So hello readers. It's Elizabeth Hour here in Vienna. Today's magic word is Bubble and lucky number is 5. If you still have some in your house from last fall, pull out your own jar of bubbles, open the window and let them be free. It's super, especially if you live on the fourth floor like I do.

Not much as been going on, apart from my parents are visiting next week and demanding a schedule that would leave people addicted to speed exhausted. And I get to plan it. :) I hope I live through it. Let's just say it envolves a rental car, the Alps and a nice leasurely zig zag through most of Italy. It will be fine. they'll be here for a couple days.
Oh and moving. Let's say that you have lived in your house for 2 years. You've made some pivitol trips to Walmart, gotten stock piled on junk and did manage to buy some useful stuff. Now, take that image and try to stuff it into 4 suitcases weighing no more than 50 lbs each. Granted we don't *do* Walmarts here, but Vienna's got you covered. So that's not stressful at all.
Um, oh right. This is a good one. So we HAVE to leave 31 may from our flat. but we have till 8 June before our next gig starts. Ha ha! I am pretty sure that means we are homeless for a week with 200 lbs of luggage. Oh that will be fun.
Did I mention that we have Cleeo? Such a sweet little fish. The only remaining one out of 8. She/he survived the Aquarium Explosion of Christmas 07 and multiple water changes with daft owners. She will have to find a new home. She doesn't have many contacts.
Well, nothing going on here. Drab boring life.
Hope your life is more fun and happy! Gotta go hang the wet laundry.
over an' out.

Wow. I am in shock. Happy shock, but shock. It hasn't sunk in yet. Probably because I still feel like I am 8. Had a super bday...so I got my haircut (at the same place I took Jessica too when she visited.) So, I like this place. This guy Peter cuts my hair and he has this huge white siberan huskey named Paula that I pet when I go there. Peter likes me (or my hair--I don't know which one) and I was telling him I wanted to do something Fun for my bday. He was so happy that I visited him on my birthday that he cracked open a bottle of champagne and gave a glass to everyone in the salon!! It was really crazy! I don't think that will ever happen again! There was a girl sitting next to me who was also doing something Fun for her hair too and we started chatting and I told her I didn't drink and she took mine. So Peter asked me how old I was turning and suggested 23--in total seriousness. He was speechless when I told him 30. I told him Beleive me--I feel the same way!
Carl had written these big signs in chalk on the ground all over Vienna for me! they were super! Like at one he wrote 30!!! How can it be!! and another one he wrote Here stands the Birthday Girl...That was fun to know it was me those were for and hundreds of people had walked over them already. Part of the last chalk sign is still there at Landstrasse!
So now I am 30. Well, I didn't combust as was previously though. That's a relief! I feel a lot better now that it's over. I don't feel older yet--but that's okay.

Hear ye, Hear ye!! Lydia and Cody just had a baby!! Valentine's Day gift he was! o what a sweet bundle. I am sure pics are forth coming on Anna and Lydia's sites--they have all the pics. :) Despite my distance, Carl and I were the first to hear of Evan's arrival and name! That helps, but nothing can take away my yearning to hold that little pea pod in my arms. It won't be too long before I am there. So if you are lucky to see him before I do, please don't forget to whisper in his tiny little ear that Auntie Elizabeth loves him best. :) Congratulations Cody and Lydia!!!

Last weekend we went north to Berlin! It was a great time and fun was had by all. There is a lot to do in the city (imagine that) and we by no means saw it all. We crammed as much as we could in the time that we had.

The weather was pathetic--but we didn't care. It actually added to the ambience of the mood. The wall was really neat to see. It's been renamed the East side Gallery and the gloom of the day matched perfectly. The city is drowing in history and you cannot visit Berlin without feeling it somehow. We went to Checkpoint Charlie and I got my passport stamped with all the old stamps that you would need traveling from West to East. The guard was really funny and put on a little show while stamping your passport. Side note--mom and dad "somehow" got over to the East side in '67...Who are my parents??!!! anyway, the city that was once brought to it's knees with anger and resentment and hostility is now today standing quite tall and proud of itself. The archetechure is simply stunning. Straight out of a si-fi novel--the pictures I have don't do it justice. Every turn is a new idea or concept for a building or space. It's a big mish-mash of things. In Vienna, it's uniformily old because it was spared (mostly) during the wars. not the case with Berlin. There are ghosts of the past lingering in all the streets--but over all the ambiance there is so positive and so strong. People will say hello! this is new. In Vienna we stare. They have dunkin donuts. I am moving there. ha ha.
We had a great trip and I hope you enjoy the photos!

This is Parliement or the Reichstag. It is SO strange. Like a huge massive drill... you can see the blue chairs on the floor below--must be quite impressive to be down there in. You can see the people at the top looking down into the room too. So massive.

This is the outside of the Drill--a massive glass orb. You can see the walk way that goes around it to the top. You can also see how the drill goes down into the next room too.

us outside of the Brandenburg Gate. Mere meters in front of this was the wall and no one could pass.

The "around the world clock". I am not sure how this worked, but it was pretty accurate. I think Berlin is fascinated with clocks. They had a gravity clock in another area that ran on syphening.

This is inside the Sony Center--The top looked like this massive flower--another glass orb with a drill coming down.

They still have the signs up of course.

The World

The Wall

and last but not least.. Unter Den Linden. (Linden is a type of tree and Linden is plural, hence the Den word rather than the Das Lind. So Translated, under the Linden trees. It's winter and there are no leaves. Or trees apparently. The Blue tubes in the back ground are the "above ground" water system. Very odd.

In this picture you can see the Sony Center in the background. These buildings are in Potsdammer Platz. Nearby is the Humbolt University where Hitler decided to burn all the books of the city.

This is the Main train station in Berlin. It's AWESOME!! it's like a gigantic mall with trains literally running through the halls. so strange and futuristic.

It was a great trip! --E.

Quirky!! I'll be quick because I have to get in the shower and then go down to IKEA and buy stuff and it's snowing and it always takes me 5 hours longer to get anywhere.

SO yesterday. My friend Jackie and I and Carl went to this "performance". We are always up for a free show and there are a lot of them around Vienna. Weelll, what I would see on this night would really make a deep and lasting impression in my mind. Jackie was like oh I think it's near a train station. So good. That's fairly easy to get to. (sidenote: Jackie is this 5'3" red head from England and is so meek and docile and quite, you cannot imagine her exerting herself beyond a whisper. Needless to say, we get along great. kind of a yin and yang situation) We follow her. We don't know "exactly" where we are going but we know the general idea. It's 9 pm on a weeknight and it's -3 degrees. I digress.

It's not at a train station, it's in an abandoned railway house or train yard. We get close and hear loud yelling by a large group of people (maybe 50) and marching. Something akin to what you could imagine during the era of Hitler. Undaunted, we shrug and look at each other and think eh well, it's theater right? ha ha. Let's go in!

Inside: a gigantic hollowed out hall that has train tracks running through it. 6 tons of bricks on one end and ominious lighting around this space. I would say it was half a football field large and about 4 stories open to the celing. We open the door--we are late, and about 300 pairs of eyes turn to us. Luckily the "play" doesn't stop. There are 20 "actors" in space suits yelling in unison something in German that none of us can make out. Ok, let me pause here. Hearing German is like hearing a big dog bark. When it's just everyday German its fine and okay, does sound a bit harsh, but not big. Then imagine 300 dogs. all barking their heads off. now the scene is a bit more intense. Fun and games are over.
That is what it was like. Yelling hitler style in German in this massive open space while "actors" are marching in place and in unison to these people yelling in unison. Echo and reecho. It's a terrifying sight. Jackie did mention they were perforiming a play by shakespeare called Coriolan. Did NOT look like a Shakespear play to me. Apparently it was a show done by a group called theatercombinat and the play was subtitled: Turn terror into Sport. OOOOOhhh kay.

For all I know in the next act they were going to sacrifice a live sheep. It could have happened. Abandoned railway stations are super places for stuff like that to happen.
The ad on the flyer says (in my german translation): Political rhetoric against incompetant bodies/humans.

WWWOOO. well, it was one "cultural experience" for the day. We all walked back in silence to the trainstation. If we could have understood more it wouldn't have sounded so intimidating. To recover, we went back to our flat for homemade apple pie! It was a nice balm after what we saw!! (thanks for the recipe Anna/gma P)

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Here's some pics of the snow. AGAIN. It's been snowing off and on for 20 hours straight.