Walls in Germany

Being in Berlin has made me think a lot about the time I came here when the wall was coming down with my friends, Shannon and Randall. My daughter, Kathleen, has been home in Charleston for a couple of weeks so I asked her to go up into the attic and try and find my diary from 1989. Low and behold, she found it. She took pictures of all of the pages referencing our Berlin trip and sent them to me. This morning, I transcribed my curly cue handwriting from the diary pages captured by Kathleen on her iPhone and put them into a Google doc. What I said and how I said it, made me laugh. I kept all of the underlines and exclamation points. It is interesting to look back on my 21 year old self.  I thought I would share it here. Basically, the back story is, we were studying and living in Paris. It was my Senior year of college. We had been reading (in the actual newspapers) about the fall of the Berlin Wall. So, Randall, Shannon and I got on a train and went to Berlin.... " November 17, 1...

As of August 2, Bucky and I have been Berliners! We moved here from Kehl just for a change of pace. I have to live in Germany for my job and we looked at different places, but Berlin made the most sense because my office is here! We found an apartment online (again moved in sight unseen) in Friedrichshain which is basically in the middle of the city.  Our apartment is on the sixth floor of an old building, has an elevator, a parking place and a guest room. It is nice and bright and perfect for us for the time being. The location is great - the Ubahn is right outside the front door and there are TONS of restaurants in the neighborhood. Plus, we have a farmers market every Saturday nearby and a Flea Market at the same location on Sundays. My office is about a thirty minute walk or just three stops on the Ubahn. We are embracing city life and doing on the Berlin things. Will keep you posted here on our ongoing adventures. Come and visit to partake! We are here! First margarita with Lu...

So, my dad loves the Tour de France. He watches it every year religiously on TV. My nephew, Canham, often goes over to watch it with my dad (his Grandfather) regularly. It is their thing. Bucky and I realized that the Tour was going to be close to Kehl so we committed to go. We aren't huge fans, but knew that my dad would be thrilled for us to experience it in person. And boy, was it an experience. Finding a place to stay was challenging because we were late in the game and all of the actual biking fans had already made their plans. But we found a nice hotel in Munster. Bucky researched the trek (it was the 20th stage) and found a restaurant in the mountains where we could go and "watch."  He made reservations and confirmed they had parking and we were set. So, we started the drive to the restaurant about an hour before our reservation, but it was only about a twenty minute drive so we were fine. Along the route, however, we came people blocking the road because cars were...

 This is the third summer we have visited Greece! This trip was to Sifnos, a recommendation from a colleague of mine in Athens. It did not disappoint. Bucky and I flew to Athens, rented a car and then took the ferry to Sifnos. We started our vacation in Vathi, a town right on the water that does not allow cars. You park outside of the "town" and then haul your suitcases along the beach. Luckily, we had a nice local man do this part for us!!  We stayed in a traditional "sailor's house" right on the water. Bucky and I loved sitting on the terrace in the morning and having our coffee. The local "old folks" would go swimming each morning and it was fun to hear them talk and laugh in their lovely Greek language. There were restaurants along the beach and we did our best to try them all out. Besides eating, we walked the beach, lounged about, lay on floats in the water and relaxed. Lucie joined us after a few days which was fun.  Our second location was def...