Streupflicht und Schneeschaufel

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Thanks Gabster for the inspiration for the thread!

Add your resolutions here & I can slip alongside and pretend I'll make some too.
Still too fragile - my sleep patterns go haywire when I'm home, stay up till 1 or 2am, then awake at 5am (6 here, usual flipping school time) then I come back & keep crashing on the sofa at 10pm and wake up at 4 bright & breezy.

We have snow, very pretty and h is off till Weds so am pushing him out for Streupflicht, bartered it for a fry-up with real English bacon, hmmmmmm.
Forecast is for -12C to -14C tonight - and when the children go back to school on Thursday. Yikes.

seeker's posts

Cheese marker?

Check this out Ernest. If I have done it right you can check out offset reports on all schools.

unfortunately, soory to dampen your fab solution, but job is London, which dtermine location only inasmuch as 30-40 min train journey and south of river, so kent and surrey still wide open.

if I could get 1 thing to narrow it down further....

Get thee to Chat & consult MNers who know more than me I'm sure will help.

How about you do a search on rightmove.com in your price range. That will probably determine it. Seem to remember surrey is rartha priceeeee luvvie. Sure that is where we looked when DH changed jobs (which brought us out here) and looked at a place called something like Virginia Waters. Really lovely. Could only just afford a 2 bed flat!!! Bugger that!

Not easy Ernest. It's decisions like these that have me hunting around wildly for a fortune teller, water diviner even, anyone who might have more knowledge than me.

I think the trick is to try and swivel your brain around to seeing the whole thing as a CHANCE to investigate and make a good choice. However personally I am not able to do this. I tend to just dither about till all the options are gone and there is only one thing left , so I tell myself this one thing was obviously "meant to be".

Hmm see another new year's resolution in there somewhere but another one I don't much like the look of.

Come on finks what is a cheese marker and who marks cheese. And even WHY mark cheese?

P.S. obviously, we have same dillema re trying to get mortgage/buy when dont have job. That is why I am looking at rentals for now - although even that is looking to be a PITA so looks like lucky me gets to live with my sister for a bit.

PPS now on strike re: housework and cooking as has just taken 1hr to convince DS to take his lunch nap. Hmmph

OMG have to take dd to swimming lessons
Not feeling like it AT ALL
The idiocy of signing up for so many classes in advance...

sorry, bit cryptic, am eating crisps & typing with one hand.
Follow my link to the thread posted below (or above dep on how you N) 6 look for seeker's posts. she got them.
They, er identify cheese

I want some. Ha ha. Does that mean you're only ever able to buy those types of cheese?

I know, quite mad aren't they? Who invents these things?
That thread is definitely guaranteed to chase away the New Year Blues.
Sorry am not much help on the moving front but just as the New Year, I may improve with age

FGS, I don't get on to MN for 24 hours and Ernest decides to move back to UK. The thread is getting low on people actually living in Germany.

Congratulations on the decision.

We had a relocation agent to help plan our move and I have to say they were great. The company paid so I have no idea of the cost. We told them what we wanted (house or flat on left bank of the lake, ifpossible with garden or at least a terrace, nice area, school nearby) and they came up with 7 or 8 houses for me to view over a 2 day period.

We concentrated on house first but I don't know about uk.

You could check out a few schools in the area (ask MN for good schools in the area you want to move to) then concentrate on those areas.

My new laptop arrived today . I am setting it up at the moment. Hope it works.

Rofl at the cheese markers. I need ones with Gruyere and Pecorino

I know ML. Maybe we should have called this one Exodus?

I really think I need a cheese marker, just for the heck of it.

Can't believe admylin is still in D though. You'd think she'd have been the first to up it. That gal sure has staying power.

lol at Exodus. That can be the name for the next thread.

I have spent hours getting my computer set up. Seems to be ok, just having problems with iTunes and the iPhone connection but that is nothing major. I will fiddle with it next week sometime.

What a relief to have a proper laptop again, even if the huge screen is a bit strange. I am used to MNetting on the iPhone and now I feel as if my eyes are being stretched to read the whole page.

Good timing though, it arrived today and my DH is out for the evening so I can play with it get it set up in peace.

I agree that Admylin should get the GermanThread Medal of Honour.

Ok, have just had a look at myhammer dot de. Think will have to tackle it another day when I am feeling a bit more confident with me German. Bringing me out in a cold sweat just looking at it at the moment, and I can feel another headache forming (or is that from the empty glass of dodgy plonk next to me?)

Cheese markers though - Lakeland, bless 'em. Can't wait to live near enough to go into one of their shops again.

TheGabster, when I used MyHammer I did a search for other offers and used some of the wording from other people so it wasn't totally wrong German. Do a search for Umzug nach England to get an idea of what to write and you can compare prices too.

Gab, can I help at all? You could come over one day for a major house move action plan. When are you going? Brain ache here. Nothing stays in.

OK, am confused. Have I missed something? Is Admylin actually definately leaving or have i misunderstood?

Wish I was! No chance here though.

I'll be the last to leave I bet, although finks should be staying. You are all so lucky to be getting out of here on time to not have to fight on with German schooling.

MmeL - you are going to be all sleekly connected to a lovely Mac, aren't you, with iPhone et al. My new laptop is a small thing of beauty but I do so wish we were a Mac house

Brr, how cold must it be where you lot are? We're in the most sheltered bit of D supposedly and it's still -10C at 9.45.
The children will be having their 1st break at school and I bet s1 is outside without a jacket... Sent them off in their ski gear today and hoping d manages to get the salopettes on again to come home.
Chances are one of the 3 will forget them at school which is locked on Fri afternoons & we are (sob) going (weep) hiking this weekend. Annual shindig, can't not go and I bloody hate hiking. What's wrong with a good long walk? Why does it have to be 10 sodding kilometres?

Have abandoned all pretence of resolutions - adverse to setting self up for failure. Am ahead in the stakes for Slattern des Jahres 2009. Downstairs is tidy but dirty & upstairs is a total wreck and filthy to boot. Am going to have to do something about the children's bit of the house. List of chores beckons I think.

Is there a better German word for "slattern" than Schlampe? That has sluttish overtones to me and I may be a slattern but wouldn't go as far as to say I'm a slut

Must hunt out clean thermals for the weekend. I am going out, I may be some time...

Very brave of you finks, I don't fancy hiking in this weather. Can't you get ill or something?

I've decided to try and concentrate on feeding healthier food to my dc as my new year resolution. I've been feeding them pizza, hot dogs and more pizza all the holidays. There's always some sort of curry in the fridge for h but we're sick of it. You can get fed up with rice and curry every day.

There is the term "Schlampinchen" which -despite that it is diminuitive of Schlampe- doesn't have the sluttish connection. It's from a poem Kathrinchen-Schlampinchen, I think, can't remember how it goes on. Also, Schmutzfink (no pun intended)or Schmutzliese.
I can't tidy up as quickly as my children can mess it up. It's a lost battle.

DId you see the thread on what chores your dc do at home? Can't remember the title but someone, think it was Riven?, was posting how much her 9 year old ds does and I was feeling like one heck of a crap mum again because there is no way my dd does anywhere near that amount of stuff or so well it wouldn't have to be re-done. I suppose you do have to train them up into good habits re housework, one step at a time, increasing the load all year long.

Need to train myself too for that matter.

Makes you yearn for the days of servants really, except that in those days I would probably have been one of the servants myself!

10 km hike in the middle of a German winter? Err no, think not. Can you not get out of it finks on the basis that you need to really muck out upstairs? At least you'd be warm doing that.

I'm sick to death of cooking the same things too admylin. But then , unlike you, I hate cooking generally.

Wonder if you cook do a nice cookery course at one of the VHS or there is some kind of German women's Institute I remember having read once which holds those type of courses, can't recall the right name now though. Might be a nice way to get out mixing a little and doing something different.

Schmutzfink is irresistible! Thanks Gracelo

I shall invent whole new words

schmutzfinken: trennbares Verb? ich finke schmutz.
ich schmutzfinke. Better trennbar I think.

schmutzfinklich adj.
Schmutzfinklichkeit, n.