~ ANNE! ~

I just hit the chocolate jackpot! I was invited to Rene's for dinner to meet his parents and walked out with six bars of German chocolate in the following flavours: Kakao-Creme, Vollmilch, Cappuccino, Joghurt-Erdbeer, Tiramisu, and Halbbitter. To be honest I'm a little skeptical about the Erdbeer, because strawberry chocolate sounds kind of gross. But Rene assures me it's his favorite.

Dinner was Wiener Schnitzel and potatoes with hollandaise sauce. Yums. Tasted like pork tenderloin. His mother kept asking if I wanted more (I think, anyway) and ate a tiny little half-portion herself.

So yes, conversation was a little difficult. As you may have noticed, I don't speak German, and his parents spoke a smidgen of English. Rene was the only bilingual person at the table (and he was too busy stuffing his face to translate). Managed all right, though, with a lot of smiling and expansive hand gestures. Clearly, I need to learn some more languages.

Been doing all right this week in the being-fed-by-friends stakes. Feast on Friday, of course, which was lovely and heavy on the cake. And Sophie had a crepe party on Saturday and, being Sophie, prepared every delicious kind of filling she could think of. So good...

Ooh, apparently they're now showing How Clean is Your House in this country! Just made Rene watch it. I am so excited - haven't seen Kim or Aggie for more than a year. I love how that show makes my humble abode look positively sparkling. My flatmate Pia and I used to watch it in Edinburgh - it was my guilty lowbrow pleasure.

What else is new? Got totally stood up by the guy from the grocery store and then got a ten-minute-long grovelling message the next day (he was sick, he came home from work early, he went to bed and forgot all about everything). I've never been so happy to be stood up in my life, as I was NOT in the mood to go make conversation with a stranger. No offense to him. Typical, though...

Went to OPDS, the Ballroom Dance Club's Open Practice Dance Session, for the first time. It was more fun than I expected, though of course the creepy old guys always feel they must take me under their wing and dance six dances, making sure to throw in many moves I've never seen with nary a lead or a word of explanation. However, there were also quite a few of the non-creepy variety and it was quite fun.

Saw Little Miss Sunshine with Sophie at the Garneau and just about froze to death. It must have been five degrees in the theatre. The movie was good, though. The little girl, Olive, had the exact glasses I had as a child - I swear! I had the long swishy hair too. Opposite personality, though - I would have died rather than perform ON A STAGE IN FRONT OF PEOPLE*. Anyway, good movie.

* Not much has really changed in that regard, though I did ditch the glasses.

So yeah, been busy. Been missing Scotland, to the point where I got out my copy of the free CD that came with Scotland on Sunday last year and listened to Dougie McLean sing "Caledonia" over and over. Yes, that is sad.

However, hearty if green-tinged congratulations to my former flatmate, Brandon, who is now allowed to stay in the UK for five more years and probably forever, and who is all sorted with a nice wee girlfriend as well. (I assume she's nice, since Brandon is. I hope so!)

Anyway, I must go insulate my windows. Woke up at 3 am last night due to shivering and have resolved to do something about that...

P.S. - At least it's November!