Friday night and the weekend's here

So much for random song lyrics as post headers. It is, in fact, insanely early on Friday morning. However, C had to get up really early and I decided to be nice (for a change) and get up, too. My general rule, of course, is make sure "she's impressed with my least achievements"(Calvin)... (picture posting's working again, yay!) Anyway. Two things I wanted to share with you. The first one comes courtesy of fellow blogstronaut kneecaps and is a screamer of a little thing. You may have heard news about cows being abducted (particularly the California contingent of our huge readership) from dairy farms. Well, here, finally is a website devoted specifically to the topic, including helpful advice on countering the phenomenon and ways of getting involved. Clikkit! You know you want to... Numpa Two was brought to me by a friend who's in marketing. It features my personal dream boy band "performing" their first smash hit (in German, BTW, though I think the old "music transcends language barriers" adage rings true here). Now, please don't pass judgement on my marketing buddy prematurely, by the way - a), I knew the guy before he got this job, and b)not all marketeers are what they're cracked up to be. This one's a top bloke. Oh! Speaking of which, here's a fun little thing on marketing lingo; a cat (or maybe more of a lupine) who's got his Steven Covey-approved, proactive spiel together.

Webcamel

Yippy yi yo, everyone. Just back from doing some work (for a change). Had a session over at another of the area's larger companies (this one in the financial sector). Really excited about kneecapses post there - cool stuff. So, what else? Worked out how to use my webcam this morning. "Well, duh", I hear you saying. But wait! It ain't just any old webcam. In fact, it's my very own cheapo digital camera (as blogged about yonks ago, see pic) which is not just a cut-price photo box, oh no! It will also store and play MP3s, apparently - not that I would ever use that - whaddaya mean, headphones coming out your camera? And on top of all that, it will double up as a webcam, which is nice for penny-pinching, depraved students like myself. So yay for webcams! Speaking of pictures, though, blogger is being a real pain when I'm trying to upload pictures at the moment. It takes about five attempts until I finally get the "Done" message - all the other times, it'll just stall after the "wait- you photo is being uploaded" phase. Hnnngh! I give up. Sorry, no photos - mebbe tomorrow, then...

It's a Girl!

Found out yesterday that the little baby growing inside of MK is a girl! Needless to say we are very excited. Except James. He has no idea what is coming! We're going to name her Erin Eileen. I'll plan on scanning in the ultrasound pics and posting them here soon.

Giggetty gig

Toosday. Trying very hard to finish this paper I'm working on right now. Slave, slave, slave... Just received sheets and stuff for the gig I mentioned recently. Okay, so here's what it is; I've been booked to do two evenings of live recording with Stuttgart-based Beatbetrieb. Exciting stuff, especially 'cos I'm booked to play percussion, which doesn't happen too often. Plus, I get to play with my buddy Dee off of AdK, whom I've wanted to jam with for quite a while now. Yay!

(Image off of Beatbetrieb.de, obviously)

Fahrn, fahrn, fahrn auf der Autobahn

Hello people, Two new things I wanted to tell y'all about. One, blogging hero and general good person a.ndy just had the kindness to share with me this link to a website. Oh, the sheer, unadulterated beauty of amateur translation! I'm so glad I don't know who did this one. For all my non-German readers (both of you), this is an example of something we call "Denglish" - the unfortunate bastardisation of two separate languages with little in common. Let me explain at least one thing - the first word at the top of the page. "Actual" is a word Germans use when trying to describe "Current events" and the like. There's a German word, "aktuell", which means "of the time, up-to-date, current". Its one of the differences I've spent countless hours hammering into the heads of my unfortunate clients - to whom the transmogrifier of this page (translator seems too nice a word) clearly did not belong. Anything you find incomprehensible on the site is the result of the aforementioned clash of cultures - don't worry about it though, as the original German text probably wouldn't have made sense to many people in the first place. I love it! Just like the "we don't change" sign featured below (not for the first time), or this deplorable Berlitz ad that everyone seems to be spamming each other with these days, it's one of the things that keep the grin on my face in this troubled day and age. The other thing was something I believe fellow blogger kneecaps was meaning to share with you. Mmmh. On afterthoughts, I'll give him another couple of days to maybe get something up there, though we'll need to be quick before everyone knows about... So, talk to y'alls soon, have exciting weekends, cheerio!

On the road again

Hey! I just came across something fun - a podcasting truck driver! Trucker Tom, as he's known to friends and highwaymen, is actually doing something I haved dreamed of on several occasions. Those of you who know me well will be aware of my trucking aspirations, or rather, this vague dream of mine about rolling an eighteen-wheeler across the surface of our little blue planet for a living. The one thing that accompanies my pipe dream is the vision of a laptop and headset firmly installed in the cab next to me, enabling me to communicate with the world as I travel its highways. And up to today, I'd always assumed that was an impossible dream. Turns out I was wrong! Now, I don't necessarily subscribe to or endorse Tom's views, but I have to say his casts have an edge to them - he's very clear on what he believes, which makes him credible in my opinion. So, as of today, props to Tom the podcasting trucker, to be added to the links list ASAP. Keep on trucking! Yeehaw...

Stormy Monday

I don't seem to be good at posting Mondays. Don't know why, it just doesn't seem to happen much. So, here I am again the day after, soaking up the glorious sunshine outside even though its still freeezing cold. But yay for sunshine! Cloudy skies and rain always put a damper on my spirits, if you'll pardon the long-dead horse of a pun. Plus, I'm listening to "Amor" by Los Amigos Invisibles, which always makes me feel better. Funny how pseudo-1970s disco does that for me - I won't go into the persykological implications for you, no way... Gottalotta stuff to do today. We're having the first of our new-and-improved-for March 2006 house group meetings round at our house today. The inaugural one, if you so like, and guess who light-heartedly volunteered to lead. Augh! Should be fun, though, with one small proviso; it sounds like one of our new participants could be a former client of mine. Now, that could be decidedly awkward. We already had that situation once before where a patient whose psychotherapeutic treatment I had fortunately not been all too involved in myself, but still someone I had met professionally, showed up at a bible study group we were attending at the time. I felt decidedly uncomfortable. This person I would have worked with as a trainer, not a therapist, which makes things only slightly better. Ah well, we'll see. Whatelse? Got booked for a pretty big gig at the end of this month. I don't really want to tell you what it is at this point, but I promise you'll hear about it as time goes by. Other than that, I shall be sending off a total of 580,394 carrier pigeons to my slovenly friend Joachim as of today, reminding him to finally, finally get me some of those party pics! Presumably, his little office will be so crammed with bewinged, cooing archangels and carneaus that, at some point, he will give in to the pressure and send one back to me with an SD card attached to its little leg. Tally hoo!

Saturday morning cartoons & kung fu

Hiya, Saturday morning it sure is and I'm right here parked in front of my laptop, waiting at the breakfast table for our guests to rise and shine. Nice - haven't done that in a long time. C's out scrapbooking all day today, leaving me to a)my own devices and b)the entertainment of some good friends of ours who're staying the weekend. I like having guests who are happy to have a lie-in at your house - to me, that kind of says they're comfortable hanging at your pad and comfortable with you as hosts. So anyway, coffee's ready, table's laid and I've just spent about an hour checking out Rosenstolz, or rather, their newest release (an audio CD with the thoughtful addition of a video DVD). I'm not usually a big fan of German music, and didn't think much of this particular band's previous efforts. This one, though, "Rosenstolz+Das Grosse Leben", I'm rather more impressed with than I actually care to admit. Is it embarrassing if you can pinpoint precisely what it is that attracts you to other people's music? Obviously not if you're asking the Music Genome Project, who run the fabulous Pandora thingy. Let me recommend this to you again, especially if you're at a loss about finding new music you like. Having a flat-rate is a bit of a prerequisite (which is why I'm in denial at the moment - not for much longer, though) to make serious use of it, but even for occasional listening/music finding pleasure, its a neat device. Okay, brekkie time (friends have awoken) - seeeya!

Write here, write now

Sorry for the lack of postage hiers - had a lot of other stuff to do, including a post for the worship leaders blog (in Tschörmenn). But hey! Back agin today. So, wot's new? Well, first of all, still no pics from the party last weekend, which sucks totally. I may have to start spam-blasting my buddy or something... take his bass guitar hostage and threaten to break a string or two if he ain't forthcoming. Ah, well - mebbe not. Er, what else? Oh yes, I wanted to hype a website by Corporate Watch, an organisation monitoring what all those multinational global-playing industry giants are up to. The site's pretty neat if maybe a teeny bit "angry young man" for my own liking. Facts seem impeccable, though, as is the mission (in my humble opinion). Having led the leech-like existence of an external trainer/consultant to some of these big organisations (hope no-one from my job is reading this), I can see the angle they're shooting at, and support the thinking wholeheartedly. Nobody really is keeping an eye on what mega-corporations are doing these days, both in terms of their effects on society and economy (the long-term view) and, of course, concerning the violence inflicted upon our unsuspecting little planet. No, I'm not normally a raving leftie, but this is, I think, a worthy cause, so go check it out, everybody! Corporate Watch - cuz you know it makes sense, baby... Oh, here's a fact I found fascinating (courtesy, as ever, of the faithful Beeb feed, my main source of factoids and trivia these days); Forbes say there are more billionaires than ever, running up a total of 793 such persons worldwide if I'm correct. Now, I realise that simply turning around and saying well, how come our economy is bleeding workers all the time then - why are people being made redundant if, as the article states, the global economy has never seen such levels of growth since WWII, is selling the point short, not reading the figures in detail, etc. But, or "maismaismais", as Ed La Poignee would say in a Joe Bar Team comic, isn't there at least some degree of relevance to the question? Is this what globalisation means today - that everyone's making money by the bucketload, but us simple people obviously don't get anything out of that, besides maybe an offer to follow our jobs out to Novo Sibirsk or Hyderabad? Yes, I admit I was probably being a bit "angry young man" myself there... Rant over. Final point, and this one really is silly: a woman in Bath has gotten an ASBO (Anti-Social Behaviour Order) for repeatedly listening to "Show Me The Way to Amarillo" at ear-splitting volume. Apparently, her behaviour was both so obnoxious and of such persistence that she successfully drove at least one set of neighbours into selling up and leaving! Wow! Plus, funniest of all, she's now had her stereo confiscated... That is so un-German. Here, we would have had a public inquiry after the first time it happened (probably), followed by a court order to either insulate the relevant walls or keep noise levels down, else the coppers show up and cart you away, pronto! Ach, mein Vaterland of efficient punishment, or whatever...

Write here, write now

Sorry for the lack of postage hiers - had a lot of other stuff to do, including a post for the worship leaders blog (in Tschörmenn). But hey! Back agin today. So, wot's new? Well, first of all, still no pics from the party last weekend, which sucks totally. I may have to start spam-blasting my buddy or something... take his bass guitar hostage and threaten to break a string or two if he ain't forthcoming. Ah, well - mebbe not. Er, what else? Oh yes, I wanted to hype a website by Corporate Watch, an organisation monitoring what all those multinational global-playing industry giants are up to. The site's pretty neat if maybe a teeny bit "angry young man" for my own liking. Facts seem impeccable, though, as is the mission (in my humble opinion). Having led the leech-like existence of an external trainer/consultant to some of these big organisations (hope no-one from my job is reading this), I can see the angle they're shooting at, and support the thinking wholeheartedly. Nobody really is keeping an eye on what mega-corporations are doing these days, both in terms of their effects on society and economy (the long-term view) and, of course, concerning the violence inflicted upon our unsuspecting little planet. No, I'm not normally a raving leftie, but this is, I think, a worthy cause, so go check it out, everybody! Corporate Watch - cuz you know it makes sense, baby... Oh, here's a fact I found fascinating (courtesy, as ever, of the faithful Beeb feed, my main source of factoids and trivia these days); Forbes say there are more billionaires than ever, running up a total of 793 such persons worldwide if I'm correct. Now, I realise that simply turning around and saying well, how come our economy is bleeding workers all the time then - why are people being made redundant if, as the article states, the global economy has never seen such levels of growth since WWII, is selling the point short, not reading the figures in detail, etc. But, or "maismaismais", as Ed La Poignee would say in a Joe Bar Team comic, isn't there at least some degree of relevance to the question? Is this what globalisation means today - that everyone's making money by the bucketload, but us simple people obviously don't get anything out of that, besides maybe an offer to follow our jobs out to Novo Sibirsk or Hyderabad? Yes, I admit I was probably being a bit "angry young man" myself there... Rant over. Final point, and this one really is silly: a woman in Bath has gotten an ASBO (Anti-Social Behaviour Order) for repeatedly listening to "Show Me The Way to Amarillo" at ear-splitting volume. Apparently, her behaviour was both so obnoxious and of such persistence that she successfully drove at least one set of neighbours into selling up and leaving! Wow! Plus, funniest of all, she's now had her stereo confiscated... That is so un-German. Here, we would have had a public inquiry after the first time it happened (probably), followed by a court order to either insulate the relevant walls or keep noise levels down, else the coppers show up and cart you away, pronto! Ach, mein Vaterland of efficient punishment, or whatever...

Wifey succeedeth

Finally, after two most depressing results from her final exams, C has come forth victorious from the third. She got a 1.5, something slightly below A for all you non-Germans, and is chuffed to bits with it! Rightly so - it seems she was treated rather unfairly both times before this one. So, yay! Good news. Still no pics from the party (duh!), sorry, so this'll have to do for now(the country band from Nashville). Joe, the guy behind the event, is still rolling on a high of dude-man-that-was-awesome-letz-do-it-agin-tomorrow even though he must have comprehensively busted the bank with this one. He thinks the two of us should host exclusive, VIP-only parties in a city near where he lives. Well, you wouldn't hear me turning that one down, as long as I don't have to take financial responsibility... No, seriously, though, we had so much fun and I can't wait to have those pics (nudge nudge say no more)!!! More soon, gotta go celebrate with C...

Tuesday's child

Hello everybody! Still a bit bleary from the weekend, spent in the kind of weather you can see on the pic below - awful shot, I know, but I did have very little time and only 30 Euros worth of cheapo camera at my disposal. Anyway, I was invited to this massive party Saturday night. C and I should have both gone, but she became sort-of-ill just Friday night and decided to stay home. More on the party itself as soon as I have some pics available - for now, suffice to say that I got about two hours of sleep and had more fun than I've had on stage for a loooong time... Oh, and the party location was at the absolute back of beyond - literally down the end of a steep and snowy ravine, in an old converted mill of such spooky, ages-old charm that I wouldn't have batted an eyelash if the furniture had come alive or one of the boars heads on the wall had started talking at some point. What a place for a shindig! Awesome. It was rise and shine early next morning in order to be with good friend and universal good guy Joe for lunch. His whole family was there, too, which made me feel a bit embarrassed but kind of privileged at the same time. I'm still beating myself up now for not having taken pictures both of the drive to his house and of the view from their balcony, which has to be on a par with vistas in places like St. Moritz or the Lake District. There was over four foot of snow in some of the places my drive took me through - entirely surreal for an area that hasn't seen much snow in recent years at all (though they used to have it all the time decades ago). Not to mention awe-strikingly, drivel-inducingly beautiful, of course... Had to head home pretty soon after lunch - yet another epic drive through sugar-coated Disney movie backdrops. As for this week, I'm going to be working away happily at my paper, with another bumper weekend coming up Friday (as most weekends tend to do - start on a Friday, I mean). Seeya!

Use the Force, Anjakin

Our good friend Anja is going to hospital for a final operation on her accident-injured back. All the best and please, everyone, pray for her. Thanks!

Well now, well now...

...young man. Working on a paper for university at the moment, which is keeping me out of trouble (read: making my life boring and devoid of fun). Well, no actually, had fun yesterday; I went bass amp shopping at at a local music store. Would have bought this, but they didn't have one in stock (not for myself, alas).

(picture courtesy of citizenjazz.com)

Anyway, what I've been wanting to talk about since yesterday or longer is this whole Securitas mega heist 50 squillion quid robbery business over in Blighty. Obviously, I don't know anything except what the media tell us about the whole affair. What surprised me initially, though, is my feelings about the matter. Because, essentially, I find myself hoping all the time that maybe those robbers will miraculously get away with their dirty deed and all the loot. Now, isn't that weird? I've noticed myself feeling pangs of disappointment with every newscast about new people being arrested, vehicles found and the like. Why is that so, I wonder? Is it a) because I'm a raving maniac with vast forces of criminal energy slumbering undiscovered beneath a paper-thin facade of bourgeois contentment, or b) might I not be the only one who feels a kind of pride in the achievement made by what must presumably be "people like you and me", i.e. the underdogs of an increasingly oligarchic society? In fact, might I be right in assuming there is something of a groundswell of unspoken support for this bunch of people who had the audacity to commit a crime of such epic proportions? After all, there appears to be something decidedly Robin Hood-esque in attacking those with money so blatantly and with such devastating results. I may be well off the mark here, but doesn't it appear almost like an act of terrorism, a counter-strike of guerilla venom against the ever-increasing dominance and sheer boundless power of those who have systematically ripped apart state institutions and systems that provided more equal opportunities to those with lesser income? Call me a madman, sue me, block my bloggings off Google (like in China) or whatever, but I have to say I'd love to see www.supportourrobbers.co.uk out there somewhere, if only for the fun of irking the powers-to-be with its existence.

(this pic courtesy of www.hindu.com)

I think I might have gotten a bit foamy around the mouth here, but this just needed to be said. Okay, okay, I'll come down off my soapbox now. Yes, I'll take my medication and have a lie-down, nurse, no problem...

Hello World

.... Historic occasion for me. My first blog post! Thanks to Eddyquette for allowing me the privelage to write on his blog. I've been looking forward to this for some time! Anyhow, this post will be short and sweet. Just an quick update on my job search. I was in Chicago last week and I had 8 interviews with companies located throughout the U.S. After interviewing, only three made my short list. And fortunately for me, all three liked me! I'm praying that something will come our way soon. I'll keep you posted. MK and James are doing well. And #2 is growing fast. MK is in her 16th week. We should find out if the baby is a boy or girl in a month or so. Thanks again Eddyquette!