It's still raining. Lots of work outside to tidy up. Drenched again. Still - good fun.

That was a strange party. Analytical chemistry converations in the living room, latin dancing in the cellar. One smoot operator that got the contact details from every single woman in the place...

But what does a vegie do with left over chicken legs... suggestions please?

The table idea from IKEA turned out to be such a good idea I'm off to find some more today. 4 Euro for a wardrobe door in the sale area, a pair of tressle legs (like for a walpapering table) for another 4 Euro each, and hey presto a nice garden table.

Anyway - it's so wet I need to go drive - love it when everybody has trouble driving through the deep water on the roads makes me feel like the roads are designed for me.

Tonight was my British BBQ night. It rained. It really rained - but the balcony has an awning, so we coped. I'd put out the advert as "bring nothing", but still I have ended up wth more in my house after the evening than before.

I guess tomorrow is tidy up time...

So I am now started my "intensive" learning. As the oldest in the class it falls on me to be the anchor, the rock, the calming influence. The main teacher is ill, our second replacement came today. She had so much fun she is wondering about asking to stay with us.

Yesterday one girl turned to one of the other students and said "you are an arse". Or at least that's what it sounded like. She was mixing her English "You are an" with the German for doctor "Arzt". You would have thought the message not to mix languages would have got through. But in the imaginary cocktail party one young lady decided to ask me if she could use the informal "du" to address me rather than the formal "Sie". Unfortunately she also mixed languages and said to me "Can I do you?". This caused much mirth in the class.

What could I say?

I'm glad I decided to join this course - it seems to be particularly good fun - I might just learn German by the end...

Okay, so it isn't walking - it's biking. But it's part of my get fit routine for the Greenland trip that's approaching rapidly. First we had a visit to the flea market. The village (I still insist that this part of Vienna acts like the village it used to be) held it's flea market day - several markets were open. There were so many cool things. The best buy I made was a nive lined trunk to put my photos into (they are currently in cardboard boxes).

Then we went on a bike ride to the Marchfeld canal - along the canal and back.

I remembered my sunscreen - but not on my hands - nice line where my jumper ended...

So - you can only stay in Sebia for three months without a visa. Hence the visit of Kate.

A week of shopping and feeding ourselves at my favourite restaurants later and i visited Novi Sad in Serbia to see where she lived.

Rather pretty.

For some time I had been recording odd TV programmes and putting the tapes away. Now that I'm in a country with no TV that I really want to watch I am getting the tapes out one at a time. It's fun watching them. Some go back a long way - even pre-Blair! Most have no label, so it's my late evening surprise viewing.
I got out one the other day and it had an excelent Santana concert on it. After it closed it switched to BBC news. I thought - I wonder what the news was. Then I saw my garden shed. It was the time of the bomb in the back garden that blew up my shed. 5th November.

It was such a cool story - one to dine out on - and yet I had forgot all about it. Is it age, or am I spending more time living now rather than living yesterday? I think it's the latter.

We moved to No 1 location for quality of life recently. On the weekend I sat in a small hut on top of a hill with my coffee, chocolate cake and schlag (sorry Lemming - I couldn't resist). There is no rush, a coffee can last a newspaper, or two. You just enjoy.