Random boredom

So, I'm in Altenberg Germany for the upcoming European Cup races this coming weekend. Note that Altenberg is in the former East Germany portion of the country, and hasn't quite come to grips with the new century. It's lovely, and if I could speak more German it might be better, but......

When my teammates warned me to bring lots of stuff to do since there was nothing to do in Altenberg, I thought they were exaggerating. They weren't. The town is tiny, with literally one cafe type place, one small grocery store, several hotels, and the local residents. That's it. We weren't even supposed to have internet, so I warned everyone back home that they wouldn't hear from me; miraculously we ended up in the only hotel that has internet! A recent discovery, and now this one will be the most popular as a result I'm sure.

Don't misunderstand - you ALL know that I love to get the local culture and learn languages and experience a new place. To that end, I bought a German program and spent the month before coming here listening to CDs in my car, but you can only learn so much. Especially between school and sliding and work, the only time for me to learn was literally in my car!

I've been practicing my 50-100 (maybe less) German words with the hotel staff but don't have enough to really "experience" much in a place where no English is spoken. I'm working on the German some more, and practicing with the staff. I asked for 2 more pillows earlier, success!

Anyway, that being said, I'm a little bored (though I do have a little work to do, and one final essay for school), so I've decided to start posting random pics, and maybe posting some stories from Alaska and my childhood growing up in the wilderness. What do you think? Ok, so I don't have the required traffic amounts to really "poll the readers." So, if anyone is looking, be prepared!