26th January 2011

Well today got off to the worst possible start. I was in bed, it was dark and so I reached out for my phone to see the time. I knocked a glass off the table and it smashed all over the floor. I got up for a dustpan and brush but stood on a piece of glass in the meantime. A fragment of glass got stuck in my toe; yes you guessed it, in my already battered big toe. I got the glass out luckily and it bled a little but no major harm done. I’m so bloody clumsy sometimes.

So today we have no internet. What on earth am I going to do with myself!! I put the TV. on and put Eurosport on because it’s the only channel I can get in English. It had to be tennis on didn’t it. Of all the sports in the world I only ever seem to see tennis and skiing on this channel and they happen to be the two sports I don’t give a toss about. I tried watching some anyway because Andy Murray was playing. It was either that or ‘The Big Bang Theory’ which was badly dubbed in German. I can’t stand English dubbed films let alone German ones. This could turn into a very boring week or two without the internet. At least I can keep up to date with my diary offline and maybe sort my music out into some kind of order on the laptop.

It turns out that Tomas let us borrow his dongle so we had internet for the day after all. It gave me a chance to do all the important things like update my Mafia Wars on Facebook, you know, all them important jobs. I haven’t had any reply from UPS yet but as Agnieszka says, no news is good news. He might be thinking about taking me on. I’ll keep my fingers crossed.

Agnieszka threw bags full of clothes out today. I took them over the road to the Red Cross collection bin. I was quite surprised really, for someone who is usually so unorganised and messy it was a shock to see her getting stuck into something like that and obviously I was happy because the more that gets thrown the better as far as I’m concerned.

I had a message on the Toytown website today. It was from Oliver a 29 year old from London who’s thinking of moving over here to Dresden to live with his girlfriend. I gave him all the advice I could think of but I don’t think anything can really prepare you for such a culture change. To move abroad where they talk a different language I think having patience and an open mind have to be the main ingredients. If you have both of them then I think your half way there.

Agnieszka made a good point tonight. I asked why there were a million Polish living in England but not many living in Germany which is its border country and a much nicer place to live. Apparently the border is closed to Polish and Czechs until March this year when the law changes. That’s why it’s so important for me to get a job pretty quickly because Germany is sure to be overrun with Polish soon looking for a better life. I don’t know how that is going to go down with Germany though who I’m quickly realising is still quite a racist country that hasn’t been overrun with foreigners yet.  There’s more Turkish in Germany than anything else which was a big shock to me. I haven’t met one Turk yet, come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve ever met a Turk in my life!!

25th January 2011

Ouch. I feel terrible. My headache was a really bad one this morning. I went to the stable and stupidly forgot my tablets and so had to go through the pain all morning. I had to go, Max was still ill and I couldn’t leave Agnieszka to do it all alone.  I admit the drinking last night didn’t help the headache but I refuse to accept that is the reason behind it.  My head was thumping, I felt dizzy, faint, sick and tired and just wanted to go home but couldn’t because the dentist came to look at the horses teeth and we had to wait for him. He seemed a really nice bloke. Patrick was Irish and said he knows an English builder who has lots of English guys working for him and might have some work for me. He’s going to have a word with him and see what he says. Any work will do me right now. Agnieszka isn’t keen because it would mean not learning German whilst around English guys and I wouldn’t be able to help in the stables. I think there’s another reason too and that is that she’s scared I’m going to be drinking with the lads all the time after work. She might have a good reason to worry about that knowing what I’m like.

I walked Iris’ horse Stinky this morning. It’s nice meeting new horses because every horse has a different character just like people do. You get used to each horse and get to know their habits, manners and moods. Stinky is a lovely horse. I always thought from a distance that he was a pretty boring and lazy looking horse but on close inspection he is lovely. Iris clearly looks after him well with his immaculate socks and blanket on and very well brushed. He’s about 8 years old but seemed to be scared at the slightest of noise. I’ve said I’ll happily look after him if they ever want to go for a holiday.

One good thing came out of this morning. Roman stopped me at the stables and said Hertha Berlin on Sunday. It turns out I am going with him and Tomas to watch the match!! My first German match and it's the team I'd planned on supporting out here. I got excited and thought I was going to the Olympic Stadion which is Herthas home ground and where the World Cup final was held when Germany hosted it last. It turns out that we are just off to watch it in a bar but what the hell, a match is a match and I’m still excited. I wonder who they are playing.

Once we got home I just had my tablet and a long bath before going straight to sleep for about 3 hours. After some nice tuna pasta I was feeling a bit better and spent the night relaxing with a little Stumble Upon and I’m A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here in the background. There’s some blonde German model on it that has just walked out of the jungle. The rest of the contestants hated her so much that they demanded that she goes or they all go because they couldn’t stand being with her anymore.

I sent an email to the personnel manager at UPS today pretty much begging him to give me a chance. UPS might be my only chance now otherwise we could well be heading to Sweden to live. The thing is UPS is even more suitable right now because of the hours being 5-8am. I could then still have time to go to the stables afterwards to help Agnieszka, especially now that she’s pregnant. I’m definitely going to be needed there when her bump starts showing. Failing UPS or us not getting a few more horses to train in the next month or so for extra money then I think we might just be left with no choice but Sweden where Agnieszka is confident we can both get work easily. I do love Sweden but after being there in November last year, I am still a little faint from the price of a beer being around £8!!!! Can I live with that?

24th January 2011

Max sent an e-mail saying he was ill today so I went to do his work. I seem to go every Monday now anyway, that’s when there’s the most work to do because the horses aren’t cleaned out on a Sunday. I only did a couple of horse boxes and soon got a sweat on. I realised just how hard it is and started feeling a little sorry for Agnieszka having to do that every day. Roman popped into the stable today. He’s from Slovenia I think but them, Czechs and Poles all understand each others language. It turns out he’s a Liverpool fan too so we found a common ground. He used to work for our stable but it turns out he had a drink problem and kept turning up to work drunk. He’s working just a few stables away now and seems a nice enough bloke.

I ran out of cigarettes today so Tomas took us to get 200 from the Chinese where he’d got some before. I was expecting a house somewhere but was shocked when he took us to the far end of a Netto car park where there was a tiny Chinese girl sat on a chair shivering to death. She went to get us 200 Palace which we’d never heard of but a smoke was a smoke as far as I was concerned and it turned out that they aren’t that bad. She fetched them from 50 metres behind her from under a bush!! Poor sod, what kind of a life is that sat getting cold all day just to make a few cents on a packet of cigarettes. They only cost 1.80 euros so she can’t be making that much on them surely.

23rd January 2011

22nd January 2011

21st January 2011

20th January 2011

This is one of them videos that really touches you.

19th January 2011

I've found another addiction, a new website, Stumbleupon.com. I could spend all day on it. Basically you customise your settings to the type of websites which interest you and click the stumble button for it to bring up random websites that you will like to read. I've trawled through hundreds this last few days and even added this blog to it.  Having said that, I really must spend less time on the computer and crack on with learning German and enjoying things outside this electronic box. 

I had a really bad migrane this morning. One where I just couldn't lift my head up. I put it down to lack of sleep (too long on the internet!), smoking again, change in the weather and staring at this screen too much. Luckily it slowly went after a nap and a few tablets. 

We watched Forest Gump tonight. I never get bored of it. It's right up there in my top 5 films of all time. It's certainly better than that Shining crap which I looked up today on IMDB.com and it was rated 8.5 out of 10!! That is the 49th best movie of all time WTF!!! Forest gump got 8.6, the 33rd best movie ever. I'd put it higher than that.

Agnieszka seems in a really good mood lately. She keeps making me laugh by referring to herself as 'us'. It's bay talk 24/7. Bless her. I need to start paying more attention and enjoying the moment with her. I hope we can get to the doctors soon to have the pregnancy confirmed and see what our next steps are. Neither of us have a clue about what to do here in Germany. There's an obsession creeping in about what she can eat and can't eat, morning sickness and symptoms. It seems the only symptom she has is that her breasts hurt and that she hates the smell of alcohol.

I had a couple of beers tonight which went down really well. I worked out that it's actually cheaper for me to drink beer at home rather than juices. It's about 40p a bottle where as a litre of juice is about 90p. I wonder if I can talk her into me sticking with beer in future. :-P

18th January

Ok the flood got out of hand! I had to empty our storage area this morning because everything was getting ruined. About ten trips up and down from the basement and I managed to get everything into our apartment and neatly away until we can sort through it. The landlord, or housemeister as they call them over here was trying to sort it out today and called a plumber in but from what I'm hearing it's how the building was built and theres little chance of them sorting it out properly. Thank god we will be out of here soon otherwise I might just give a toss.

I managed a really good tidy and clean today and the place looks immaculate. I can't live in mess and feel better knowing it's getting the Daniel touch at long last. 

I cocked up with the whole smoking thing today :-(. I just can't do it. Not yet anyway. I'll keep the cigs to a minimum and try stopping again soon. 

We found another film to watch tonight which I didn't recognise in the cupboard at first because the title was in Spanish but it was an all time classic, The Shining! Or at least I seem to remember it was a classic and told Agnieszka it was because she's never seen it. In reality, after watching it, the only description I can come up with right now is a complete and utter bag of crap. I can't believe how bad it was!! We must have been easily entertained back in the 80's to appreciate that toilet content. I never did like Jack Nicholson films and now I remember why. That movie is never going to waste 2 hours of my life again...that's a promise.

I'm getting on quite well with this blog and am almost ready to publish it around the various sites. I have Nikola working on a header for me and still have a few ideas to improve the look and content but overall it's certainly up to a readable level. If I can keep it up for the whole year I'll definately have enough content to work on for my ultimate idea. I want a book out of it. Not necessarily a book to publish, but a book for my child to read in years to come. A book to help him/her understand what our lives were all about when they were born.

I've made a right mess of my nose. Agnieszka told me I had a spot on it yesterday so I stupidly tried scratching it off. I didn't manage it but I did manage to scrape a one inch piece of flesh away, make it bleed and put me in the running for the casting of a modern day version of The Elephant Man!! Gggrrrhhhh, I can be  stupid sometimes....more than most LOL.

17th January 2011

Spring is in the air! A lovely day with almost all of the snow gone now. Even the big piles have melted which surprised me. I took advantage of the weather and cleaned the balcony so it's ready to sit on again. Then the council or whatever they are called out here were going up the street pruning the trees. Their generator and chainsaw are a bit noisy but I can live with it. It seems to take them 1 hour for every tree though so they might be here for a while.


I took the time to look after the houseplants today too. pruning off all the bad and feeding and watering the good, moving them around and cleaning all the leaves. They certainly look a lot better. When we move I'm going to get loads of plants. I want to show off my gardening skills, inside and out.

Agnieszka came home in a bad mood. Owners not paying on time as usual. They have so much money and have no idea how much it effects us poorer people when they decide to send it 2-3 weeks late.

We had floods downstairs again. The landlord was there with some kind of a machine to try and suck it all up. I just left him to it. It's not our job to fix this stupid building. I can't wait to get a nice bigger place that I can really call home.

I've decided this stopping smoking just isn't a reality. I can't do it. The craving never seems to be going away. Sussie is coming tomorrow, I'll have to get some off her. I feel bad because Agnieszka is doing so well but I just am not as strong as her. Maybe I can cut right down but stopping entirely just doesn't seem like an option to me right now.

We got on to the subject of holidays again this evening. We do seem to both agree that Dubrovnik in Croatia would be lovely. Then we toyed with the idea of driving there, it's only about 700 miles. Then we thought about hiring a caravanette. That really got me excited. Oh how I've always wanted one of them. It would be great if we could ever afford one. I couldn't stop thinking of all the countries we could visit and stop for a while in on our way to and from Croatia. We could fit in Austria, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Hungary, Slovakia and Czech Republic all in one holiday!! That would be 7 new countries to add to my list!! I want to travel so much.  Then it hit home about us having a baby and I think it might have to be put on hold but it's certainly an idea stuck in my head now until it comes true.

16th January 2011

Well what can I say. Today we did absolutely nothing and just bummed around having a lovely lazy day.

We had a flood down in the basement again today, thats the second in a month. This time it was quite bad though. Everyone with an apartment in this block has a storage area down in the basement and the water was seeping in to everyones stored boxes. Ours was floating in it but luckily most of our things are in suitcases and raised out of the water. I did find a box full of VHS tapes and music c.d's which was starting to get wet so I took that upstairs to have a look through. There was nothing special in there worth watching so I wish I hadn't have bothered. I did my bit to try and soak up some of the water whilst lazy git stayed in bed on the laptop.

I cooked dinner too! Fajita's!!! Well, fajita filling with rice. Very nice as always and plenty left for me tomorrow. Agnieszka can't have any tomorrow because she's being good and following all the food guidelines for pregnant women. One of them things is not to have reheated chicken so its all mine :-).

I finished my book 'An Innocent Man'. It really moved me, the best book I have read in a long time. I looked the  book and the people mentioned in it up on the internet and was delighted to find it's coming out as a film this year...now that will be good! I also found some of the people from the book on Facebook and sent them friend requests for the laugh. I wonder how many will accept.

We started watching Twelve Monkeys which was one of the films I found in the cellar but I got bored and fell asleep. Yet another half watched film to add to the hundreds throughout my life.

15th January 2011

O.k. so I went to the stable today. It was great to get out and see the horses, especially Maximool. I got a nice video of him and Baron having a play in the paddock biting each other in fun.  I was pleased to be home though as a headache started.

I received four letters when I got home...four!!! No one sends me letters, Agnieszka only got one from Postbank saying she can't have a bank account with them yet until she sends them a form back. They must have found some dodgy past credit or something. I on the other hand got a bank card and a credit card with my pin numbers and Internet banking set up. LOL. They obviously didn't check my credit rating too well ha ha ha.

Agnieszka made a lovely pork escallops and some kind of broccoli and spinach bakes. After that and being very full we even spent some time looking at German baby names. We will never settle on a name. This baby is destined to be called 'It'.  She liked Kay as a boys name (no chance) and Rita for a girl (never), and I liked Adolf for a laugh or Fernando for the Liverpool football connection. The only name we both liked was Charlie. I think we have about seven months to come up with something yet. We would both like something a little different, any suggestions then please let me know. I don't really want an English name. It might be nice to have a foreign name.

I finished my packet of cigs today and have stopped again. I say stopped, I'm still puffing on the ends in my ashtray which are all but gone now but I haven't bought any and am not intending on buying any.

14th January 2011

I think we have a break through!!! :-)

During the night I turned and put my arm around Agnieszka, completely by accident I might add, and after a few exchanged words (I vaguely remember her saying she's just stressed and us both saying we love each other), which were said whilst I was still half asleep. What ever happened, and for whatever reason and way it happened, it seems to have done the trick. Lets just hope it continues when she gets back from the stables today.

I got a letter printed out and ready to send to the tax office back in England this morning. They owe me big time!! I was on emergency tax for two and a half years before I moved over here and am still waiting for a nice amount of cash back.  I sent them all the paperwork they need at the end of October, just as I was moving here to Germany and presumed all would be sorted out and the money put into my bank account.  Not a sausage!!!!  It's very annoying because we really need that money now. I'm expecting about 2,000 pounds off them but to be honest I'd settle for 500 at the moment. Just give me my money!!!!!!!!!

I had a dream last night. One which has to be documented in case it comes true and everyone starts to think of me as the next Nostradamus and I become famous! Ok basically, I saw World War III. It was the world against Russia. I'm calling it a world war but I don't remember China getting involved. Basically Russia took over the whole of the middle east and all of Europe apart from France and England. America, Britain and, believe it or not, France, fought them back from the south of France. The allies then took southern Germany, Italy and all of the southern middle east back before doing a u turn and taking all the north back too. After taking every country back it was decided not to invade Russia but just pinned them back to their country for good.  There, I had to tell you that to guarantee my future fame and fortune. :-P

I found out prostitution is legal in Germany!! Shocked!! It is in Poland too apparently. I thought it was just Holland where it was legal. It was on a website I follow called local.de where they tell the German news in English. It's a great site that I look at every day. It was saying that prostitutes were branching out and starting to sell themselves as a kind of home service for old people who are just lonely and are willing to pay a prostitute just to visit them and sit and talk to them for a hour. What a great idea, good luck to them I say.

It seems Agnieszka hasn't got health insurance and so this baby could prove to be very expensive. We are looking around and trying to get insurance at the last minute to save on costs. Sussie rang one doctor for us and they wanted between 200 and 500 euros just for the first appointment!!! That is disgusting!! It's easy to take the health care for granted in England where everything is free. We may have found a solution but will have to wait and see.

Sussie was here again and everyone got on well today. We discussed getting me a job. One option was to just deliver junk mail or papers or something door to door for 600 euro per month. There were no positions available in this area though so back to square one. Then Agnieszka decided that me learning German was vital and a must so she called a friend who is a language teacher and asked if she could give me private lessons. We will wait to see what she says, failing that it looks like I might have to go on an intensive one month course for about 1000 euro. Whichever way I'm quite excited because I desperately want to speak the language.

Lots of other subjects came up such as getting a car next week, going on holiday in Croatia in May, Eileen's car breaking down and having to be sold for parts, oh and marriage!!! LOL LOL Agnieszka keeps mentioning us getting married. She can but try. Been there, done that and worn the tee shirt. I don't think I'll ever make the same mistake twice.

I had an email from my English contact lens company saying they are sending my prescription to my mums address to send on to me. Then I can order some online here in Germany and finally start getting out of the house every day :-).

I enjoyed today, everything is good again.

13th January 2011

She'd better start talking today because I don't know how much more I can take of this. The longer it goes on the harder it will be to put behind us. Agnieszka is clearly just as stubborn as I am. I will eventually back down and apologise if I am in the wrong though. I have yet to hear her back down or say sorry for anything. This WILL be the first time if she want's us to be a couple again.

I'm having to type this on my laptop with it's cracked screen. No internet obviously so I've opened Firefox and am typing it all under quick notes. I just hope its days rather than months before I ever get to add it to my Blog.  Having no internet might just be a good thing. Everything we seem to do revolves around the internet so once this petty arguement is over then maybe we can find some other hobbies together. It will also give me more time with my German lessons.  I use a great programme called Byke which is fantastic for learning German words but not for sentences. This is a great chance for me to really fill my head with tons more words over the next few weeks. I really need to crack this language and fast!!! A Job is crucial now.

Oooops, I tell a lie. I just found the internet dongle on the floor under the chair. I wonder if Agnieszka knew it was there or whether she thinks I'd taken it after her outburst last night? Oh well it's here now :-) 

I'm back again adding a little more. I'm probably boring you aren't I? Sorry but you are the only companion I have right now. My time with you in a morning is all I have to look forward to. I've just done something stupid which I may regret later. I went and bought more cigarettes, 19 for £3.49 (4.20 euro). I've been doing well considering all the stress lately but I have nothing else right now so I thought I'd treat myself and try to smoke some of this stress away. God I hope things are sorted out today. I have no idea what Agnieszkas been up to or what she's planning or thinking. We need to get her to a doctor and I don't know if she's planned it or not. I know she's been looking at cars and houses on the internet but thats about it. I want my Agnieszka back!!! :-(


Well nothing improved today. Infact it got worse. Do you know how the various governments have different levels of alerts for terrorist attacks? Well we are at  the critical stage with an attack being expected any time now!!  Silence all afternoon and then Sussie came and things happened. I took a bath and a walk to keep out of their way so they could talk. Whilst on my walk I think Sussie and Agnieszka had an arguement and Sussie was gone when I returned. Agnieszka had clearly been crying and she confronted me about what my plans were. A few unpleasantaries were shared before Aileen called. Agnieszka started ripping into her but then things seemed to calm down as they talked in the kitchen whilst I was in bed...at 8pm!! I heard Sussie call on the phone, Aileen went and after the call Agnieszka joined me in bed. 


Am I being unkind? Should I be more supportive because she's pregnant? Should I let her win this battle even though I feel she's been out of order? Should I stick to my guns and teach her that she can't treat me like this? All these questions were running through my head as I lay there trying to get to sleep. I wanted to hug her but didn't dare in case I was rejected.

12th January 2011

Well just when it couldnt get any worse it actually has. We spent the entire day just as we did yesterday without speaking. I tell a lie, Agnieszka did mutter a couple of words. I got a "hello" when she walked in from the stables and a "theres food in the kitchen if you want it". I didn't reply to either. I've had it with the small talk. There's food in the kitchen! She's even taken to eating in there alone now. I pretty much did without food yesterday, just grabbing a couple of couassants and some biscuits and today I managed a sandwich this afternoon and finished the biscuits. I didn't eat the food she made. The way I see it is she only made enough for me because that is how much she had to make, then she ate hers first before coming and telling me mine was there. It will have been cold by then and was still in the pan!!

So no. I am not budging today. same routine with me learning a few German words followed by an afternoon and evening of reading. I'm onto a John Grisham book now 'The Innocent Man'. It's a true story which surprised me. I've read the Firm and The Client by him. I enjoyed The Firm. It wasn't the kind of thing I'd usually read and the film was a let down but it was very well written. I waded through 179 pages today. I'm enjoying it under the circumstances.

Agnieszka finished the night with a tantrum. She was getting mad with the computer, I think because the internet wasn't working. I had my back to her and she started slamming it quite hard on top of the table. Something sounded as though it broke and fell on the floor and she stormed into the kitchen and had a good cry. I would find out tomorrow morning that it was the internet dongle that she'd broken. NO INTERNET!!!!! Well thats it. What the hell else have I got out here apart from my 3 hours on the internet in a morning?

Very early night. I think I was asleep by 9.30pm. Agnieszka was watching films...on the internetless laptop.

 

11th January 2011

Ggggrrrrhhhhh I'm so mad!!!! I have no events to tell you of today, no excitement. Just a day of being ignored after the pettiest of arguments last night.  This time its because she says I love the computer more than her!! LOL. SHE was on the computer not me. I asked if we could make the bed up so I could lie down and she had a mini outburst saying I was mad because she had the computer and then sulked into her side of the bed. Early night.

The last time I had a day like this was my birthday. Yes Agnieszka managed to ruin that for me too. Today turned into one of them days with Agnieszka coming home at 12, saying hello, me returning a hello and then silence for the rest of the day. I am bloody sick of it. This went on till bedtime and if its to be the same tomorrow then so be it, I am not backing down when I have done nothing wrong.

Ironically, who spent the day on the computer? Yes Agnieszka! I sat finishing my Anne Frank Diaries book. I read all day and my eyes really hurt by the time I got my head down.

Fingers crossed to a better day tomorrow and she sees sense because I can keep this up for the next 9 months if I really have to!! Gggrrrhhhh!!!!!!

10th January 2011

Well what a start to the day. I woke up this morning, went to blow my nose and blood was all over the place. Its because of the cold I've had which has almost gone now. I've just been blowing my nose so often and so hard that I'm causing nose bleeds now and again. Nothing to worry about but my sinuses are all over the place and quite sore at times. 

I went to the stables today which made a nice change. I think the fresh air did me good and helped to minimise my hangover. I met young Max who seemed like a nice lad. He usually works on Saturdays there but is there for a month through the week now as some kind of work placement from school. He's only 14 or 15.  We walked a few horses but couldn't have any of them in the paddocks because it was just too icy. Its a risk that can't be taken because just one slip and the horse could break down. I walked Fuxy (It's Swedish Streak really but we call him Fuxy as a nickname which means chestnut) and she was slipping all over the place and with every slip she panicked. No injuries though.  The ice is melting slowly and I'm surprised at how much snow has gone. The temperatures really are quite high for this time of year at about 8 degrees celcius. 

Agnieszka and me then went on to open a Post Bank account. My first German bank account!! I just had to sneak a video in the post office for this blog, it must have been the smallest post office in the entire world at about 10ft X 10ft. We think we are entitled to 75 euro each for opening the accounts which is a starter offer they were advertising which ends today. Fingers crossed for that.


We had a tidy up and a yummy tuna pasta before Iris and Pavel came for a drink this evening. Iris is German and Pavel is Czech, neither speak any English. I tell a lie, Pavel does know how to say 'suck my dick', but that's all. It was just a few drinks that's all. My only involvement in any conversation was when they were trying to get me to sell my sperm again. It ain't happening people!! LOL

Mist over the race course.

Maximool

Pixie playing with Johnny the horses toy. She bit the handle off.

9th January 2011

I told Jenny and Katie the news today and they were both in shock. Now that close family know I don't see any reason not to tell everyone else. Having said that I haven't put it on Facebook yet. They can wait.

Agnieszka was suggesting that I join a sperm bank LOL. She wasn't joking either I don't think. She was looking on the internet and found one in Berlin where you go every 14 days for a year and they pay 110 euro per session!!! Good money but I can't see me tossing myself off in some seedy office with a German Razzle or Escort in front of me.

We set off to the football about a hour too early. I worked out all the train times wrong because the kick off was at 1.30pm but I'd forgotten it was 2.30pm in Berlin time. Anyway we found Belushi's Bar to watch the game. I can't say I was too impressed with the place. Come to think of it I wasn't impressed with the score, people in there or the rest of the day if I'm being honest. Liverpool lost 1-0 to a controversial penalty after just 1 minute. Steven Gerrard was sent off too which again was very very harsh. Liverpool played quite well and certainly deserved at least a draw. Agnieszka said 1-0 is a good score. How a 1-0 loss and being knocked out of the cup can ever be a good score I don't know. I think she was trying to make me feel better. One of the Man Utd fans asked me if I had a problem after I looked at him when he was slagging Liverpool off. That was the turning point for me. I saw red and just wanted to hit him after that. Agnieszka stopped me from starting anything though. I was the only Liverpool fan there. There were about 12 Man Utd fans around me, cockneys, Irish, southerners, but no one from Manchester.

After a bad journey home with me and Agnieszka arguing about the future and work which escalated into the house I was glad the day was over. I was getting fed up of the arguing and so took the sheepskin blanket and said I was sleeping in the kitchen. I woke up about 1am and sneaked back into bed because the heating had gone off and I was freezing and the tile floor is not the comfiest of mattresses.  This was just one of them bad days which could so easily have gone the other way. Roll on tomorrow!!!

Belushi's Bar

8th January 2011

The birds are singing :-) The thaw is definitely on with temperatures expected to hit double figures in much of Germany today. It's wonderful to feel that we aren't confined to our houses and wake up listening to the birds all getting excited because they think it's Spring.

We had a visit today from two men about fixing our oven. Some idiots, when making the oven, thought it would be a good idea  to fix the internal window with plastic catches. They melted, obviously. It sounds like a few people in the surrounding apartments have the same problem. They are going to get onto the manufacturers for us. At the moment we can only use the oven with the door slightly open so that the external window doesn't smash.

Shock of the year and probably my life!!!!!!! Agnieszka is pregnant!!!!!!!!!!! She came back from the stable and told me. I didn't believe her so she showed me the pregnancy test she had done that morning. We thought she couldn't have kids! Apparently she has tried for 18 years in previous relationships, never taking precautions in her life and has never managed to get pregnant. I come along and   she's pregnant after a month of living here. We are guessing that she's about six weeks gone but we need to get to a doctor to have everything confirmed. It is the last thing I expected and I don't really know what to think about it but seeing how happy Agnieszka is has made me think this could be a good thing.

Tomas was the first to know, even before me!! Eileen seemed excited and very shocked. I emailed my mum, dad and Craig with the news but none of them replied today. I'm dreading what they must think, three children with three different women isn't the best track record is it. Sussie wasn't impressed and after having a go at Agnieszka in German about it, Agnieszka quickly snapped and told her to stop spoiling our happy day. Things quickly calmed down and were ok again. I noticed Sussie talking German for most of the time she was here. I think it's a plan of hers to help me learn German but it won't help. I can't have a conversation with someone if they are insisting on talking in another language. Tomas is the same, he insists on speaking Polish around me all the time yet he can speak perfectly good English.

I started smoking again today :-( sorry. As soon as I heard the news I had to rush to the shop to get some cigarettes to calm me down.  I got one packet but plan on stopping again once they have gone.

Agnieszka surprised me tonight saying she was taking me to see Manchester United V Liverpool tomorrow. I'm so excited :-)

Agnieszka and her new vibrator.

7th January 2011

After a slow start to the day I soon got cracking. I have been in a spring cleaning mood for the last few days now and I finally got a bit done. Agnieszka had a visit from some insurance man so I took that time scrubbing the kitchen tiles and hob. They've never looked as clean. As for the toilet, well, that was the first thing I noticed when I came here. The bottom of it was disgusting but just wouldn't clean. I finally found the guts to throw my hand down there with a Brillo pad and its certainly looking much better.

We had a marathon of This Is England today, watching the film followed by This Is England 86' TV series. I wasn't that impressed with it considering how much people were raving about it back in England. It was just a poor attempt at recreating Shameless as far as I could see.

There's a new rule starting in the house tomorrow. If you're not sleeping you wear a bra!! Why walk around all day holding your boobs up with your hands and hurting every time I happen to bump into them? There's no sense in that is there? I told Agnieszka I was sick of tripping over them because they were dragging on the floor, luckily she saw the funny side.

I'm starting to feel the effects from not smoking now and not all for the good. The cravings are much less but I'm near the end of my cold so the constant crap I'm blowing out from that and the phloem from my lungs is all adding up to a pretty disgusting sight right now. On top of that each cough is starting to hurt the lungs. I'm sure it will all be worthwhile in the end.

It was rumoured that Roy Hodgson was going to be sacked by Liverpool today. I was really hoping he would be and Kenny Dalgleish given the job he deserves. It turns out that Kenny isn't in the country till next week and Liverpool haven't even got a Managing Director at the moment so there's no one to make the decision!! So he still has the job for Sundays huge game away to Manchester United in the F.A. Cup 3rd round. I can't believe I'm going to miss it. I'm truly gutted. I have been looking forward to this since the draw was made but we have no money and I respect that so I'll just have to miss it. I wouldn't mind so much if I could hear it on a radio or something but I'll have to settle for updates from BBC sport on the Internet. Oh well, just make sure you win Liverpool!!!

6th January 2011

Happy Three Kings Day!! I've never heard of it but I do know that it means all the banks are shut over here today. It must be like a bank holiday. Today is also the day we have to take our Christmas trees and decorations down, I wonder if there's a connection. That's exactly what I did anyway, I took the tree down. It didn't look good when we got it and it certainly doesn't look good now with it's droopy branches. It was only about 3 foot tall. After taking the decorations off it I put it outside on the balcony to see if it comes around at all. Next year I'm choosing the tree.

I got out today...yay!! Only to Netto lol but at least it was out. We had no food so it was nice to get some bits in and stuff ourselves all day. My cravings aren't as bad as they were and my grumpiness seems to have mellowed a bit so hopefully I'm over the worst now. When I get a craving now I just have a Rivita cracker bread with potato salad on it or my latest joy, sticks of pretzels. You know the type, them pretzels you get at Xmas with bits of sea salt stuck to them about 1.5 inches big but these are just sticks about 20cms long. I'm treating them like cigarettes and smoking about 200 of them a day when I can. They are only 35 cents a bag!!!

It looks like the temperatures are starting to rise and the big thaw is on. They are predicting huge flood problems which I think must be inevitable given this is the largest amount of snow to fall in 120 years. I think it will be months though before these huge mounds of snow at the sides of the road disappear.

5th January 2011

I Didn’t sleep too well and woke up with my head feeling swollen and full of cold. At least I'm man enough to say it's a cold, quite a mild one at that. It's not man flu that's for sure.

It's been a very uneventful day today. I've been in a bad mood from not smoking, my cold has peaked and reached its worse. We just watched Starsky & Hutch and Rocky and got an early night.  I should say Agnieszka did. I was up until 1.30am changing this diary from Wordpress over to Blogger. They say there isn't much between the two but I'm finding that you have far more options to personalise things here on Blogger.

4th January 2011

Well my bloody cold has become fully blown today. Getting lots of crap out of my system though so that can only be good. I can’t help wondering if it is related to me stopping smoking though. Agnieszkas pumping me lots of tablets, I have no idea what they are but they do seem to work for a few hours afterwards.

I remembered a picture of my Great Great Grandad James Lamb from the days of doing my family tree and was desperate to find it online where I may have put it on a website in the past. It had a horse in the picture and I wanted to see what the horse was like now that I know a little more about them. I found the picture (below) and the horse was huge!! That's the best photo I’ve ever found, I love it  .

Great Great Grandad James Lamb cc1890 Thornton

Agnieszka made me laugh again, one day she’ll think before she does something lol. She rang to order some straw for the horses and after talking on the phone for 5 minutes and getting rather annoyed at the guy on the other end of the phone for not knowing where to get the straw from that he was supposed to deliver, she realised she’d called the taxi company by accident.  What must that poor man have thought ha ha ha.

Sussie came today, she says she’s in love but he’ll probably be married or gay, bless her. It sounds like she doesn’t have the best of luck in love, maybe this time.

I spent quite a long time on German learning today. I found quite a useful set of German lessons on You Tube which I’m going to try and a good hour or two reading my GCSE German book. I try, I really try, but It just doesn’t seem to be sinking in. I learn something and within a few hours I’ve forgotten it again. Then I have Sussie and Agnieszka having a go at me because I haven’t learnt anything. I just seem to be fighting a losing battle. I am going to try harder this week but I just don’t think I can ever speak German without some proper lessons or help.  They expect me to be going to a job interview in two weeks. That is never going to happen at this rate. I won’t be bullied into going and making a fool of myself again. I will make a fool of myself when I’m ready to do so. I really have to get this language sorted though so I can work and integrate with everyone. I feel like an alien sometimes.

3rd January 2011

O.k. well waking up today without a cigarette was very hard, the hardest it’s been. I’m hoping the worst is almost over and it starts to get easier soon before I start shouting and smashing things.

When Agnieszka got back from the stables we watched a bit of Ski Jumping. They are mad for it over here in Germany and Poland. I’m guessing that’s because they are pretty good at it. I think England have had just one jumper in history..Eddie the Eagle who was famous worldwide for being the worst jumper ever.

Things are pretty desperate here at the moment. I just finished the last boiled sweets and have realised there’s nothing to eat in the house. We had a lovely meal today, a goulash made with buckwheat groats which apparently is an eastern european thing. They have them in Cornwall too. They were nice, didn’t taste of much but were a nice texture, a good alternative to rice and very good for you. Anyway, after eating that and then finishing off the rest at the end of the night with pasta I think it’s safe to say that we ain’t got anything left to eat!! Fingers crossed for a miracle tomorrow. When I stop smoking I turn to food and if I haven’t got that to turn to then I don’t know what I’m going to do.

I watched Agnieszka eating an apple earlier. The core was eaten!! The entire core!!!  I presumed she didn’t know because she wasnt watching what she was eating but after telling her, she said that’s where all the goodness is….yuck!!!

Then she made me laugh again. I started with a bit of a cold and my nose was running all afternoon. I was a bit worried about how much toilet paper we had. I explained that I needed 9 pieces per number 2 (4 x 2 folded pieces and one for the front) which she found odd that I have the same amount of paper each time I go. So she went on to explain that you only need 1 piece, she got one, stuck her finger through the middle of it and said that you stick it up and then wipe your finger as you’re pulling it back through the whole.  I laughed but I really do hope she was joking and doesn’t actually put that into practice!!! YUCK!!!

After watching a documentary on The Real Rainman who the film was based on (very interesting guy), the internet decided to stop loading films. We must be up to our connection limit for the month, very annoying!!  So an early night tonight, very early.

2nd January 2011

So today I was up early and went to the stables with Agnieszka. It’s the first time that just the two of us were there. Both Tomas’s were off today. Old Tomas because it’s Sunday and young Tomas because he worked yesterday whilst we were in bed with a hangover.

I was reluctant to go because I am now down to about 15 days worth of contact lenses which is scaring me a little. I will NOT leave the house without contacts and need to sort some new ones out urgently but we just haven’t got the money right now.  It was nice though, just me and Angieszka. I spent the whole time (about 3-4 hours) taking horses to and from the paddocks where they could have a run around. The rest of the time I took my favourite three horses to the field which is bigger than the paddocks and gives them more room to run around. It also gives me a great chance to take pictures and videos without any distractions.

I mentioned my favourite three horses so I guess I should go into a little more detail. Firstly there is Maximool. I rent him along with Agnieszka. He’s my first horse so he is very special to me. Everyone else in the stables seems to have a problem with him saying he can be naughty and jumps at them sometimes but he’s never been anything but lovely to me. I think I might be too soft with him but I don’t care, he’s lovely. Maximool is a baby, just one year old. So is my other favourite who is a beautiful chestnut horse called Baron. He is tiny so I hope he will grow quickly because he has a lovely temperament as you can see from the video below where he is having a good run around. Then there’s Mumboo who started racing last year so he will be two. Everyone loves Mumboo, he is just so soft and gentle, everyone thinks he’s a bit gay. So they are my favourites, all three of them stallions and fingers crossed, all three are going to win us some money this year or next.

I was in a bad mood when I got home. No reason for being that way, just not smoking. Things only got worse too. After watching a few films about serial killers (a common interest Agnieszka and me have) and then a very gruesome Sweeny Todd the laptop broke down! Only the second day into the new year and Agnieszkas favourite toy broke down on us!! Gutted!!  So as of tomorrow we are stuck on my old laptop which is a sorry sight. It has a big crack across the screen making it very hard to work on or watch anything on it and on top of that the disc drive doesn’t work.  The only consolation is that the computers are almost the same model so we just might be able to make one good one out of the two. Agnieszka’s has had it. It just went completely dead.

Maximool

Mumboo

 

Baron