27 Mai - Fuzzy

What is up with the fizzy water here?  OK, fine, Germans don't drink tap water and they don't have drinking fountains, but why add CO2 to the water?  What purpose does that serve except not being able to drink as much at once?  Are they worried about hypertremia?   I shook the bottle and everything and it didn't make bubbles, but after I had already bought it and opened it, it most definitely did have bubbles.  I don't think it's terrible (although Skylar hates it) but I just want water without fuzz, is that too much to ask. 

It was kind of chilly today... the rain yesterday must have broken the heat.  The weather here is strange; it can go from 85 and beautiful to 65 and storming and then back to beautiful again.  I like the cooler weather though.  

This afternoon, I met with Diana, Daniel, and the other students that are going to the Masters class to discuss traveling details, what to expect, and presentation requirements.  They were speaking English, but I am completely confused.  I need to do a 20 minute presentation on a paper, but I am still not clear if I am to work with the students here or those that are going from MN.  They gave us the papers and then it is up to us to decide who presents which.  Then there is also a presentation of the program (that they prepare?) and one person from each program presents that... hopefully it is not me.  Then as far as I could tell, we each present on some sort of project that we have completed as part of our studies.   I'll have to dig for that one from my 'projects' that I did early on.  That's  a lot of presenting... I've only hyperventilated once and that was a while ago.  I won't be traveling with the group there since I am leaving a couple days earlier to attend the Systems Management classes, but I will return with them.  The accommodations are being set up for both classes by someone at the University (?) and they are going to let me know how to make it work with Skylar so that I don't have to get my own much-too-pricey accommodations.  Although, if I did, I would look up that place I stayed in when I was there because it wasn't that bad for the 5 days... but still way more than I want to or can spend.  The train tickets are already going to cost about 300 euro for the both of us.  It turns out Nora's boyfriend is also going to the Systems class which for some reason makes me feel better even though I only met him very briefly once.  Diana emailed and he is going to check how they plan to travel there and if there is a possibility of traveling with them.  This is all I know about the whole thing.

This afternoon I met with Wendelin about my book progress and things seem to be coming along.  There are so many aspects of the German system so unlike any other system and so different than anything I am used to.  It has also evolved a great deal in just the past few years, especially in the disease management area, so facts I find are often outdated.  I have a bit of restructuring to do and rechecking the dates on many of my findings.  Then we meet again after the holiday (next week there are no classes) with hopes of tying it all together and delivering the product by the end of the next week.  

It's funny walking around with Diana or even sitting in my office and being around people having German conversations.  For instance when someone stops by for a minute to talk to Michael and I am there or when Diana meets someone in the hall as we are walking, they look at me like they are including me in the conversations, while I stand there with this blank look on my face.  They'll make jokes and laugh and look at me, like, why didn't she get it? but there isn't really need to explain that I don't speak German, so all I can think is that they think I am some sort of moron.  Oh well.