Ack! Too Many Public Holidays This Month!

May is a month of public holidays in Germany, and this year, all of them have landed on weekdays, which basically means that we have at least three fewer working days.  I am certainly not complaining, but I am using it to explain my lack of posts the past couple of weeks.   Who am I to stand in the way of public holidays?  The number of days off came as a surprise to me years ago when I first moved here.  We had just started our repair operation, and two months after launch (when things were far from stable) we suddenly had a holiday each week.  That is thing:   When the calendar works right and the holidays fall on weekdays, it kind of throws you for a loop, albeit a good loop.

When the weather has cooperated, I have tried to take advantage of the extra days off by spending time outside.  Of course, everyone else is doing this too, so the cafes and pubs are pretty active.  Frankfurt have had sort of a bad footballing year, and within a matter of days, one of the teams has been relegated to the 3rd division (from the 2nd), and the team in the Bundesliga has to play a relegation playoff, and their form for most of the season has been poor and indifferent.  Thus, I am not expecting them to stay up.

Meanwhile, the English league finished with a bit of last minute drama.  I will refrain from making too many comments, because the pundits have really irritated me in recent months.  While I respect that Arsenal did not have a particularly good season, they still managed to come in a distant second place in the league.  Thanks again to the Geordies who did a number on Spurs on the final day of the season.  That made my month. 

In fact, as the match results were coming through, and despite my lower back pain (yep, i threw my back out about a week and half ago), I rushed over to the pub to celebrate with....erm, no one, really.  It was just another Sunday afternoon before a public holiday (Monday) where everyone was out and about enjoying the weather, eating ice cream, having a drink, and in my case, looking forward to a break from football, albeit we have only a  few short weeks until the Euros. 

This morning, my back is feeling quite a bit better, the weekend is almost here, and next week?  You guessed it.  We have another public holiday.

See you out there
bryan