In which the rain smells like Glühwein.

It's been a busy few months. Lots of adventures and wonderful visitors from afar, lots of rehearsals, lots of work. Lots of time spent baking instead of sorting through photos in the rare moments of free time at home, as the last thing I want to do after a long day at the office is look at a screen. Lots of pumpkin and chocolate-pumpkin pie, lots of cookies -- from ma's classic gingerbread (one of the best ways to introduce Germans to the rich, spicy flavor of molasses) to soft, almondy, meringuey, cinnamony Zimtsterne, to hilariously ridiculously delicious chocolate peppermint marshmallow cookies that, when brought to work, instigated emails from my colleagues with such subject lines as "OMGOMGOMG!" and "OH MEIN GOTT DIESE KEKSEEEEEE" (= omg these cookies). Lots of pumpkin spice truffles. Lots of recipes I have yet to try.

I spent more time than usual at the Christmas markets this year -- still not a lot, but more than usual. Here are some scenes from Hamburg during the longest nights of the year. 

Christmas was very quiet this year, spent in the company of a few fellow far-flungs, a brisk walk along the beach in Blankenese followed by a fab meal. Good food, good friends, damn good eggnog, a good deal of snoozing, and more downtime than I've had in weeks. Just the ticket.

One of my favorite people recently made the voyage all the way from San Francisco to Hamburg, and a couple days ago we took a little stroll in nearby Lüneburg, picturesque even on the rainiest, gloomiest of December days.

Speaking of picturesque, I spent 10 days hiking/exploring with friends in Ireland and Northern Ireland in November, and gahh, it was glorious. The weather was mostly miserable, but the hours spent wandering through those wild, remote landscapes were totally worth the Authentic Irish Headcold I had in the weeks that followed. Photos to come, sometime.

And snow? We've had a little. Just for a couple days, and just enough to make this ecstatic Minisnowmensch come to life. I'm hoping he'll make a comeback in 2018.

 

In which spring is sunny and sweet.

It's legit: spring has sprung, and as like every year, the city is psyched. Amazing how quickly we forget the joy of springtime once summer rolls around, and how fresh and pure the excitement is once the sun returns after half a year of drizzly darkness. Here in Hamburg, we had some especially beautiful days towards the end of March, with t-shirt temperatures and enough sunlight to make sunscreen a permanent fixture in my bag again. The trees are popping pink and white around the Alster, and the daffodils are out in force on the southeast shore of the lake, attracting both ducklings and tourists with selfie sticks. (Well, the tourists have the selfie sticks, not the ducklings.) Walking downtown on one particularly beautiful Friday evening, every conversation I overheard in passing went something like: "I can't believe how beautiful it is!", "It's so warm!", "The warmest March on record!", "This is awesome!", or "Herrlich, herrlich" or "Einfach wunderschön!" or "Träumchen!" or "boa digga scheiß digga voll GEIL ää". Everyone was so, so happy. And then it got cold and I got a cold and the sky started dripping and so did my nose and I had to wear a thick coat and hat and gloves to the grocery store yesterday and you know what? That's okay. Remember when it was so beautiful?

Like a couple weeks ago when a friend and I went for a walk along the Elbe west of the city. It was still too early for greenery, but budding branches were bracing themselves to bust.

Each morning I head to a part of town that is known for its architecture but not exactly for its aesthetic appeal, and walk along the U-Bahn tracks from the station to my work. The short walk doesn't usually have much to offer, except for now, when the trees throw a party and the path from A to B morphs into a fairytale landscape gone photo studio for bridal magazines. Especially in these last sunny days, time slows down as you tiptoe under the branches, the air all a-flutter of floating, flip-flopping pink petals catching in the sunlight as they dance their way down to the confetti fields.

Last weekend, a friend and I left Hamburg and ended up going on a glorious 25km excursion along the coast of the Baltic Sea. Truly a splendid adventure. And so many splendid dogs.

And while we're on the topic of sweetness and light, I've been on a bit of a truffle fix lately. Discovering how simple (albeit time-consuming) it is to make very impressive, professional-looking truffles has lead to many a late night in the kitchen listening to podcasts and bending over a bain-marie of smooth, melted chocolate. White chocolate ganache with lemon, raspberry and ginger, adorable s'moreables, and deeply raspberry chocolate. And dark chocolate peanut butter cups. And less truffley rolled barley pudding with orange syrup and tahini, and caramel apple pecan blondies, and megabrownies stuffed with caramel and nuts and marshmallows. And chocolate banana pancakes. Because a lot of my friends decided to have birthdays in the last few weeks. And also, why not?