R&R

Well, our crazy traveling slowed down a bit and now we're here in Vienna for about 3-4 weeks without leaving. Honestly, it's been fairly nice so far. We've been able to catch up on some of the museums and other things that we haven't seen yet here in this city. Honestly, there is waaay too much to do in Vienna. There are so many museums, concerts, operas, historic places and events that it's impossible to ever do them all. I have a calendar laid out with all the things I want to do before I leave and it's getting to the point where I have 1 or 2 things planned for just about every day! It doesn't help that the weather has turned cold and rainy/snowy lately, making all of us a lot less ambitious to go out and do things. Honestly, I'd just like you find a recliner and some hot chocolate and read some Philosophy.

Last week we went to a museum called Neue Berg. In it we walked through the musical instrument display and the armor and weapons exhibit. Amazing stuff! They had pianos from Beethoven and other famous composers, armor from the Turkish sieges of Vienna in the 1500s and more. There's a lot of history in this continent.

Yesterday we went to the "Lainzer Tiergarten". It is a large nature reserve on the outskirts of Vienna where they walled off a large area for woods and animals. We were able to see Fallow Deer, Mouflon and European Bison. Pretty nifty. The Fallow Deer were sort of like a small cross between a elk and a moose. There are also wild boar at the reserve but we didn't see any of those. I was horribly disappointed. I want wild boar, dangit!

I'm all signed up for my classes for winter and honestly, as much as I'm dreading leaving Europe, I'm pretty excited to get back to friends, family and school. Weird, eh? Somehow I desperately want to both stay here AND go back. Maybe I can figure out a way to do that in the next 3-4 weeks.

It's snowing today, the christmas lights are up, the chestnuts are openfirishly roasting away (smelling amazig, BTW) and the Christmas market opens tonight. Such excitement. You should see the girls in our program. They're about ready to wet themselves out of excitement. It's like they've never seen Christmas in Austria before. Silly.

I haven't played basketball in months. I realized the other day that this is probably the longest I've gone without basketball since I was 11 or 12. Pretty wild. I need to play soon. Not want, NEED. I've found a few Austrian guys who play and we have a tentative appointment to play next Saturday. Cross your fingers!

Anyhow, there's the boring old didn't-travel-all-over-the-world update. Ciao!