Weekend trip crossdressed: "Eurogress Aachen," Franzi's longest conversation yet, and (supposedly) more lesbians

As you know, Franzi loves dressing up for evening entertainment activities. Now, Aachen is provincial, as compared to Stuttgart, Munich, Cologne, and Düsseldorf, but still, any decent concert, opera, theater performance, or musical deserves to be dressed up for accordingly.

There are two distinctions handed out in Aachen annually – both since 1950 by the way – the “Karlspreis” (International Charlemagne Prize of Aachen), to public figures who have made significant contributions to Europe and European unity and the “Orden wider den tierischen Ernst” (Order Against Deadly Seriousness). The latter was initiated by the Aachener Karnevalsverein (Aachen Carnival Association), as Aachen is a “Karnevalshochburg” (Carnival stronghold) in Germany, the likes of Cologne, Düsseldorf, and Mainz.

The Order Against Deadly Seriousness is awarded to well-known national or international public figures "who combine individuality, popularity, and wit, but above all have demonstrated humor and humanity in office." Those honored become Knights of the Order Against Deadly Seriousness for life. The ceremony takes place around carnival at “Eurogress Aachen,” a convention and event center, just outside the outer city ring, the main hall (Europa Saal) of which provides space for up to 1700 spectators.

“Eurogress Aachen” is where Franzi was heading (by foot from the hotel) that evening for a piano concert. The last time I was at Eurogress Aachen was in 1988 (together with that wannabe-feminist) to see and hear the Dutch performer Herman van Veen, who plays the piano as well, amongst several other instrument, and is both very funny and very profound: “Are there cannibals who eat only vegetarians?”

The outfit for that evening (#4 of 5 that weekend) was a wonderful, short, green ruffle dress that I had recently purchased online. It hadn’t been available for several weeks and I signed up for notification. When it came back on, I shot it most immediately on my cellular phone while in a meeting at work. The short black leather jacket, I had just bought that morning and have since regularly worn it with various outfits. It is a very soft matte leather, and I simply love it.

Portrait of the evening

Leaving the hotel

In the gardens of “Eurogress Aachen”

The piano concert was not worth telling you much about. It was a performer, who intermingled stories about his life with pieces performed on the piano. I don’t doubt his piano skills, but his stories were dull and the whole thing kinda boring.

At Eurogress Aachen

Back at the hotel, I again found the hotel lobby / bar well attended, with the same great atmosphere and festive spirit as the night before. In the center was a very comfortable-looking and unoccupied arrangement of several cozy armchairs and two large sofas around a large knee-high table. Without thinking about it much – Franzi sat down at the end of one of the sofas.

Shortly thereafter, while I was enjoying a gin tonic, I was joined by a group of six, mostly men, who had returned from an event of the annual meeting of their political society (not a political party) that took place in Aachen that year.

A friendly and somewhat funny, but extremely nosy guy sat down next to me and immediately started to talk to Franzi. We had an interesting conversation and as he was recently divorced (as I found out in the course of our conversation) he was probably trying to find out if Franzi could be a potential target. We talked about Aachen, about travelling, about the ideas and goals of their political society and if I were interested to join.

We somehow came to the topic of age and he actually asked me how old I am. Can you believe it! He was floored and didn’t believe me when I told him that I am in my very late 50s. The situation became even more interesting, when he learned that I have an engineering degree from Aachen University and that I work for a large multinational company. I guess he just could not get his head wrapped around those factors and the fact that I was looking as cute as a button, sitting there in my extremely feminine green ruffle dress, nestled to the corner of the sofa, zipping on my second gin tonic. He shook his head a few times and said “What am I missing here?”

The conversation took a turn when I mentioned my wife and that she was travelling elsewhere with a female friend that weekend. He looked at me with some disappointment on his face and said “Oh, …. I thought so already.” I felt like telling him the truth but was afraid to ridicule him in from of his clubmates and I, therefore, forewent my potential third gin tonic and left for my room shortly thereafter.