Good to be back here. I have walked a lot and ate too much and just bought a hundred pounds of art books.
OK, a bulleted list summary:
- The flight out was brutal. Couldn’t sleep on the plane, other than little half-hour naps here and there. Left SFO at about 8:30 PM after a mechanical problem, got to Frankfurt at 4:00 PM the next day (but a nine-hour jump in there) and then had to wait for a 9:30.
- I wandered the concourse, found a place to shower for 6 €. You got a little booth with a lock, a sink and counter in one half to put your stuff, and then a shower. It’s Germany, so it’s all sterile and looks like an Ikea showroom. I brought a change of clothes in my carry-on, and it was the best shower ever.
- Screwed up meals royally – ate dinner at 4:00 the night before, skipped the meal on the plane, and then the “breakfast” we got was a dinner roll and a packet of jelly. Got off the plane and promptly ate an entire McDonald’s.
- Handed over $200 at the airport exchange and got a handful of coins. The Euro is doing much better than the buck.
- I wandered around the airport and it was absolutely abandoned, then realized I was on the wrong level, and had to clear customs and go down one more level to the actual departures area. Sat around and spent about a hundred bucks on hot dogs and tiny bottles of Coke.
- Got to Nuremberg, got to the hotel, slept like a baby for eight hours.
- Sarah had to go to her trade show on Saturday – she’s been at it all week. So I loaded up what I still call the walkman (iPhone now, I guess) and walked about 2.5 miles west to an absolutely incredible little guitar store. They had a ton of Fender basses. I played some of the Custom Shop heavy relic Jazz basses and they were absolutely incredible. Also played a Rickenbacker, which looked cool, but I found I am not a Ric guy.
- Walked around Nuremberg for a long while, taking pics. There was some kind of vegetarian festival going on, which was interesting.
- Walked to the big train station, ate, dumped more dollars, bought some NyQuil, walked back to the hotel.
- Went out for dinner with Sarah’s work people and spouses and ate a tremendous amount of Nurnburger (sp?) sausages, white asparagus, and hard pretzels. Ended up getting sick from all of this shit.
- Walked over ten miles for the day, and got a 20,000-step badge on the fitbit, which was a first.
- Today, we woke up and found a triathlon was going on, and all of the streets were blocked off in a giant loop for the racing bikes. It was too cold to swim though, so they made them run twice.
- We went to a railway museum, not because I am Sheldon Cooper, but because it was attached to this communication museum, and it was a two-for-one. The railway museum was all in German, so we made up descriptions for all of the exhibits. (“Very few people knew Harland Sanders was a Colonel in the German Army prior to World War I, but was secretly a Jew and fled the country for Kentucky” etc.)
- The communication museum was also mostly German and confusing, but they had a bunch of old telephones and crypto machines.
- Ate lunch at the German National museum, but did not go in, since I’ve seen a lifetime of Gutenberg bibles and suits of armor.
- Went to the New Museum and there was a Laurie Simmons exhibit there. Who is… wait for it… Lena Dunham’s mom.
- Bought a ton of books at the book store, including this giant Chuck Close book that was marked down to 7€ and a Damien Hirst book big enough to kill someone.
- Walked not as much today but still a lot. Everything was closed on Sunday, which was weird. Even Dunkin Donuts was closed.
- Leave for Frankfurt tomorrow.