Staycation

Hi, y'all!

I am on staycation since yesterday. My employer kindly asked if I could take some days off until the end of our business year (30 June). And as it wasn't that hectic the last few days I have two weeks off around Easter and another two weeks around Pentecost. Weather is absolutely awesome at the moment (besides the flying pollen) and so I am very busy enjoying the sun. My travel plans so far: Housetralia, Sofambique, Islamabath or Bangladouche :-)

Last Saturday I sanded and oiled our garden furniture and had to treat myself afterwards with a chocolate cake! Tried a vegan version with flour, sugar, cocoa, plant milk (I mixed coconut with oat milk), baking powder and chocolate chunks - nothing very exotic but I liked that I could reduce our egg consumption with it. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against eggs, in fact I love my scrambled eggs on weekends. But when I think about the male chickens, I support brother-cock-initiatives and prefer recipes with one or two eggs, only. No abstinence but conscious consumption. Anyway, the cake was so yummy, especially when still warm and the chocolate chunks still slightly creamy...

Well, and then two friends of mine who also sew a lot showed me the face masks they sewed and I was hooked. Gathered all my cotton fabric scraps, searched the whole house for wire and sewed. Well, ironed mostly, to be honest. I followed the instructions of the city of Essen, and I imagined that people with glasses may not like the frame and some elastic behind the ear and thus chose the version with bias-tape instead of rubber band. It meant a lot of ironing, I can tell you, but in the meantime I learned that sewing elastic is as wanted and as available as toilet paper… So I made the right decision, I guess.

This morning I threw them in the mailboxes of our cul-de-sac-neighbors with a little note (handmade auxiliary masks, to be hot washed regularly - in Germany we like a good manual, you know). Hubby chipped in that I would rub it in the old folks' faces that they are old, at risk and mortal, but until now I only got positive feedback. 

Last weekend we also had a note in our mailbox with a poetry project organized by the daughter of our opposite neighbors. We are not allowed to go to museums but we can and should take walks. Therefore, she wants to adorn the pavements with poems and slogans , so you can enjoy nature, weather and poetry all at the same time. Everybody can contribute by dropping her a note with a saying or a poem which might be written on the pavement in front of someone's house. And the next rain will wash it away. I like that idea. 

Hubby wanted Einstein's saying about the infinity of the universe and human stupidity whereas I wanted something by the German comedian Heinz Ehrhardt. We compromised on a quotation by Steven Hawking :-)

THE THINGAMAJIG

Somewhere deep in Egypt’s desert
lies the hugest of all things,
a lady’s head, a lion’s body,
we all know it is the Sphinx.

With wanderlust, to the west she looks
with her still and stony face.
If she looked east, it wouldn’t matter,
she’d still see nothing any place.

(translation by Elaine Danforth of “Das Dings” by Heinz Erhardt)