March 5 and 6
This weekend, we started out meeting with Axel over his cost estimate. It was higher than we'd hoped. We left his office with plenty of homework to do to see if there was anyway this could work. We were staying down in Pommersfelden, in Schloss Weissentein, our neighborhood castle. Walking on the snow-covered grounds was good therapy.
That evening, while dining at the Gasthaus Dorn, across from the Schloss, we mentioned to Mr. and Mrs. Dorn that we were looking at a house in town. Of course, they knew the whole history of the place and exclaimed about how expensive and complicated that would be. "Why not look at my small house a couple of doors away. It's even older, but completely remodeled." "How much?" we asked and he gave a figure less than Mr. Werner's. Ouch.
We agreed to look at the house the next morning, as soon as Mr. Dorn had enough time to warn the renter currently in the place.
Sunday morning, we were waiting for Dorn as he took care of some local customers, and glanced at the local newspaper. There, on the front page, was news that the Bamberg base, where Marianne had hoped to work, was closing. Five minutes later, we were in Dorn's small place and, though we liked the price, it was too small and cramped to work with. Besides, our future was now completely confused. We gave up, writing a diary about the whole story.