It’s taken me two and a half months to…

The happiest day, so far, in Berlin was the day that I moved into my apartment.

Since then I’ve made a lot of progress: the bedroom was the first to be finished, then there was a long gap: the handyman came and got a lot of stuff done, but he had to come back to do a few more large chores—including securing the kitchen cabinets more firmly to the wall.

Once the cabinets were attached to the wall, which happened at the beginning of October, I started doing dishes. At first I was enthusiastic about the washing project, getting through a number of the dishes that had been stored since moving—but like all projects involving what seems like endless cleaning, I got bored and stopped working on it.

However, now that next Saturday is my housewarming party, I have had the motivation to actually finish the dishes—tonight I washed my last pot and it’s in the drying rack awaiting movement to its final home in my new home.

So that’s what took me two and a half months: washing all the dishes that had been wrapped in newspaper, moved, and stored.

It’s the second happiest day of my Berlin life.

I’ve also been getting ready for the party—which is going to have somewhere between 10 and 15 people. The hardest part, for me, is figuring out the drinks. I have 22 bottles of beer (5 different brews), 2 bottles of white wine, 2 bottles of red wine, some bottles of water, apple juice, red currant (johannisbeere) juice, and a bottle of orange juice.

I’m still not sure if I have enough liquid—and if there’s anything I’m good at, I’m good at not buying enough beverages for my parties.