Far East Cynic

Seems like I never left.

After a long plane ride-made longer by the fact the plane left Frankfurt two and one half hours late- I am back with the S.O. in the hellhole metropolis of Shopping Mall USA.

This was not a trip by choice-thanks to Alabama's ridiculous immigration laws, they would not let the S.O. renew needed paper work like her driver's license and other items by mail. She has to present her :presence" documents "in person."

Now why that had to involve me-is something I can't answer  My plan had been to put her on the plane over here-make sure she had a place to stay, and the cat and I would enjoy a well deserved respite from her nonsense. I thought it made perfect sense-especially since I can't afford on one plane ticket, much less two. ( And what plane tickets I can afford are for destinations far east of Germany-not West, this puts a hole in my timeline to get back to the promised land for a "me" trip).

But then she called my bluff-begging me to come along . She offered to pay for own ticket. I took the money from her-and made the arrangements to return to the place I really didn't want to come back to. Even if it is only for a short while. Part of her ongoing scheme to keep me from enjoying myself, I guess. Certainly the odds of her doing something to perk up my spirits are slim to none.  But she will make damn sure we hit the malls-of that I am quite sure. (Nobody rides for free!)

And I really hate the reason-and this is a great example of why these so called-"tough" immigration laws don't work. All they do is penalize legal residents of the US, which the S.O. is. She is a legal resident of the US and also of Germany now. However her German residency rests ( as does mine) on keeping all of our US paperwork in order.

It really pisses me off. Because of what I do-this woman has already been investigated by the federal government at least three times already. Her stuff is in order-she is an Alabama and US taxpayer for God's sake.

But still we have to be here.

I am going to use the opportunity to do some needed work on our house-and in so doing accomplish the checks needed to make the tenant happy and justify my "active management" of the property.

Shopping Mall looks pretty much the same as I left. Not much has changed-the flight in was the usual small Canadair nonsense. There is nothing remarkable about this town-there are literally hundreds like it.

Except for all the fat people.

That's the one thing that is pretty remarkable after a long stint out of the US-just how many really fat people there are here. Germany gets a bad rap for that-but I'll tell you, at least in Stuttgart, you don't see the number of big people that you see here. At least among the women.

So for a few days at least, I'll be in and out, up and down a step ladder, installing some needed additions. Hopefully it will save some money-and I won't kill myself.

And we are going to get some dental and other medical appointments done. So its not a total loss. We have a dentist in Germany-but this way the dentist will have to fight with my insurance company, not me.

As it should be.

  1. Happy Memorial Day!  Thanks for your service to our (freedom) country.

  2. I was visiting Greenfield Village in Dearborn, Mi today. I also noticed the very large percentage of people that range from fat to obese-some so heavy they could only get around on those scooters. Americans these days are a very unattractive nation of people.