Big spender

After sleeping in on Saturday morning, doing not much and finally doing some homework for Sheffield, I decided that having 3 Euro in my pocket when I had plenty of money in the UK was silly, and the overseas withdrawal charge be damned. My bank appear to finally be showing it as a separate item, so at least I knew what it was.

I used the ever useful Google Maps to find local cash machines (Geldautomaten) but it only showed me some banks - ATM got others but also something completely different with the same acronym. I decided to look for 'bank' instead and found one just across the road from the U-bahn station. Being a Saturday afternoon it was of course closed, and there were no cash machines outside. Yet more ways in which Germany is like Japan.

(And there is a version of Japlish - such as the lingerie ad with the strapline 'Just feel like a volcano'.)

I gave up and headed into town, as I knew there were cash machines in external walls there. I used one that Z had used a few weeks ago, belonging to what seems to be the local co-op. There was the usual will-it-won't-it moment as it did its international authorisation voodoo, but then it made a soft but unmistakable cash-dispensing noise. Going from an empty wallet to a full one is a nice feeling - a bit like from an empty stomach to a full one.

Making my way to the main street (Zeil) I picked up a battery charger (which was 8 Euro when identical ones next to it were 10, result) with two high capacity Ni-MH batteries, some more socks (despite going back to the UK for more clothes, I seem to have left half my socks there) and finally to the Asian shop we'd found before, where I treated myself to a gorgeous green-glazed ramen bowl (the bowls I have are so shallow you can't even put a full can of soup in them), some udon and soba noodles and some miso as well as a pair of chopsticks. The idea of eating noodles without chopsticks is somehow deeply wrong.

I walked back to the Rewe supermarket near the flat, which despite being reasonably large manages not to have much of a selection. I got some supplies and some crisps and Quark with herbs for going to G's the next day and headed home. My wallet was 45 Euro lighter, but I was much happier.

Got back to doing my homework, didn't realise how long I'd been out and ended up finishing the unit (reading about methodological issues in historical research - in Japanese) at 1:30am. Lots of chatting to David in NY and watching videos of kittens and bunny rabbits from the internet did not help - what did people do before broadband...

So, slept in again today and did some more work and off to G's soon for fighting games and such nonsense.