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Once more into the breach
Oct. 2nd, 2007 10:21 pmSo, today was both lazy and full of minor accomplishments. Tis from such that one makes up the dignity of one's life, and so they get full word-count today.
This morning, I got up fairly early (as always before my alarm clock and roomie, who turned out the lights at 9:30 last night!) I set out to get my stupid change of address form duly registered with the Austrian authorities at the address given to me. Now, it was good that I did this, because on my way to the building, I passed a bookstore that stocked (finally!) the Moleskine City Notebooks over which I have been lusting for many a day now. I bought one, and went on with my errand. So, now I'm registered for the stuff I needed, and I have the object of my desire. Upon close inspection, the notebook is perfect save for the fact that it's maps do not include the city streetcars and bus lines that will make my life less pedestrian, so I am honestly considering writing them in.
I met up with Colleen to stop by the bank and give them copies of our photos. Apparently they needed them, and lost the ones we gave them a month ago when we opened the account. Curiously, the woman who opened our account was still not in (as yesterday), but we left our photos and phone numbers with the girl at the counter, who tried to speak to us in broken English. In any case, we have done what needed to be done, and hopefully that will be the end of it.
We then stopped by the Historical Crime Fiction course that we both waitlisted for. (And ran into the second of two people I had in my language course, also doing class related things.) The room was packed, but the professor was clearly a nice and funny man who was trying to accommodate as many as possible without ruining his course by the sheer number of papers he had to read at the end of the year. As he went on with his talk about what the course required, I became increasingly aware that this was the kind of course which I could have aced blindfolded at Wellesley, but that I had nothing on my record to prove that I could do the same in German. As I was 83 on the waitlist in a class which seems likely to end up at 40, I didn't worry too much, but Colleen and I both seemed to regret the fact that we couldn't get to hang out with this really cool guy. He seemed Wellesley-worthy, as in interested in his subject, a highly capable academic and teacher, and clearly wanted to see what the students had to say.
Anyhoo, after that Colleen and I massaged our bruised egos with sandwiches eaten in Sigmund Freud park, in front of the Votivkirche, and decided that since we had *nothing* to do for the rest of the day, and we both needed to shop and eat a real dinner, we would do that together. We headed off to Naschmarkt. Now, I had been there twice before, once on a very random tour with Kurt while it was closed, and once with some girls from my language course to see what could be seen. I had not bought anything there before, but I really liked it. The produce looks good-much better than most open air markets I've seen- and the sellers are not incredibly pushy or trying to stick you with the worst stuff. You ask for a bag, pick your own stuff, and then it gets priced by weight, so that you don't get shafted by crappy food. The prices are much better than in the grocery stores around here, and the selection is more interesting.
There is a definite hierarchy to the set up of the place- I actually came in towards the far end of the stalls, and the food towards the front looks better by far. They have some really good stuff other than just produce- permanent restaurants, some luxury items and speciality stores, and lots of meat shops.
Normally I'm a bit suspicious of buying my meat from anyone doing business like that, where there's a lot of press and they could just screw you and not get caught, but most of the butchers and fishmongers there were actually permanently established, not just stalls. So, I think it would actually be a decent place to get meat- the prices were certainly better than other places. I got an eggplant and two zucchinis for E1.50, which is much less than I got them for at a grocery store in Milan, which is a cheaper city to live in than Vienna. Colleen got some fresh Italian bread and sweet peppers, and we shopped around at a couple of Asian markets for a teapot for me. (While I love my little water-heater here, I need a teapot. I just *do*.) However, while I found several likely candidates, I was feeling a little profligate and there was nothing that seemed worth the prices they were asking.
Colleen and I made dinner together- she claims she cannot cook at all, so I did most of the stove-related stuff while she chopped and was my little errand-monkey. I had boiled some chicken yesterday, mostly to get the broth, and I threw some of that in with the eggplant, zucchini and mozzarella in a little stir-fry. Nothing terribly special, but apparently more cooking than Colleen does really at all. It was, however, fairly wonderful after a long day of running around and trying to speak German.
I actually spent money on downloading last year's episodes of House, so we watched a couple of those in my room before Colleen headed home.
After reviewing my school schedule, it appears that I can maintain my current status of Free-Gloriously-Free! Mondays and Fridays, but there will be some rearrangements. It's looking like a single class on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, and three on Thursdays. I need to email the professor for one of those classes and make sure I can still get in, as registration has closed for the History department. Sadly, my Islam in Germany and Austria does not actually start till November, so I can't take it for credit, which annoys me to no end. For the immediate present, it means that I have only one class this week, on Thursday at 6:30pm, and that all my other days are completely free.
For those of you who've been reading along, this means that I find myself once more in almost exactly the same state as I was last week, which I went to Milan to avoid: I am in a strange city with nothing to do but wander around and spend money. This is dangerous, but also fraught with possibilities for cementing friendships and finding new interesting things in the city.
This morning, I got up fairly early (as always before my alarm clock and roomie, who turned out the lights at 9:30 last night!) I set out to get my stupid change of address form duly registered with the Austrian authorities at the address given to me. Now, it was good that I did this, because on my way to the building, I passed a bookstore that stocked (finally!) the Moleskine City Notebooks over which I have been lusting for many a day now. I bought one, and went on with my errand. So, now I'm registered for the stuff I needed, and I have the object of my desire. Upon close inspection, the notebook is perfect save for the fact that it's maps do not include the city streetcars and bus lines that will make my life less pedestrian, so I am honestly considering writing them in.
I met up with Colleen to stop by the bank and give them copies of our photos. Apparently they needed them, and lost the ones we gave them a month ago when we opened the account. Curiously, the woman who opened our account was still not in (as yesterday), but we left our photos and phone numbers with the girl at the counter, who tried to speak to us in broken English. In any case, we have done what needed to be done, and hopefully that will be the end of it.
We then stopped by the Historical Crime Fiction course that we both waitlisted for. (And ran into the second of two people I had in my language course, also doing class related things.) The room was packed, but the professor was clearly a nice and funny man who was trying to accommodate as many as possible without ruining his course by the sheer number of papers he had to read at the end of the year. As he went on with his talk about what the course required, I became increasingly aware that this was the kind of course which I could have aced blindfolded at Wellesley, but that I had nothing on my record to prove that I could do the same in German. As I was 83 on the waitlist in a class which seems likely to end up at 40, I didn't worry too much, but Colleen and I both seemed to regret the fact that we couldn't get to hang out with this really cool guy. He seemed Wellesley-worthy, as in interested in his subject, a highly capable academic and teacher, and clearly wanted to see what the students had to say.
Anyhoo, after that Colleen and I massaged our bruised egos with sandwiches eaten in Sigmund Freud park, in front of the Votivkirche, and decided that since we had *nothing* to do for the rest of the day, and we both needed to shop and eat a real dinner, we would do that together. We headed off to Naschmarkt. Now, I had been there twice before, once on a very random tour with Kurt while it was closed, and once with some girls from my language course to see what could be seen. I had not bought anything there before, but I really liked it. The produce looks good-much better than most open air markets I've seen- and the sellers are not incredibly pushy or trying to stick you with the worst stuff. You ask for a bag, pick your own stuff, and then it gets priced by weight, so that you don't get shafted by crappy food. The prices are much better than in the grocery stores around here, and the selection is more interesting.
There is a definite hierarchy to the set up of the place- I actually came in towards the far end of the stalls, and the food towards the front looks better by far. They have some really good stuff other than just produce- permanent restaurants, some luxury items and speciality stores, and lots of meat shops.
Normally I'm a bit suspicious of buying my meat from anyone doing business like that, where there's a lot of press and they could just screw you and not get caught, but most of the butchers and fishmongers there were actually permanently established, not just stalls. So, I think it would actually be a decent place to get meat- the prices were certainly better than other places. I got an eggplant and two zucchinis for E1.50, which is much less than I got them for at a grocery store in Milan, which is a cheaper city to live in than Vienna. Colleen got some fresh Italian bread and sweet peppers, and we shopped around at a couple of Asian markets for a teapot for me. (While I love my little water-heater here, I need a teapot. I just *do*.) However, while I found several likely candidates, I was feeling a little profligate and there was nothing that seemed worth the prices they were asking.
Colleen and I made dinner together- she claims she cannot cook at all, so I did most of the stove-related stuff while she chopped and was my little errand-monkey. I had boiled some chicken yesterday, mostly to get the broth, and I threw some of that in with the eggplant, zucchini and mozzarella in a little stir-fry. Nothing terribly special, but apparently more cooking than Colleen does really at all. It was, however, fairly wonderful after a long day of running around and trying to speak German.
I actually spent money on downloading last year's episodes of House, so we watched a couple of those in my room before Colleen headed home.
After reviewing my school schedule, it appears that I can maintain my current status of Free-Gloriously-Free! Mondays and Fridays, but there will be some rearrangements. It's looking like a single class on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, and three on Thursdays. I need to email the professor for one of those classes and make sure I can still get in, as registration has closed for the History department. Sadly, my Islam in Germany and Austria does not actually start till November, so I can't take it for credit, which annoys me to no end. For the immediate present, it means that I have only one class this week, on Thursday at 6:30pm, and that all my other days are completely free.
For those of you who've been reading along, this means that I find myself once more in almost exactly the same state as I was last week, which I went to Milan to avoid: I am in a strange city with nothing to do but wander around and spend money. This is dangerous, but also fraught with possibilities for cementing friendships and finding new interesting things in the city.
