Ridiculousness & London

For those of you who don't know, I love to write poetry. I used to write more frequently and would like to believe that it was better during this time period, but hey, who I am kidding? Most of it's pretty crap. I take no offense to this, though, as I enjoy writing it nevertheless. Here's a good one that summarizes my journey today on the Deutsche Bahn from Bremen via Osnabrück and Herford to Detmold: on the train listening to the JT Mix and Radiohead scattered raindrops on windowpanes the whir of the engine coughing and then sputtering and then no more. sigh. "es tut mir sehr leid, aber gibt's verspätung jetzt..." right, stay calm. the guy across the way from me is pretty darn cute. makes it all a bit better. After a lovely four days spent in London with Sara and her quartet buddies, I trucked my to London Stansted Airport to fly back to Bremen. The amount of ridiculousness I dealt with from Ryanair, a supposedly reputable low-cost airline, was, well, ridiculous. Not only did I receive the rudest treatment I've ever seen in the airline industry, but I would have missed my flight had it not been for a Random Act of Kindness from a completely German stranger. Basically, after having to pay a host of ridiculous fees for baggage check-in (I know I'm overusing the word ridiculous, but I'm sorry - there's just no other fitting word), I got caught up in a line at the currency exchange and also in the Ryanair fees payment line, and still didn't have enough pounds to cover my expenses. This wonderful lady who was also paying fees and on my Bremen flight leaned over and said in German, "These people are complete jerks. Don't worry, hun, I'll pay your fee with my credit card and you can pay me back once we're in Germany." I could have kissed her. It was a sheer moment of holiday guardian angel-ness. Afterwards, we zipped through security - well, I was ridiculously (there I go again) held up for 5 minutes until another holiday guardian angel security guard came over, asked, "What's the matter, love? You look like you're going to cry there" and then checked my bag, muttering about the incompetency of her colleague, and sent me off - and barely made the flight. In Germany, I endured 2.5 hours of ridiculous verspätung (sounds like some weird Spam-like meat, huh? It actually just means "delay"), came home with five minutes before a rehearsal, and so ran out again, only to eventually eat "dinner" (cold pasta + strawberry yogurt...no, not mixed together...I do still have some culinary refinement, thank you very much)at around 11:30 PM. Hmph. Could have been, worse, I suppose. Anyways, back to London. What a fabulous city during the holidays! We went for walks, ice-skated, watched lots of Family Guy and Sex & The City, and just chilllled out. It was exactly what I needed. Seeing Sara can clear out months of agitation and uneasiness like no other. Although the workload starts the second my foots hits German soil, I do feel refreshed. If you want to see pictures, check out my photo website some time next week.