Our pals Brian and Mikey left us on Sunday after their jaunt around Europe with us and many new and interesting experiences with airlines and international travel.*
But we had a fantastic dinner today containing ingredients we wouldn’t have had if not for Brian and Mikey’s trip here: Speck and celery seed. They brought the celery seed with them, and it was essential for Susie’s Meatloaf. While we were in Innsbruck, Brian ponied up for a big ol’ hunk of Speck, which we incorporated into Susie’s German Potato Salad. It was a glorious meat-n-potatoes meal.
I encourage everyone to try it.
On a less joyous note, I have to go back to work tomorrow morning after a whopping 10-day vacation based mostly on comp time (with a little help from the Tag der deutschen Einheit today). Still got lots of time to burn though, and that’s not including our upcoming trip to Michigan in a couple weeks or Carolyn and Max’s Austrian Thanksgiving next month. Our best guesses: that cruise in December I’ve mentioned before from Italy to Portugal and back, or maybe a long weekend in Madrid with Rachel, or — what the heck? — both. My boss applied for a small payout of my overtime hours, but that got axed by the big wigs, so now I’ve got to find a way to use up three-quarters of those 200-some hours I’d saved up. The only crummy part: going on vacation all the time is expensive; going to work is free. I guess that’s why I actually get paid a little more when I’m on vacation than when I’m just working my usual hours. It’s nice that someone recognizes it’s not easy using up all this free time.