My whole body ached on Saturday morning but I didn't know why. My first thought was that it might be related to the uncomfortable lift home the night before on Zoran's bike, perched on the crossbar squished between Zoran's handlebars and Zoran. When we first set off my foot was caught in the pedal, causing me to scream as I thought it was being torn off. At this point Guido, on his own bike and who was already laughing, rode on ahead so as to be able to take pictures of the whole proceedings from a better angle. We found an equilibrium and, after slipping off the pavement into the road and swerving through some oncoming traffic a couple of times, I was dropped off in one piece.


In the lounge however, I found a display of disarray sufficient to jog my memory and remind me why my body was hurting. After getting home, I'd had the good idea of putting on some music and having a dance but attempting to execute these two manoeuvres at the same time had led to me slipping and falling over, crashing into the cabinet and knocking off all my CDs, which clattered noisily onto the metal pipes that run around the bottom of the room (they're not as bad as they sound) and reverberated through the whole apartment and probably down into the Hoff's as well. I lay groaning on the floor and regretting my good idea before dragging myself to my feet, angrily switiching the music off, and collapsing into bed. I had two bruises to show for it.


Yesterday Zoran and I took the train to Mainz, about ninety minutes north of here and very beautiful. The centre had the cobbled streets and red-brick buildings that I have very quickly come to recognize as typically German. We wandered round eating icecream and taking photographs of the city and this man:

This is Johannes Gutenberg, inventor of the printing press and owner of an impressive beard (shame about the Macdonald's in the background but isn't that always the way?). According to the Lonely Planet's Guide to Germany, the Gutenberg Museum is a must for those in the publishing industry. Here one can see a working version of Gutenberg's original design and the first typesetting machine, as well as an informative history of printing - tempting stuff.


Being employees of a publishing house, Zoran and I felt that we were included in the group of people for whom the Gutenberg Museum was a must and thus spent most of the afternoon looking for it and even coming so close that, had we turned our heads one degree to the left, or even just swiveled our eyes, we would have seen that we were in fact standing as close as a person could possibly get before they were charged admission. By the time we found it, it had closed.

These pictures are examples of some of the things we saw in Mainz but the real highlight was this: an actual, never-before-seen, real manbag!

Zorrers had never seen a proper manbag before, and now that he has he's not so sure he wants one. And who can blame him, I mean look at it! I can't see that it offers any practical benefits over the humble pocket and as far as the look goes, well -- we're all thinking the same thing. There is something a bit too cowboy about it that says this item should not be seen on a man who wishes to be taken seriously.

Mainz: home to the printing press, fine wines, and manbags. The Lonely Planet evidently needs updating.