Pestergrams
10 October 2003

Lately I've taken to annoying Annette by sending her a constant stream of emails, throughout the working day, featuring highlights from the Berlin traffic reports on Radio Eins.

This morning, for instance, I sent her a high-priority message with the subject line "IMPORTANT!", containing the following text:

"Geisterfahrer auf der A113 zwischen Bernau und Kreis Schönefeld! Bitte nicht überholen!!"

Which means, more or less, wrong-way driver on the autobahn between Bernau and the Schönefeld interchange, please do not pass. This seems to be a peculiarly German problem, drivers barelling down the autobahn in the wrong direction while hundreds of Polizei desperately stop traffic for miles around. Don't know what it is about Germans that makes them do that.

Yesterday, my ears first pricked up (metaphorically speaking, as headphones do hinder ear-pricking-up) when I heard:

"...Pferde auf der Fahrbahn..."

And then an hour later the ears (metaphorically) pricked up a again:

"...ein Wildschwein liegt auf der rechten Spur..."

Which means, first, horses on the roadway, and second, a wild boar is laying in the right lane.

My comment: "It's just Schlachtplatte Tag on the roads of Berlin-Brandenburg, isn't it?" Which would be "day of the slaughter-plate", to use the charming German name for one of my favourite dishes, a large platter piled high with the cooked meat of diverse beasts.

On the domestic front, Annette's parents left Wednesday evening, and mine arrived less than twenty-four hours later. Mads was thrilled; Annette and I want to have a little chat with them about the timing of visits. Over the past three years they have also managed to: arrive in Berlin during an apartment move, with Annette eight months pregnant, while overlapping with both Annette's parents and a friend (this lead to the the somewhat hysterical night-of-five-guests in the Kreuzberg apartment, where there here, remarkably, enough rooms and beds to house everyone in separate quarters, although Brenda was stuck on a single foam mattress on an old door propped up on cinder blocks in the middle of the kitchen); arrive in Calgary during Annette's first week of teaching, days after a long and exhausting dig-up-the-basement-floor-and-install-plumbing visit from her parents; arrive in Calgary during Annette's last week of classes, during a period of intense marking stress, despite explicit wishes to the contrary. In each case, much irritation. They're only here until Monday, and the long weekend is packed with social and athletic activities, so I don't anticipate much friction. Famous last words.