I woke up with that dreaded feeling of having been disconnected with the world for a few days and knowing I had so much to catch up on, including filing my first VAT income return for my new business using this new online system. Their slogan (literally translated from German) is that “it explains it almost by itself,” but I have not found that to be true. My German is pretty good so I don’t think that their claim got lost in translation. My German is also not to blame for the fact that this system is not particularly user friendly. But alas, I think I am now registered and have filed that first document. I called the bureau just to make sure. The guy on the other line sounded as if he shouldn’t have a clue what a computer is, but he could at least tell me the number of the line where I need to put the “0”‘s.

Oh and because my son also woke up coughing badly, I finally took us to the doctor. I have bronchitis. So now both my husband and I are on antibiotics for bronchitis. My son for strep. And my daughter for an ear infection. This just about sums up the end to our second winter in Germany – the winter that never was.