that everything I was doing should work.  I talked to another american who came down with a cold shortly after she arrived, and found out the name of the product she got that actually has the same active ingredient as real sudafed, so on Monday, if it's not significantly better, I'll try to grab some of that.

Blah…sick

So I’m sick.  Not in a Swine-flu sort of way, but the kind of sick you get when the weather changes quickly and your body is not prepared for it.  And while I have health insurance, I’m not really sick enough to go to the doctor, so today I headed to the drug store to find out what magical herbal remedies they had in store for me.  (Really, I needed lotion and vitamin C with zinc, but I figured it couldn’t hurt to look at the herbal tea section.)