I can touch my knee without bending down

Today it was my turn to walk - or be walked by - Gero. That's his name, so if you ever show up at the shelter and they tell you, that you are taking Gero for a walk, make sure you have your running shoes on. He pulls so strongly, that my right arm is now significantly longer than my left arm. Otherwise he is a lovely fellow. Not interested in bikes or joggers, friendly to all other dogs. I would take him home with me, if I wasn't working full time. The boys have lived with a dog before, so I am sure they wouldn't mind.


It's cold in Germany. We walked for 2 hours and managed 10k. If you take off time to sniff and pee (the dog, not me), you can tell we didn't stroll.

Afterwards I went for the final run this year, another 10k, but in almost half the time. Next year "stats of the week" will be back (my only New Year's resolution).

Who's walking whom?

After one hour walking (or - depending on your point of view - being walked by) the Dalmatian, dad needed to lie down and sleep. Someone should tell that dog that now he is 12 years old his running days are over.

Who's place is this?

There are days, when I can print, but scanning is out of the question...


... they have made it clear, they do not want the blue jacket on a hanger...


... and I am not even thinking about using any of the furniture on the balcony...

Call me Hercules

I was buttering a Neujährchen (as far as I know, they are only called that in the Rhineland and you only get them around New Year)...

... when this happened...

Maybe I should stop working out in the gym?

And just because they looked so cute, I am posting more pictures of the boys:

Power Walkies!

Twice a day you can walk one of the dogs at our animal shelter. When the weather is fine, there is more than enough volunteers. This morning I was the only one there when they opened. And when I brought the dog back, I could see that only three more people had shown up. Guess what... it was raining. Raining hard. Cissies.

The dog I walked was not actually one of the shelter dogs, but one of the "holiday dogs". (When you go away and do not have anyone to look after your pet, it can stay at the shelter for a fee.) It doesn't matter to me; they all deserve to get out for a bit. This dog was about the size of my cats and had a grey muzzle. So I thought, I was in for a comfortable stroll through the forest. Instead she went straight into top gear and we power walked for two hours.

My legs are so tired tonight, I do not need to go for a run or any other sort of exercise.

Mountain goat

Today was a cold, but bright day with blue skies. Ideal weather for a long (1h 54min) run. Back in September I ran up a hill to look down into the valley below, but had forgotten my camera. Today I took it along.

It started harmlessly at creek and lake level:

Then I crawled up the hill in snail pace. And after each hill, there was another one. It doesn't look anywhere as steep as it felt like...

Back in the valley, I spotted this beautiful Mandarin duck:

Unfortunately, he and his mates were a bit camera-shy...

They have been digging holes into the road for ages now. This machine is new, though. The redish colour of the stone reminds me of my childhood. If we had no chalk we used to look for those stones, so we could draw hopscotch on the road.

Hey! My feet are cold, do something!

It's cold, so I have put the heating on...



(He stayed like this for an hour. His feet must have been very very cold indeed.)