Eggstasy

Have you ever wondered what four dozen eggs look like if you pile them all up? 

Look at the size of these packages of eggs.

My mom called me today and was like, Hey, I'm running late, so can you help me out with our contribution to the homeless shelter? I need you to pick up four dozen eggs and hard boil them for me. And my first thought was, "Goddamn, that's a lot of eggs." 

Maybe this is because I live in a European city, where most of us live in apartments and do small rounds of shopping every couple of days, but 48 eggs seems like a s***load of eggs. An absurd number to cook at once in the comfort of your home.  

But off we went to the store where, lo and behold, you can buy packages of 30 eggs! All in one box! Seriously though. Who needs 30 eggs at the same time?  It seems like a lot, especially because in the United States all eggs are washed before they're sold, which means they need to be kept very well refrigerated and are thus even more inconvenient to store. 

48! In one pot! Would you look at that.

Of course, all food seems to come in comparatively enormous containers over here. Or at least, that's my impression whenever I first arrive. Over time my perception shifts. It begins to seem normal that groceries are sold in a space that could accommodate a couple of long-haul airplanes, and normal that you can buy detergent in a box so big, you require assistance to get it into the back of your car.  

By the time I get back to Vienna I have grocery dysmorphia in the other direction. Our local grocery store, which is the size of a Texas gas station, seems positively adorable. I go around for a week thinking, "My, what cute little cans of tomatoes! I'll put them in my tiny basket next to my tiny tins of tuna, itty bitty wedges of cheese and my weeny little packages of unbelievably boring cereal. Aww, look at these wittle bitty loaves of bread!" After paying, quite often in cash, I skip back to my flat to play dry-goods tetris in the only cupboard we use for food. 

This is how much my daughter cares about the stupendous number of eggs I'm boiling. 

Anyway. Now I'm off to help bake dozens of Christmas cookies that will sit around looking forlorn until some fool, and its always the same fool, makes the poor decision to eat them all. *Sigh*. 

P.S. Look at me all updating this blog more than once every two weeks. 

Snowed In (Excuses for Being a Bad Blogger)

I have been a very bad blogger. Two weeks! All of this lazing around at my parents' house is taking its toll. I'm becoming sluggish. And there have been many fun distractions - my friend Denia was here, then my glorious Aunt C. and then scattered other good times. But what really threw me off schedule was the ice storm last weekend.  

I live in a cold country. From October to late March, temperatures in Gumpen Village Street regularly fall far below freezing. Precipitation precipitates. Water races from heaven to earth in every form it can, sometimes in two at once. Snow is merely its most aesthetic manifestation. We also do driving rain, fierce sleet, the pissing mist (a personal favourite), and marathon drizzle that soaks the bones and rots the heart. 

But while such weather puts a dark damper on the Austrian soul, it doesn't actually stop the business of doing things. The moment snow or sleet is announced, a literal army of trucks hits the streets strewing gravel. Snow is cleared as fast as it lands and shopkeepers come out to salt their sidewalks. There are, of course, exceptional blizzards that shut the city down, but for the most part workers go to work. School kids go to school. Stores open, trucks make deliveries, trams and subways go about their business, and airplanes take off and land.

So what the H-E-double-hockey-sticks, Dallas. Obviously a warm municipality cannot be expected to restore vital services quite as fast as cities up north. But still. Last weekend was a poor show. 

We woke up on Friday morning with no electricity and temperatures slowly sinking inside my parents' house. That can happen after a big storm, right? I didn't realize this was a semi-permanent state of affairs until my dad said we should get packed. Sadly for Denia, who probably expected some Texas sunshine and, you know, electricity, we weren't entirely able to deliver. She eventually got a warm roof over her head, but it wasn't ours.   

In fact we were all under a much nicer roof, provided by the lovely Hahsler family, who kindly let us play with their used baby things, gave us beds to sleep in, and allowed us to rummage through their kitchen cupboards and drink their coffee (and wine) and eat their food and scatter our bags and baby formula and snow shoes throughout their house. We were grateful and warm and happy to be off the streets, which were glazed with rock-hard ice. 

(I guess we just didn't think we'd be out of our house for three nights and four days. Yes, that is correct, three nights and four days. Come on, electricity company. Git yer self together. Jesus managed to rise up from the dead in less time than you needed to resurrect an electric pole. Denia had left and my Aunt C. had come and nearly gone again by the time power had returned to the Hunt residence.)  

But of course, we couldn't let Denia leave without putting her life in danger. So on the first night of the storm we decided to take an epic journey to Arlington, which is part of the Dallas Metroplex and ordinarily but a 30 minute jaunt from where we were staying. 

An old friend from high school, Hania, was in Arlington to attend a conference. Denia and I had made dinner plans with her before the Icepocalypse, and were not about to give them up. Perhaps sensing that his vehicle was in grave danger, and because he bathes in awesome sauce, my father offered to drive. 

When we set off at around 6 P.M. we still entertained a grand plan of picking our friend up and bringing her to a restaurant in Dallas, then driving her back before returning home ourselves. As we bumbled along at 20 miles an hour, our plans were slowly downgraded. 

First we considered taking her to a Dallas eating hole that was slightly closer to the highway than originally planned. Then we discovered that the whole stretch of highway was shut down. Oh dear. As we slipped and slid through downtown Dallas, we decided it would be best to just have dinner somewhere in Arlington, near her hotel. 

An hour later, and we still were not even close. At what felt like a dog-sled's pace we plugged past endless darkened car dealerships and strip malls and bizarrely well-visited taco places, with nothing to break up the tedium except the odd 18-wheeler doing a little heart-stopping tail waggle as it tried to change lanes ahead of us. We passed ever more vehicles abandoned by the roadside. The highways and overpasses were either deserted or backed up for miles. At some point we gave up and decided that if we ever made it to the Sheraton Conference Center we would be content to just eat there. And give my father an award for Most Awesome Dad of the Year. 

The good news is, Hania was worth it. We probably spent five hours on the road but seeing her (and spending some quality time sans baby) made up for it. Well, it was worth it for me, anyway. Thanks again, Dad! 

Wandering around the Arboretum on Dad's birthday.
Nava is wearing Mom's gloves. I love my family.

And speaking of my dad. Yesterday was his birthday. To celebrate, we had barbecue and wandered around the Arboretum in the sunshine, which returned just in time. I love you, Dad. You are the greatest. 

Down at the Pumpkin Patch

Just got back from Thanksgiving with my aunts, uncles and cousins in Houston! But before I get into all of that, I just have to share our photos of the baby at the pumpkin patch. 

Pretty much the only reason for pumpkin patches is to photograph your offspring at them, right? 

A likely-looking pumpkin patch at the Dallas Arboretum

The whole family was in one place, including Nava's Uncle Elliott, and to my knowledge none of have taken pictures at a pumpkin patch in years and years and years, because it's kind of a weird thing to do without kids, but this time we had a kid and so off we went! Or rather, my mother was working but ordered the rest of us to go. 

We had a sapphire sky and high hopes we had for pictures of adorable punkins and rosy cheeks! 

Unfortunately, it was also the very last day of the pumpkin patch season, freezing cold, the sun was setting and the baby was asleep under many layers of blankets. 

Isn't she adorable up on that bridge to nowhere? Awwww. 

Oh well. There's always next year. 

Nava, her granddad and a pumpkin

Makin' those memories to last a lifetime with Elliott

She's in there somewhere, promise.