Hey guys, since I last talked to you I have spent a week in Bamberg with Anna Maria and her family – but unfortunately I’ve been fighting one of the worst cold/flu situations that I’ve ever had for the entire time!

On Wednesday morning, Klaus and I got up super early to head to Nuremberg airport (about an hour south of their home) to pick up Anna Maria. I was feeling absolutely terrible on this morning, with a cough, sore throat, and a fever – but I didn’t want to miss the trip to the airport and the long-awaited reunion with the wifer! It all worked out, but, once we returned to the house, I pretty much holed up in my room for the rest of Wednesday to sleep and sweat. While I did that, we got our first snowfall of the year and the rest of the family went in town without me to check out the Christmas market. It was a total bummer to feel so bad and not be able to join in the family activities.

On Thursday, it was a lot more of the same for me. Laying around and trying to get better. We went to the doctor in the morning, but there was little to come out of that visit since the local doctor didn’t have an x-ray machine to look at my lungs. His best guess was that I had the flu or pneumonia and he wrote me a prescription for some antibiotics. I was feeling pretty frustrated about being incapacitated while Anna Maria was here for only 5 days, but there is not much you can do about the timing when it comes to get sick. In the evening, Klaus cooked up a nice meal and then Inge prepared me some boiling water with tea in it to inhale, so that was nice of them as well.

On Friday, I was feeling a marked improvement in my condition. Not perfect by any means, but enough so that I felt like going out of the house a couple of times. In the afternoon, Anna Maria and I took a walk to the neighboring village to enjoy the snowy landscape and it felt good to be outside for a change. In the evening, we ventured in to the city to have a walk through the Christmas market and to get a little present for Klaus and Inge. They had given their toaster to their other daughter, Eva, when she moved to Berlin. I decided that one small thing I could do for them to show some appreciation for all they have done for me was to get them a new toaster. It seemed to have been a well received (and useful) gift!

On Saturday, I woke up feeling pretty bad again – but I had to get myself in a positive state of mind and push through because it was the day I had set up for my birthday/going away celebration downtown with all my local friends. By the late afternoon, especially after a good meal of duck from Chef Klaus, I was feeling good enough to go out and celebrate as far as my body would let me. It turned out to be a fine time, and it was good to see all my friends and also to spend time with Anna Maria’s brother and sister who came in to town just for the occasion!

The birthday get together was a lot of fun, but predictably, I was feeling pretty terrible again on Sunday. On Sunday, I joined the rest of the family, however, for a trip into the city to have brunch and in the evening we all hung out at the house. It’s pretty rare these days that the Liedl’s have all three of their kids and their kid’s partners together at the house.

Today, Monday, started out on a sad note as it was time for Anna Maria to head back to the airport and home after her short 5 day visit. I was up the entire night coughing, so Klaus and Inge volunteered to drive her to the airport at 3:30am in my stead so that I could try to get some rest – which was greatly appreciated! I said goodbye to her and then managed to get a few more hours of much needed, yet very restless, sleep.

In the afternoon, I wasn’t feeling too terrible and the sun was shining, so I decided to go out for a short walk around the Liedl’s home village of Breitenguessbach. I enjoyed getting out of the house, but my lungs are so congested that even walking around town left me short of breath.

In the afternoon, I had one last old friend to see – my buddy Jörg (or Yogi as we used to call him). Yogi was a co-worker of mine when I was a working as a cook at the Army base in Bamberg immediately after getting out of the Army. We had tried many times to get together over the last 13 years when I would come to Germany for a visit, but this is the first time that we managed to do it without something coming up. That’s a long time not to see somebody!

Yogi made the 40 minute drive over from his hometown of Bayrueth and picked me up to go into Bamberg for my last dinner in Germany. It was great to see him and I was glad to learn about his very successful catering and food truck business called “Jörgerburger”.

After returning from dinner, it was time to get down to business with packing my suitcase for the long journey home tomorrow – always such a drag. But 7:15 am departure from the airport will be here soon and once again Klaus and Inge are going above and beyond to get up early and drive me to Nuremberg. I can’t thank them enough for everything they have done for me! I will be arriving in Florida on Wednesday evening to spend 10 days at my dad’s place for Christmas, and then back to Kentucky and regular life!

It was a really incredible trip overall and I can’t have any real complaints. If all goes as planned, I will be back in Europe in July for a few months to go to a few new countries and play some more music. So I’m already looking forward to that!

You guys, this will be my final blog post of this trip. It’s been a great experiment and I’ll treasure the ability to go back and read through my experiences when I’m home and missing the road. I hope that you all enjoyed it as well, and I thank you for reading along and being a part of my big adventure.

I will hopefully talk to you all again this summer! Until then, may your jobs always be big ones! 😁