Easter, part zwei

Yesterday I had another nice day with another nice German family. This time my hosts were Cornelia and her husband Volker and their children Dario and Lea-Sophia. They live in another small town to the west of Frakfurt in the house that Cornelia grew up in. Her parents built it nearly 50 years ago and she and her family lived downstairs and her grandparents lived in the apartment above. Today, her mother lives upstairs and Cornelia and her family live downstairs. It is a modern-style house, with big windows overlooking a spacious garden. I am sorry to say that I didn’t take any pictures, as the camera’s memory was full. I guess I took a lot of photos yesterday!

I am continually struck by how compact and efficient the European homes are. Both of the homes I have visited have been small by American standards, but they do not seem small or cramped. Both families had a ton of books and narrow bookshelves that lined the walls and in both homes there were a lot of built in cupboards for storage. Today I was most impressed with the very fancy, yet compact, coffee maker in the kitchen. I believe it was German and it produced the best coffee nearly instantly. Cornelia put two cups of milk in the oven to warm, placing the saucers on top of the cups. She then used a small whisk, twirling it quickly between her hands to froth the milk and finally put the cups under the spout of the magic machine to dispense the hot coffee. Delicious!

While Cornelia prepared lunch, Volker and I walked their dog in the woods bordering town. This stretch of land isn’t really a park, but is a stand of woods filled with trails. We saw a lot of other walkers, bicyclists, runners and people on horseback. I was interested to learn that there are wild pigs in this part of the country, and that the males can grow to nearly 250 lbs. And, they have large tusks! Fortunately, we did not see any on our walk.

Cornelia drove me back to my apartment by early evening. I then spent a quiet night- cleaning up my computer (actually going through and organizing my files and documents) and I actually worked on my grant quite a big as well. It is amazing what you can do when you have lots of free time on your hands. Today I plan to try a long run along the Main River- I have been told that traveling in the west-bound direction is the most scenic. I seem to have picked up a little bug, my throat is sore and I have a bit of a headache, so hopefully the run will go well.