plan?

saturday evening i broke down and went to the grocery store. i got just a few things to hold me over. my one au pair friend came over and we made pizza and watched a movie. sunday morning i woke up to the sound of ringing church bells. it was quite nice. i also went for a run. it was literally the 5th run i've taken in 2009. no joke. applause welcome. i stayed near the neighborhood. and learned my way around just a bit more. i decided to make the most of my free time and go for a walk in search of a park. i found a nice little park with a great overlook of the city. i sat and read the god of small things for a while. afterwards i walked back home and made some dinner.

view from the park

this afternoon i biked to the train station/downtown area. it really scares me biking downtown. don't get me wrong, a leisurely bike ride is great. biking as a form of transportation along highways and busy sidewalks, it's just not my idea of fun. i walked around town. and went into some stores. let's be honest, i have nothing better to do and no money. i went into the german equivalent of corte today. it's called kaufhof. it wasn't the same. it didn't smell like jackets. really it didn't smell like anything. after wandering for some time, i headed back towards the train station. i decided i should take advantage and seem somewhere else in germany, that costs less than 20 euros to get there and back. i bought a ticket to hannover for thursday. the machines only let you pay with cards so i had to wait in line to talk to a ticketing agent. through his lack of english skills and my nonexistent german, we somehow managed to understand what one another was saying and i got a ticket for the day i wanted. below are some random shots from the day.

german corte.

the city beach. it's behind marktplatz. people just lounge and sometimes play volleyball.

and drumroll please...i (sort of) know what i am doing next. callie's wonderful aunt and uncle and cousin live in bilbao. they have graciously offered to let me come stay with them. they may or may not know of a family in bilbao who needs an au pair. there also could be other job possibilities. we'll see. currently i am putting the job search on hold. getting to bilbao is going to be tricky. i have a lot of luggage and i'm definitely going to have to pay some sort of baggage fees. also, catching a flight on short notice to and from smaller european airports, doesn't offer the cheap flights i am accustomed too. no vueling unfortunately! hopefully i'll be in spain by the end of next week! once i smooth out all the kinks in the plan, i will go from there...