Music

No photos this time, cos the weather was crap this week so I didn't do much - snow in some of the surrounding areas, but not in Mainz cos we're too low here. The sun is out now though, and I don't have to wear my big jacket anymore!

The highlights of my week were all from the weekend really. On Friday it was the 30th birthday of one of the Sandras in the lab, so we all went out to this Mexican restaurant / cocktail bar to celebrate (Sausolitos: http://www.sausalitos.de/Filiale_11_20_9.html). I ate before, which was probably good because the dishes were HUGE and my "standing-only" pants wouldn't have allowed me to finish a meal ;) So I had a coupla cocktails and tried to dodge the smokers, and it was nice cos I met a few more people with very good English. I avoided the 'flying kangaroo' cocktail too, even though patriotically, I shoud have tried it. It had rum in it though (blah).

At midnight, we went to a nightclub called 'Kuz', where a couple of girls had pre-paid for our tickets, which was great because the lines were MASSIVE. It was an Über 30 party (over-thirty's party), which they seem to have a lot of around here, so it was a bit of an older crowd than back in Vegas. The club was like a massive old hall, but there were two rooms and it was absolutely chokkas. We walked past the first room (where I wanted to go, because there was a good song playing) to the second room, where there was 80s music. Due to the size of the crowd, a couple of girls and I went back to the first room where there was some pretty decent house music. After a few minutes though, it changed to Linkin Park, then Limp Bizkit, then it rapidly deteriorated into a lot of very angry people wearing black jumping around in a violent manner. So we went back to the safer, happy 80s music and the overwhelming crowds. I heard some German hip-hop and some pretty decent German pop-rock, then the fumes started to get to me. Sadly, smoking inside is not banned here, and it was like there was a fire in that room (actually, if there was a fire, we would have died because there was no way of getting out fast). My clothes absolutely reek of smoke now, but it was a good night.

Today I went to "Jugend Musiziert" with Thomas Wölfel (the labhead) and his wife, Catherine (pronounced Catrine - another labhead). It was the regional finals of a young people's music comp, and their daughter (violin) and son (cello) were both playing. I was told 10:30 to see their daughter play in a trio (apparently they're very good), so I rocked up and had to wait outside the door for ages, because someone was playing. After 10 mins or so, the doors opened and I realised I'd missed the whole damn thing. I was so confused, but later I found out that daylight savings started last night, unbeknownst to me. So frustrating. But at least now the Wölfels know I'm not just rude! The most annoying thing is that one of the girls in the lab told me about it, and she said 'between 2 and 3 tomorrow, the clocks change', and I thought she meant in the afternoon, but she meant 2 and 3am :( A side-effect of the frequent use of 24-hr time in Germany.

Anyway, then I went and saw the results of the trios comp (Thomas's daughter's group won, and will now go to the whole of Germany comp in Nurenburg), then I had lunch with the Wölfels at their place. Eventually I saw some music, when I watched their son play in the afternoon, after which we all went out for icecream! I wish I'd had my camera there, cos this thing was like a work of art. Hazelnut (Haselnuss) icecream with cream and caramel sauce and sugared hazelnuts and wafers. They have these Eiscafes everywhere around here - kind of like Freestyle in Rosalie, but with heaps more options. Apparently they're often run by Italians, who come in the Summer for a season, then they leave during Winter and the cafes are used for other things. Kristy, we'll have to go there when you come over!!

Catherine has kindly invited me to the ballet on Friday night, which should be interesting. I find the standing-on-toes thing kind of disturbing, but hopefully it'll be one of those nice happy dances, rather than the slow depressing ones. Maybe I'll be cultured by the time I come home (jk)! Maybe the arts can be my new hobby, because I hear the Lions are injury-ridden already and the season has barely started!

Ciao!