Run, Lucy, Run

On the Road

September 4th, 2008

Today’s post is brought to you by Jet Lag, keeping me awake from 3-6 am for the next few days.

I decided that I probably shouldn’t let an entire month go by between posts, so here I am. I arrived in Germany yesterday for a couple of concerts with Absolute Ensemble.  This is a group I have been a part of for over ten years now, but this is my first gig with them since 2006 when we went to Vienna and Sicily and I was pregnant with Ashok.  This time around, we are in Bremen for the Bremen Musikfest,  a festival we have attended for several years now.  The concerts will be great, I’m sure, but the real fun is getting to hang out with all these folks that I haven’t seen in years.

I am here alone, which has been hard.  I miss the family like crazy and I considered bringing Ashok, but decided in the end that the stress of the long journey, jet lag and hanging out with a foreign babysitter (that I would have to track down) while I work might not be more fun for him than hanging with his Pops for a week and a half. Thank goodness for Skype-we have been able to video chat twice already since I arrived, which has made a huge difference.  Brian will definitely have his hands full, but he has already scored major points by purchasing a talking Elmo doll which Ashok was happy to show me during our chat a few hours ago.

Last night we had a wonderful dinner at a Syrian restaurant in town.  Eating Middle Eastern food is really the way to go in Germany.  There are so many immigrants from that part of the world here, and they are definitely the salvation when it comes to the German dining experience.  I wish I had brought my camera to document all the delightful things that appeared on the table, but chances are I would have been far too engrossed in eating to remember to photograph anything. I had a wonderful lamb dish, served on a plate of hummus that was preceded by an assortment of six vegetarian appetizers in small plates including fresh falafel and stewed eggplant.  I managed to make it through the meal without falling asleep in my hummus, an amazing feat considering I had only slept for about two and a half hours since arriving.   After dinner, I hung on until midnight before crashing, only to wake up again at 2:30 am.  If I continue to sleep in 2.5 hour increments, you can except a lot more blogging than usual.

I am hoping to get some good running in while I am here.  Running at home has really sucked this summer, another reason I haven’t been posting much.  Lucy isn’t the only one who has slowed down considerably these last few months-my times have been terrible and I have felt like absolute crap on about 90% of my runs.  I’m hoping the cooler weather and change of scenery here will give the jumpstart I so desperately need.  The beautiful Bürgerpark is right next to our hotel, so I don’t even need to worry about navigating city streets or negotiating car and bicycle traffic (the bikers here will run you down like a dog, seriously).

Now, however, I am counting down the minutes until I can enter into the greatest part of this trip-the German breakfast buffet.  German food is definitely not my thing, as I mentioned, but they know how to do a very decent breakfast.  I look forward to a heaping plate of smoked salmon, bread, cheese and unidentifiable meat products and surely some very strong coffee to get me through today’s rehearsal.

Entry Filed under: Foodstuffs, Running, Music