Nachdem nun mitterweile wieder etwas Alltag eingekehrt ist, die Probezeit sicch schon langsam dem Ende zu neigt und auch die letzten Arbeiten an unsrer neuen Wohnung in Düsseldorf erledigt sind ist es nun auch Zeit für einen virtuellen Tapetenwechsel.
Momentan ist die Welt sehr düster und in meinem Kopf keine Platz zum bloggen. Ich werde mir daher eine Auszeit nehmen. So lange Danke ich für die Wärme und Anteilnahme.
Ich bin gerne im Waschsalon. Ich fahre auch gerne Zug. Da bleibt die Zeit einfach mal stehen und gibt Raum, den eigenen Gedanken nachzuhängen. Die Welt draussen verschwindet für eine kurze Zeit, wird unwichtig. Vielleicht liegt es an den gleichen momotonen Geräuschen die alles andere schlucken.
Und dann tritt man heraus und das Leben bricht wieder über einen herein.
There are a few misteries in our daily life. Like, why is grand ma's cake always the best, girls always in groups at the restroom and the weather always bad on weekends. And there are also a few things, you can't use google for. Like cooking jam. I always considered home made jam as an difficult issue. Something I relaay love but would never do myself. But as knowledge has to be passed by from one generation to the other my grandma introduced me in the art of jelly cooking.
And it was easy. It neither hurted nor was it difficult. I burnt a finger by accident as the fruits are really hit, but that was the only bad thing that happend. Therefore I want to share this experience.
I. Mix fruit with sugar (the special one for jelly) and boil mixture for 4 minute. Be creative in adding flavour (here rhuabard with cinnamon and gloves)
II. Collect heaps and heaps of glasses to save your money. Yogurt glases, the one from cucumbr and so on. And don't trow the lid a way!
III. Fill mixture in glass. Don't burn your fingern. And.....TATA... first home made jam is ready. Well done!
Thank you very much for all your sympathy. It helps a lot! For the moment we can`t do nothing else than hope the best.
Hihi, that was fun! I really love doing sports and so I signed in for the JP Morgan Run in Frankfurt yesterday evening. As the headquarter of the holding I'm working for is based in FFM it was a matter of honour for my company to take part. SO we drove down from Mönchnegladbach to Frankfurt for an 30minutes run. With approx. 80.000 runners it was more a battle about space than a nice running event. But it was great for teambuilding. As there were 2 business units competing against each other (finance vs. sales) I was forced to do the winning job for my team. Well, I did it :) But for know my legr are really sore! Guess who are the finance guys....
This weekend was bulky waste collection. The whole town was crowded by old and unused furniture. Is`s interetsting what peoples throw away. Lot of old couches, coffe machines on every corner, damaged bikes and old kitchen interiour. But, hey, it`s Düsseldorf - one of the whealtiest towns - or at least a place with a good quote of millionaires per habitant. On our way back yesterday late at night we bumbed into an very kind old gentleman. White hair, sports blazer, that kind of gentleman. He was bringing down his old stuff for collection. To make it short: we are now proud owners of a pretty cool (and good) set of golf clubs including bag. Rubbish obviously belongs also to the eyes of the beholder.
Yesterday we rushed into the festival of petanque - some kind of boule trophy. You know, those small silver heavy balls you can buy in the DIY shop. Hum, not really. Those boules are real expensive. Did you know that there are even competition boules? And a international league? The rules are easy: a team consist of 3 players with 2 identically coded boules each. The Pointer attemps to position his boules as close as possible to the coche (piglet). The counterpart falls upon the shooter who aims to shoot opposing boules. Well, sounds like a match of chess doesn`t it?
We watched the finals late at night and actually it was pretty cool. They had closed the complete Rhein bank and created a huge area of competition fields - like a beach ball area with gravel instead of sand. People hung around everywhere and there were heaps of french guys. It had a flair of late summer evenings somewhere in rural France. Much better than chess....
Hey guys have you seen it yet? No? So I'm not telling anything about the story but that it is great! Like the other tweo parts we saw it in english. I dont like the german voiceover. There are a few things I have to admit.
First, I have a new femal hero. Captain Swan. Oh sorry, didt I say to much. However, she is great. Tough women, nice haircut and I'm really considering taking martial arts lessons. She's so cool.
Second, I love to collect quotes. As I use to watch great movies a few times it very likely that I can repeat parts of the movie fluently. So, there's a short quiz. From which of my 3 favourite movie are those quotes.
1. That's a very nice bolder
2. Oh, no good
3. I think he has to compensate for something
4. Raise the colours
5. Booh
6. Snowcorns? Oh it's lemon
A short hint: 2 of them are animate movies...
Der, den ich liebe,
Hat mir gesagt,
daß er mich braucht.
Darum gebe ich auf mich acht.
Sehe auf meinen Weg
Und fürchte von jedemRegentropfen
Daß er mich erschlagenkönnte.
(Bertolt Brecht)
Auszug aus der Traurede vom Wochenende. Wish you all the best!
At the moment everything goes up and down. The operation was postponed yesterday - so we have to wait another 2 weeks. Up or down? Well, something in between. There is this common saying that you have to travel trough dark valleys to climb the summit. It is very kitchy but true. Without amptitudes in one direction there wouldn't be the other direction. Or easier - no down's, no up's.
I'll be on the wedding of my best friend this weekend -definitely an Up. So please stay tuned until Monday.
Sometimes it's hard to believe what we see. Like those sculptures we saw in Sausalito. The artist just put one bolder on another and -tata- it worked just by balancing them perfectly. No glue, no magic, just physisics and patience. I guess, none of us could do it. Life somehow is similar. It follows some kind of structure that is often unknown. And like those sculptures balance is hard to find. Those stone cairn remeber me on one thing: if everything breaks down - and that can happens easily - you just need patience to rebuild it though it will be different.
Yesterday evening it has started. Perhaps you know it also. Probably you do so. If you have worked a little bit to much, slept a little bit too little, danced on to many parties at one time than you probably know the moment when it starts: this goofy madness. In my case it started under the shower. There, I found out that you can make gorgeous faces in the shower head. And that’s what I did – I made faces to myself. It was funny and silly and even got better as I tried to picture this. Time for a long weekend, don’t you think?
Sometimes I have the impression that I have to lock everything I am, I’m feeling and thinking deep down into myself. Sometimes to protect myself. But unfortunately it’s not so easy to put everything in a nice box, wrap it, lock it and put it in a corner somewhere in your mind.
1. No picture today because I'm in a hurry (see 2.)
2. No more postings before Thursday as I'm on my way to another business trip to Amsterdam. That's great since it is the first time that I will see that beautiful city. But boring as I travel to a privat lable trade show....
3. Still no telefon or internet at home. Telecom is on strike. That's annoying.
I do have a few things I do not really like to do but I don’t really care about. And I have principles. Things I would never do. Not for rational reasons, just in principle. As drinking things I’m forced to drink. In principle everything somebody wants me to do where I do not see any rational reason for. I have to agree, I’m a little bit stubborn from time to time.
So, what happens? On my business trip to Poland last week I was forced to drink a Mad Dog – some kind of vodka with Tabasco. A very unpleasant experience everybody in our company has to face. Just because it hurts (or better burns like hell) and because everybody did it. Well, not me. I refused to do it. My boss was a little bit offended but he could accept it as I’m a girl. He really told me, than if I would be male he had to insist on it! Okay! Okay?
And I sunk in my very own discussion about how far would I go for my career? Would I abandon my principles? And If I do so, which would remain untouched and which would I give up? And what would happen if I really would start to weaken my principles?
Last weekend we rushed into an cycling race by accident. It was held around the famous shopping mile in Düsseldorf called KÖ (Königsallee). It was fun for us to watch it and fortunately we had our cameras with us. It was the first time for me that I try to picture fast moving objects. I guess, I took a few hundreds photos. And a lot of them showed nothing else than concrete as the cyclists were too fast. Than I start to move myself as the guys past my camera. It was fun - I really felt like a semi professional photographer. I love those pictures that capture the movement, the speed and the competitive spirit.
Wow, I'm back. Finally! And how was it? Chaotic! First, we missed our flight. Or better, it was postponed. So we had to re book. Instead of flying direct from Dortmund to Worclaw we could only fly to Berlin. Well, better than nothing we thought. Our faces fainted the moment we saw the aircraft. It was not really an aircraft, more a can with propellers. Hm, we survived it and arrived in Berlin safely. And then the real journey started. We had to convince a Taxi driver to bring us from Berlin to Worclaw (Breslau) - that's a 300km taxi ride. As my boss is a former retail buyer and a sales person by heart we did it - for 250 Euro. It took us 9h instead of 4h but it is a good story.
Everybody knows that common saying, that the glass is either half full or half empty. How you will see the glass depends on your very own point of view.
Right know I'm facing a few problems with my point of view, especially regarding benchmarking. Am I good? A good athlete, a good colleague, a good person? Compared to all those lazy coach potatoes or boring office jerks I am definitely better than them. But, is better then somebody automatically good? No, not really I guess. Compared to all those super social guys and those "I work 50h a week and train for an ironman successfully" super athletes I regard myself a pretty average. Should I be frustrated now? No, not really. Probably I just have to face it like it is, do as good as I can, always try to do it a little bit better and accept that life can't be perfect.
Perhaps you remember this picture. I took it more than 6 month ago for another posting. Incredible how time passes by. However: I will be on my first business trip for the next days. So, no postings until Monday.
As some of you might know, I'm training for an half ironman this summer. This weekend we had a little bit time and decided to spend a day near the event location. As the Allgäu Triathlon is know as one of the hardest and toughest event I thought it might be cool to see what 'hilly course' means. And frankly: I'm horrified! I can't do that. No way! That's hard but I learned to evaluate my abilities very critically and I'm not able to do this course. So, I canceled those plans. And, am I disappointed now? Kind of. But not really. I found another event, just 2 weeks later, flat course, nice location and I will do that. And guess where: ERLANGEN! So guys: We will be around Nürnberg the first weekend in August!
There is one thing you need to have in Düsseldorf: an appropriate ride. Not one of those super sleek, carbon fiber road racers or those cheap & crapy bikes form the grocery store. Something that is comfortable and stylish at one time. Something that's more a lifestyle than a vehicle. Something where speed doesn't matter. Something like an holland bike. The first lesson I learned was, that there's a huge variety of holland bikes (old and news, cheap and expensive....). But just one original: the Gazelle! Old fashioned elegance, slow motion cruise mode. Well, what should I say. We bought one and it's really cool!
A few weeks ago we went on our first semi professional photo shooting. A friend of us had needed new pictures for their rock climbing school. And so we spent few hours near Bad Urach trying to capture rock climbing lessons. It was great fun. The best thing was me in the rocks! To gain a better view and a more interesting perspective they gave me those 'climber pampers' (you know what I mean) and I could crawl around the cliffs pretty save. What a party! I will put up more pictures during the next days on our flickr.com page.
Perhaps you mention the shift from German to English. Well, I don't want to get that rusty in English so I decided to change to English occasionally. Hope that will be fine with you. The other thing is that at the moment I'm just able to post during working days since I still have no internet access at home. German Telecom still need a few days.
