plantzen

Last Thursday, I left work a little after noon since all the competitions had been packed and submitted. L had actually given me instructions to have the interns in the competition room clean things up and clean up the files, and if they got all that done, that they could leave at four.

I ducked downstairs and delivered the tasks. Except I told them that they could leave as soon as the tasks were done. Seriously, they had been given about 30 minutes of work and four hours to kill. Plus, we had all put in some serious hours this week already.

After work, I stopped by a middle eastern market and bought harissa paste and some flatbread and chickpeas to try out a new recipe for lamb couscous. I was surprised to find Saori already home when I got there at three.

She had just been having a really off day at work, so decided to take the rest of the day off. We were also both really tired so we did some German homework in preparation for our class, and then took a nap before heading back to the city center for class.

Friday we were both feeling much better, and invited our friend Apo to dinner after work. I made a huge mess making dinner. Harissa is my new favorite condiment. Used widely in north African cooking, especially Tunisa and Morocco. It's an oily paste made from  roasted peppers and chiles and garlic, and an assortment of other herbs and spices. I used it as a rub on the lamb, and its pretty wonderful. It's an oily orange mess though, which stains everything it touches. The recipe turned out to be Saori's new favorite.

Saturday, we went downtown and shopped around for a few more things for the apartment. At design store Magazin, we bought a small trash bin for the kitchen wet trash since we separate out paper, bottles, and plastic. We are plagued by tiny fruit flies here, so we have to be scrupulous about keeping things clean.

Apo picked us up outside the hauptbahnhof in a black mini cooper, his new company car. It was a spectacularly beautiful day, warm, sunny, and I was the only person out wearing shorts. We fought hellacious traffic out of the city to a cluster of big box stores in the suburbs. Actually, these were better than big boxes- the Pflanzen Kölle store was actually a series of giant greenhouses.

Saori has been obsessed with plants lately. It started with her 30th birthday, when one of her coworkers gave her a tiny fig tree plant. Then when I arrived and started talking about getting some orchids, she got really excited and we bought a few from Ikea. Then she got started on succulents, and just got totally hooked. She can spend hours just looking at the plants, and reading about them. The only trick is living in the city, the selection is limited, and expensive. So Apo, who is also very into plants, offered to take us out to the giant plant store.

We splurged a fair amount, for a plant store. We bought many many cheap cacti and succulents, I bought a bird feeder and seed, and also some pots and soils. Now we have a much greener house.