Die Kaffeestube - German and Austrian cyber Kaffee und Kuchen

[admylin]

Kaffeeklatsch for anyone in a German speaking country or interested in German, Kommt herein und setz euch!

There seems to have been more Feiertage than usual in th elast couple of months! We also have Tuesday off school and they've just had a really long weekend. There wa s aday off for the Abi exams too.

Oh well, looks like the last round of testing is going on in the next couple of weeks then it'll be time wasting and projects until summer holiday in July.

It is a pain with the dishwasher. I guess I don't mind washing up by hand but it's the decision making that I hate. Do I risk calling out a Reparaturdienst and have to pay 50 to 80? just to be told it's not worth fixing or that it could cost 150? to fix and is it worth it on a machine that is over 10 years old? Also the cheapest new machines are around 250 to 300? but I'd have peace for a couple of years atleast...I hate making decisions and dh is no help with his head full up with work stress and no answers to his job applications.

I think I need help with his applications although I'm sure his CV can't be improved. How important is the cover letter? It's down to what he's achieved and published and his skills are all in his CV.

admylin how annoying about the dishwasher. I think a lot of companies will take the old one away when you order a new one. It´s a shame you don´t know how long you´re likely to stay in Hannover.

Linzer Are you giving up both the school and private English lessons? I bet it will be such a relief not to do all that planning.
I´ve hardly done any teaching this year. The teacher who was always ill has finally retired, so the school don´t need as much cover. I did do 2 hours yesterday, but that was the first time for weeks.

Gator You´re friends sound completely mad. I think your idea of reducing contact is good. The idea of friends is to feel good when you meet up with them, not come away fuming.

Our local Freibad finally opens tomorrow, so hopefully if the weather stays good we´ll be off there over the weekend. I´m now wishing I´d done a bit more exercise over the winter.

hupa I'm so glad that my dc are now old enough to go the Freibad alone! Ours is open already so dd went to buy some sun cream as she plans on going with her friends next week!

I looked on Neckermann at the offers for dish washers and it siad 99? to remove old one and fix new one that adds to the price too.... still coming to terms with the few thousand euros the orthodontist wants for the dc's braces.

admylin Sorry I can´t be any use about the application letter. You could start a thread in another topic, maybe employment or further ed. and strike lucky with someone who has the relevant experience.

We didn´t have to pay for ours to be removed, but it was a local firm, so they might have done it as a favour.

I'll have to try and get dh to discuss the options with me. Could be an idea to look atteh local elektroladen although it'll only have the more expensive machines. I'd say we're looking at 3 to 400? for the cheapest.

Good idea about starting a thread about the letter.

Morning all!! treating myself to some MN time - dishwasher (sorry admylin!) and washing machine on and I've just cycled 4km to the next village and the same back to get rolls so feel I deserve it.

admylin - grrrr about the dishwasher. Its difficult to decide whether to buy a new one but its a household appliance that once you get used to, is very hard to do without. I havent applied for a job for a long time so not sure whats stopping him getting the jobs he goes for. I would think the covering letter needs to be interesting but not detail all the content thats in the CV. Got my fingers crossed for him (and you too of course!).
On those DVD's there is a good series called "Britains Next big Thing" about people designing products for big shops like Habitat etc. Really interesting.

Linzer - did think that article was just one someone had made up to fill a slot. Dont imagine the people in Vienna (what are they called? Wieners!!!) are any more moany than other city dwellers. Unimaginable tho that someone is earning enough to lose 2 million euros - I want that job! Good on you for making the decision to stop teaching English. Think that'll relieve some stress! Glad the last few days have been better for ds - wonder what goes on sometimes in their little heads!

Gator - whoo hoo on the crawling - love seeing babies crawling - they are so cute!

thatis - I'm another one who's not a fan of the tiny baby stage - find them really dull. But from about 6 or 7 months I think they are adorable but then find between 2 and 3 a complete pain in the arse! (wonder how I managed to have 3 dc since I only like certain ages . You're right tho - once they are walking life is so much easier for them when you're out. No more soggy knees.

Have we had the hay fever conversation on here recently? couldnt find the posts. Mine is really bad at the moment. Have got Cetirizene but they make me drowsy so can only take them in the evening and even then I wake up a bit dozy from them. A friend recommended some Homeopathic remedy but I'm not a great believer in Homeopathy. Have bought them tho as I'm desperate. What do you all use?

We've finally booked a summer holiday - we're going somewhere near Kitzbühl for a week in August. Really looking forward to it since there seems like loads of activities for the dc as well as lots of walking to do (altho my dd wont be too excited about that!). We're so indecisive about holidays - it drives me mad so forced dh to book this one before we end up with nothing.

Last day of school today before their 2 weeks holidays. Thankfully the weather is nice so we can get out and about lots. Going to go to Playmobil land next Friday if anyone else fancies a day out and a MN meet up!

admylin I'm no good at making decisions either. If money was no object, I'd go for a new (cheap) dishwasher for peace of mind; if you end up staying for a while, you'll probably get more and more frustrated at the amount of washing up by hand that you're doing and wishing you'd bought a new dishwasher as soon as the old one broke. Having said that, if you go and buy a new one, your DH will probably be offered a new job a week later. Sorry, not much help I know.

Cover letters are important as you can really tailor them to the company/university etc. you're applying to. Obviously you can tailor your CV to some extent too, but you can highlight exactly what makes you the most suitable candidate for the particular job (and the most relevant aspects of your CV) in the cover letter. DH gets to look at a lot of applications, which he often brings home with him if he doesn't have time to go through them all at work, and I'm sometimes amazed at what people will include in their CVs; one had written the names and ages of his children, for example, and it still seems quite common here to include your marital status. I'm sure I've even seen parents' occupations too.

hupa I'm just giving up the private lessons, but the school lessons will be much less work next year anyway as DD1 will be moving up to middle school and I doubt DS's teacher will want me to teach English to the Vorschulklasse. I only teach DD2's class for 25 minutes once a fortnight at the moment, although may offer to go in every week next year as I'll have given up the rest of the teaching. The other good thing about the school lessons is that I don't feel guilty about cancelling them if I'm busy with translating, which I don't feel I can do with the paid lessons.

Our open air pool opened on 1st May and DH took the DC last weekend, but I'm not a huge fan. The thought of bumping into dozens of people I know while I'm wearing my bikini doesn't fill me with great excitement, the water's generally too cold (other than in the thermal pools), it's very expensive and it gets ridiculously busy on sunny days. But basically, I just don't like making conversation when I'm wearing a bikini.

Ploom I got this after it was recommended on here Vividrin (free delivery and cheaper than Apotheke) and I didn't need tablets, worked great. Dh just started with it now and it stopped his nose problem so quickly, his eyes will start troubling him soon too so the eye drops will help but they are also sold separately.

I've never had a dishwasher. But there will be one in the apartment we move to! Yippee!

admylin, that's it exactly - I feel lighter for having dejunked. And I feel there is a bit more to dejunk yet, and once that's done, I will feel quite free!

Ploom, sorry to hear about the hayfever. Hope it clears up. What a way to spoil summer.

Ooh, a holiday sounds good. Not sure what we will do for a holiday - something in Germany, I think, seeing as we are here!

Taking DS swimming later today. The pool is mostly full of old people, who all coo and fuss over him! He is an attention junkie! :)

Aargh, need to have my usual Friday afternoon rant! Lesson finished at 1 pm, last-but-one child picked up at 1.30 pm. One child (same one as last week) still here. She has now just told me she's hungry, after saying at 1.30 pm she didn't want anything to eat. DD1 has already had her lunch (fishfingers, chips and peas, all already cooked - I just had to defrost them - so I didn't have any extra available) and I'd made myself some sandwiches beforehand. Have offered pizza margherita (as I had some leftovers in the fridge that only needed heating up), which I know she normally eats, but she doesn't want that. So I'm doing her fishfingers, which seemed like the next easiest thing - but still quite time-consuming.

Aargh. I wouldn't mind giving her lunch if I knew she was going to be staying, but I just wish her parents would let me know! I could have started cooking something for her at 1 pm if I'd realised (and then I wouldn't have given her the two Milchbrötchen, which obviously didn't fill her up for long enough).

I know her mother is going to try to give me double the amount I'd charge for the lesson, but that's not the point really. We need to leave for DD1's dyslexia lesson in half an hour too.

Aaaargh. She's just been picked up, so now I have half-cooked fishfingers. I told her mother I was in the middle of cooking lunch for her, and also offered to drop her DD off afterwards, but they had no time to wait as her H had locked himself out. I tried to make the point that I was in the middle of cooking lunch for her DD specially. Oh well, they can go in the freezer for another Friday. I'm just rather annoyed that she hadn't even thought to phone me to let me know how late she'd be.

The fishfingers can go in the freezer, obviously. Although the way I feel at the moment, I wouldn't mind putting a few people in the freezer as well.

It just gets worse from week to week linzer, good job you're giving the lessons up soon anyway!

If you phoned a Reparaturdienst how would you word it if you want to know how much they charge just to find out what's wrong with the dish washer? Was kostet die Untersuchung? No that sounds like I'm speaking to a doctor....they should be able to tell me their Anfaht and other costs shouldn't they? I've read that the time it takes to get to the mechanical parts of a dishwasher adds to the price as it's got to be pulled out to get to the back of it (it's built in).

Argh how annoying about the dishwasher admylin and the girl being picked up so late and Linzer - I'd never have cooked her lunch in that situation though! I've become quite mean now and only give uninvited guests fruit and water, sometimes I make exceptions for ones who don't ask, but if they wander in looking for my kids and belligerently inform me they have hunger they get an apple or nothing, got sick of other people's kids thinking I had to wait on them :o Strangely we still always have a house full... Good decision to stop the lessons though!

Admylin I think cover letters are pretty important, mainly to show you really want that particular job and have thought about why you are an excellent candidate, where a CV, although you tweak it, is more generic and you don't explicitly emphasise how splendidly your specific skill set suits that particular vacancy... DH seems to feel the need to change jobs every couple of years and has quite a good hit rate with getting the jobs he applys for, and I know he writes a new cover letter for each job and does quite a bit of on-line research to see what they are looking for before hand. It's all game playing of course, 5 minutes earlier he never realised it was really his lifelong dream to work for whichever company...

We break up for the 2 week holiday today, DD has no homework and is very happy - DS1 is sad because his best friend has already left for holiday, his new Turkish friend (woo hoo we are no longer the only non German family in the village) has just gone home from the playground, and DD and her friend, who were playing here, have gone to the friend's now and there is nobody but his baby brother about... Ploom we are not too far from Playmobile land (well 1.5 hours) and I have promised the kids we will go sometime relatively soon(ish) but we are leaving for a week in the UK on Sunday, so won't be here when you go I guess, which is a shame.

Friebad is open here too, we went at the weekend - dd is swimming quite well now, though DS's swim course is beginning to look like a waste of money - it's all very well being all nice and softly softly, and he likes the lessons - but after this length of time DD could swim, and despite being at least as physical as she is he is still miles off swimming alone without any form of float! He is at least water confident, but then really he already was, I am not sure the lessons have achieved anything to justify what they cost! I am sure I look positively frightening in swimwear, but strangely I quite like going - could be because I have given up caring what people think of my appearance for the moment... Also I like that getting changed is so much less of a faff at the Freibad - and ours is pretty cheap (?14 for a 10 visit card for the older kids, which is it fine for them to share, though the adult rate is more than double the 4-16 year old rate and I only bought a day pass, which I think was about ?4.20...)

I have forgotten what else I was going to say, and should probably go and discourage DC3 from playing with DC2s bike before it falls on him... I do like this weather and being outside all day though :)

Hello all. It has taken so long to catch up with today that I have forgotten most of what everyone has said. Sorry about the dishwasher admylin, it's definitely something you grow to rely on to save just a little bit of time. Hope you get something sorted soon.

Well done for deciding not to teach anymore. They really have taken the piss with not picking up the dcs on time. I'm with thatis, they could have a banana!

I think cover letters are really important as they would entice the reader to look at the CV. Definitely tailoring the letter to the research institution and telling them why you want to work there and what you bring that they need makes them sit up and take notice. I hope he has better luck in the future.

I am a fan of the babystage, partly because I know where they are if I put them down! S is very cute at the moment, but constantly chasing him round the park (he likes to walk back to the car, or any car if we walked in the first place!) can be a bit tiring!

Our little swimming pool on the estate should open this weekend but it's chucking it down at the moment and there has been a foot of snow on the mountain! I might leave it a couple of weeks!

Hope you are all having wonderful evenings. Enjoy the long weekend.

You're not near Sankt Poelten, are you Linzer?

Yes, it's our Landeshauptstadt Jenny - although we're not very close to it (it's about an hour's drive away). Do you know it?

Thatis I wouldn't have given any of the other children lunch, but this girl's mother is the one who never stops feeding my DC when they're there and I know she would have given mine lunch if it had been the other way round. The annoying thing is that I can never get away from her as she always starts cooking something for the DC and it seems rude to leave, but seeing as she didn't stay even though I told her I was cooking fishfingers for her DD, I won't feel so guilty about it next time.

I don't really care what people think of me in my bikini, I just feel self-conscious in it IYSWIM. And also it feels a bit strange to talk to people I bump into in their bikinis/swimming trunks - it makes me feel a bit awkward. I have no idea why!

admylin Have you phoned the Reparaturdienst or do you still need some help with what to say?

Ploom Would love a thread meet-up at Playmobil land and I know the DC would love to go again, but unfortunately it's a little far for us!

Those of you who've broken up for two weeks holiday, when do your summer holidays start? Our ridiculously long summer holidays start at the end of June/beginning of July, so we only have five weeks to go - and not even a full five weeks, with two bank holidays coming up.

I just read some horrible news story about someone shooting his child in the head in a school there, Linzer.

My dd is breaking up for the summer holidays on June 12th and going back on September 5th! I'm looking forward to it.

Going skiing tomorrow. It's the last weekend of the season and they have had another foot of snow this week. Maybe my friend and I will make it to the summit this time.

Have a great weekend all.

It was on the radio news yesterday when I was driving the children home from school for the English lesson; they were all in shock. It's never been so quiet in the car. Just awful - the boy is still fighting for his life, apparently.

Have fun skiing! We're having a BBQ this afternoon; hopefully the weather will be warmer than for our last one, but it's nice and sunny at the moment.

That news story was horrible, unbelievable how anyone could do that.

Hope the school holidays are going well. We'Ve just had our last long weekend until the summer holidays start at the end of July. It's going to be a long hot term with lots of day trips and teacher Ausfall.

Still trying to decide what to do with my dish washer. Dh thinks it's worth spending 50? or more for an electrician to look at it and I think it's just too old to save and not worth investing in. I can get it collected and disposed of for 10?. I'm not really missing it and find the kitchen is tidier (that's strange isn't it). I was always running out of things that were in the dish washer not clean as it wasn't full enough to switch on so had to wash then anyway.

Anyway, to please dh I am going to e-mail a few places who offer rapairs to see what they say (and hope they all say not worth it). This is what I want to say and I lknow it's really bad German but what do you think?

Ich habe ein Problem mit mein Siemens Geschirrspüler. Der ist 11 Jahre alt und der/das Wasser würde nicht abgepumpt und es hat stark nach verbranntes gerochen. Außerdem ist die Sicherung raus gesprungen. Lohnt sich eine solche alte Maschine überhaupt zu reparieren?

In the Betreff I would write Kostenschätzung maybe?

Hope everyone enjoyed the (long) weekend. DH took yesterday off as school was closed after the bank holiday, and we had a nice relaxing day at home - or rather, mainly in the garden as it was nice and sunny. We've got another bank holiday for Corpus Christi next Thursday, but no Fenstertag unfortunately so no long weekend.

admylin I would write Kostenvoranschlag as the subject, but maybe that's an Austrianism?
For the e-mail:
Ich habe ein Problem mit meinem Siemens Geschirrspüler. Das Gerät ist 11 Jahre alt. Das Wasser wird nicht abgepumpt und es hat stark nach Verbranntem gerochen. Außerdem ist die Sicherung geflogen. Lohnt es sich, ein solch altes Gerät überhaupt zu reparieren?

Ploom I thought I'd posted a parcel of DVDs to you a few weeks ago, but was to discover the parcel in a drawer yesterday. They're finally on their way to you now, anyway!

Ooh which reminds me gator I will try to get the DVDs parceled up as soon as possible too!

Linzer thanks for the correction, I should maybe sit over my written work for abit longer then I'm sure I would have found some of those mistakes! Worrie dnow that I might not get many answers as a couple ofthe websites said they charge a Pauschal for Kostenvoranschlag so hope they will atleast answer.

No rush, admylin - we're in the UK for 2 weeks from Monday so I won't be here to receive/watch them anyway :)

Hope things work out with the dishwasher, whatever you decide to do.

I'm waiting for a dress to be delivered to wear to my friend's wedding in a few weeks, but I just checked the order online and realised I ordered the size I was pre-pregnancy. I have a feeling I'm going to be ever so slightly disappointed when I try it on!
I just checked the 2 week forecast as well and the day of the wedding is supposed to be wet and only 16°c. Boo! I really hope it's nice weather for her.
I'm so excited about our trip, my shopping list is getting longer and longer by the day and I'll be able to catch up with all my friends, see my brother, visit a few relatives and weather permitting maybe even get to the beach - I'm bouncing off the walls at the moment.

DS is having a nap so I'm making the most of the peace and quiet. Now that he is crawling really well he is into everything and is constantly on the go. It's really cute to watch as he hasn't quite worked out yet that by making loads of excited noises on the way to grab something forbidden it means that I know instantly what he is up to. I quite like that he hasn't figured that out yet!
He has started saying 'mama' though so all is forgiven :)