Shovel Test

Findings of the day: those new shovels work very well.



And those pebbles taste pretty good.

Last Weekend

We are defintely behind in posting. These pictures are from last weekend, when we went house-hunting and rewarded Karl and Henri with a visit to the Wildpark Poing, most definitely one of their most favorite places. Not just because of the free roaming animals, but also because they got a killer playground the size of South Brooklyn. Karl took the lead and explained the intricacies of wildlife to his brother (and yes, we are aware of the common-sense-practice to not let toddlers stick their hands into animal cages, but that cage was exclusively populated by bunny rabbits and fluffy birds).



House hunting. Has occupied our minds and hearts for quite some time now. With our luck the Munich market overheated to a point of ridiculousness approaching SoHo/TriBeCa prices ca. 2005. So now our piggy banks, lovingly fattened over the years, look mighty anorexic around here. The hours preceeding the lovely outing to the Wildpark had definitely been a new low in real estate adventures. First we went to a depressing suburbia, where they had a lot of dingy 60s row houses with Jags and Range Rovers parked out front. Next we went to Ebersberg, a small town half hour outside of Munich. The place was nice. But sold. And a stroll across the Easter market to the local ice cream parlor made us realize in horror that our sons would be two of those "Deliverance" style Bavarians, if they'd grow up there. The day was topped off with a visit of a row house in the Olympic Village, which in 1972 was a model project in contemporary design. It was a strange mix somewhere between a 3rd world showcase in social housing and an eery set for George A. Romero film. Back when we left the US of A four years ago (!), Munich city marketing had just come up with a new slogan - "Munich loves you" (I think we sent around the accompanying image film back then). Well, after those last house hunting outing we can definitely confirm - Munich hates us. That's why we're leaving. Well, not for good, even though we're contemplating, if it might not be easier to find jobs in Berlin than appropriate family housing in Munich. Tuesday we're going to Italy for a couple of weeks, some friends' of friends place in the Marche near the port town of Fano. It's a no internet kinda place in a hamlet that has no store, but a bar. Henri already got himself some gear for the beach. And we got a whole list of fish places, Renaissance towns, caves and ravines with creeks to bathe in that we wanna go to. So you might not hear from us on this blog. But that just means that we will be too busy frolicking in the Mediterranean.

Day at the Beach

It definitely was a great beach day today. That golden light of Bavaria starts to come back, which is actually very much like those flattering lights around bathroom mirrors in expensive restaurants. It turns on the sheens and the glows and even a objectively ugly city like Munich turns into a dream destination everybody and his cousin wants to live at (and somehow already bought a house or an appartments... we've been house hunting for a while now and it sure is a bit like the lower leagues of Ultimate Fighting - tough as nails and meager rewards). Nonetheless we took the boys to the beach and definitely enjoyed that Californish side of Munich we actually like a lot.



Karl was all excited to throw stones again. So he tried some new techniques. This one's called "hard rain on Henri". Of course there was ice cream and pebbles to bring back to the house.



Ah, have we mentioned that Karl is now the proud owner of a carrot field? It's in our backyard. Our neighbor Klaus planted it for him. You should be able to read the sign saying "Karls Rüben", but he was too excited to stay still.

Sick Kid

The fever just doesn't want to go away! Today, Henri and I went to see the doctor once again and he told me that Henri might have pneumonia. Poor thing! We got a new set of antibiotics and hope for the best. Once again.

Early Summer Sunday

The original plan had been to go with grandpa to one of the last weekend shows of the Circus Krone winter season. Somehow Karl changed his mind though and for days declared all large feline creatures scary and all types of clowns boring. Having rather summery weather conditions made the decision to postpone the next Circus visit to next December final. His efforts to drag us all to the Wildpark/game preserve were futile though, since that place is kind of a journey from where grandpa lives. So we settled on going out to the lake to see grandpa for lunch, cake, icecream and whatever other fun meal can be cramped into a day.Turns out you can do all the circus action all by yourself (with a little help form Opa Paul). Later on Karl tried his hand at the piano again. Somehow he developed his style. He's more single note Thelonious Monkish and less full on attack Cecil Taylorish now. Helped that grandpa assigned different animals to different registers. You miss Henri in those outing pics? Well, he caught himself a good ole fever to spend the weekend with. He'll be shipped to the doctors, and yes, we would be just fine with the virus crash test phase of his toddlerhood coming to an end now.

Free Jazz

I took Karl to the Jazzlines Festival today, where I had a speaking gig last weekend. We went to see Gunter Hampel, a friend from way back, who is something like the German Ornette Coleman.
When I came to New York for the very first time I crashed at his place for a week, sharing a a large studio with Gunter, his sidekick Thomas Keyserling and John Coltrane's former sparring partner Marion Brown. So a lot of history. Karl first didn't want to go into the dark hall in the middle of a summery early evening, but I coaxed him with the promise of a new book. So he went and sat through some hardcore Free Jazz for almost an hour. Mesmerized. I do hope that fascination holds. Sure does for daddy. Karl's definite favorites these days though - Hank Williams and Joseph Haydn. Kind of a nerdy NPRish Park Slopish combination of tastes.

P.S.: Here's a taste of what Karl sat through. A fellow editor actually wanted to call youth services when he heard I'm taking Karl to a Gunter Hampel show.