June 25th – RIP

June 25^th 2009 will be marked in my book (I don't have a diary or write one and this blog isn't one) as one of the weirdest days ever. I know things happened before 5pm (GMT +1 on summertime), but that's when this day turned for worse.

Natazzz informed us that news had broken on Belgium TV that tv-presenter Yasmine had died. A suicide, a measure I've never really understood but this is not the right place to engross these thoughts.

News of the death of Farrah Fawcett followed shortly afterwards. Though it didn't surprise me, I was still shocked that it happened so quickly. The news that she and her longtime partner Ryan O'Neal thought of getting married told me that they had run out of hope. That she died only a couple of days later is still a blow in the guts.

This morning, while catching up, I learned of the death of Michael Jackson. The news broke on twitter, but everybody was thoughtful and waiting for confirmation from serious sources.

They were right in doing so, cause only shortly afterwards news of the death of an actor made the rounds – this one was a hoax. How horrible is that? Playing with the emotions and empathy of people is just downright awful.

I know that Ed McMahon died too, but I've never really heard of him before. Whereas Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson accompanied my youth; before Michael went totally crazy – and sometimes even then – he made some really good, extremely awesome music.

And Farrah Fawcett – show me the lesbian who was not a fan of Charlie's Angels? I should give this some thought, if these three Angels weren't at the source of my still ongoing love for crime serious with women detectives?

sunday morning musings

Ever since I "moved out", Sunday mornings have been my favorite part of the week. As soon as my presence was not required anymore at the family breakfast table, I became an early riser. I don't do much; it's my personal version of celebrating slowness, my own slowup which only requires me getting up.

When I was living in apartment, I took a book and my walkman (you know the thing you needed before mp3) with me and headed out to a park.

Nowadays, whenever weather permits, I take my cup of coffee and go out onto the terrace. This morning though with only 13 C° (55 F°), which is way too cold for June, I'll prefer to have my coffee inside and watch the Sunday morning rerun of my favorite talk show with my favorite talk show host.

Then I'll be probably awake enough to start research for a new NAS; the old one crashed yesterday, but at least I was able to recover all the data on the disk.

Cu l8er

the perfect gift

It's that time of the year again - girlfriend's birthday. And those of some other people too.

Presents are really important to G, coming right after birthday congratulations, they don't have to be big or expensive it's the thought that counts and she likes the unwrapping ritual. This is why I often tease her with the wrapping - creating a form that has got nothing to do with the content at all.

I always have a hard time choosing the perfect gift, also because of one rule which I always apply - I never buy anything I wouldn't buy for myself. I'll make compromises where the color is concerned but that's about it.

The most impersonal gift you can make is giving money, unless they asked specifically for it to buy something big. What I truly like are gift cards. I'm an avid Internet shopper and when you're not around me daily, chances are high that you're giving me something I already have.

And you can even vary the gift cards depending on the current needs, e.g. when my brother married I gave him gift cards from IKEA.
Then there are cities that offer them which means you can shop and pay with them in almost any store you want.

To me gift cards are not an excuse or even a sign of disinterest - next to geeky gadgets - they're my favorite gift.

Stupidity – and the award goes to…

Monday I had – judged by my standards – a really nice shopping trip. Except for that occasion when I wanted to buy a gift-card for ITunes. You might wonder what's so difficult about that? We were in Germany and the card was for a Swiss friend. I asked the guy if I could use this card in any ITunes-shop in any country and he said "Why not? It's via internet, isn't it?"

Uh – working 10 km from the border to France or Switzerland and not knowing…anyway – I breathed deeply and told him calmly that it's impossible to buy from the US-Store which somehow got through to him. Simultaneously we started reading the back of the card where it said "only to be used with German ITunes-Store". Bugger. At least – besides being a dork - he had tried to help.

Tuesday morning we made a quick dash to Switzerland, in hope of getting that gift-card. We started by adding more dvd's to our collection. Then G asked an employee who was busy sorting dvd's "We're looking for the ITunes card. Do you have them here?" – We were in the entertainment section, after all. This woman responded, with a voice sounding slightly slurred "No, I don't know what you mean. Cards? You should head over to the computer department. They will be able to help you". She repeated this about four times and grew louder each time. G and I fled as fast as we could; this situation had a wee dose of surrealism ;)

This was by far the most stupid person I've encountered in a long time.

We ignored the advice and headed to the checkouts where we found the gift-cards right away.

favorite language

A couple of days ago there was this poll on facebook about your favorite language. Mind you, there were only five choices but the selection included some of the language I speak.

English, French, Spanish, German and Latin.

I took Latin back at school and hated it. I only wished I had come across Rita Mae Brown's "Starting from Scratch" earlier; I'm sure those classes would have been more fun.

German is my native language and I've lived in many different regions in Germany and sometimes hate how certain dialects but also groups of people butcher this language. It's not the most romantic language and it doesn't sound sexy when spoken, but it gives you so many possibilities with the times and nuances that I don't really understand why people would voluntarily reduce these possibilities.

English is a different matter; I learned this language at school, like most Europeans. I'm still regularly surprised when I meet people with five and more years of English classes, who are not able to speak the language.

I admire the Dutch and Scandinavians cause all I've ever met with those nationalities mastered this language to a level I'll probably never will.

And still I chose to write most of my blog posts in English, to the dismay of some (sorry, I'll try to write more in German in the future). I started reading books in English when I was about 16, discovered English tv-channels at about the same time – thanks to a satellite dish and listened for a long time exclusively to music with English lyrics.

So what's my favorite language? I'd love to speak Spanish, started this some years ago but never got far due to lack of time. Apparently I got the basics right – this might also be related to the despised Latin – cause I do understand bits and pieces of it, especially when written or when spoken by my brother-in-law (though that's a mix of Spanish and Catalan)

Surprise, surprise, it's French. I loved the language already before I was able to speak it - only some more years and I will have spent more years of my life in France than in Germany. There are many different dialects as well, not all of them sound nice to my ears and yet I still love this language.

I didn't have the best education at school, too much about using the right vocabulary and grammar, but once I got over this, I really had fun speaking this language. And the French didn't mind mistakes – ok, they were a special crowd and I sometimes felt as their mascot but those were great times.

French is very melodious, no matter from which region the speaker comes. They have preserved their origins by some harsh rules (specific amount of French songs on radio, etc.), but it's only done them good. The language is always related to a certain "savoir vivre" and "joie de vivre" and even though I hate writing the language, French is my favorite language.

And I love Paris, but that's a different post. This picture was taken in the Jardin des Tuileries (that's the park attached to the Louvre), looking onto the Place de la Concorde and the Tour Eiffel in the background.

Names – ever think about them?

 

Ever wondered what's in a name and what this might imply?

In Germany we have this thing called saint's day and in some families this day is given more attention than anniversaries.
Most of those saint's days go back to religious persons and there are complete books on that topic. If you're from a religious family you probably have a more traditional name, one that can be traced back to a saint.

I recently read that there is a wave of choosing more androgynous names like Luca or Lena though I don't see anything androgynous about either of them. Sure, normally a name ending on an "a" would lead to the assumption that you're dealing with a woman - unless you're facing an Italian name. Italian Luca's and Andrea's are always male. As for Lena (and who is not thinking of Lena Heady at this moment?) nothing modern and androgynous about this one, as it's short for Magdalena - very religious, very traditional and definitely very feminine.

Family names are a different matter, sometimes left open to speculation, e.g. I have at least three versions that really make sense as to where my family comes from. I prefer that version where it would mean "on fire".

And I'll leave you with that thought.

Random Stuff: Questions, food for thought?

This is not planned as part III to "boring and random stuff about me", these are questions I often wonder about, some are meant rhetorical, some are real questions.

1. Why do so many lesbian authors choose androgynous names for their characters? Or "male" nicknames? And why do they often pair blondes and brunettes? I can't believe that so much of lesbian fiction is alt- or uber Xena-fiction. (really don't know the difference between alt and uber, yet I'm sure that this is not fanfiction)
   
2. Is there really no base-line below which political elections will be cancelled? I can't believe that elections with 30% of attendance can still be valid. Sure, people who stayed at home will have to live with this, but still….
   
3. What is the point of having a non-smoking policy on trains but not at the stations?
   
4. If I stopped thinking for others for an entire day, e.g. on the road or avoiding run in with those little monsters at the supermarket, will I still be alive in the evening?
   
5. Why are most current lesbian plots on TV spoiled by one of them being pregnant, some sooner, some later?
   
6. E-books prices don't differ as much as I expected from "real" books. I hope that authors get a bigger deal from e-books as production costs are extremely lower.
   
7. I'm beginning to like facebook's "pick your 5" and wonder if there's a possibility to cross post them to my blog.
   
8. Dita von Teese is supporting the German Act at the Eurovision Song Contest? Seriously? I'm glad that my tv fees support Patricia Kaas ;)
   

More boring and random stuff (also known as part II)

I barely had posted part I, that I already thought about facts I had missed, which is why I instantly started on part II. These points also trigger ideas for "normal" blogposts, which had been awfully scarce lately. Let's see with what I'll come up next.

1. Missing the "winners" gene, I don't play to win but to have fun, I've been known to give the craziest answers at trivial pursuit just to see the reaction of the rest of the group.
   
2. I'm not a very tidy person, but everything I do follows some hidden, extremely analytical agenda
   
3. When I recently made the switch from winter to summer shoes, I realized that I own more than 10 pairs of "good" summer shoes and not a single one of them is black.
   
4. My favorite reading and viewing genres are crime, mystery and sci-fi.
   
5. I can be extremely stubborn, which sometimes ends with me simply ignoring specific persons. Especially when they ended some argument by making a dramatic exit incl. slamming doors.
   
6. I do have a sensor for true emotions (that's perhaps the reason why I can't stand soaps) and have major issues with people, especially in professional life, who are clearly showing to which type of communication-skills-seminar they've (just) been.
   
7. Lived above a bakery when I was a wee child; until today the smell of fresh bread makes me feel at home.
   
8. I hate people who come to ask for my opinion and then try to persuade me that I'm wrong.
   
9. This also extends to colleagues who want to know how something should be done only to launch into an argument why this doesn't make sense. If they want to run head first into a wall, let them.
   
10. I'm allergic to dust and several fabrics.
    
11. I can be a real snob about food especially when it comes to brands.
    
12. Sometimes I think that I'm extremely accident prone. The run-in with the black elder seems to have left a scar on my arm.
    
13. Several weeks ago I set the kitchen on fire, a towel which was too close to the stove was the culprit
    
14. I can remember really weird or unnecessary facts, but it's also happened more than once that I couldn't remember why I had gone down to the basement. Or that I needed to make 3 trips until I had what I initially went for.
    
15. I can't take horror movies seriously; but movies about or with real animals often leave me upset.
    
16. Ice-cream is my favorite food, especially of the frozen yoghurt kind
    
17. I never do "stuff" just because everybody else is doing it.
    
18. I never leave house without my sunglasses but have forgotten everything from my jacket to closing the doors and windows
    
19. I love to observe thunderstorms.
    
20. I'm afraid of crowds
    
21. It's been proven on twitter that I'm completely unromantic, at least in ways that are commonly considered romantic. Please refer to # 17.
    
22. I care about words, language and correct pronunciation and some dialects make me physically sick. And though I don't really speak a dialect and also cannot place them geographically when hearing them, I understand most of them after listening for a couple of minutes, incl. most Swiss and Austrian dialects, and to some extent Dutch.
    
23. I talk to my pets, always ask them how their day was and if they slept well.
    
24. Went to Malta and Iceland in the same year, Malta in August and Iceland in December and always wished it had been the other way round.
    
25. Spent last Sunday re-watching the latest 5 episodes of Bones for the 3^rd time
    

Boring and random stuff

Following a tradition started by Ingrid, continued by Natazzz, picked up by megelder to be taken up by Natazzz again – I feel compelled to bore you with a list of random facts myself

1. I moved about a million times but the last time was about 9 years ago.

2. My favorite place is somewhere in the Provence, not too far from Lavender fields in the garden of my yet to buy vacation home.

3. The modern Tate Museum impressed me more than the Louvre.

4. I lived in Paris for 5 years and never went inside the Louvre Museum.

5. I don’t like beer, except on hot summer evenings when I crave Panaché

6. I don’t like Cola, neither Cola nor Pepsi. My favorite “soft drinks” are water and fruit juices.

7. I’m not a vegetarian, but can go without meat for weeks and I don’t eat red meat.

8. “They do have salads on the menu” is not the reason why I would choose a restaurant. When dining out, I want to eat dishes I won’t get at home.

9. When I cook, the kitchen always looks as if an experiment had gone wrong. I never learned cooking and am most at ease with dishes that get their finishing in the oven. On the other hand, I do have some talents in baking and my marmalades have a large fan base.

10. I am a nerd and a geek and our living room and my office often look as if they were right out of an SF-movie.

11. I love learning about new things and always research those topics exhaustively.

12. I’ve suffered from various degrees of insomnia all my life but my cat Wölkchen was the best cure against it. For the first years, she always slept on my chest and her purring still puts me to sleep.

13. For reasons unknown to me, pets and kids take to me instantly.

14. I’m incredibly shy.

15. I don’t run nor jog, never.

16. I never smoked, not even once. This accounts for cigarettes and joints. But I was high at least once, on “secondary” smoke at a Pretenders concert.

17. Ages ago, my apartment was burglarized. I’d still like to know what they thought of the “Desert Hearts” tape which was still in the video recorder.

18. I’m not into accessories, not on me, not in the house; and this even extents to cooking and baking, you want decoration or garnitures? Not from me.

19. But I love gadgets, mostly from the electronics department.

20. I hate shopping, doesn’t matter if it’s for groceries or for clothes. The earlier I’m done, the better. Despite this handicap I love shopping at IKEA and most DIY-stores.

21. I can’t read maps but have a good sense of direction combined with a very good, almost photographic memory.

22. I’m not good with numbers. No matter if this stands for a date or a phone number, I’ve got my gadgets to remember to them.

23. Despite the fact that I’m often up early, I’m not a morning person.

24. I’ve always had a thing for women older than me.

25. I love coffee; you wouldn’t want to cross my way until I had my first 3 or 4 cups of morning coffee.