Things I do now that I'm married...

...that I'd never have done before.

#1 Contemplate buying a house. When my uncle (who is "good with money") suggested this when we were asking for advice as to what to do with money accrued from the wedding I very nearly passed out. Seriously, I went all pale and weird and started stammering that I wasn't a grown-up yet and that it seemed "too permanent". But I've more or less overcome that now, just about in time to discover we probably couldn't afford to do anything of the sort. Ach, well.

#2 I have started collecting interior design images in my special folder on the hubby's Mac. My laptop finally died you see*, so I'm using his, and he made me the special folder to stop me "messing up the whole darned desktop"**. I went shopping today not for clothes or other trinkets but for a laundry "hamper". I actually used that word in my head and all. A "hamper". Ker-ist.

#3 I am contemplating making a spreadsheet to sort out our finances. I figure this will be the final nail in my hip-and-cool-gal-about-town persona's coffin, but, and this is the really worrying bit, I really don't care. When I'm not having a silly, hangover induced freak-out about how "boring" my life has become (it hasn't at all), I am perfectly content pottering about doing domestic things. At least for the moment, I'd imagine the novelty of domestic bliss would wear of pretty sharply if I was to follow through on the threat I made today and just become "a stay-at-home little wifey". But for the moment, for these next few months before the Big Move location and career-wise I'm going to try and glean all the enjoyment I can out of the simple miracle that is me being a lovestruck newlywed.

* To be fair, it didn't completely. I just finally ran out of patience with the fucking thing.
** The husband doesn't actually used words like "darned" unless he's being ironic. But sometimes, him being Texan and all, I like to have him speak like a cowboy in my head.

Today...

...I went for a walk in Templehofer Park. For shame I have never been there before due to last stage terminal laziness. But in my new spirit of Being a Better Me I dragged myself along (I hadn't left the house since Friday evening, disgusting). And d'you know what? It was lovely. All misty and crazy looking and really flat. Full of weird "art" and cool dogs and also some mean looking dogs, but they were in the little fenced off bit so that was okay. I should mention I'm not some weird dog-fearer, this one was just really mean.

Then I went for a potter about in the neighbourhood next to mine, that bit with the Schillerpromenade and Herrfurthplatz in it. It was nice, I love aimlessly wandering round another Kiez, particularly if it's close enough to my house to make discovering a new bar or cafe doubly exciting. I did peer into one promising looking one on Selchower strasse that I am going to properly check out when I get the chance. I love a good cafe, and I need to make the most of them before the summer comes and I spend all my free time down by the kanal drinking Augustiner and Tegenseer Hell and wondering if I'll ever really, truly, totally want to leave this city.

Sugar in my tea.

Means I have a vague hangover. Vague, yes, but a hangover nonetheless. After no less than four beers. FOUR! Who the fuck am I? The Virgin Mary? But anyway, I have tea and gross yet delicious pastries and an afternoon of doing very little and then some mad rock party in Neukoelln to look forward to today, so all is not lost. Add to that the fact that yesterday was AWESOME and it's shaping up to be a very good weekend indeed!

So yes, yesterday. It started out sunny and awesome, particularly as I was assesed teaching a class and it went superbly well. The children were ANGELS, and I was so, so proud of them. A special shout out goes to Julian (4) for yelling "Ha, ha, you're touching his willy!" when I was helping Jonas with his fly. Good times. Then I took myself off to Potsdam for the afternoon as the weather was so glorious and I had never been there before. And well golly, aren't I glad I did. I was only there for a wander and coffee and cheesecake amount of time but I really felt that I'd been away. And it is so, so pretty. Go, go I cannot recommend it enough.

And then, to top it all off, I spent the evening with some good people, sitting by the canal (complete with full moon and about seven million swans) and in a bar, drinking delicious German beer and shouting about things.

SOMMER IST DA!!!!!!!!!!!!

Endlich. And with it comes a whole host of pros and cons. Mainly pros. I love Berlin in the summer, but I swear to God they lie when they say the buses are klimatisiert. Particualy in Spandau. I have sweated more in my life on the buses in Spandau than I have in any gym. Gross, gross, gross. But then it is Spandau, so I don't know what I'm expecting.

But oh the pros! The biggie is the weather, obviously, and I just checked weather.com and it's going to be like this for ten days at least! Oh the joy and wonder of an Irish girl looking at a forecast that states "chance of precipitation: 0%". La, la, la and LA. I am going to wear shorts today.

Scrap the shorts, I just tried them on and they are too scandalous for non-holiday wear. Seriously, I looked like the Gaga, which is all very well but time and place and all that and a Sunday afternoon helping the boyfriend move house is neither the time nor place for Gaga-emulation. Summer dress it is. Nope, not dress, different shorts. More floral, less Gaga.

Jesus Christ, I need to leave the house. This post has descended into nothing more that me babbling about outfit changes. Sorry. It may be sunny, but I seem to retain the unfailing abilty to digress and dress inappropriately. Sigh.

BIRTHDAY!!

I haven't blogged in a while, ostensibly because I have been busy, mainly because I have been lazy. But two weekends ago I had one of the best birthdays ever, ever, ever. The fact that I managed to drag it out from Thursday to Monday evening was in itself amazing, and allowed for drinks, dinner and drinks, dancing, brunch, more dancing and a post-Berghain afterparty that lasted for about twenty hours (no, really). High points, in vaguely chronological order:

Getting AMAZING gifts such as a ticket to the National in May, a My Little Pony and my own personalised, rewritten version of the Very Hungry Caterpillar.

Dinner at the new, bigger Maria Bonita (it's not called that, it's called Maria Something but I can't for the life of me remember what. Skalitzer Strasse 81, at any rate). Loads of amazing people showed up and were lovely to me and I got to get all drunked up on margaritas and tequila.

Dancing at Kleine Reise with, I'm pretty sure, more or less everyone I know in Berlin. I particularly enjoyed dancing to this, watching my good friend draw another good friend's portrait on the toilet wall (with me explaining to all "she's a really talented artisshht"), and witnessing an impromtu harmonica solo in the bathroom. Good freakin' times.

Berghain on Sunday is probably best explained in a series of soundbites:

"I KNEW she was going to do this! I knew she was going to make this a technofest. I'm too old for techno. I don't understand it any more. Doesn't anyone still listen to Dylan?"

"What the FUCK is that?!" (looking at a very pretty floral tissue I had give her but a few hours before)

"Jesus, you know you're wasted when you look at the back of someone's head and think 'That's weird, why haven't they got any lips?'"

Our Flat on Sunday night/Monday is probably best explained with a brief summary of the main conversations that took place:

Approx. two hours on the relative merits of the Kings of Leon albums 1 through 4. Ditto Snow Patrol.

Roughly the same amount of time comparing the feminist messages of Dirty Dancing and Pretty Woman.

Some time past the point of reason on the motives, morals and techniques of Las Vegas strippers.

Recurring Theme of the Day- if your dad is a knight, but a knight on merit, how posh are you?

So yes, an awesome birthday was had. Thanks to all involved, you are amazing.

OH TANNENBAUM!!!

Wowee, but do I love Christmas. We just put our tree up and he (namely, Chubby. Last year's was Fatty) looks awesome. Terribly tacky and garish but in the best possible way. We had a great time putting him up, with one of us wedged under the tree wedging newspapers into a pot, with poor Chubby wedged into the bottom half of a tonic bottle. Decorating him was even more fun, helped along by the Flatmate's "Now that's what I call Christmas" album.

We are now having "medicinal" hot toddies and watching Arrested Development. Good times.