I’ve been a Twitch streamer for six months now. Isn’t that weird? I’ve noticed that a lot of the really fancy streamers use an elgato Stream Deck as part of their setup. This is essentially a “macropad” – a little programmable keyboard that you can set up so that clicking a button kicks off a series of actions. People use them for adding sounds and graphics to their streams, replying to comments, even controlling lighting and cameras. They’re not cheap though, and as much as I coveted one, I didn’t think I’d use it enough to justify the expense.

Then somehow I found out about the duckyPad. This is an Open Source “do-it-yourself” mechanical macropad, and all up the components come to about half the cost of the Stream Deck. It has a very simple little scripting language you use to program each key, and it has a little screen that shows what each one does. You can have 32 different “profiles” (set of 15 keys), which means up to 480 different key actions. And it also lights up! I decided to order one and explore what I could do with it.

Here’s what it looks like straight from the box if you order the standard components:

Putting it together was actually very simple following the instructions in the Assembly Guide. Man, those tiny 2mm standoffs are awfully small though, even for my hands! The only difficulty I had was getting the keyboard switches inserted. They required a little more pressure than I expected, and I was really paranoid that I’d break one or bend one of the pins. As it turns out, when I had the thing together and turned it on, one of the keys was indeed dead. I pulled it off and saw that, yep, I’d bent one of the pins flat. Luckily the Snook whipped out a pair of pliers and managed to straighten it out, and once reinserted it worked fine. So yeah, the instructions say over and over to be careful for bent pins, and now I understand why!

The duckyPad comes pre-programmed with a couple different profiles, but most of them were Windows-specific. I installed the Configurator app and used the provided USB card reader to plug in the SD card. Then I was able to start creating new profiles and scripts.

The duckyPad is literally just sending off key presses, just like you’re typing on your normal keyboard. So anything you can do via keyboard shortcut, you can trigger with the duckyPad. The critical thing for Mac users is invoking Spotlight with “COMMAND SPACE”. That’s what you use to open apps and change focus. I also found that often the duckyPad is too fast and I needed to insert a DELAY before subsequent key presses (like between opening the browser and typing in a URL).

One annoyance is that some apps’ keyboard shortcuts only work while the app is in focus. If you’re using Windows, there’s an “Auto-switcher app” that will automatically switch profiles based on which app is foregrounded. There’s currently no Mac version (someone is working on it), so I’ve found it helpful to have a dedicated key that switches focus back to the desired app (especially when presenting or streaming).

I’ve spent a few weeks now tweaking and refining my setup, and I keep finding new things to automate. With some of these, I just cannot remember the keyboard shortcut so having a button helps. With others, I’m finding that I already have the muscle memory for the keyboard shortcut so I may not need the macro. The ones that get the most use by far are volume control (much better than the stupid Touchbar on my Mac) and the “mute” shortcut (used to invoke Mutify and turn on/off my microphone), so I’ve reproduced those as the bottom row of keys across multiple profiles.  But read on to see what I’ve got so far…

And if you have any suggestions for things to add, please let me know!

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The AWS Summit EMEA is coming up next week, and a few of my colleagues created funny videos to drum up excitement. Seb documented his preparations…

Je suis prêt pour le AWS Online Summit le 9 juin prochain. Et vous ?

150+ sessions techniques dans 7 langues, (18 en français)

Quelque soit votre niveau, vous apprendrez quelque chose.

Inscrivez-vous aujourd'hui https://t.co/2DDNBvunk8 pic.twitter.com/VTLEvU0OVh

— Sébastien ☁ Stormacq 🇺🇦 (@sebsto) May 27, 2021

As did Darko, but a bit more retro. 🙂

https://twitter.com/darkosubotica/status/1392165193753448456

Isa did a super cute one with her pupper Jago, a “Solutions Barkitecht”. 😂

https://twitter.com/isahuerga/status/1395301974317338625

My first impulse was to do something similar for mine, but of course include myself surrounded by knitting projects. But the more I thought about it, the more boring that felt. I knew I really needed to raise the level of creativity.

And then I had a flash of inspiration – GPS art! This is where you run/walk/cycle a particular path and the GPS path in your tracking app draws a picture. What if I could cycle my way across the AWS logo?? I immediately started searching for an app, hoping there was a way to automatically plan out a route. But guess what? Tech has not cracked this particular problem yet. My only option was to do it the hard way.

I opened up Google Maps and realised immediately I was going to have a problem. Munich is an old city, and it doesn’t have a nice rectangular grid for its streets. It’s also got the Altstadt (the medieval city center) and a river running right through it, all of which really limited my options. I decided to focus on looking for something suitable for the smile part. It probably took me half an hour to find a nice big curving bit to the south-east. I used the drawing tools in Google’s “My Maps” to draw on the map and plot out the rest of the logo. Not too bad! All I needed then was to join it up into an actual cycling map that I could follow.

For that I used Strava, which I’ve been using to track my cycling for a few years. It has a feature where you can create your own Routes and it will help plot out the path. I ended up creating it as a “walking” route because that gave me finer-grained control over which streets I could take. (When you select “cycling,” it will push you towards cycleways – which is normally great, but for this I was willing to forego that.) It turns out this caused me one slight issue, which I’ll get to shortly. But pretty quickly I had my route, as well as an estimated distance – 21.8km. Yikes! And that didn’t even include getting from the start/finish to my house. I knew this was going to take me a couple hours to complete.

On the day of the ride, I had the Snook film me getting ready. I filled up my hydration backpack and wore my new padded cycling pants. Then I was off! I have a mount for my iPhone on the handlebars, which allows me to easily see the map as well as film footage of both the road and my face as I’m riding. Everything went pretty well, until…

Yeah. My route had me turning left… onto that bridge way above my head. There were stairs, but at that point I was in no state to drag my bike up there. This is the downside to using a walking route! So I had to improvise a bit, going down a side-street and walking my bike along a path to get back onto the route.

The only other mishap was a wrong turn at the base of the second point on the “w”, which I thankfully caught quickly. Unfortunately Strava doesn’t allow you to remove points afterwards, but it was small enough that it doesn’t really detract. On the upside, I also discovered that when you “pause” tracking on Strava and then “un-pause,” it will draw a straight line between those points. I realised I could use this strategically to create diagonals and smooth out some of the rougher bits along the “s”.

As I got back to the house, I messaged the Snook to come out and meet me so he could film one final bit of me arriving and saying “I’m getting ready for the AWS Summit. Are you?” I was pretty puffed at that point, and the hydration pack was completely empty. 😅

So here’s the final cycling workout!

Then I used iMovie to cut together all the footage I’d created, along with a final screenshot of the map. I was really pleased with it and sent it to a few folks. One of them loved it and was really enthusiastic, but the other reactions were muted. It was only when I probed them further that I realised they didn’t get it! They weren’t seeing the logo at all. Once I pointed it out they could see it, but without that context it just looked like I was riding around Munich aimlessly for no reason. 😂 So I had to do a lot of explaining, including for the lovely marketing folks who cut together the final version with music and graphics.

Anyway, here it is! My first ever attempt at GPS art. And if you’d like to attend the AWS Summit next week (it’s free!), you can register here: https://amzn.to/3fbS1wA.

The Corona situation has been improving in Germany, mainly because the vaccination rate has been steadily increasing. Supply seems to have increased and we even hit 1M vaccinations in a single day! Here in Bavaria the situation is even better. While the big Immunisation Centers are still adhering to strict prioritisation, the local government recently announced that GPs could administer the vaccine regardless of priority groups. We’re at about 40% of the population with one shot, and 13% fully immunised. And thankfully, the Snook and I can now count ourselves among that 40%!

We were able to get appointments at MVZ Laim through the Doctolib app. The Snook had seen on Reddit that some folks were managing to get appointments there, and he started checking the app periodically. When appointments appeared for Saturday, he jumped on it. Then we debated whether to go through with it or cancel. MVZ were only offering AstraZeneca with a 12-week wait for the second shot (putting us into August for full immunisation). If we cancelled and got an mRNA vaccine, we’d be able to get the second shot sooner. Ultimately we decided it was better to have some protection now rather than risk waiting any longer.

At MVZ there was a steady stream of people in for their vaccinations. We checked in and were happy to find that the staff swiftly switched to English once they heard our accents. We were asked if we’d brought our safety waivers (acknowledging the risk of the AZ shot), which we had. Then we were directed into a waiting room. After a few minutes, the doctor called Rodd but realised we were together and brought me in as well. We had forgotten to bring our “Impfung Ausweis” (vaccination card), which is a little yellow book where your doctor records all your vaccinations. He instead gave us a form that recorded our first shots and made us promise to bring the Ausweis next time. Then he swiftly gave us the shots in our left arms and directed us to another waiting room for 15 minutes in case we had any adverse reactions. Then we were allowed to head home.

I honestly teared up a bit when he gave me the shot. I haven’t been particularly worried about myself through the pandemic; it was more the thought of how much human ingenuity and hard work and sacrifice had gone into this massive effort around the world. SCIENCE, YEAH! Humanity is amazing. ❤️

For that first day, I didn’t really have any side effects other than perhaps a mild headache. By the evening though, the Snook was responding as he does to any viral infection: fever and chills to the point of teeth chattering. During the night my usual response kicked in, with a fever, muscle aches, and my arm getting very sore. We both spent the next day resting and hydrating. Now on Day 2 we’re feeling better, but both of us still have slightly elevated temperatures. Our arms are still sore.

Still worth it.

A German dish that we really enjoy is Flammkuchen, which is essentially an Alsatian pizza. It’s a common thing you can buy in Biergartens, but you can also make it at home pretty easily!

Here are the ingredients you need: pre-made Flammkuchen dough (or you can make your own using this recipe), pesto, crème fraîche, mozzarella, cherry tomatoes, and beer. (Well, actually the beer is just for the chef! 🍺)

The first step is to mix up the crème fraîche and pesto in a bowl…

Here’s the flammkuchen dough unrolled out on the baking tray. It’s rectangular, but you can also make them circular if you’re making your own. The dough comes on baking paper, so you can just bake it right on that.

Then you spread the crème fraîche and pesto all over the dough.

Next you add the mozzarella. The one I like comes in a single lump and I just tear it up and scatter it around.

Lastly, you add the cherry tomatoes and then season with salt and pepper. Obviously you could put other ingredients on there too – little bacon lardons are pretty popular! Then the whole thing goes in a hot oven for like 15 minutes.

And here’s the finished Flammkuchen! 🍕🍺

We were still getting snow flurries at the start of April, but as the weeks went by the weather finally started to warm up. I decided it was time to get my butt in gear and make up some ground towards my cycling goal.

On Easter Sunday I went for  16.7km (10.4mi) ride to the Englischer Garten and back home along the Isar.

There were so many people in the park for the holiday. I was delighted to pass a little old guy playing the accordion and managed to record a bit as I passed…

https://twitter.com/web_goddess/status/1378736763829620745?s=20

I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of the blues and greens of Germany. It’s such a different landscape to back home in Australia! I found this public artwork along the Isar that was a bit of a platform sticking out over the river that you could venture inside.

A few weeks later I went on another long 20km ride to Olympiapark. The Snook and I had ridden there last November, but this was my first time venturing on my own.

I really like the particular style they used for the structures at the park. Wikipedia says, “The eye-catching tensile structure that covers much of the park was designed by German architect and engineer Frei Otto with Günther Behnisch.” Nice job Frei and Günther!

I also made a point of visiting the Memorial to the 1972 Olympic Games Massacre. To my surprise, the memorial was only formally opened four years ago in 2017. Unfortunately it appeared to be under renovation, and I couldn’t get any closer than this. The Jewish Museum of Munich has a nice depiction of what it normally looks like…

I left Olympia Park and rode past BMW World, which is evidently the most visited tourist attraction in all of Bavaria. Then I rode through Luitpold Park, which features another giant “hill” created by rubble piled up from WWII bombing attacks on the city. Looks like it would be great for sledding down in winter! I stopped for a photo by the obelisk at one end of the park.

A couple days later I did a quick 10km loop along the Isar and back…

The highlight was crossing the Thalkirchner Brücke on the way home and discovering the local kayak club out practicing!

Last weekend I finally gave in and started my Strava subscription trial, which gave me access to routes other people have added. One of them looked pretty fun, a big loop around Nymphenburg Palace and through some suburbs that were new to me. It ended up being another 20km ride!

We went to Nymphenburg Palace last September but just explored the gardens. This route took me way around the back side of the grounds along the palace wall. Here I am crossing the canal on a little bridge, and you can just see the Palace way, way off in the distance!

I’ve been experimenting with taking some photos while I’m riding. My iPhone mount works fine pointing up, but it does cover a little bit of the camera lens when looking forward. Still, you can see the castle wall there and lots of other people out enjoying the sun.

While riding back through the city towards home, I was delighted to see an honest-to-goodness Goggomobil pass me. The thing looked like a museum piece! Fortunately it got stuck at a stoplight so I was able to pull over and take a quick selfie for the Snook…

Can you tell it was a warm day? I took a bottle of water with me (that’s why I’m wearing a backpack), but I actually finished it long before I got home. I realised that hydration was definitely going to be a limiting factor on these rides, so I ordered myself a backpack with water bladder off Amazon.de.

This baby holds 2 liters and has a nozzle that clips over my shoulder, so I don’t even have to stop. I was excited to try it out on my longest ride yet. The Snook had told me recently about Komoot, which is another site where you can find recommended riding, running, and hiking routes. I found a route, filled up my backpack, and headed out today for a 30km ride…

The weather was cool and cloudy, but there wasn’t any rain forecast until the evening so I figured I’d better get out there. I first rode back to Nymphenburg but then turned northwest and meandered through Durchblickpark. “Durchblick” refers to a glance or a view, and apparently the park is so named because you’d have originally been able to see all the way across it from Nymphenburg Palace to my first destination – Schloß Blutenburg, a nearly 600-year-old castle on the banks of the river Würm.

See? You can just spot the castle a looooong way in the distance. Eventually I got there and parked my bike so I could look around. The courtyard was open, and took some photos of the apple trees in bloom and the decorated chapel. There was a biergarten outside along the water that was open for takeaway, and there were families enjoying lunch among the flowers.

I was only about a third of the way into my journey at that point, so I hopped back on my bike and continued along the Würm…

As with all German rivers, it’s charming AF.

Soon I left the city behind – I literally passed the sign marking the borders of Munich! – and found myself riding through fields.

If you zoom way in, you can see the Olympiaturm way, way off in the distance!

Pretty soon the fields started to smell strongly, and I wondered if they’d just been fertilised. But then I solved the mystery! We’d been wondering where all the organic food waste goes, and today I found it: a giant “Kompostwerk” just outside of town. (Speaking as someone who grew up in a rural area, I much prefer the smell of compost to manure!)

My end destination – well, the point where I turned around to head home – was the Langwieder Lake District. I rode under the Autobahn and headed out along the narrow strip of land between the Langwieder See and the Lußsee, and eventually I came to a little pebbly “beach”. I stopped for a bit to drink some water, eat some trail mix, and send an update to the Snook. It’s a far cry from Aussie beaches, but it seems like it would be nice on a sunny day. I was surprised to learn just now that this whole area was man-made, and the lakes are actually dug out gravel pits from the building of various highways! I’ll have to bring the Snook back here one of these days…

And then at last it was time to head home. My legs were feeling pretty tired, as was my bum. (Note to self: look into padded cycling shorts!) I also started to get nervous that my phone battery was going to run out, so I tried to keep the screen off most of the time. My feet and lower legs started to feel a little crampy too. When I was about 5km from the house, I realised I’d missed a turn to get into a cycling path and stopped to do a U-turn. As I slowed to turn and head back the other direction, I turned the wheel too far and was slow getting my foot under me, so… I stacked it! Fell right over. 😂 Only a few scratches, and of course my dented pride. It was bound to happen eventually.

I was really running on fumes by the time I got back to our neighbourhood, and I was so tired I walked my bike up over the Donnersbergerbrücke. I definitely think I tested my limits today, both my fitness and my iPhone battery!

So that’s the current goal status: 204km for the year, which is 127.4km behind where I need to be to hit 1000km for 2021. I racked up a lot of miles in April though, so if I can keep it up, I reckon I might be able to catch up by the time we get to Summer! 🚴‍♀️

When you’re living the expat life, I don’t see a lot of point in only eating the things you did back home. If you didn’t want to try new things, what was the point of leaving in the first place? When I did a semester in London in college, I remember one girl would only eat from American fast food restaurants, and I was livid that she took a spot from someone that would have appreciated the experience more. I swore that would never be me. So when we got to Germany, I spent some time researching classic German dishes that we could try to recreate.

Rouladen was one of the first*, and I’ve made them several times since. They’re rolled up beef parcels with bacon, onions, mustard, and pickles. Um, YUM. After my first attempt, I bought special Rouladennadeln, little metal skewers you can use to secure the rolls without having to tie them with string. I figured I’d document in case you’d like to try it yourself!

I’ve used a few different recipes I found online, but the most recent was this one from Edeka (our local supermarket). In addition to the beef (more of that in a second), the main ingredients are mustard, pickles, onions, sliced streaky bacon (I used this thin smoked ham), carrot, parsnip (or “parsley root”), leeks (I subbed in some very chunky green onions), and celery (mine is defrosting as the Snook likes to freeze pre-chopped baggies of it).

Here’s the beef itself. My understanding is that it’s slices of topside or silverside. Pretty much every German meat counter has a hunk of beef sitting there marked “Rouladen” and the butcher will happily slice off bits for you. My local store actually has pre-sliced bits wrapped up in cellophane, so I grabbed four of them. They were so large that I actually sliced them in half, into 8. If your slices are thick you can pound them thinner, but these were close enough to the recipe’s 0.5cm that I didn’t bother.

You start by spreading some mustard on each of the pieces of beef, then sprinkling with salt and pepper. Then you layer on the bacon, onions, and pickle. Technically this recipe wants you to slice the onion, but I misread and minced mine as a previous recipe had had me do. I think I’ll try the slicing next time, as I’m guessing it’s easier to keep the onion inside when you roll them up. For the pickle I sliced each one into quarters. Another recipe also had me used thin carrot sticks too, but this one left them out.

Those are my Rouladennadeln (roulade needles). Fun, huh? Time to roll up the Rouladen.

Look, I’m obviously not a 70-year-old Bavarian Grandmother who’s been doing this her whole life, but I’m pretty proud of this, okay? 😊 You can also tie them up with kitchen string, or use toothpicks to secure. (That’s what I did the first time, but it’s hard to keep the toothpicks from breaking.)

Now to prep the veg. Everything is chopped up into little bits.

Now it’s time to brown the Rouladen in some oil. I used our cast-iron casserole, but you could also just use a big pot. I only did a few at a time and tried to let them get a nice bit of crust.

Once you’ve browned the meat and set it aside, you dump all the veg in the pot and cook it until it softens.

You need a few final ingredients: tomato paste, red wine, and beef stock. You add the tomato paste to the veg and cook for a bit, then deglaze with the wine. Then you stir in the stock.

Nice rich sauce for our Rouladen!

The Rouladen go back into the pot, and the whole thing simmers with a lid on for 45-60 minutes at low heat.

When the Rouladen are done cooking, you pull them out and place them in the oven to keep warm. Then you strain the veg out of the sauce (and chuck it away!), and let it boil down a little to thicken.

And because “hey, why the hell not, we’re in Germany!”, you further thicken the sauce by whisking in 100g of cold butter cubes. Hells yeah.

Now you can put the Rouladen back in the sauce before serving. I also pulled out the Rouladennadeln at this point.

And that’s it! Traditional German Rouladen.** We served it with steamed carrots and a bit of mashed potato (which had some leftover cabbage mixed in). Very tasty!

* Funny story: I happily announced in a team meeting after my first attempt at this that I’d made “Rolladen” and everybody started laughing. Rolladen are… Venetian blinds. Yeah, don’t mix up the terms. 😂

** I’m sure this is one of those things where there are a million regional variations, so if you’re upset that mine didn’t adhere to your family’s tradition, send me a recipe and I’ll try yours out!

You all seemed to really like my cost of living post, so let’s dive into something equally as mundane – German groceries and supermarkets!

If you follow me at all here or on social media, you know that the Snook and I enjoy cooking and make a lot of things from scratch. Back in Australia, we even renovated our kitchen so we could get in a bigger fridge/freezer. Our normal process was that every Saturday I’d plan out the menu for the week and then we’d both go to the store to do a single weekly shop. We also got a veggie box delivered every two weeks as well. A couple of times a year we’d go to Costco and stock up on bulk things, and we’d also hit up the Aussie Meat Emporium every now and then to stock the freezer with meat. We’d generally cook probably 4 or 5 days out of 7, freezing any leftovers. We’d usually alternate who cooks, though since I made the menus I’d usually assign the really elaborate things to Rodd. 😉

Once we got to Germany, we realised pretty quickly that this system was going to have to change. The main problem is that German kitchens (at least the ones in apartments) tend to be smaller and have less storage space than we were used to. The AirBnB we were in for the first 10 days had only a bar-fridge and barely any pantry space! When we started looking for apartments, we deliberately looked a place with the biggest kitchen and fridge we could find. The one we got is great, but it’s still smaller than back in Sydney. We’ve got two cupboards to use for dry goods, a couple small shelves over the stove for spices, and then a stacked fridge/freezer.

We tried for the first few months to stick to the once-a-week Saturday shop but we’d struggle to store everything. We also tried out a veggie box delivery service but had the same issue, trying to figure out how to cram most of it in the fridge. The solution, it seems, is to do smaller shops, more frequently. How very European! 🥖

Our current process is to shop every 4-5 days (avoiding Sunday because everything’s closed here), and we take turns making the menu and going to the supermarket. One nice thing is that there are so many options within walking distance of our place. The main supermarket brands here in Munich appear to be Edeka and Rewe (analogous to Coles and Woolies back home), and there are like four Edekas of various sizes in the neighbourhood. For discount stuff there’s also Aldi Süd (different Aldis depending on which part of Germany you’re in!), Lidl, and Penny. There’s also Amazon Fresh for same-day delivery, which was a life-saver when we arrived! We’ve also found a couple Asian and Turkish groceries nearby for specialty items. Germans are big on organic, so there are also Alnatura organic supermarkets and a few farmers’ markets around too (though they’re mostly shut down due to Covid). And if you’re curious, we’re still mostly under lockdown here so current rules are you have to wear an N95 mask in any shops.

But anyway yeah, a plethora of options. Our default is the Edeka in Theriesenhöhe, just a short walk across Bavaria Park, mostly because it’s the closest and we’ve got a good feel for what’s available. (Aldi/Lidl always feels more hit and miss with what’s in stock.) It’s not huge, but they really pack in a lot of stuff! After seven months, we feel like we’ve mostly got it figured out. A lot of stuff is the same as in Australia, but there are still some wacky differences we’ve found. Read on for lots of pictures and details…

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