chattius

I have to say that my favourite character, an oppressor, wouldn't play that nice without the programmable autocaster I found in the web. Also need, a tool to find all the stuff in the hundred chests from different characters.

Slightly snowing and misty. Ideal weather for pocket money. #3, #4 & #5 were selling x-mas trees to families who were chopping them themself. Also Glühwein ( and an alcoholfree kid variant) and Bratwurst to warm up after the familes walking and looking for a tree. Living in a 120 people village there are not much mini-jobs for the kids to earn some money. So 3 weekends selling x-mas trees and some snacks is nice money for them.

zombies -> Wiedergänger Ever since stoneage people feared that the death would walk (gänger) again (wieder). A Hünengrab (sort of Dolmen) translates as grave of a giant. They put real big stone blocks above the grave to prevent the death to walk again. In coming times people forgot the reason for the stone blocks and thought it would be graves for giants. The nearest Hünengrab was just 3 kilometres away from me, but trees were growing through it and pushed the stones to the side. In northern germany plain land some remained undamaged.

Levi -> [ˈneɪkəd] Auto censoring made me to use this, my sis words were: sold all down to her skin My older sis did a travel with school to Dresden in east germany before reunion. She said when walking from the youth hotel it took 5 minutes and the first east german girl asked if she would sell her western jeans. East german jeans used to be very very robust but ugly to skin, the washing machine was allways releasing blue water, ... So western jeans were 'in'. East marks were quite useless if back in the west so she did a shopping tour with the girl and exchanged the jeans for a nice dress for the prom. Next day she was 'selling' another jeans to another girl. 6 jeans with her and she returned home bare of jeans, Adidas boots and western underwear = [ˈneɪkəd] while at the shop. But she had one more suitcase - full of dresses and shoes.

giant slides -> stone wash creek Mix between rollercoaster and a water slide, sitting in a sort of boat which was pulled up and down and released for a dive into a lake. Latin class often combined a travel to the roman german museum with the joy park. 16 and 35C, girls from class wanted me to sit in front... laws of physics were saying me yes, because the dive wave was falling o nsecond row mainly, wet t-shirt contest

8 track setto 38cm/s good enough for classic music, set to 4.7cm/s and you had 8 hours of nonstop music quality -> slide projector Having a sister who was a trained photographer and a family where everyone played an instrument, my 8-track was often used for slide-shows. Mixing all the instruments and have tracks to give signals to the 2 slide projectors... Music and changing pictures 'perfectly' synchronized.

80's -> radio and tape I had a Grundig Satellite 3400 world receiver and a Uher Reportage tape recorder. Other boys bought Vespa scooters. But being able to receive all the charts from nearly every country in the world and being able to copy them in a good quality... Was a guest to nearly every party (even ones with my older sister) because I had the music before the Singles were out in Germany. Music was more impressive to girls than a Vespa.

Saturday before Advent we use to decorate the big fir in the church garden using the cranes of our Unimogs. The church is a 850 year old fortified church on top of a hill with a big wall surrounding it. So the fir can be seen for miles at clear nights. Our third was playing Leise rieselt der Schnee and other pre-xmas songs on her electric zither. Leise rieselt der Schnee is my favourite pre-x-mas song for all times: a frozen lake, a clear night with stars, snow starts to fall, standing in front of the house and waiting for x-mas. As a kid it was the house of grandpa and we took it when he died. The song brings all the feeling back, big family together at grandparents and grandgrandma, In average we have such nights every fith year. The english version is more song for waiting for x-mas night and not about the 4weeks of advent. But listen to it if don't speak german to understand why it is my favourite pre-xmas song.

X-mas approaching ... specialist -> Wham! Giving your heart to a specialist in taking hearts is not the same as giving it to someone special it seems...

doubt it -> Schöffe In dubio pro reo I was one at a court mainly for agricultural, forest and wild game cases. A Schöffe used to be an expert in a field a professional jurist had not much knowledge and his vote counted as much as the one from the professional jurist. The German law system is not based on the british one and relates back to Charlemagne. Schöffe, in Germany, a lay jurist or assessor assigned primarily to a lower criminal court to make decisions both on points of law and on fact jointly with professional jurists. A Schöffe may also sit on a higher court.

Jolene -> The BossHoss Never had the luck to listen to Dolly live, but I was at the Ring and at Wacken when The BossHoss performed. Think it is the best cover.

reunion -> new kid on the block Dad was doing electrics at new powerplants so we moved a lot. I was in 9 different classes but only 3 invite me to class reunions. Most look who was member in the final year and forget that I was 2 of 4 years in their class.

family -> complicated Last generation: When my mom calls for a family meeting it are her childrens with their families My generation: If I do I call for one it are my children with their familes or friends. Next generation: If our oldest calls for a family meeting it is she, her husband and their 3 kids... When I married my wife she became a member of my family, and I one of her family... At least for my and her parents see last generation. My son in law is part of my close family but I am not in his close family meaning, see next generation. So family is a very complicated word It is good to know that our whole family with all its subsets is something to trust on

Hmm, for a Bratapfel as a x-mas delicatess; vanilla sauce is a must. Also all the spices which make x-mas, anis, cinnamon, cloves, ... Also the marinating wine for the raisins has these spices. For the apples: I would never choose the apples I like to eat unprepared for baked apples. They are sold fresh and good looking. Better are the apples which could be stored up to may in old times in a cellar. We have, I think, 17 apple sorts: for directing eating good looking sweet ones , small ones with ot of tannin for cider, apples which could be stored in the cellar till may, for baby food, ... Our oldest studied arboristic and was planting like 1000 small apple plants to be sold once reaching 6 feet. Luckily you talk with me and not her about apples ;) State pays some money if helping to keep the old local variants alive, like the Siebenschläfer (named after a dormouse which sleeps 7 month a year). It gets leaves and blossoms very very late in the year and so isn''t affected by our late frost periods. The Siebenschläfer is like a Jack of all trades, not the best for direct eating, storing only? up to february, cider is getting a bit to sweet (adding sorbus fruits helps), ... But if a family has just one tree in the garden at our climate, it is a consideration.

Snow, but dry cold with sun is nice. But thewing snow with fog and no sun ,it feels 20 degree colder than it is. luckily we had sun at weekend.

A good baked apple starts with choosing the right sort of apple, a sort with high acid and don't getting too soft while baking: I prefer a Boskop or a Holsteiner Cox. Without kids we placed the raisins some hours before in spiced wine. There are also variants of baked apples close to Himmel und Erde ( Heaven and Earth ) Without kids we placed the raisins some hours before in spiced wine. At Himmel und Erde you do dices from apples (heaven) und potatoe (earth) and boil and mash them, serve with roasted onions and roasted blood sausage. You can replace the apple part with a baked apple: Nearly 10 years ago, ice cream with baked apple taste 🐘 have a good brain.

Saturday enough snow for cross country skiing. After sundown a lot of noise in the sky from cranes flying south. As sure as hell some idiots drive without winter tyres in the dark and call the firefighters - so a busy night. Luckily only one who managed to damage the oil system. Lot of warning signs that the local country roads won't be cleared, news paper wrote it, was in radio, ...

classic -> Erich Kästner At summerbreaks we were at the farm of my grandparents, siblings, cousin and cousins. Boys in sleeping bags in the hay barn, girls in the former house for farmhands. There was also a box with books. Nearly all of Erich Kästner which already was read by my dad, uncles and aunts. The Parent Trap Emil and the detectives The flying classroom Dot and Anton ...

Fleetwood Mac -> Nautilus If you like FLeetwood Mac's Albatross, Nautilus is close to it. In Albatross the music tries to imitate a soaring Albatross, in ANutilus a nautilus difting in an ocean.

luxury -> Schickeria Parties where only certain people are invited, most of them are just famous for being famous. I remember a benefit ball to honour sport stars who were winning olympics or world championships. The camera caught a schickeria person saying loud what a lame party only b-class people. The person who thought of himself being famous was soon only famous for his stupidity, the next bouncer at a schickeria party was a former olympic wrestler with a good memory and face recognition.

Simens -> Electric Victoria !00 years before Musk and his Tesla, Siemens sold 50 electric driven cars already.

Do -> 31 Before the Harrier and the Osprey the Dornier Do 31 was a vertical take off and landing combat zone transporter tested for the german army in late 60ties. No crashes and all prototypes are in museums. NASA and Neil Armstrong tested it and liked it. German army saw no use because the training was to defend till help arrived and not to attack. Civil versions were stopped when the oil prices exploded in earlier 70ties. A member of my glider club has a flying RC model.

golden -> Horde The mongole empire was called the Golden Horde after the death of Dschinghis Khan

teeny tiny -> alliteration Teenytiny is klitzeklein in German.

battlezone -> Elite The BBC Acorn was never a success un Germany. I bought one in a sales out because I knew how to code the 6502 processor. We had 6502 machines at school. It had good interfaces for attaching hardware: morse decoder, stitchery machine, washing machine, .... Still functional used with our knitting machine. It game with the game Elite.