It's that time again! Oktoberfest

YES fellow Junkies, the time we all should focus on the most serious issues that face us...
Drinking large 1 liter mugs of beer, eating salty food, listening to Polka Music, sweating and seating at picnic benches inside large tents and of course screwing.


Oktoberfest starts today in Munich (or München if you speak a the Deutsche) (München, is derived from the Old German word for Mönche, which means "Monks" in English.)

Anyway I digress...

In 1985 I lived the dream, working in Germany as a young technician for an American company I got the opportunity to to to Oktoberfest for the weekend. We drank a shitload of Beer, served in Oktoberfest beer mugs (1-liter-Steins, Maßkrug in German are made from heavy glass and typically have a decorative brewery logo on the side).
This is a picture of a VERY Strong Waitress with 8 Maßkrugs in her hands. The Ketosis Junkie would be challenged with doing such.

So we drank and ate and I ran into a couple of local Bavarian girls, we hung out and made a rendezvous for the next day, as I had to manage several of my American co-workers who had drunk to much.

The next day we headed to Oktoberfest where I met the two young ladies and we skipped the beer halls went to their apartment and discussed politics, music and the nature of man. We smoked some hash, drank some beer and they showed me the German game of swap the salami. These two girls were very close and sharing a young American between them was as natural as sharing a sandwich with your best friend. I feel in love with Germany. Now these were the days where shaving had not quite made it to Europe, so, by today's standards, there was a bit of stubble, and the landscape was a bit wild.

Some facts on Oktoberfest:
The Munich Oktoberfest, traditionally, takes place during the sixteen days up to and including the first Sunday in October.

The original "Oktoberfest" occurred in Munich, on October 12, 1810: For the commemoration of their marriage, Crown Prince Ludwig (later King Ludwig I) and Princess Therese of Saxe-Hildburghausen (namesake of the Theresienwiese festival grounds) organized a great horse race (the marriage took place on October 12; the horse race on October 17 — therefore, there are different dates named as being the first Oktoberfest).

The Oktoberfest is known as the Largest Volksfest (People's Fair) in the World. In 1999 there were six and a half million visitors to the 42 hectare Theresienwiese. 72% of the people are from Bavaria. 15% of visitors come from foreign countries like the surrounding EU-countries and other non-European countries including the United States, Japan, Brazil and Australia.

Oktoberfest numbers (2007)
Area: 103.79 acres (0.42 km²)
Seats in the festival halls: ca. 100,000
Visitors: 6.2 million
Beer: appr. 69,406 hl (1,269 hl non-alcoholic)
Wine: 79,624 liters
Sparkling wine: 32,047 liters
Coffee, tea: 222,725 liters
Water, lemonade: 909,765 ½ liters
Chicken: 521,872 units
Pork sausages: 142,253 pairs
Fish: 38,650 kg
Pork knuckles: 58,446 units
Oxen: 104 units
Expenditure of electricity: 2.8 million kWh (as much as 14% of Munich's daily need or as much as a four person family will need in 52 years and 4 months)
Expenditure of gas: about 205,000 m³
Expenditure of water: about 90,000 m³ (as much as 27% of Munich´s daily need )
Waste: 678 t (2004)
Toilette's: about 980 seats, more than 878 meters stands and 17 for disabled persons.
Telephones: 83, also for international credit cards.
Lost property: about 4000 items, among them 260 pairs of glasses, 200 mobile phones, a wedding ring and two crutches.