Something One Would Never See in Chicago

Yesterday, I was standing in line, waiting to check out, at the grocery store, when the elderly woman in front of me pulled 20 Euros out of her wallet and handed the wallet, along with the 20, to the cashier. The cashier then took out the 8 Euros and 95 cents that the woman still owed, counting it out to the cent, and handed the wallet back along with the receipt.

Weihnachten, Silvester, und Drei Könige

Christmas was perfect, just like last year, because we stayed home! Of course it is nice to visit family and friends, but this should be done on December 26, which is also a holiday here in Deutschland, as well as other countries, like Great Britain, where it is called Boxing Day (I think it's the same in Canada?).



On Christmas Eve, Philip and Alex baked cookies for the Weihnachtsmann (Santa Claus), who brought them lots and lots of Legos. And he didn't forget Oscar.




Callum, along with his mother, flew from Boston to Erlangen to visit his grandparents and the boys, or so they like to think.


Silvester (New Year's Eve) was spent having dinner at the home of one of Bob's colleagues and later on our terrace shooting off bottle rockets and watching the explosions over the center of town (sorry, no photos, because we don't have the expertise to capture fireworks on *film*).


The holidays ended on January 6, Drei Könige (three kings, also known as the Epiphany), with us driving to Pottenstein in the Fränkische Schweiz to see the fires on the surrounding hills (see my post from last year, January 7, 2007).