More exciting than expected

This week I had the best Monday I think I will ever have. I found out that my postdoctoral fellowship application was funded. I was not expecting this in the least. In fact, I was fully expecting to get the standard letter saying that the foundation had received an exceptional number of qualified applicants and they were terribly sorry to not be able to fund my proposal. The opposite happened - and though I was asked to please be patient (not my strong suit) and refrain from contacting them with questions until I receive my official documents sometime in the next 4 (gah!) weeks, a celebration was definitely in order.


It turns out 3 were actually in order. Zoli took me out to a tapas restaurant in our neighborhood on Monday night to celebrate. Then I went out for beers with people from my lab on Tuesday, including my first-ever games of Kicker (Americans call it fussball - totally backwards, but I guess Kicker is easier to say than Tischfußball), a local obsession at which I am terrible. Awful. Embarassingly inept. (But I got my fellowship!)

On Wednesday I went out with my boss and another postdoc for drinks in a building with an amazing view of our institute and the harbor, not to mention an impressive bar, followed by pool (much better than Kicker). By this point I was thoroughly done with celebrating and just wanted to come home and sit on the couch for goodness sake, which I think officially makes me old.

But still - it's exciting! I will be gainfully employed! The foundation supposedly will pay for German classes! (Not that I can verify this by asking them or anything.) I will get my own special ID card from the foundation! I now know for sure what I'll be doing for the next two years, which is both more exciting and more relieving than I expected. I am very, very pleased that these red brick buildings will be my workplace for the next two years.

Maybe by the end of it I will even be able to play Kicker.