Beer and Words

We are happily moving towards Oktober with beautiful, sunny and not too cold weather. Several articles struck me this morning in the local newspaper and the first was about genetically engineered plants in regards to the primary ingredients in German beer ( I don´t know what goes into American beer other than carbonation). The German brewers want to make sure that only natural hops and grains go into the making of beer. This is to preserve one of the oldest food laws on the books dating back to 1516 called the "Reinheitsgebot" or purity commandment. Here is a translated link in "Engleutsch" so bear in mind that the computer doesn´t make perfect translations.
The other article concerns the German language and how it has spread throughout the world. There are over 10,000 words in use in places as far away as Japan and of course the USA. Check this link that is translated. Some of the words that are originally German are of course translated but you will get the sense of the article. In Japan Orgasm is Orogasumusu from German Orgasmus and Kaffeepause (coffee break) is Kaffipausii. Wandervogel (person who travels around a lot) is wanderfogeru or rucksack is rukkusakku. We know in the States the words wanderlust, alpen, abseil down (rope climbing down) or to go to the Beergarden, gemütlichkeit, angst, kaputt,schadenfreude, fress (gorge oneself) and so on. Have a gemütlichen day!

this is the last of the plummy letters

Here is the final result of the business with the overflow of fruit. There were a lot more jelly glasses than are shown here but I wanted to make an artistic statement. The gals are shown here doing the yeoman work of pitting the purple orbs and the head cook being me took the picture. They complained something about "slave" labor but I held the whip over them and voila! Beautiful jelly. I don´t want to think about plums till next year

plums on high

today I took the ladder
placed it again under the tree,
plotted where and how
to reach the purple orbs.
of course there were holes
where I the day before
had plucked and pulled down
the sweet and heavy fruit
grown almost overripe and
some with withered faces like
senior members of a race.
the tree is fragile and branches
break off as if it is somehow
weary with making leaves and
bundles of fruit. Perhaps it is
protesting the loss of of almost
a half of its bulk from the burning
flames of a negligent neighbor a few
past summers ago
storing his smoldering grill in the
small tool shed which became
enveloped with flames searing
the tree and ruining the harvest
that year or maybe the strong
winds that had raked the garden
this spring.
I stood at the top of the
aluminum scaffolding looking
at the bright late afternoon sun
through some of the openings
left by the wounded branches
seeing how the flatter sun of this
part of the northern hemisphere
gives a perculiar shadowing to
objects like a dutch master´s
painting. Later I steadied the
ladder for my friend who climbed
high up and I just looked around
happy not to do anything.

harvest time

A sad note I must say was the result of a call I received on Wednesday morning from a funeral director in Bayreuth asking me if I could sing some gospel music for a funeral. I replied in the affirmative and was told the funeral was for a young man of 20 who had committed suicide on September 7th which coincidentally was the date my grandson Samuel was born. The service took place at a small and beautiful cemetery in the town of Weidenberg near Bayreuth in the Fichtelgebirge mountains. Here is a picture of the entrance to the cemetery and a picture of the surrounding countryside













Yesterday I went into the garden and armed with my new aluminum ladder scaling the heights of my venerable plum tree to receive the benefits of the fruits of my labor so to speak..The plums are a small variety in Germany called "Zwetschgen" and are purple in color with a sweet taste. The tree has suffered not only from age but from an idiot neighbor who put his still smoldering grill into his tool house near my tree which hangs a bit over to his side. The fire dept. put the flames out but not before half of the tree was burned and all the plums were ruined. I pruned the tree of the dead branches and it came back to life the next year. This year we had strong winds which further pruned the tree as nature is wont to do. The broken off branches luckily still had bunches of fruit which ripened in spite of the lack of sap from the mother trunk...I now have to figure out what to do with over 25 pounds of fruit.

finally the weather is trying to act like the end of summer

We sailed into September on a cold breath of winter or late fall. The headlines in the local papers read things like "BRRRR" and my tomatoes were at best a light pink-green and those were the ones in my greenhouse. The grass in the garden was verdant and thick as a result of the rainy cold weather and the pumpkins had no problem swelling into basketball sizes.

Last week around Wednesday or Thursday the sun began to shine and I had to open the car windows to cool off without putting on the air conditioner.


I took a long walk with Gudrun on Sunday she in her electric wheelchair and I trying to keep pace with the slightly faster than walking speed machine. We went to a town north of her part of the town named Koeditz to see what the local gastronomy offered. It was a bit of a disappointment as at the late hour of 5 PM hot meals were no longer served and only light fare was offered. The restaurant we picked was tidy and clean but to my chagrin, they only had beer in bottles being as the draft machine was not in order. I really expect in a pub or Gastaette as it is known in Germany to be able to enjoy draft beer. I have bottled beer at home as well as bread and cold cuts in my refrigerator. I ordered the beer and coldcuts anyway because the walk was long. I had worked up a thirst and hunger so had to accept what was given. Here is the town we went to.


The light along the path we took was brilliantly lit from the sun as it can be at times in Hof although the weather is often gray and gloomy. Here is a field that was freshly cut.






Surprisingly in the small town of Koeditz we saw a house pictured below that was more like a small castle. Yes there are rich people even in our area

Lots of things have been happening here in Hof and for me several more important things in the
States. Two events with my children, respectively sons have occurred. The one was the arrival of a new baby girl on 19 August mentioned mentioned in a previous blog and the other was the arrival yesterday of a new boy. see link.




















Kevin working next to his van. Kevin and Veronica


On the Hof front I finally got off my stumps and have begun to do a bit of necessary remodeling for lack of a better word with my apartment. I was touring with my bicycle with friends in a lovely area near Selb, Germany and we stopped a local pub in a small village named "Kaiserhammer". I took a picture with my cell so the quality is not good but it is quite charming and has self made beer which is exactly what one needs on a long ride. While there the owner brought us beer and said," here is your beer" in English which surprised me. I questioned him and he said that of course he learned it in the school but had been using it lately as an Englishman is camped in the area with his mobilvan. I inquired further and was introduced to Kevin a free living spirit and his lovely girlfriend Veronica who is Italian. "mama mia"! He travels around Europe with his van stopping long enough to do a bit of work (he is an excellent carpenter being able to build a house from the ground up). We made plans to meet up during the week in order for him to do some carpentry that I have been putting off in the kitchen.


Later that evening we all went to my garden to enjoy a bit of grilling with vegetables and salad.