Guten Tag

Scott checking in, blogging from the road. I'm in Frankfurt this evening to catch a flight to Atlanta tomorrow morning. I can't wait to be home, it's been an interesting trip but it's not fun being away from the family. I know Tammy wants me to put together a post so here goes, I'll keep it short (sure).

I stayed in Eberbach for the trip (Eber=Boar and Bach=Town) which explains the wild boars all around town (as seen in previous Tammy post). I spoke with a local who knows Eberbach and he indicated the town created the boars for painting as a charity fund raiser. Business' would purchase the boar, paint it and display it for I think he said 500 Euros. I'm not sure how many different ones I found, I think it's close to 8 or 9 different painted boars. The village is about 12,000 people living in close quarters, talk about where everybody knows your name. It has a long history and many parts of the original town walls & corner guardposts are still there. I was staying inside the original town gates so I was able to walk pretty much everywhere. It's much different than the US, outside of resteraunts people will sit under the umbrellas and drink beer, chat and just relax. It's not the rush, rush pace in Atlanta. People are in no hurry, it was interesting to people watch. The food was excellent, I got the Schnitzel & Spatzle fixes and also tried the Rumpsteak and Saurbraten, all excellent. Good beer, no surprises there.

I spent most of the time on my own so I walked around a lot, got lost many times but all in all it was a good time. I was able to see two of the major pieces of equipment for my company in the infancy stages, makes China very real about now. The trials I was sent to work on were completed early so I had one extra day to take time to travel and see Heidelberg on the way back to Frankfurt. The weather wasn't cooperating so I only spent a short time there, I was also in a hurry to get to Frankfurt (like the plane would leave early...Mr. Dudley is here, let's taxi and get him home). Heidelberg would probably take several days to see all the sights, a castle and shops galore. I must've walked 10-12 blocks on a street that contained just shops & shops & shops, food, clothes, music, art, etc. I was about 1/3 soaked from the rain and decided to head back to the car. The shops were nice, old buildings, etc. but wet is wet no matter what country you are in and I didn't want to get soaked.

I drove on this trip (not the original plan but roll with the punches) and was able to get moving on the Autobahn. I captured proof that I took the car up to 180 kph before noticing my exit was very close (whoops! there it goes...............). I told you I was in a hurry to get to Frankfurt.

So now I sit, waiting for tomorrow morning. I’m not sure if it’s better to stay up late and hope to sleep on the plane tomorrow or if I should sleep and be awake for the 10+ hour flight. Last time I was unable to sleep more than a couple of hours/night the entire week and so I slept a good bit on the return flight. I’ve slept better this time around so I don’t know how the flight will go. The airlines do all they can to entertain you, it’s interesting how it has changed in the 2 years since my last trip here. Last time, it was watch the movies they had for the flight and everyone watched the same thing. This time, each seat had it’s own little touch screen menu of options so I could choose from TV Shows, Movies, HBO, Games, Music or look at the screen showing where we are in the flight pattern and think “Aren’t we there yet?”. The one thing that’s bad about selecting your own movie is that people look at you funny when they notice you’re watching Horton Hears a Who. I also found it interesting that everything was free with the exception of the HBO programming which were all comedy specials. Even in flight HBO isn’t part of the standard cable package.

My next post should come to you from the U.S. if all goes as planned.