so, so sleepy

I can barely keep my eyes open but there is work to be done yet tonight. One of the serious bummers about teaching is that I'm tired when I get home and don't exactly feel like lesson-planning and organizing all evening too. This week's started lightly but will be very busy at the end. I just want to move Hazu off my blanket, and crawl under, or, if I'm very lucky, to be able to jam my feet under her warm little body and hear no protest. Usually the protest is in the form of a disgruntled short snarly meow, but sometimes it's half-hearted as her laziness is greater than her annoyance. She has adopted CK embarrassingly. They talk to each other eyeball to eyeball until she's had enough then she drapes herself over his shoulder and just hangs there. Would do it for hours if he didn't have to move periodically. She has taken to sitting in front of her food bowl willing it to fill itself. Lo and behold! it does! He always caves in, even if she's just eaten. He's trained. He's also spent all evening reading his new books--2008 restaurant and wine guides to Vienna. He may never speak again, unless it's to ask: what's the name of that place again? you know, the one with great Tafelspitz? Hmm.

There is a bowl of ginger cookies, hidden under a large pineapple. Not hidden enough. I want one. Since we have no oven, and molasses is not available here (one import store had it, told me they'd sold the last in August), how is it that I have fresh yummy homemade ginger cookies? I borrowed a friend's oven as I tried two different ways to substitute molasses. Turned out fine. When I asked some of my students where to get molasses, they knew what it was, but then said it takes months to make, should start it in summer for Christmas. And where, pray tell, does one get sugar cane? In July? That, they couldn't answer.

It has snowed twice already--just enough to frost the tops of the huts, which are wreathed in greenery. We stood outside in the snow yesterday drinking hot punsch with a mix of locals cramming under the market umbrellas at the punsch stand. It's wicked, wicked stuff. One cup will put you under. Hot, spicy, and nothing but alcohol. I had the thought that the alcohol would burn off, but the temperature is j u s t under that point. So the devilbrew hits the bloodstream awfully fast.

I saw my first fur coats of the season! The old Viennese women pull out their fur the moment snow hits. Often with sensible ankle boots and brown nylons, more often with insanely high heels and very red lipstick. Grandma, you're a looker. I don't know how they do it. The shoes I mean. I don't want to know how they do fur coats. Really, seriously fabulous shoes on cobblestones. Skip the maryjanes, little Susy! You're a Vienna Girl! start with 3 inches, the world will be your oyster! Oy vay. I have periodic notions of pulling out my favourite shoes but then I remember I have to walk and where. I waterproofed my flat, can-fit-thick-pairs-of-wool-socks boots last night. That's my concession to sexy: dry feet.

CK is now brewing coffee, and I just saw him sneakily put the rum bottle back in its somewhat-hidden spot. Coffee with a hit of rum. Yum. The cat is stretching as tall as she can to reach the tops of the upholstered kitchen chairs to make sure the pinprick holes her nails make are as high as possible. Time to get a scratching post.

Christmas markets opened this weekend. The downtown (Stephansplatz) uBahn station is always a treat to get out at--one exit takes you in an escalator to ground level, the top half of the escalator uncovered. It is amusing in the rain to watch umbrellas pop open one by one as people glide higher and get hit by the rain. Until it's my turn. It is the only escalator I know of that brings you from your subterranean journey and places you at the foot of a Gothic cathedral. It's awe-inspiring, even if you're in a rush somewhere else.

There is another delightful seasonal surprise at Stephansplatz. Another subway exit pops you up to Graben, an expensive, pedestrian, shopping street. The first thing you see above you is an enormous swag chandelier of thousand of white lights strung from one side of the street, then another, and another. They go all the way down the street, and I saw a little narrow side street with identical miniatures slowly spinning in the perpetual Vienna wind. I haven't seen them turned on yet--but even in the daytime they are gloriously beautiful.

CK wanted to go away somewhere for Christmas, but I voted for Vienna for our first Christmas together. I think it will be amazing. As long as I find a Christmas gift for him before then...