Playing Dress-Up… :-)

My parent’s got to play a little bit of “German Dress-Up” this evening, and looked adorable doing so… It was the official opening of Oktoberfest in Stuttgart and, of course, the Garrison Commander and his wife had front row seats (right next to a Duke and Duchess  that Dad felt the need to tell us all about) for the festivities… Haha Apparently Carolyn and I missed out on quite a party! At the end of the night my parent’s finally came stumbling home like teenagers who’d been into a little too much fun… With the post-party giggles and all… The Germans obviously managed to put my Dad’s tolerance for good German beer to the test… :-)

If nothing else two good things came out of the evening… They managed to wear their adorable “German” outfits… Dirndls, hats, braids, and all… And my Dad apparently very enthusiastically invited everyone he met to our house for Halloween (Forget the fact that he doesn’t like Halloween and in fact will be TDY on Halloween this year… :-) Should be interesting for mom!

I on the other hand have been last minute packing… And playing a little bit of dress-up myself, trying on formals to take to Oxford… :-)  I’m mentally preparing myself… Because apparently I should have been building up my alcohol tolerance for the last four years instead of doing all that darn studying!… My orientation week schedule right now has more “Teas”, “Welcome Drinks”, “Toga Bops”, and “Slow Pub Crawls” then I can mention… It sounds like I may have a busier social life as a graduate student than I did as an undergrad… Ha! :-)

Well that’s all for now… I’ll make a point to post on Monday once I’m safe and sound in my new flat in Oxford!

With Love From Germany… Mary Elizabeth