Damn, we have a…
in our
mouse drawn by mr. n., house by missy c. 
Weather chaos on Valentine’s Day
The weather is totally weird here in New Mexico. When you think it is already spring and sometimes as warm as it could be summer (remember my sunburn), then the weather forecast reports about a huge snowstorm and you do not want to believe it.
Well, the forecast was right and we got a lot of snow, right on Valentine’s Day.
Valentine’s Day, either you love it or you hate it. Mr. N. and I owe it to chance that this day always is our half-year anniversary. This year we had our two and a half year anniversary. Wow…time flies by fast.
N. had a day off and we wanted to do something; go on a trip. When I looked out of the window in the morning it looked like this:
It snowed a little bit, but it did not look like the snow will stay long.
Although it was not recommended to drive on the roads that day, we gave it a try and packed a sleeping bag and warm clothes in the case that we get stuck in the snow. ;o)
We drove on the so called “Turquoise Trail”, one of many trails south of Santa Fe. After half an hour we thought, well, we cannot see much, because it is so foggy because of the snow storm. “Nice” car drive through a white-grey landscape where you could not even see the mountains any more. Too sad. We had a good time though. I will post some of the photos soon when I have more time.
The weather climate changed immense on our journey. While we had only a little bit of snow in the beginning of the trip, it snowed heavily later. The roads got worse and we were happy that our car still has the snow tires on.
At home we relaxed a little while and afterwards we drove into town (Santa Fe) to eat dinner at our favorite sushi place, the Kohami. It snowed very bad on the way. It was an exhausting drive, because N. could not see much, but we could make it in time (did not lose our reservations).
Because of Valentine’s Day they had many guests, the favorite tables had been taken, but by chance our favorite table became free when we arrived. The former guests just left. Lucky us.
We ordered our favorite sushi and waited. After about 20 minutes the waitress brought us a Miso soup for free. We didn’t know why, but we guessed because we waited a little bit longer until the food came. It was not long, in my opinion. I mean, it was their second most busiest day of the year and I can understand that they have more guests than on normal days…but we were happy with the soup. Yummy. In the end we payed less than we expected. Again we thought they might have taken stuff off the bill, because of our waiting for the food. The staff at Kohnami is very nice and very friendly. We love that place.
Happy and full we went home. It did not snow that much anymore. Good. But we saw at least five accidents on the way back and police car lights everywhere. New Mexicans do not know how to drive, was N.’s conclusion. I have not seen that many accidents on one day before. Ok, it snowed a lot, but the roads weren’t icy. They just had a layer of snow. If you don’t brake hard, you don’t slide. If you leave enough space to your front man you don’t slide into him. N. said it is much better to drive on fresh snow than later when it becomes flat and icy.
A long part of the interstate, which goes to our home, had been closed because of the snow storm (or because of all these accidents).
We were on a slow road next to the interstate and then, since the interstate was closed, we had all these crazy drivers in front of us. I wondered how less distance they leave to their front man. No wonder, why they crash easily into each other. Weird NM drivers. They live in the mountains and should know how to drive on snow.
Well, at least we arrived safely at home.
I did not want to believe it, when N. on the following morning said, “it snowed a lot last night, hon”. He heard a loud “oh noooooo” from me. What I then saw, was this:
We got the same amount of snow that we had with the last snow storm. It is so weird. A few days ago I got a bad sunburn while sitting outside, and now all this snow again. It is too early to put the winter clothes away…too early.
Hope you had a good Valentine’s Day.
Hannah, thank you very much for the nice e-card!
Blog Update and new feed address
Yesterday I updated my blog to the new wordpress version 2.1. It took me a few hours, because I had to secure all my files and my blog database and with our slow modem connection it takes very long to down- and upload files. I am glad that my blog works with the new version. All my plugins work as well. Yeah! I only had trouble with my coppermine plugin. Though I could find a very helpful tip in the wordpress forum (thanks to Tarmo from pekola.net). I just love the wordpress community!
I do not know who of my readers subscribed via rss feed (there are only a few according to my feed-service feedburner), but please check my feed address(es), because it will change probably today!! Sorry for that!
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Ich habe mein Blog gestern auf die neue WordPress Version 2.1 upgedated. Es hat ein paar Stuendchen gedauert, bis ich alle Dateien und die Datenbank gesichert hatte, da unsere Modem Verbindung einfach zu lahm ist (wie schon mal erwaehnt 44k). Aber ich bin froh, dass mein blog ohne Fehler laeuft und ebenso alle plugins. Nur mit meinem Galerie plugin hatte ich Probleme, aber in der tollen WordPress community habe ich ziemlich schnell einen Hinweis von Tarmo gefunden, wie man die Galerie wieder zum funktionieren bringt.
Ich weiß nicht, wer von meinen Lesern meinen blog per rss feed abonniert hat (mein feed Dienstleister feedburner sagt es sind ein paar), also wer sich angesprochen fuehlt, moege bitte die neue(n) feed Adresse(n) anpassen, die wahrscheinlich heute noch geaendert wird!! T’schuldigung fuer die Umstaende, muss aber sein.
• Blog ♥ 0 comments »Health issues
I was 16 and went with my best friend A. to Rendsburg (a small town near my home town in Germany) to get my belly button pierced.
My friend wanted to get a piercing through her tongue. We both were a little bit nervous because back at that time (it was 13 years ago), the whole thing with piercings was quite new in Germany and there weren’t many professional studios who offered this modern stuff.
A. and I arrived at the address and looked up into the sky. We stood in front an ugly sky scraper in a very poor looking neighborhood. It made us feel uncomfortable, but now that we are here, we want to do it. We opened the front door and went inside the house into a small hallway. There weren’t stairs, only an old and not really reliable looking elevator. We looked at each other, both frightened. We tried not to touch the dirty and stinky elevator too much, hopped in, pressed the button for the floor that we needed to go to, and waited for our journey to death…or better journey to the piercing experience. I don’t know how, but we made it. The piercing guy opened his door and we went inside. A lot of different smells reached our fine noses. This was not a piercing studio, it was just the living room of a weird guy. Weird, because he had two or three very fat long-hair cats, his flat looked kind of messy and anyway this place looked dirty. I doubted that this was a good idea to come here. The guy was friendly and told us how he would do it and gave us a few thick photo albums that showed his work. It showed people who pose with their new piercing or tattoo. A lot of these people were (half-)naked. Either man or woman, we could see all kinds of external sex organs with sometimes so many piercings that there was no skin left ‘free’. To look at these photos didn’t give me a better feeling. I didn’t know what to think about the piercing guy. I hoped that it would be enough only to life my shirt a little bit to get my belly button pierced. A. was first. I saw how the piercing guy put on latex gloves, started to do preparing antiseptic things, pushed one of his cats between his legs away (with the gloves! yummy..)…and finally my friend A. had a piercing through the tongue. Then it was my turn. He sprayed ice-spray on my belly to make it numb. The pain of the ice-spray was worse than the actual pierce. All done.
That is all I can remember from that day, when we got our first (any my only) piercing. I never had any infections with it (although the whole process in that dirty environment was weird). I never took my piercing out, not even when doctors wanted me to (e.g. when my knee was x-rayed).
Last week Mr. N. went to an acupuncture appointment in town. I accompanied him. The “acuboy” (as I call the acupuncture guy here) was very friendly and explained his work procedure to me. Why he uses the different needles and what happens when he does this or that. Very interesting. I always wanted to know more about acupuncture and have never seen it ‘live’. After a long talk about health issues and Chinese medicine I asked him what he thinks about metal in a body, like piercings. He said that there are different theories and one is that, especially with belly button piercings, it blocks the ‘chi’ flowing in one’s body. Hmmm.
I thought that I have a lot of health issues since…yes, since I am 17/18 years old. That was when I got hay fever and one by one all my other allergies. This was the first time I thought about a relation to my piercing with these allergies. I never took it out for a longer time so how shall I know? The talk to the acuboy influenced me quite a bit. I removed my piercing in the morning of the day when I got my sunburn. Now I have a quite large hole in my skin. 
It looks weird…without it. I lived so long with it that I think my belly looks totally different now. But it is maybe only my view. N. (always diplomatic) said I look fine with or without it. He likes Cola belly. ;o)
If you go back to the post called ‘Die Sonne brennt’, you can see my belly without the piercing. It is not the best belly picture (and don’t look in my face!), but you can see the hole. Sigh. I didn’t ever think about removing it before I will be pregnant and it grows out or so.
Well, I will see, if I feel better without metal in my skin. Anyway, belly button piercings only look good in a well-trained, strong, and muscular belly… 
I think, nowadays, it is cool to not have a belly button piercing. Yeah! Back to the roots, back to nature, back to a plain beautifulness of a body…whatsoever I already convinced myself.
Discovering the environment
What a perfect day to go fo a hike!
The weather is getting nicer and we spend more time outside. In the last two weeks we went for a few hikes in the near mountains and environment of Santa Fe (Bandelier National Monument, Bear Canyon, Tsankawi pueblo, and another one that I don’t know the name).
For those, who haven’t seen the pictures in my gallery yet, I will post some from the Bear Canyon trip now.
The Bear Canyon hike was the adventurous one, because we walked behind the maintained paths into the wildness. Wildness means one only had a 30 centimeters wide path to walk on and if stepped too much left or right, one sinked down into the deep snow (up to knee deep). It also means that, if you walk beyond the maintained paths, that you hike on your own risk. Yeah, we like adventures like these, so we didn’t even think about stopping.
Here a photo of one of the paths through the forest:
You can’t see it very well, but the snow beside the path was very deep.
In real life my Mr. N. is a monkey because he climbs on everything that you can climb on. When he means hiking, he rather means climbing. So we climbed up a little mountain (little? fo me it was huge) that had such a steep gradient, nobody would have the idea to “hike” it up. We did. Half way up the mountain we enjoyed the first great view over the area.
On this picture you can see the gradient a little bit (was very exhausting for Cola with bad stamina):
and enjoying the warm sun beams
Mostly, we had to hike through very deep snow. Sometimes we found dry areas where the sun melted the snow. Good for a picnic. N. always, as monkeys do, climbed up very fast, and Cola had to keep up with him as good as possible…pant (hechel)…I was very dizzy and out of breath most of the time. Yes, I am honest.
Here our picnic place on the mountain (N. build a chair for us to sit on):
(look at his pants, how soaked they are *g*) and our view
N. wanted to hike..eh climb up to the top and every ten minutes he said “we’re almost there, hon”…I didn’t want to give up, so I followed him.
He promised that we will have a much better view from the very top of the mountain, but unfortunately the trees in front of us were too high to see much more than before…well, at least we (I) made it to the top.
I was more scared to hike the whole way down because of the gradient and the slippery snow. This time N. was right as he said that I should slide down; it would be much faster and easier as well. Sliiiide down? I thought he is joking. If you would have seen how deep and steep it went down, you probably would have waited for helicopter help or something.
No, it was not bad. Actually it was totally fun! The snow held me well in my slide tracks and I only had to watch out for hidden stones or stuff that would let me trip over. This is how it looked like, when I slid down with tremendous speed (unfortunately the photo cannot show my speed) ;o) :
My shoes and pants were totally soaked with snow and ice, but I didn’t have cold feet the whole time. Good winter boots. I love them.
When we hiked back the sun already started to go down and it was chili. I was glad that we found out of the forest :). When we looked back
we were proud of our adventurous hike. (On the picture I marked the mountain we hiked up)
N. could not feel his toes anymore and he had ice-cold snow water in his boots, but in the end we felt great after that day. Excluded: my muscle ache that I got later…
Phone terror
…or how your credit fades without even talking to people on your phone. Grrr…I just got another of these ad calls…I saw the 800 number (another state) and interrupted the call by pressing my hang-up button. Then I heard a beep (alarm), which means I have a new voice mail. Weird. I was not sure, if a marketing company would even leave a voice mail. Most of the calls are made by computers and you listen to recorded voices. Very nice, that you cannot even interact with the person. Maybe it is better for them, because I can easily be furious about such things. For instance, I could do something with their number 800-742-6390, but it probably is just a fake number, too.
Out of curiosity I checked it and…GRRR, yes, it was “them”. Damn. This reminded me on the tip from Hannah, to register my phone on donotcall.gov. Yesterday the site was down, but today I can register. It only took a few minutes and I only needed to provide my email address for activating the service. It said that companies should stop calling me in the next 31 days. For the next five years, until 2012, my phone number is on the do-not-call-list. I hope this works. I will see and report.
Die Sonne brennt
Heute war ich mal ganz faul und habe mich den ganzen Tag von der inzwischen sehr heißen Sonne wärmen und regelrecht toasten lassen. Eigentlich sitze ich noch immer draussen. Es ist gleich halb vier. Es ist so heiß, dass ich mich immer mehr entblättert habe und schließlich nur noch in N.’s shorts (ich habe ja bedauerlicherweise keine kurzen Hosen oder Röcke eingepackt) und BH da sitze. Immer noch zu heiß. Mir läuft die Suppe nur so am Rücken runter. Schon komisch, dass zwei Meter neben mir immer noch Schnee an der Hauswand liegt. Inzwischen habe wieder Jeans und T-Shirt an, aber es sind bestimmt 30 Grad in der Sonne. Mr. N. meint zwar, es seien nur knapp 20, und sagt mir gerade, dass ich total rot an den Armen und im Dekolletee bin. Sonnenbrand. Im Februar. Hatte ich auch noch nie. Leider habe ich auch nicht daran gedacht, Sonnencreme von Deutschland aus mitzubringen. Wozu auch, denn N. meinte ja, es sei bitterkalt und ich solle primär warme Sachen einpacken. Tja, nun habe ich einen Überschuss an Wollsocken und Fleecepullovern und sitze im BH draussen und schwitze immer noch. Verkehrte Welt, denn es ist hier noch immer Winter! Nachts ist es auch immer noch recht kalt. Wüste halt. Ich möchte vielleicht doch nicht wissen, wie heiß es hier im Sommer wird, wenn die Sonne jetzt schon so brennt.
Nun sitze ich drinnen, da mein Internetkabel nicht bis zu einem schattigen Plätzchen draussen reicht ;-). Und wie ich leider feststellen muss, hatte N. doch mal wieder recht, meine Arme sind krebsrot. Schöne Sch…. Dabei bin ich doch sonst immer so vorsichtig mit der Sonne. Allerdings habe ich dann auch Sonnencreme mit mindestens Schutzfaktor 15. Nun, eigentlich wollte ich meiner allergiegeplagten Haut nur etwas Gutes tun (Sonne hilft ungemein). Da habe ich die neumexikanische Sonne wohl total unterschätzt. Bald sehe ich dann wohl so aus:
For now I look more like this…Aua-Arm und mit klasse 1A schlauem Blick und rotem Bäuchlein.
Nachtrag um 20Uhr: Habe mich gerade nackt im Spiegel gesehen und kann nur sagen, die Bilder zeigen den Sonnenbrand nicht richtig oder er ist um einiges stärker geworden. Ich sehe sehr schlimm aus. N. ist die Kinnlade heruntergefallen und er bemitleidet mich sehr. Oberarme, Dekolletee schön in Herzform (T-Shirt-Ausschnitt) und Bauch total verbrannt. Achja, und der Hals auch noch. Gesicht ist komischerweise ok. Ich erspare euch weitere Fotos. Ich hoffe, ich kann einigermaßen schlafen nachher. Jetzt wird erstmal diniert…es gibt Reis mit schwarzen Bohnen und Squash mit Salad und kleinen Aufbackbrötchen.
Eure Hummer-Cola.
Nachtrag am nächsten Tag, morgens: Erster Gedanke beim Aufwachen: ich habe mir nur mein Gesicht gestern nicht verbrannt, weil ich Make-up mit Schutzfaktor 15 aufm Gesicht hatte. Ganz vergessen. Hat prima geschützt also. Toll. Werde mich trotzdem nach Sonnencreme umschauen, da ich nicht täglich make-up trage(n will).
Feb 8, 2007 • Deutsch & USA & Visuelles ♥ 1 comment »America is fun
A few days ago we went for an afternoon hike to a beautiful park, where 700 years ago the Pueblo people (called Tsankawi) lived in small cave rooms. At the entrance, the following map explained the hiking area.
Look at the items that are not allowed during the hike.
No comment. Welcome to America.
Who is kidding me…ehm…killing me?
Cola’s new (blog) planet
ENGLISH:
As you may have seen, the poll for my new blog’s name is finished. Although I couldn’t get a clear result from the poll, because it was tie (5:5), I now decided for my personal favorite: Planet Cola. In my opinion it sounds better, and since N. said that ‘MissyCola’ sounds like a place where you bring your dog for beauty aspects, I think Planet Cola fits better as my blog’s name. I also love it that it has ‘PC’ and ‘net’ in it…what a surprise :))).
Happy new blog name!!!
Please change it in your links on your websites/blogs.
P.S.: The picture has been taken in Australia, it is (was) a German supermarket sign that I modified.
GERMAN:
Wie ihr ja vielleicht schon festgestellt habt, ist meine Umfrage zu meinem neuen blog Namen vorbei. Es gab leider kein klares Ergebnis. Die Umfrage endete in einem 5:5. Ich habe mich letztendlich für meinen persoenlichen Favoriten entschieden: Planet Cola. Meiner Meinung nach klingt der Name besser und seit N. meinte, das ‘MissyCola’ nach einem Ort klingt, wo Frauchen ihr Hundchen zur Beautypflege hingibt, denke ich, das ‘Planet Cola’ als blog Name einfach besser passt. Außerdem, wie ja schon mal erwaehnt, sind die Worte PC und net in meinem neuen blog Namen…was ein Zufall. 
Bitte aendert den Namen in den Links auf euren Webseiten/Blogs.
P.S.: Das Bild entstand in Australien und wurde etwas abgeaendert. Grins.
Feb 6, 2007 • Blog & Well-informed ♥ 1 comment »My new US cell phone
Yeah…..I finally have my US mobile phone! A new phone…and weird things happen. First, it surprised me that I have to pay for incoming calls, even for incoming sms! At the moment, I pay 33 cents per Minute for incoming calls and 5 cents per incoming sms. I have a $10 prepaid card that I got for free with the phone. Another free add-on that came with the phone was further $25 credit. With this credit I have better rates…”only” 19 cents per minute and also 5 cents per sms. However, I paid $32 for a very nice Nokia phone (I love Nokia) and with it came a headset, a charger and $35 credit. If I calculated it right, the phone was for free.
I gave my phone number only to my family and my best friend A. yet, so if it rings it must be them or my Mr. N.. The second day with my new phone and it rang! Yippie…it is for me it is for me, I thought. I answered the phone and a guy said he just dialed the wrong number. Grrrr… and I payed for the few seconds of the call 33 cents. Today, Mr. N. and I went for a walk in the late afternoon sun and then it happened again. My phone rang. Yippie…but wait a second, first I check the number of the calling person. It was from 949-something. N. said, it is your dad. I disagreed, but he said in a hurry ‘answer the phone, it is your dad!…’. I finally answered the phone and a recorded voice wanted to advertise something to me…nice…these marketing companies already have my number? T-mobile already sold my number to them, or what?? Double-triple-grrr…. Two minutes further on our nice walk in the warm sun, my phone rang again…it said only ‘call’ on my display, which means private (or not known) number. I didn’t answer the phone this time. I thought it was the same company, this time suppressing their phone number. Hehe, not with me…
A few seconds later my phone made a sound that I got a message on my voicemail. My voicemail? I didn’t even know that I have it. I didn’t set it up yet?! I don’t want a voicemail. Well, now I want to know how it was, maybe my dad? After $2 less on my card and listen to a lot of talk of my voicemail-help-automatic-voice-person I had my voicemail set up. It finally let me listen to the voicemail message I got. It was my dad.
Now, every time when a marketing company or someone who called the wrong number, calls me, I have to pay for the call. That really upsets me.
N. said that phone numbers are not protected and companies sell them, maybe t-mobile already did. Nice. Would not be too bad, if I do not have to pay for receiving a call. :/
It is hard to tell, if I know the calling person, because my dad’s number was in my phone book, but his call still showed him without displaying any number. Too bad. Anyway, I am happy to have a new phone and at least I didn’t pay anything for it. It was a good deal and it is nice and small, with color display and finally a hand-free headset that I wanted to have for my German mobile for so long…
Yours happy and also irritated Cola.
Feb 5, 2007 • English & USA & Visuelles ♥ 5 comments »