Graz, Austria

View from the hotel overlooking Graz
The outdoor restaurant looking north to the Alps
Hotel in St. Michael, Austria
Stream next to the Hotel in St. Michael 

Cathedral in Trier
Behind the altar in the cathedral in Trier
Trier City Center
Trier City Center 

Trier
Cathedral in Trier
Kelli in the cathedral courtyard in Trier
The Black Gate in Trier - Built in the 3rd century! 

Sunday, Sweaty Sunday

Found this Nick Lachey cartoon on another blog today. Thought it was funny.

We headed to Luxembourg yesterday with a group of people from GM. There were 8 of us walking around what turned out to be a pretty cool city. Not a place that we would head back to after this one visit but interesting nonetheless.

On the way there I noticed that we drove past the city of Neunkirchen which I recalled was the location of the one and only Hooter's in Germany. I therefore on the way back had the pleasure of introducing Hooter's to six people. Kelli was one of the six since she had always avoided trips with me in the States to go get wings by claiming that it is a strip club with a side of chicken. Very entertaining. Got through about 25 3 Mile Island wings, mmmmmm.

Today was another scorcher and I took the opportunity to sit on my butt and watch the British Open all day. Looks like Tiger is doin it again. I am off to Graz, Austria for the week.

Go Tigers!

Cologne

Here are ssome pics from Cologne last weeekend.

You really can NOT tell how big the cathedral is until you see it.



 

Melting

My god it is hot. Really hot. It almost hit 100 the other day (very rare in Germany). This would not be so bad if not for the fact that THIS COUNTRY DOES NOT BELIEVE IN AIR CONDITIONING!

I have learned to accept it as a fact of life due to the fact that bitching does nothing but make you warmer.

Seriously, mix in a Lennox or Trane one time

The World Cup blur

Man that was fun.

I NEVER thought that those words would come from my mouth spurred on by watching countless games of football (soccer). I can honestly say that my total minutes of soccer watched, live or otherwise, has at least been multiplied by 5. (I watched a frickin Sweden-Togo match) (They tied).

I really gave it a try this time. I learned ALL of the rules, realized that EVERYONE (not just Americans) bitches about the diving and I found a new appreciation for a game that I used to compare to a trip to the dentist. It is not a perfect game but which American one is?

Baseball? - no steroids in soccer

Basketball? - no Jordan rules or "the last 5 minutes of a game lasting a half hour" in soccer

American Football? - what exactly is holding? and excessive celebration? and why the hell do kickers get to decide everything?

I know, I know, there isn't any scoring. But how many Lion games (for you Detroit people) have you been to with a 21-7 final (Lions with 7 of course) final score? That's a 3-1 final in soccer, pretty common. The ties are a little frustrating, but we dealt with hockey ties until recently.

That's my defense of the game. I will admit that my attitude may have been swayed by the GREAT atmosphere throughout Germany for the past month. You could go anywhere in any city and there would have been someone from whatever team playing with flags and facepaint with all the passion of a Spartan on UM-MSU football Saturday. You really haven't seen a celebration until you see the Ecuadorians let it all hang out, trust me.

I will miss the World Cup. I know that this is something I will never experience again because you can't replicate this in the US unless all of the games are played in, say, Michigan and the top ten biggest cities have their hotels filled with passionate people from around the world.

Brazilians in Traverse City?

World Cup Time

The Kurpark was ready for the madness of a German run to the World Cup. We planned to watch the final game in the park WHEN the Germans made it there. Unfortunately for us, the Italians had other plans.














The calm before the storm













The park was perfect on the day of the game.
















And even all the good lookin chicks came out to cheer on a German victory 

More World Cup

Everyone was enjoying some beers waiting for the game to begin
















Here is the scene in the old city in Wiesbaden. Every bar/restaurant hada TV set up outside and the streets were FILLED with Italian and (mostly) German fans (duh!)













Germany's hopes were high













But the Italians were victorious, and as we all know, they went on to win it all 

Santiago and Vigo

Here are a couple of photos that I took when I was working near Santiago, Spain earlier this month. Life is tough...

The Saturday Morning Market
"Knife" mussels, my new favorite food on the planet

 

More Santiago and Vigo

The Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela
















Again













The beach in Vigo, south of Santiago near the Portuguese border













View of Vigo and the Atlantic from a nearby hill

Tigers

very strange to be waching the tigers play the mariners live and have the sun blaring in my face at the same time.

this whole world being a small place thing may have someting going for it

Viva Italia

It does kind of suck to hear people honking their horns outside our windows right now waving Italian flags. My enthusiasm for soccer (fussball) took a big hit with 118 minutes of scoreless snoozefest and then watching the Fatherland get their asses handed to them in the last 2 minutes in double overtime.

It was fun while it lasted, I was looking forward to another raging bash in my backyard with 50,000 of my closest friends on Sunday. However, now on to bigger (much) and better (also much) better things.

Sometimes the gods smile upon us and grant us things that make us put things in perspective. This just happened tonight.....

I have returned home from watching SOCCER to see that the DETROIT TIGERS (best record in the major league Tigers that is) just happened to be on LIVE on my TV battling the A's.

Justin Verlander is firing rockets and all is well with the world.

FYI: If the season ended today, the Tigers would play the A's in the ALDS

Good riddance Big Ben by the way......can't wait to watch Scott Skiles squirm as Ben launches airballs in the playoffs next year. For 15 Million a year, i would learn how to toss my first born* through a frickin hoop......

Stevie Y = class = Kaline = Dumars

* does not exist yet

Kelli's B Day

Here are some pics some Kelli's 30th Bday. We had dinner at the top of one of the tallest buildings in Frankfurt