So, I didn’t exactly go nowhere as I dove deep into my imagination to finish yesterday’s blog entry, and then there were those essentials like eating that required me to leave the apartment. But don’t let me fool you if I sidetrack this blog post and fill it with lies that somehow I had a grand adventure all the same. Though, let’s be honest, writing as much as I did today and editing what I wrote yesterday was exactly what I might expect from a grand adventure, so excuse my contradictions.
This is the first-ever photo of Klaus and me together. Klaus is my brother-in-law, and he’s also a solid guy who’s been absolutely key in helping Jutta make her ten trips to the United States from 1996 to 2013. Since 2013, when my mother-in-law broke her hip, he and my sister-in-law Stephanie have hosted us in their home on every visit we’ve made. As a matter of fact, Klaus is the second reason I’m in Germany at the beginning of summer, and Jutta is the first reason. You see, Klaus has shouldered a lot of responsibility in caring for family, managing the main family assets, and helping Katharina as she moves through university. Klaus had to deal with his own mother’s belongings after she passed back in 2013, and now he’s been dealing with many of the details regarding Jutta’s effects, and I felt if I could be of any help, I’d make it happen to be here.
Klaus and I have never really taken the time to get to know one another, but this trip has given us a small window to learn a little more about where each other is coming from. Today, he and I not only took care of more of Jutta’s history that she can no longer keep with her, but we went shopping and just talked about stuff.
The first stop on our morning adventure was over at the Bornheim-Mitte open-air market, Saturday version. Before we could shop for a thing, Klaus needed breakfast, so we hit a small cafe that had just one table open; it was now ours. Sitting down for a bite to eat and some coffee seems simple but after more than 25 years of being brothers-in-law, this was only the second time we’ve done this. The first time was just a couple of weeks ago. We were at this market to pick up fruit and some veggies while other things required a proper grocery.
REWE grocery store was where he went next. On my first visit just a few days prior I was astonished that such a beautiful large building could be built right here in the middle of a residential neighborhood. I wondered what could have been torn out or was there a grocery store here before? Klaus clarified things by letting me know that this had at one time been a depot for some of the trams that make their way over the streets of Frankfurt. Ah, now I can see the railyard influence I was oblivious to a minute before.
Yeah, I told you about Dick Milk in a previous post as being key to Grüne Sosse; well, here it is so you know I’m not joking about such a serious subject. Just how many men have to be milked to collect such amounts boggles the imagination.
I tripped, and I don’t mean yesterday’s visits to those churches. I’m talking about all of the eggs in this store sitting on the shelf. What’s so peculiar about that, you ask? The shelf is NOT a refrigerated shelf; these eggs could just be on your countertop. Klaus pointed out that they will be fine there until the 19th, a week away, then they need to be refrigerated and are good until the 25th. I told him how, in America, if eggs were left out for more than 30 minutes, most of us would probably throw them away. Relating this to Caroline, she informed her occasionally doltish husband that it’s because our eggs are washed because Americans are squeamish about blemishes that might be on the egg in the form of chicken poop or blood. Because Germans don’t wash their eggs, they have a protective coating that they are laid with that keeps them fresh. I swear that, at times, I feel like an idiot.
There’s really nothing special about this display of cheeses sure, they are all for grilling, as grilled cheeses are popular in Germany and, I’m sure, elsewhere, but it’s a small reminder to me that food should rotate in and out of our lives instead of relying on staples we eat for a lifetime.
Keeping with the theme of variations of products we grow accustomed to, look at these bratwursts. At first blush, you may not realize it, but these are not your ordinary grilling brats. A couple of them are just kinda weird, but I’ve not tried them, so who knows? On the far left are Grüne Sosse brats, and towards the right are Handkasewursts; the wild ones are wild boar, the ones from Wetterau take influence from a region north of Frankfurt, while the package with a sheep on it that says Lamm is lamb.
This image is a torturous reminder of what might have been our favorite stoner food when Caroline and I lived in Frankfurt: veggie fingers. Like fish sticks, except with veggies and no longer with cheese, because their veganness demands no animal products are used to make these, I’m sure that after a couple of bong rips, these Gemüsestäbchen would still be ace!
These are posted only to make Caroline pine about one of her favorite food items ever: rhubarb. When we moved to America and discovered Prairie Home Companion, Caroline found her anthem in Bebob-a-Rebop Rhubarb Pie, and finally, the protest songs lost their place in her heart.
The early 80s called Caroline and wanted their protest songs back after I divulged her loyalty to rhubarb instead of the scene, and here they are being handed off to the official state agency that handles those things no longer relevant, thus also removing a cultural threat to the future. Goodbye Bots.
Klaus and I visited a couple of used record shops to see if anyone wanted Jutta’s record collection. The first shop only collected guitar music with the requirement that “Your parents had to hate it.” This nice enough guy suggested we try around the corner because that shop specializes in classical and jazz. We explained the situation and were invited to take his dolly so we could load up the two large boxes of records and bring them back easier. Seriously, who does that in America? Anyway, he took all the records after checking out the titles to be sure there wasn’t a million-dollar record among them. Again, this kind of honesty is amazing to me.
At this very moment, I started writing about today, Day 19, here on the 12th of June, 2021. It is now just after 8:00 p.m. and I’m once again hungry and must take myself out of here to find what will only get more difficult to acquire as the night goes on. But be it delusion or euphoria, I feel in the flow of goofing around in front of the screen and keyboard that are recording me. That, though, has to be contended with as I do not operate on joy alone.
When I finally went out for dinner, Bergerstrasse was packed, and impossible to find a table, so I gave up. The Italian joint where I ate a lunch of Carbonara the other day wasn’t very interesting either, that left Blauen Bock at the corners of Neebstrasse and Saalburgstrasse. I had avoided this on a previous visit to Germany as I walked into their dining room, and the place was so thick with cigarette smoke I would never believe they could serve a good meal, but for a drink, it was probably a place worth visiting. I don’t drink. Anyway, here I am, and food is starting to arrive, beginning with Handkäse mit Musik because, of course just that, and after this appetizer, Grüne Sosse with extra Dick milk.