I'm out tomorrow...

...so let me think of something incredibly, humongously witty and informative to fill the time now. Err... wait, wait, it's on the tip of my tongue... ummmm... how about... err... BRAIN FART!!! What a lovely expression, don't you think? I picked it up from Tiffany, a former colleague at CultureClick (yes, she is American); she headlined an e-mail to the entire team with the phrase, which made me cry with laughter. I didn't even know what it meant at the time, but the sheer fact, to someone who grew up being taught that "crap" was a rude word (my family's about as 1950's middle class as they used to get back then) that anyone might use such an expression in a business e-mail seemed unbearably funny. Sorry - you had to be there, I suppose... Anyway, did you know that Ricky Gervais' podcast on Guardian Unlimited is the world's Number One podcast (most downloads ever)? Chekk it out - itz really funny!

Going nowhere Part II

Here's some of what Google threw up on the topic of "Going Nowhere Fast"...

If you're going nowhere, fast

Bleeargh! Heya blogosphere - whadda morning for it. In fact, I think I will be doing what the title says; I wanna try out fasting once a week. A) because all that flab needs getting rid of, but more importantly B) 'cos I'm hoping it might improve my faith life as well as motivating me to finally get back up on the discipline horse. Things have kind of slipped out of hand recently, which has been enjoyable, but doesn't really work in light of where I'm trying to go and what I want to be. Yer know, it's all fun and games not having to hold down a "proper job" (I finally quit my weekly commitment with CultureClick), but the idea isn't really for me to spend all that freed-up time glued to my computer or daydreaming. I know, I know, you're all dying with envy just reading about my life, but I promise you, the fun of it really does wear thin quicker than you (or I, come to think of it) would ever have believed. See, I'm supposed to be a student right now, and in fact I took a long time making that decision in the first place because I know how flaky I can be. I abso-posi-lutely want to pile-drive my way through this study course as quickly as I possibly can. One, because me studying means we're living off C's money (with me contributing through gigs, seminars, etc.), which makes me feel obliged not to just sit around doing nothing, and secondly 'cos I want to move on, get a life, get God and go where he wants me to. Whiddelse? Had a fan-tastic weekend - mostly just relaxing with C; we went over to Gaggenau to help C's younger sister move house on Sat, then went for the most gloriousest winter walk ever on Sunday after church. We also watched "About a Boy" for the first time, which tells you just how up-to-date we are when it comes to all things cinematic. Okay, that's not entirely fair, we'd both read the book and tend to avoid movies of stories we liked on paper. Oh BTW, we watched "Så som i Himmelen" last weekend and thought it was the bees' knees - ultra-cute, melancholy but with a twist of humour wound through it. Okay, so the ending was kind of pathetic, but even that gets contrasted by the images of Daniel (the main character) in the bathroom. Hokel dokel, I musht get back to life, then. Seeeya! a.ndy + horsesmouth + the new Billy G

No, I ain't...

..lying through my teeth. I really couldn't think of anything exciting a minute ago. However, browsing through my flickr pictrs just then, I remembered this thing: Yes, I know, flashy fancypants bloggers would have put this through PhotoShop, re-edited, cut it out and generally glamourised it. Unfortunately, I can'twon'tdon't PhotoShop yet (and NO, it ain't a standard part of my OEM package, thanks for all your kind advice, but it ain't! Believe me! No, really!). So there. Anyway, I thought the pic was funny. Then again, I am sort of German, so mebbe I just don't have a sense of humour...

Hello everybody...

...check out horses mouth's latest. Can't think of anything creative meself today. Thorry! Cheerio

There goes another one

Well, well... Bin surfing around a fair bit lately. Let me pimp David Nightingale's Chromasia once again - be prepared to have your mind boggled by his work. Photography doesn't get much better than this in my humble opinion. Whit else? Oh yeah, my man Billy Goodman is already busy-beeing away at his next album, mere months after completing "Blues from the Gospel". That, BTW, is one of the coolest, chilled-outest blues/gospel albums ever to bless my ears. No, I'm not a blues hack, but this is pared-down, freeze-dried, mesquite-smoked, 17-year vintage single malt delicious stuff; best served in your favourite rocking chair out on the porch after a long, gruelling day, dram in hand, cowboy boots cooling off in the evening light. Speaking of Bill and his music, though, we've been plotting and scheming fiendishly up in his secret hideaway in the hills, and what we came up with is... we may be going out busking! Way-hey! Can't wait - I haven't done street music for years now (it was kind of a "no-no" with my job as a management trainer - after all, what would my clients have thought if they saw the dude with the suit hustling for their money after hours) and can't wait to get back. Thing is, when you're a pianist, busking ain't so easy, so I'll probably end up banging a drum and singing backup. I do love street music, though - getting people to stop and pay you attention is a unique, visceral sort of thrill to me. Plus, the money I make would go towards funding a truck to go down to Hungary, delivering secondhand clothes to an organisation that works with gypsies in Hungary and Romania. My good friends Trudy and Russ work there and I've been wanting to go see 'em and deliver the stuff for over a year now. Okay, what else? Oh, some more light entertainment from the land of the Free, of course. Our subject today will be "political correctness", children, so open up your books on page three... I luuurve the way 'Melicans seem obsessed with euphemisms of all sorts. Not only do you call a toilet a "restroom" (but laugh at English middle class women when they need to "powder their nose"), you also have funny names for stuff like soap ("facial bar" - what is THAT all about?) and these machines, which are usually found in public lavatories... Whaddayamean, "convenience center"? Reminds me of an IT company I know, whose German subsidiary used to have a department named "Professional Services", until some less tactful member of the Brit/Aussie/US fraction must have pointed out that, to us, that does sound a little too massage parlour and not so development lab, really...

And here is one I made earlier...

(a photo, that is). THIS has got to be an incentive for unmarried European males to flock the shores of, well okay, Florence, Kentucky (do they have shores?) as of now. This wonderful offer was on show at a country store in the middle of nowhere. Maybe they're having a shortage of men there, I dunno - but hey, if I weren't married now, this would sound attractive...

Downtown Cincinnati impressions

Hi again, Just to fill yer in on our hols, here's some more pics, these being of downtown Cincinnati . Enjoy!

We-ell, I for my part...

...am an .inf file extension, according to the survey results at bb.com. Which File Extension are You? Thanks, a.ndy for the idea - this is fun! Come on, everyone, show some love - head over to the File Extension Quiz, fill in the questionnaire, then show me Yours - I've already shown you Mine! Any contributions e-mailed to me at eddyquette@googlemail.com will be posted for posteriority. Kneecaps, here's your chance to get in a blog entry with minimal hassle - just do the quiz, then copy and paste the code and you're out they-are! Toodles

Holiday reminiscence Pt. 3

Okay, more hols stuff! Here's shots from Music City; Nashville, TN. Yes, of course it was incredible to be there as a musician, to actually walk the streets and see the studios where so many hits are produced, where talent is ten-a-penny and musical genius both a given and prerequisite for any kind of success. BTW, thanks for your pointers on picture places. I'll be trying flickr for now; let's see how that works... Here's my sweet wife outside one the larger studio buildings. Er... yep! (what can you say to a statement like that?) Yeehaw! Nashville, road movie style... Did Tommy Mottola hang out here, I wonder? Or is this building (or rather, it's ugliness) the reason for Andy Lack? And more importantly; will we ever find out?

I wish...

Holiday reminiscence Pt. 2

Let's see, what else can I tell you? The whole trip was an adventure in the truest sense - I mean, flying standby and ending up in First Class for the trip out was a blast before we'd even left Frankfurt! We got the serious fat cat treatment all right - huge, multi-adjustable, leather recliner seats, champagne, a choice of delicious food and wines, constant pampering by really helpful staff, the works. One of the funnest bits for me was realising at some point hours into the trip that our part of the plane was, in fact, cordonned of from the Great Unwashed by one of those thick felt ropes complete with gilted hooks at the end that you find in museum queues and posh night clubs. Standing there looking down the aisle which did get quite a bit narrower the other side of the rope gave me all kinds of different thoughts. First, I felt a little out of place - after all, I grew up staring at that kind of rope quite a bit, wishing I could be on the other side where things always seemed so much more exciting than where we usually were, looking for a cheap place to eat or a "reasonably-priced" hotel. Yes, I do think I've worked through a lot of my childhood traumas pretty successfully, but some things will come back to haunt me from time to time... Another sensation was, of course, "this is cool! This is exclusive! Hey, look at me, I'M flying First class - remind me, how much did you pay for your cheap, cramped little space out there without all that service and style?" I did suppress the urge to shout, though - after all, I probably paid less for my privileges than almost everyone of those people in Coach. So anway. Oh, another hoot was, of course, the inevitable I 94 or Visa Waiver Form, to be filled-out in-flight and including deep, insightful, probing questions such as (and I quote): "Have you been involved in [...] terrorist activities; or genocide; or between 1933 and 1945 were you involved in persecutions associated with Nazi Germany[...]?" Anyway, after getting there and getting settled-in, we found that we'd in fact landed right in the heartland of some of America's finest scenery. Not only were we mere miles from the watertower known throughout the States for its inscription, "Florence Y'all" (no, this isn't one of my pics, but it is a lot better than mine - thank you, cincinnati.com) in fun-laden Florence, KY. No, in fact it was only a matter of several more miles (dispensed of painlessly at a mind-numbing 65 mph on those endless multi-lane freeways they have in 't US) to the very house that featured in countless vid clips and, of course, a Miller Lite (beer) commercial for it's, well, astonishing array of computer-choreographed Christmas lights and (the scary bit) the accompanying cheesy, 1980's style soundtrack that was FM-broadcast at passing vehicles for maximum entertainment value. Unfortunately, I don't have photographic material of the place as complaints from the neighbourhood forced Carson Williams to eventually shut his display down, but we did drive by there one night and take a peek. Snopes.com has a rundown of the story, in case you're interested. All for now, more later...

US holiday reminiscinence Pt. 1

Here we go again. Sorry if I'm not quite back to daily post form - in fact, I'm debating whether or not I will continue on a daily basis at all. Much as I do enjoy blogging (and your e-mails and comments on what I do), my first priority really needs to be this student gig. Well, we'll see - I'll keep you posted. Speaking of posting; got a very nice e-mail yesterday informing me that both Walter Becker and Donald Fagen of Steely Dan are starting up individual websites. Here's the link to Walter's (who is adamant you need to subscribe to his newsletter) and here's Donald's do. Both aren't world-rockingly exciting as yet, but judging by their previous form on steelydan.com, great things may be yet to come. So! Where do I start for today on my US hols rambling? Well, how about a nice little picture to kick off with? Get an eyeful of this little cutie, seen outside Charley's (really rather not-so-exciting) food place near Music Row, Nashville, TN. Yes, I know, a sleeker techie person than myself would have cunningly employed PhotoShop to manipulate the lighting, make the colours stand out more, etc. Unfortunately a) I don't have PhotoShop and b) I wouldn't have the time to play around with it even if I did. Speaking of which; can anyone recommend a site where I can dump photos and link 'em here, rather than actually lumping x amount of data on the blog itself? Your recommendations/links/free invites would be welcomed...

Bouncing back... kind of

Helloo! Finally, it seems I'm back in sufficient shape to do a little blogging. At least, the murky haze seems to have lifted (on afterthoughts, maybe I really should have taken a shower earlier) and I'm not perpetually falling asleep. That's got to be a good thing, right? So, anyway, I'd said I was going to document some of the stuff that happened/we saw/we bought/we said/was said to us, etc. from our trip to the US of A. Right, instalment Number One and no, it ain't that much of a stunner for most folks, I suppose. I luurved them, though – trucks!!! And no, I don’t mean SUVs and Silverados, I mean the real stuff; “semis”, 40-tonne 18wheelers with 10cylinder caterpillar engines and ruddy big exhausts. Oh, and none of your poncy cab-over-engine designs either – the real thing with about an acre of hood and that old fashioned chrome grill on the nose. One of my main concerns getting to the States was that maybe these wonders of my childhood (countless hours misspent staring at photographs, devouring books or just rumbling my own little model Kenworths and Peterbilts across the highways of my imagination) would have died out by the time I got there, replaced by fleets those hideously ugly contraptions that Freightliner and others seem to be churning out. Finding these babies here was, therefore, pure bliss for this closet aficionado…

BTW, my main reason for featuring all these pics is of course because I know they’ll have little James over in Burlington going “uck! ‘uck!” while pointing at the screen. What a sweet little guy – I’m so honoured to have met him in person. Hope the “aiyas” (airplanes) are coming well, dude…

Dazed, bewildered, confused...

... and incredibly, depressingly weary all the time. See, what happened was that I stupidly managed to run clean out of thyroid tablets at the end of my fab-u-licious holiday back in Boone County, KY. Upon getting here, I even more foolishly failed to get my rear in gear immediately to re-stock and start feeding my metabolism with 'em again. And noooowww... to quote one of my all-time favourite authors, "I feel like a military academy - bits of me keep passing out". I've been in perma-drowse mode for several days now and, annoyingly, the effects of my re-acquired drug seem to be taking time to kick in. My reality feels a bit like when you're listening to that bit of Finding Nemo where the little fish talk "whale", i.e. really slowly and over-pronouncedly. Oh dear - that wasn't even a word, I know, I know... Anyway, I WILL be getting pictures, stories and other wild and (hopefully) interesting thingies up here once I'm back to normal mode agin, okay? Seeeya...