A week ago today was just as sunny as it is right now, and almost as cold, too. I was at O.K.'s for the weekend, and we decided to go for a walk straight from the front door. By now, the area around O.K.'s village will be familiar to you from all the photos I have been posting over the six years I have been coming to this place, but as you know, things are never exactly the same from one walk to the next, even along the same paths walked many times before.
We left Hofweier via the small communal woods and crossed the road towards the Nächstenbach parking lot, meant for hikers and walkers. Only a few cars were there, as it was still chilly and a Saturday - typically, most people are busy around their houses, gardens, washing their cars and shopping on Saturdays.
Also, we heard and saw quite a few people working in the woods, cutting down trees and clearing paths; not all of it had to do with the recent storms, but it is the time of year when the community-owned woods put designated lots up for auction, in order for the people living in the area to cut and work their own wood.
A long, slowly uphill path with plenty of sun took us to the Sägereck, where we've stopped for a rest several times before. This time, it was too cold and wet to sit for long, but I needed to catch my breath for a few minutes.
From there, we walked on towards the "kissing oak" - Kußeiche - a place that I have also told you about before. Up to the Silberköpfle ("little silver head"), the highest point of land belonging to the community of Zunsweier. Good views from there all around, and then a brief descent to the point called "beautiful vista" (Schöne Aussicht).
I love the old-fashioned sign, and it reminded me very much of a picture in a Christmas book my sister and I were given when we were about 5 and 6 years old:
After the Schöne Aussicht, it wasn't long before we reached the first houses of Zunsweier. Walking through the village and across the sunlit fields back to O.K.'s village took just under an hour, and we were back at the cottage in time for a (late) coffee after 12 km of walking.
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| Coming out of the woods at Zunsweier |
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| View towards Schloss Ortenberg, well known to you by now |
Sunday was Carnival (called Fasent in O.K.'s area), but just like last year, there were no official events in the village. Still, we gathered at O.K.'s parents with his sister and her husband for his mother's delicious goulash soup, and later the six of us walked through the village, where other people had had the same idea, and there were even some making music and handing out sweets for the children - an informal mini-carnival, if you like.
We were in costumes, too; I am not allowed to show you what O.K. looked like, but here's me:
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| Have You Seen This Man? |
"Fasent"? You mean Fasnet (Fastnacht), don't you? I don't normally nitpick but knowing Baden und das Schwabenland so well "Fasent" threw me, momentarily, for six: What else have I missed since leaving the motherland? Other than Neue Deutsche Rechtschreibung. Dear dog in heaven.
ReplyDeleteU
I do mean Fasent, Ursula, not Fasnet. In the Ludwigsburg area, we would say Fasching or Fasnet, but in the Ortenau, where O.K. lives, it is Fasent. See here, for instance: https://www.stadtanzeiger-ortenau.de/tag/fasent
DeleteAs for neue deutsche Rechtschreibung, some of that stuff has already been turned back to what it used to be, while some of it will remain. It took me a while to get used to it, and now it's all about gender-gerechte Schreibweise, which does not make things easier (or any text more legible).
I am sure that most women's knees would turn to jelly of they encountered you in your costume. It is a very sexy look. Have you ever considered gender change? You will need to start talking in a deep, gruff voice, laughing at dirty jokes and following football much more closely.
ReplyDeleteSorry - "if they" - not "of they". You will also need to learn how to scratch and burp properly.
DeleteThat look may be sexy, but with that beard all I can do is mumble - I can't eat or drink, and the fuzzy stuff gets in my mouth. It is very hot and sticky under both the wig and the beard, and so I am not going to make a career of this.
DeleteBy the way, I laugh at dirty jokes already, and if I really put myself into it, I can burp quite impressively!
I love the skies you show on your walk. It always lifts my spirits to see clouds of all colours against the blue sky like that. I had forgotten about goulash soup. I must see if I can find a recipe. My mother used to make it sometimes. (I don't think she ever wrote the recipe in her book though, but I'll check to make sure.)
ReplyDeleteO.K. and I are both "sky fans" - we send each other pictures throughout the week of beautiful skies we see during walks or even just from the office or kitchen window.
DeleteI make goulash several times a year for O.K. and myself, but usually not as a soup; we eat it "thicker", with Spätzle or spuds.
What a nice walk and I love the beautiful blue skies. You have a great costume! It sounds like fun walking around the village during the carnival.
ReplyDeleteThose blue skies do so much for our wellbeing, don't they! The Sunday was fun; I enjoyed people not recognising me and then their reactions when they did :-)
DeleteI don't think your partner sports a beard but I have been looking online at famous people whose initials are O.K.
ReplyDeleteIt is quite a list.
I narrowed it down to ...
Oliver Kalkofe, German actor.
Oliver Koletzki, German DJ.
Otto Kuntze, German botanist.
Otto Kiep, German diplomat and politician.
Oliver Kragl, German footballer.
Oscar Klein, Swedish physicist.
He can't be Oliver Kline the Glasgow bookmaker, can he?
If he is then Ollie owes me £568 from a Yankee bet back in 1971, and that's without interest.
Jack
When your Ollie made that bet with you in 1971, my O.K. was only 4 years old. That would have been a very early start for a bookmaker. You may have to track down the man in a different place than my blog, if you ever want to see your money.
DeleteAnd he is definitely not famous enough (nor does he aspire to fame) to appear on that list. Also, he does not sport a beard.
Can I really trust a lady who walks around the Black Forest in a faux beard, and who may be undercover BND (Bundesnachrichtendienst) or German Intelligence?
DeleteI thought of consulting Tasker, a devil-ishly clever boffin who plays at Air Traffic Control in his sleep, but there is a rumour he is not even called Tasker.
Are any of you in Internet Land who you say you are?
As for Ollie Kline, I have been searching for that rogue bookie these last 50 years.
I am like Dr. Richard Kimble, looking for the One-Armed Man, who was last seen in Chicago Heights.
Richard Kimble (Davis Janssen) was a man falsely accused of murdering his wife, the hero of my favourite television drama of the 1960s, The Fugitive.
The man who calls himself Tasker may one day write a post on The Fugitive.
It was the Golden Age of black and white television ...
Wanted Fugitive: Dr. Richard Kimble.
DeleteYouTube.
My other favourite show was The Twilight Zone, from an age when occult conspiracy theories were only just catching on.
The Twilight Zone was introduced by Rod Serling, a brilliant chain-smoking writer who could have been the brother of Peter Falk.
Rod Serling had his own demons, as a former paratrooper in the Pacific in WWII.
Like Tasker I watched a lot of television as a boy, mostly American.
As for your question, Are any of you in Internet Land who you say you are?, are YOU who you say you are? Starting from your first name, is it Jack or John, or both? (Please don't tell me we should start calling you JJ now!)
DeleteUnlike you and Tasker, I did not watch all that much TV as a kid. There were only 3 channels here, and Children's Hour really was that - about an hour's worth of shows aimed at kids. When the weather was good and we were playing outside, we would not go in just to watch TV. It was different on rainy days.
I was christened John, and called Jack, after my mother's younger brother, Jack Hamilton, who drove a black taxi-cab, and could sing Puccini in Italian, a bel canto tenor.
DeleteI can't sing but I love singers from Billie Holiday to Elvis:
I have been listening to Sissel, Like An Angel Passing Through My Room (YouTube).
A song written by two members of Abba, the band you admired.
We did not have television until I was four: I remember a Western on Monday nights, Wagon Train, starring Ward Bond, a pal of John Ford.
My father liked Panorama, a Monday evening current affairs programme, described as The Window on the World. I can still hum the theme tune of both shows.
I was baptised in St. Simon's R.C. Church, just down the road from where I now live.
The church was burned down last year.
The police have charged a young man with arson, one Ryan Haggerty.
No relation.
Uncle Jack affected to dislike popular singers of his day (he was born in 1929).
One of the few pop singers he admired was Robert Goulet, to whom Jack bore a striking resemblance, even down to the moustache.
Goulet was born in a mill-town in Massachusetts in 1933, to French Canadian parents.
A baritone, he never got the film breaks, and could not even get on Vegas in his last years. He has a great recording of *If I Loved You* from Carousel, and a lovely song, *
Also: *Robert Goulet-Playboy After Dark - Here's That Rainy Day and Real Live Girl.* YouTube.
YouTube.
You can also hear him, near the end of his life:
*Robert Goulet & Paige O'Hara - You Don't Bring Me Flowers/ I Won't Send Roses.*
A duet, with each singer singing a different song, is hard to pull off.
Uncle Jack, who has been dead these 30 years, revered Pavarotti, and introduced me to Fritz Wunderlich whom he rated as high as any tenor in history.
Robert Goulet *If I Loved You* in Carousel.
DeleteYouTube.
He was not in the films of Camelot and Man of La Mancha, though he did both on stage, the first on Broadway with Julie Andrews and Richard Burton..
Franco Nero was cast in Camelot and his singing voice was dubbed.
Peter O'Toole was cast in Man of La Mancha and he couldn't sing for toffee.
A YouTube singer I have just discovered is Bailey Rushlow.
She does 3 great Elton John compositions:
Your Song. Goodbye, Yellow Brick Road. Rocketman.
She also plays acoustic and digital piano.
Haggerty's comment made me smile. And your costume made me laugh!
ReplyDeleteIt made me smile, too. And can you believe that my own mother did not recognise me when I sent a picture of O.K. and myself to her and my sister on the Sunday? She recognised him instantly, but thought I was maybe someone of his family.
DeleteLovely scenic photos from your most recent walk. Your mini "Carnevale" sounded fun.
ReplyDeleteWe are walking each day now it's warmer, but mostly because of 'doctor's orders' due to Bob having a health scare last weekend and ending up in the hospital! We are also following a very low sodium eating plan, hard as it means even more cooking from scratch for me, and taking time to read the sodium count on every product I buy in the grocery! Some amounts are shocking and needless to say we came home loaded with a ton of fresh veggies and fruits from the last shopping trip!
Meanwhile life goes on and we are counting our blessings whilst praying hard for Ukraine and its people.
I wouldn't even know what sodium does in my body, and why it is in my food. You are much more aware of such matters than I have ever been, Mary, and I hope it makes a difference to your and Bob's health and wellbeing.
DeleteWalking is the best medicine, along with laughing and hugging, and I guess you can provide that for each other, too :-)
Lovely photos, as always. It is good to take familiar walks and be able to notice and appreciate the changes.
ReplyDeleteHow nice that people still made a bit of carnival fun. Hope you didn't scare the little children!
I believe the little children didn't even see my outfit as a costume - I was in normal clothes, wearing an unassuming pair of trousers and padded winter coat.
DeleteI remember how scared I was as a little kid of the witches and devils!