This morning I detoured through the Zentrum von Juelich to go to one of the groceries that was rumored to have decaffinated coffee. I didn't find it. Again.

I finally went to the strange little store (next to a bakery) that sells coffee and cell phone and flip-flops (and, I am told, vacation packages), threw up my hands and said pathetically "kaffeine frei?" They rescued me. Then, of course, it turned out later that, in fact, I'd seen decaf in every store, but it wasn't called what I thought it was! The group told me to look for "Kaffeinfrei" but it's apparently called "Entkaffeiniert" -- which I saw in every store but thought meant something different. Ah yes, this humility, I'm sure it's good for me in some way!

But this is the round-about way to say that the wonderful thing about the detour was that there were fresh croissants at the bakery -- fresh as in "came out of the oven while I was standing there" fresh. So I brought some to take back to the institute for morning coffee, and once in a while on the ride back the smell of warm croissant would waft forward to tantalize me. They were good, too.