I talked to my daughter in Germany today and she told me wonderful news. They purchased a laptop and have arranged for DSL service. The bad news is the DSL won’t be hooked up for a couple of weeks, but at least she finally has a computer to use and won’t have to go to the library on base to use the PC. I will let everyone know when she starts posting in her blog. Fortunately I gave her a digital camera for Christmas (as did Soldier Boys parents) so I expect lots of pictures on her blog! (That’s more of a demand than an expectation, but who’s keeping score anyway).

The bad news Brooklyn told me was that her ring finger swelled up really bad. In fact it swelled up so bad that she had to go to the on-base doctor and he cut her wedding and engagement rings off. She doesn’t know why her finger swelled but she did find out that she has high blood pressure (at age 25?) and needs to cut out the caffeine. Welcome to the family curse Brooklyn.

In case you didn’t know, Schweinfurt (the city in Germany that my daughter lives in) mean town of pigs. By the way, thanks to the several people that emailed me to tell me that. It’s very fitting that she should be living in a city of pigs because G-man and I used to have our entire house decorated in pigs. Over the last couple of years we have boxed up many of our pigs during home improvement projects and never bothered to unbox them. But we still have a good number of pigs around our home. Back to my daughter though. She said that there was a pig festival in the city last weekend that she and Soldier Boy attended. I think that the G-man and I will have to arrange a trip next Spring to coincide with the pig festival of Schweinfurt. We hate missing a good pig festival.

While I was on the phone with her a bell started ringing in the background. She explained that it was the traveling butcher. A truck comes (I’m not sure how often) and parks on the street and rings it’s bell like an ice cream truck would. Then people go and tell him what cut they want and he cuts it fresh in the back of his truck. When I told the G-man about that he was so jealous. I could see visions of BBQ dancing in his head. Good grief, a man and his meat. *rolling eyes*