Castles and Beer

And a cheery Guten Strudel to you.

You may have noticed I haven't posted anything in a while. Or maybe not. Maybe the internet isn't as "into" my blogging existence as my self absorbed guilt would lead me to believe. Alas, there is no way to tell. Heavy sigh. Ennui.  

I've been busy.

 I'll tell ya, this whole "job" thing is really putting a damper on my blogging. And my housework. I know, I know...poor baby. It's just that now that the weather is (still) awesome and it stays light out until about 10:00 pm, and Germany has really outdone herself with festivals and events and beirgartens and such, it's hard to find time to write about it all. I get it- I can hear you rolling your eyes at my first world problem. Noted. I'm rolling my eyes at myself too, which is actually making it hard to focus on what I'm typing.

In keeping with the "Germany is made of beer and tourism" theme, Husband and I have spent the last few weekends visiting castles and getting rambunctious at the Stuttgart Frühlingsfest (Spring Festival) in one of the famed beer tents, reminiscent of Oktoberfest in Munich. As an interesting aside, the Stuttgart Beer Festival usually coincides with Oktoberfest and the Germans typically flock to Stuttgart to get their beer on while leaving Oktoberfest for tourists. I haven't been to an Oktoberfest yet, but sources on the inside tell me it's full of Americans, Brits and Australians. And lions and tigers and bears. 

Does anyone else think it looks like Hogwarts?

Over Muttertag (Mother's Day) Husband and I trekked out to Hohenzollern Castle and after climbing straight uphill for 25 minutes, we were really impressed by how neat it was- by far my favorite castle we've seen. In honor of Mother's Day they had a band playing and allowed people to wander about the castle without a set tour, which was really interesting. Definitely worth the impromptu workout. Husband and I are in decent shape, but we were still huffing and puffing up the hill to get to the entrance. But these Germans- man these Germans!- they are just powerhouses! It must be all that biking in lieu of driving, because we had grandmothers passing us on the hill. Like little old ladies just zipping up a near vertical incline. Unbelievable. Props to the Germans. I've yet to spot a fat one.

I'll have one of those.

Last weekend we were lucky enough to snag tickets to one of the beer tents at the Spring Fest, and seriously, words can't begin to describe it. Not that I won't try. The tent was about the size of two school gymnasiums, they had a live band playing on a fully loaded stage akin to what you would find at a rock concert, about half the crowd was wearing dirndls or leiderhosen, and the regular size beer is a liter. A LITER. I had two. The tent is packed with hundreds of long picnic style tables, but few people are sitting. Most are standing on the table. That's just what you do, I guess. You stand on the table the whole night, singing along to the U.S. top hits of the 80's and 90's- Germans seem to really like American music- and about every third or forth song is this German drinking song where you continually "Prost!" (Cheers), and continue to drink a lot.

Always drink with friends.

Lots of friends.

So now that we've caught up I'm off to do about 3 loads of laundry. Prost.