Unfettered

 This Friday was a company-wide day off not tied to any regular holiday. A perfect chance for me to explore somewhere a little further away and hopefully not have too many crowds. Back in the Bay Area I'd used previous company-wide day off (colloquially known as Sundar-days for the Alphabet CEO) to avoid crowds at the local disc golf courses so I decided to do the same here. The nearest 18 hole course to Munich is in Weilheim in Oberbayern  which is about a 40 minute train ride away. Buying tickets was straightforward since there is an english version of the Deutsche Bahn website and an App for E-tickets. I bought a single day regional ticket to get there and back but not tied to any specific train. Friday morning I checked the app and headed to track 29 which is on the northern addition of the train station. I arrived  early so the previous train had to depart before my train arrived. I was one of the first people on and took one of the seats with a table which included a map of t

 Once again the forecast called for rain so I decided to actually visit the Stadtmuseum. I was able to buy a ticket online though the website was unclear on what was actually open. I arrived and entered without a problem but it turned out only one wing was open which turned out to be another art exhibit,   World in Transition. From Otto Dix to August Sander – Art of the 1920s . The exhibit was interesting enough including some paintings of trains and factories which I enjoyed. No pictures allowed though and shorter english descriptions so I did not end up spending too much time there. The permanent exhibit I wanted to see " Typically Munich! " remains closed. This may turn into a 'Hungarian parliament' situation which long time readers will recall took me at least 3 tries to finally visit.  Since the weather was more unsettled than outright rainy I decided to take a look at inside the churches in the old town. There appeared to be an event around Peterskirche since on

 Once my time arrived I lined to enter the museum. I think my first European art Museum since I visited the Paris Musee D'Orsay in 2018. The main rotating exhibit was "UNDER THE OPEN SKY Traveling with Wassily Kandinsky and Gabriele Münter" . I ended up there first since the brochure I picked up turned out to not have a map so I followed the people who looked like they knew what they were doing. There was a line to get into the exhibit since they were limiting capacity in the wing to aid in social distancing. Inside, in addition to the art, every room had a refrigerator sized air disinfector so I felt reasonably safe. The exhibit itself was quite interesting and had placards in German and English. It turns out Kandinsky and I both appreciate mountains as you can see by comparing the pictures below. I also appreciated seeing the two artists takes on the same subject. This also happened to be landscapes which is something I'm fond of in general. I was glad I'd picke

 I found out the other week that my landlady periodically hires a cleaner for the apartment so we scheduled the first appointment for the weekend of March 13. In the interest of Covid safety and avoiding awkwardness I opted to be out of the apartment while it was being cleaned. I planned to take advantage of the newly reopened museums since the weather wasn't forecasted to be particularly nice. I decided on the Münchner Stadtmuseum (Munich city museum) since I figured it wouldn't be high on the list for locals. As far as I could tell from the website they required masks and recommended contactless payment.  I started out Saturday morning with a detour to a coffee and pastry shop called Chocolab which seems to have great SEO since their Google map pin seems to show up frequently. I had a coffee and a gooey fudge brownie. The brownie was decadent but I prefer the coffee from the cafe a few doors down from me.  Despite the detour I still arrived at the museum before it opened. Luc

At over a month in I've settled into a rhythm. Though my team is here in Munich I do still have meetings with folks in California so my working hours skew later, either 10-6 or 12-9. This does give me mornings for grocery shopping and exploratory walks. Weekends are naturally more exciting when I can explore a little further afield.  Two weekends ago now, I struck out East to Ostpark which has another hill where the Alps are supposedly visible. It was cloudy when I went so here's my trusty bike again.  I took the long way back home through Landschaftspark Hachinger Tal which ended up being the highlight of the ride. Its a park built on an old airfield with the main runway still intact and free to bike along. There were plenty of people out, bikers, rollerbladers, skateboarders, cross country skaters, and in the field next to the runway kite buggying. It reminded me a bit of Alameda due to the old airfield buildings. Crossing the Isar near my apartment I caught one of the trams

 Inspired by a local restaurant I attempted to make Kartoffelknödel (potato dumplings) and Apfelblaukraut (red cabbage) for dinner last week . The red cabbage was fairly simple and one head makes plenty of leftovers. The potatoes were a bit more work since they needed to be cooked, mashed, formed and then steamed. They tasted good but the texture wasn't the same as those served by the restaurant. I may have picked the wrong type of potatoes or maybe my impatience (and lack of tools) during the mashing step did me in. I cooked some vegetarian sausages as my protein since I don't eat much meat these days. The plate looks authentic and tasted good too. Though I had to buy them online, I now have sufficient food storage containers that I can cook dinner twice a week and eat leftovers the rest of the time. I've been slowly sampling the local restaurants as well, mostly on weekends. Since Germany is known for their bread I've been having sandwiches for lunch. I started out wi