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April 23rd, 2008
09:58 am - ??
Question: Is it weird that my cat is obsessed with tortilla chips?
I can't eat them with him around, because he will sit right by me and slap them out of my hand when it emerges from the bag with a chip in it. Then he will leap to the floor, or wherever the chip landed and crunch away, before taking up his chip-slapping position by my mouth again. They're pretty salty, so I don't think he should eat too many of them, but he's really fast!
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April 6th, 2008
04:47 am - Another long overdue post
Stefan's sick and sleeping on the couch. It's amazing how much a person can sleep when he's sick, isn't it? He slept virtually all of yesterday, then through the night, at 6am woke up (unsurprisingly) and transferred to the couch, where he's been sleeping since then. With a break for breakfast. Unbelievable almost, but he needs it, his job has been really stressful lately (he's in charge of a project and is having repeated problems with suppliers).
I've been at my new job for 3 months now, and my probabtionary period is finally over. Yay for permanent contracts! I know it sounds ridiculous, but I just love having a desk job now. Teaching was pretty stressful in and of itself, but what was even more stressful was taking the bus from lesson to lesson, standing out in the rain at the bus stop, being splashed by passing trucks, etc. It's nice to have regular hours, too. I just couldn't handle working such wildly varying hours, and never knowing from one day to the next what I was going to be doing. And then there's the places I was working... Long story short, I'm happy I made the switch.
My colleagues are really nice, too. I share an office with a Brit, a South African, and an Italian. All doing translation. We do things like user manuals for our machines, correspondance with out-of-country customers (that's virutally all of them), contracts, proposals, etc. It can be monotonous, but it's relaxed and that's a priority for me right now. I've started a Pilates class at the company too, upon tales of miraculously pain-free backs from my two English-speaking colleauges (both much older than me). It's fun, but hard! You wouldn't believe how hard it is to do some of what seem like the simplest exercises.
In other news, I've been sucked into the Translator's Marathon team. My section is the shortest, only 6.5k (I insisted). We've been going running together almost every Friday after work (Fridays are short days in the company) and I've been practicing at home. I'm aiming for under 45 min.
But now, I'm off to iron about 500 shirts, because I've been putting it off for many many days. And the pile just keeps getting bigger...
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January 6th, 2008
09:58 am - Last Day of Vacation
Back in Leonding. We spent 3 weeks in Tirol, due to me being between jobs, sort of, and Stefan being forced to use up his vacation days. It was pretty nice, but my in-laws stress us both out after a certain length of time. Christmas was nice, I have some pics up on my Picasa account if you're interested. The cat didn't knock over the tree, but he did remove virtually all the ornaments hung less than 2 feet off the floor. Something to remember for next year.
Before and after Christmas, we spent nearly every day skiing. I feel like I'm getting pretty good, despite one or two seriously painful crashes. At least I didn't end up in the hospital. At least not for a skiing accident. My mother-in-law's crazy dog bit Stefan in the hand while they were playing tug-o-war with a toy. I'm sure the dog didn't mean anything by it, she was just trying to get a better grip, and it wasn't that big a bite, but it was pretty deep, so that evening saw us sitting in the Emergency Room, surrounded by snowboarders with their busted shoulders and skiers with busted ankles, before having the wound bandaged up nicely. Apparently, dog bites get infected quite often, but it looks to be healing nicely, thank god.
We spent New Year's in Leoben, where Stefan went to college, and where some college friends of his still live. Unfortunately, person after person called to cancel, and so it ended up being just us two, the two hosts, and one of the hosts parents to round up the numbers. But we had fantastic Raclette. I'd never heard of it before coming to Austria, it's apparently a Swiss specialty. You have a little stone grill on the table, on which you can grill all kinds of meat and veggies that are sitting around the grill, raw. Also, you can put things in tiny pans with cheese on top to set under the grill and melt the cheese. It's fun.
Anyway, now we're back in Leonding, ready to start the new year. I'm starting my new job tomorrow, as a translator. I'm excited, but nervous as well. If I remember things correctly, this'll actually be my first real full-time job, ever. Crazy, isn't it? But first I was a language assistant, which was only part time. Then I was a freelancer for a few years. And now a real job in a real office with a desk and a computer. Would you think I was crazy if I told you that I'm looking forward to sitting at a desk all day? I know, I know. But it'll be a nice change. It'll all be a little hectic yet while I finish up my remaining teaching contracts while already working full-time at the new company. But my last English class will be over end of February, I think, and it should all be smooth sailing from there.
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December 23rd, 2007
10:59 am - Ouchy
We went skiing yesterday. I had what is hopefully my last official lesson. I was worried that I would've forgotten everything, since we didn't have a chance to go last year, but in the end, it came back to me pretty quickly. We skied on the baby slope with Stefan's uncle (my teacher) for a couple of hours, or until I managed to fall over while just standing still, a sure sign of tiredness. And let me tell you, my muscles are soooo sore today. Not really my legs, but my arms and back from pushing myself forwards with the poles. Because I don't dare go too fast on the steep parts of the slope, I don't have any momentum over the flatter parts, which means I have to push myself forwards to the next steeper part. Ouch.
Anyway, we're enjoying our 3 weeks of vacation here in Tirol. Staying with Stefan's parents is a bit trying at times, but it always helps to remember that we don't have to stay here forever. But I'm enjoying watching BBC Prime, sleeping in, and not washing the dishes all the time. I think we are going to pool our Christmas/birthday money and buy ourselves a dishwasher for Linz. Woohoo!
Remember my last post about the many weddings next summer? First conflict already. My best friend is getting married August 23rd in America, and some friends of Stefan's are getting married the same day over here in Austria. I obviously have to go the wedding in America, but I'm not sure how we're gonna work out the other wedding. These are some friends of his from college, who he didn't have any contact with for a few years because of some bad blood over something that happened before I was in the picture, I don't even know the details. Anyway, I hadn't even met them until last year, I think. But they did come to our wedding (I guess the past is in the past now), and I think Stefan feels obligated to go to theirs. I dunno. Hopefully he'll decide to skip it and come stateside with me. We had been planning to go on a little road trip and see some sights this time around. Well. It's a while away yet. So typical though, isn't it? There's at least 12 weekends during next summer to choose from, and two unrelated groups decide on the exact same day. Murphy's law, isn't it?
Alright, enough rambling for now. Sorry if this post is a little lacking in continuity, but the intricacies of Eastenders is interfering with my typing.
Merry Christmas!
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December 11th, 2007
04:03 am
This here is the coolest video I've seen in quite a while. Wow.
In other news, I really need to get my Christmas presents and cards in the mail, like, yesterday. So I'm off to do that.
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December 2nd, 2007
04:24 am - Holy heck!
Wow, there must be something in the water. Or maybe not, because this seems to be a trans-continental phenomenon. Maybe the planets are in line, or a radioactive asteroid is affecting us all.
This week, around Monday, I found out that my best friend Sarah got engaged to her long-time boyfriend. The next day, I logged onto Facebook to discover that a friend I haven't heard from in several years has also gotten engaged! Talk about coincidence! But then, another friend from SLU had a baby, I think on Wednesday. And yesterday, we found out that one of Stefan's friends from college has also just gotten engaged.
WTF? Something must be going around. I don't even have that many friends, and suddenly, four of them have life-altering events in one week? Weird. I feel like I should do something to keep up, like move to Africa or get divorced or something. Not really, don't worry.
Weird though.
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November 10th, 2007
03:57 am - Winter
Welp, it looks like the first real winter day is upon us: it's snowing, the snow is sticking, and there's a ski race on TV. Just about 6 more months of this, and it'll be summer again.
Got an email from my mom, saying that the thank-you notes I sent last month never arrived in the States. I can't believe it. I know at least one note did arrive, so they can't all have gone missing. But just the idea that some of them got lost, after the wedding invitation debacle (they still hadn't arrived last I heard) makes me furious. How complicated can it be? I even went to a different post office this time! I'm never sending anything by snail mail again, it's just ridiculous. So now I have to email everyone to ask if they got their thank-yous, and if not, send them again. And hope they arrive. Grrr....
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October 19th, 2007
02:47 am - I don't really know how to feel about this incident
It's been the headline in Austria for the past few weeks: Arigona Zogaj.
In 2001, Arigona's dad fled Kosovo and illegally entered Austria seeking asylum. Asylum-seekers are permitted to remain in the country while their case is being processed, and because this is Austria, that often takes years. In 2002, however, his application was denied. The same year, Mrs. Zogaj and children entered Austria illegally and applied for asylum. Denied. In 2003, their 3rd application was also denied, and they were given notice to leave the country or they would be deported. But Mr. Zogaj didn't leave the country. His kids continued going to school here. Life went on as normal as the family continued to appeal the decision.
Then, 2 weeks ago, the government finally used the last resort of forcible deportation. The police arrived at the Zogaj house to remove the family and put them on a plane to Kosovo.
Mr. Zogaj's 14-year-old daughter, Arigona, ran away from home before she could be deported. She doesn't want to go back to Kosovo. She can hardly remember it, she says, and she doesn't speak very much Albanian. Just German. After 2 weeks in hiding, the government promised not to deport her before the end of the year, and she came back.
I really don't know how to feel about this situation. Should she be deported or not? On the one hand, her father acted very irresponsibly when he brought the whole family to Austria without any assurance that they would be allowed to stay. It was stupid not to prepare the family for the move back to Kosovo when they knew it would only be a matter of time. Also, why should she get to stay when I am barely allowed to stay? I'm half Austrian, for heaven's sake, and yet I'm only allowed to remain in the country now because I'm also married to an Austrian who earns enough money. Yes, the girl has completely integrated into Austrian society, which is something the Austrian public highly values (heaven forbid you wear the traditional clothing of your native country or speak a foreign language in public. Lederhosen and German only, please). But should that mean anyone who speaks German can live here forever?
On the other hand, it's completely unfair that the government would allow an asylum case to drag out over 7 or 8 years, allow an entire family to be imported in its duration, and then decide that they all have to go home after all. And make such a huge deal out of integration, which doesn't help the people in this situation in the least.
It's a real lose-lose situation.
The newspaper also told me the other day that a recent poll discovered that 30% of Austrians would be in favor of immediately deporting all legally resident foreigners from Austria. Of course, the people who answered that poll were thinking of the Dangerous African Drug Dealers TM and the Oppressed Turkish Women with Veils TM. Not me, personally. But it's still a group that includes me.
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October 11th, 2007
03:36 am
Well, I've actually read quite a few, but I don't remember too much from a lot of them because I read them in the dark mists of memory that is high school.
_____________________________________________________These are the top 105 books most often marked as "unread" by LibraryThing's users as of 9/30/07. Bold what you have read, italicize what you started but couldn't finish.
Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
Anna Karenina
Crime and punishment
Catch-22
One hundred years of solitude
Wuthering Heights
The Silmarillion
Life of Pi : a novel
The name of the rose
Don Quixote
Moby Dick - When the ocean didn't even appear in the first 50 pages, I gave up.
Ulysses
Madame Bovary
The Odyssey
Pride and prejudice
Jane Eyre
A tale of two cities - isn't this Dickens? I can't stand Dickens
The brothers Karamazov
Guns, Germs, and Steel: the fates of human societies
War and peace
Vanity Fair
The time traveler's wife
The Iliad
Emma
The Blind Assassin
The Kite Runner
Mrs. Dalloway
Great expectations
American Gods
A heartbreaking work of staggering genius
Atlas Shrugged
Reading Lolita in Tehran : a memoir in books
Memoirs of a Geisha
Middlesex
Quicksilver
Wicked : the life and times of the wicked witch of the West
The Canterbury tales - had to read some of it in high school, now I wish I'd read it all.
The historian : a novel
A portrait of the artist as a young man
Love in the time of cholera
Brave New World
The Fountainhead
Foucault's pendulum - Tip: don't try to read this 3 pages at a time on the bus to work.
Middlemarch
Frankenstein
The Count of Monte Cristo
Dracula
A clockwork orange
Anansi Boys
The once and future king
The grapes of wrath
The poisonwood Bible : a novel
1984
Angels and demons
The Inferno
The Satanic Verses
Sense and sensibility
The Picture of Dorian Gray
Mansfield Park
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
To the lighthouse
Tess of the D'Urbervilles
Oliver Twist - another Dickensian disaster
Gulliver's travels
Les Misérables
The Corrections
The curious incident of the dog in the night-time
Dune
The Prince
The sound and the fury
Angela's ashes : a memoir
The god of small things
A people's history of the United States : 1492-present - my philosophical / alternative / jerk ex-boyfriend got me to start this one, but I don't think I finished it. Actually, I think it must be around here somewhere. Maybe I'll give it another shot.
Cryptonomicon
Neverwhere
A confederacy of dunces
A short history of nearly everything
Dubliners
The unbearable lightness of being
Beloved
Slaughterhouse-five
The Scarlet Letter
Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation
The Mists of Avalon
Oryx and Crake : a novel
Collapse : how societies choose to fail or succeed
Cloud atlas
The Confusion
Lolita
Persuasion
Northanger abbey
The catcher in the rye
On the road
The hunchback of Notre Dame
Freakonomics : a rogue economist explores the hidden side of everything
Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance : an inquiry into values
The Aeneid
Watership Down
Gravity's rainbow
The Hobbit - sorry, but I can only process a certain amount of descriptive passages in a book, and that quota was full after the first chapter.
In Cold Blood : a true account of a multiple murder and its consequences
White teeth
Treasure Island
David Copperfield
The Three musketeers
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September 30th, 2007
08:48 am - In order to serve you better...
I have some nice pictures of native flowers from various hiking trips that I wanted to print and frame. We don't have any decoration in the bedroom, just a big white empty wall. I thought they'd fit perfectly. So I took my USB stick to the local drug store, which has kind of a photo-ordering machine thingy. Actually, they have two: one generic and one Kodak. Of course, I used the generic one. I ordered 10x15cm photos. I got them back, took them home, put the first one into its cheapo IKEA frame, and lo and behold, it's not the right size! It's 10cm wide, but only about 13cm long, which leaves a visible gap in the frame. I looked at the drug store's homepage, and after clicking through many many links, found a bit of information telling me how cameras save pictures in a 3:4 format, which isn't 10x15. In order to prevent chopping anything off the photo, they just make them a different size.
Now, I can appreciate the idea of this. And it would be fine if they were going into a photo album or something. But the fact is, 10x15 is a standard size for which they sell frames. 10x13 is not. And why didn't the photo-ordering-machine-thingy tell me I would get back pictures in a different format than I ordered? ARgh!
Well. Today was a beautiful day, so we opened our Upper Austria guide book and kind of chose a destination at random. We went to Rechberg, home of the so-called Schwammerling, which is a big rock balanced on another rock. According to the informative sign, Napoleon's troops (and I'm sure thousands of other, less-famous people) tried to topple it, but couldn't. It's kinda cool. We took a walk which included this Schwammerling, also going through the forest, which was brimming with mushrooms. First we saw fly agaric mushrooms, which are poisonous, but supposedly indicate the right soil and forest conditions for one of the most popular edible mushrooms, the Steinpilz. And of course, there were plenty. But we didn't take them. I love mushroom hunting, and of course the one time we set out without our identification book, bag, and pocket knife, we literally step on edible mushrooms on the way. Well, at least we know where to go mushroom hunting next summer. It's pretty much the end of the season for it, so we probably won't have a chance to go again this year.
After the little hike, we had coffee and cake at the town's inn, and they were both reasonably priced and extremely delicious: a rare combination.
( Pictures from the day )
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September 27th, 2007
09:35 am - It's about time!
So, wedding is over. Thank god. Everything went well, there were only some tiny mishaps. My brother forgot the Bible, dinner was about an hour later than planned, but I think these are minor things overall. The point is, we are married now and we had a great time with family and friends. It was extremely stressful, but also extremely memorable. Take a look at selected events here.
It's fall in Upper Austria. How do I know? Well, leaves are falling, apples are being collected from the ground by men in raincoats to make cider, and garbage is being piled at the side of the road and picked over by Hungarians. It's an interesting tradition, really. Every fall, cities across the country allow residents to get rid of all their large and unwieldly garbage items. Normally, your garbage has to fit in your trashcan, but on one day a year, you can put your old TV or out-grown toddler's bed out with the trash. People normally put their things out a few days in advance, because the pick-up schedule isn't always completely clear. Hungarians, for some reason only Hungarians, come through the cities, loading up little trailers with the finest selection of people's trash. Mind you, your neighbors also went through your pile at night when no one could see them. It's amazing what is gone by the first morning.
In other news, we now have a cat. His name is Kürbis, which is German for "Pumpkin", because he is orange and white. I named him, and I thought it was a cute name, but apparently I don't quite have a handle on proper names for animals, because everyone I've told his name to so far has just laughed. It's like I named him "Kitchen Sink" or "Zimbabwe". But whatever. He recognizes his name and comes running when you call him, so it's too late to change now. His favorite activities include running wilding from room to room just before bedtime, napping on my lap when I'm sitting at the computer, and licking up the puddles of water remaining in the shower after we use it, which I find pretty strange. Check out some pictures of Kürbis as of a few weeks ago here. He's grown quite a bit since then, actually.
So, that's about it from the land beyond the sea. I really will try to keep the LJ updated, but then again, I've said that before...
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July 5th, 2007
02:07 am - Two weeks til the wedding...
...And our invitations still haven't arrived. We sent the overseas ones on May 4th, and they are still missing. But I'm still holding out hope: yesterday, we received a package that my mom had sent from the States on May 4th too! Only 8 weeks in transit, not too bad.
Also, of about 70 invitations sent, we've received 2 official RSVPs from people who the postal service managed to actually get invitations to. One from my Grandma, and one from a friend of Stefan's. Everyone else, apparently, just assumes we know if they are coming or not. And we do, for the most part. But for example, whereas we know Stefan's cousins will be there, we don't know if they'll be bringing their kids, BECAUSE THEY DIDN'T RSVP! I guess this is just karma, really, because up until now, I didn't really take RSVPing that seriously either. That or it's because we didn't include response cards in the invitations. Maybe we were really overestimating people's motivation when we expected them to pick up the phone or write an email or send a post card or whatnot. Hmm.
I guess if these are the worst things to happen surrounding the wedding, we'll be lucky. At my cousin's wedding last month, the band called literally an hour before the reception was supposed to start, saying they wouldn't be able to make it because one of them had been arrested. Seriously. So of course, there was major panicking, and someone managed to dig up a replacement band at the last minute, but it wasn't the kind of music people in that area usually listen to, so there wasn't much dancing going on. But that was compensated for by a whole lot of drinking (and I did my share)!
We're headed to Tirol again this weekend, to take care of sort of last minute wedding stuff. I'll be so happy when it's over with, just so I can stop thinking about all those little things that still need to be done. What really needs to be done at the moment though is clean up the apartment. So I think I'll get right on that.
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May 30th, 2007
02:52 am - Only two and a half weeks til the flight!
I'm really looking forward to being home again, but I'm not looking forward to the flight. Flying makes me feel so sick, it's horrible. I've never been able to find something against the nausea, other than sheer willpower. Dramamine just makes me feel dizzy, which doesn't really combat queasiness. I've tried sleep deprivation, but I can't seem to sleep on airplanes. Alcohol is not bad, it helsp me relax just a little. Maybe a little more will help me relax a little more?
What I'm going to try this time is distraction. I'm taking my mp3 player and a bunch of podcasts of my favorite shows (Car Talk, Wait Wait Don't Tell Me, This American Life, etc). That's how I distract myself when I go running. That way I'll have something against the boredom, but also something against the noise. It's so damn loud on airplanes! Well. We'll see. Any suggestions?
In other news, we made our rings last weekend at the goldsmith's in Leoben. They turned out really fantastic! Check out the whole process here.
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May 8th, 2007
03:06 am - May is upon us.
Last weekend I finally sent out our wedding invitations. So, for those of you in the States, be checking your mail towards the end of this week, beginning of next! I'm so happy to have them gone, because we put a lot of work into them, and I was so paranoid that I would suddenly find a typo or something on the finished inviations and have to do them all over again!
Anyhow. Wedding things have taken over my life complete. There is virutally no other topic of conversation in our household. I'm looking forward to the wedding now mostly just so that it'll be over with!
In two weekends, we are going to Leoben to our jeweler to make our rings. It's a deal they do with engaged couples. You can spend a Saturday morning in the goldsmith's workshop, and he'll help you melt the gold, cast the form, size it, work the surface details and set the stone. I can't wait!
Let me stop boring you with my wedding. Let me bore you instead with a quaint Austrian tradition that is much in the papers this time of year: the May Tree.
Each village and sometimes even each neighborhood (basically, whoever wants to do it), has a party at the beginning of May (ideally May1st). During this party, they take a pine tree that's been stripped of all it's bark and branches except the very top few, and heave it up into position in the marketplace/soccer field/cul de sac. Then there are a bunch of activities like who can climb the highest on the naked trunk. And lots of drinking.
Now, these things are huge. I'm talking normal tree-sized. The bigger, the more prestigous, of course. But here's the tradition I really like: stealing the May Tree.
Whoever puts up a tree has to make sure to secure it carefully and guard it around the clock, otherwise some (usually drunk) guys from the neighboring village will sneak up in the middle of the night and steal it. In the morning, you'll only find a note saying where the tree is, and what the ransom consists of (normally a number of snackplates and beers). To get your tree back, which you have to do to avoid total embarassment, you have to pay the ransom. Or, alternately, steal it back. If you don't, the thieves will put up your Tree themselves, to shame you.
Last year, someone stole a tree off the top of a mountain with a helicopter and was holding it for a ransom of 50 hot dogs and 100 large beers. This year, someone ran over his friend with a tractor, twice, as they were on their way to steal a tree. Both were drunk, of course, and the one guy died.
Nevertheless, isn't it cool?
Here's the German Wikipedia article on the May Tree. It has some good pictures.
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April 18th, 2007
02:00 am - semi-annual update
Time to post again. Geez, time is just flying by, isn't it. I've been so caught up in planning for the wedding, gathering documents for my next visa application, and so one and so on, that I hadn't even noticed it was the middle of April. April! Holy hell, it's only three more months til I'm married!
Ok, calm down. Everything will get finished in due time... I hope. Most of the important things for the wedding have been done, except I don't have any shoes, and we don't have a cake. Yet. And we haven't created any kind of registry. And I haven't made an appointment to get my hair done. Ok, but those are minor things, right?
To be honest, I'll be glad when all this is over with. When I can just sit on the couch in the evening without feeling guilty about all the things there are left to do. When we can finally get on with what we wistfully remember as "normal life". When I can finally start applying for jobs apart from Berlitz.
I'm getting sick of thinking about this wedding. I feel like I talk about nothing else with my mom, my friends, and Stefan. Well, here's something not wedding-related. Our landlady, who lives upstairs, is a little bit nutty. Last week, I looked out the window and saw a man with a roto-tiller, ploughing the yard. Hmmm... Strange... First I thought she was just having a flower garden put in or something, but he actually tilled the entire yard. And it's not a small yard. Then he raked together all the clumps of grass, smoothed out the dirt, and finally, spread GRASS SEEDS. WTF? There was grass there before! And it was fine! Anyway, now the landlady has the sprinklers going at all hours of the day, which means we have really low water pressure. It's kind of annoying, but I keep thinking what her water bill is going to look like!
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March 14th, 2007
04:10 am - A new meme
The rules:
1. Leave me a comment saying, "I, too, am an egomaniac."
2. I respond by asking you five some number of questions. You will answer them, because you like talking about yourself.
3. You will update your LJ with the answers to the questions.
4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five some questions.
Although some of the questions I got from![[info]](http://stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) sciphi are pretty lame, I'll stick to the agreement and answer them anyway.
1. Do you plan on living in Europe for the rest of your life? If not, is it going to happen anyway?
No, I don't plan on it. But I also don't plan not to. Basically, there's no plan. I have no real reason to go home, other than that it's home (is this reason enough?). It'll probably happen anyway though for the following reasons:
A. We have good jobs and nice friends here. In Illinois, no job and fewer friends.
B. We went through hell to get a visa for me to stay here, and have no desire to repeat the process in English.
C. Once we have kids, we won't want to rip them out of school and away from their surroundings.
D. This city offers a quality of life that would be hard to match in the metro-East. cheap, safe and convenient public transit, cultural attractions, parks, outdoor recreational activities, BBC Prime, free healthcare (if by 'free' you mean that we lose more than half our paycheck to taxes each month), relatively good schools, and a special status for me-- the American.
2. Why did you major in History?
I thought it was interesting. I've always been interested in how things got to be the way they are now. Those pictures of Cleopatra and Caesar dressed as medieval Queen and King had always fascinated me, to think that people used to think that life had always been the way it is now, no real conception of history. Plus, you can't do anything half-way intelligent in this world without knowing something about the past.
3. If you had to, would you rather live in Beat San Fransisco, Renaissance Florence, or Golden Age Athens?
Renaissance Florence, for sure. Mostly for the fashions. But partly for the perspective.
4. What's your favorite movie?
I find that my favorite movie changes quite regularly. At school, my favorite was M by Fritz Lang. When I was taking a class on Chinese history, it was Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. When I lived in Vienna, it was The Third Man. At the moment, I couldn't say. I think you can only know this in retrospect. I'll tell you my favorite Western, though, since they just don't make good ones anymore: My Darling Clementine.
5. You have 9 friends on myspace. One of them is Tom. How is it that I'm not in your top 7?
Tom is coming to my wedding
Current Location: Home, Leonding
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February 12th, 2007
11:47 am - Eww...
I'd like to cast my vote for the most disgusting thing in the world.
What do you do if your bathtub doesn't drain fast enough, and you can see the previous tenant's long hair caught just below the opening of the drain? Of course, first you try to douse it with some draino, hoping it will dissolve the hair. Then, in dismay, you realize that the draino is just sliding off the hair because it doesn't stick to wet things. And remember, your man is not at home to do this gross thing for you.
So (naturally) you reach for the crochet hook. And start to pull hair out of the drain. But it's not just hair. It's everything that's washed down the drain and stuck to the hair. Soap and people-grease, mostly. Black gunk. Plus, the water here is incredibly hard, so there are white crunchy bits of lime cementing the older bits of hair and fat together.
:: Shudder.
Anyway, while you're trying to forget that image, check out some pics of my new place! Only now we have a real bed, not just a mattress on the floor.
Current Location: Home
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February 8th, 2007
06:18 pm
Just one thing that I've been meaning to post. An announcement from an American airport, I think O'Hare. I listened to it for hours and the boarding call came just in time to prevent me from finding the author and doing something evil to him. I mean, it's different when these are Native English Speakers. I wasn't surprised at being told to "change the platforms" in Vienna. English is a foreign language here. But in Chicago? I guess I overestimated them. Or maybe I've become over sensitive, being surrounded by mistakes all day at work. You be the judge.
"Do not leave baggage left unattanded."
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05:31 pm
Just to let you know, I haven't died or abandoned you all, I've just been working on my website for the wedding (or as stefan likes to point out, there is no "my" anymore, just "our" ;-) Check it out if you have time, I'd love to hear any suggestions for additional important information. Caution, it's not quite finished yet. I'm trying to put all the useful info there that my American family will need when they come. I'm going to make an Austrian version too later, only obviously not as elaborate, b/c the Austrians don't need to be told what "Blunzngröstl" is. They know to avoid it.
Current Location: work, Berlitz
Current Mood: ![[mood icon]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/charitycam/suns/hungry.gif) hungry
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January 8th, 2007
09:14 am - Furniture!
Ahh, finally! This weekend we brought all our furniture to the new apartment, after having painted it (the apt, not the furniture). We'd stashed it at my in-laws place in Tirol for a few months. Finally, no more air mattress! Finally, a mattress on the floor (the bedframe didn't survive the move)! I never thought I would be so happy to sleep on a mattress on the floor. But I am. Puts it all into perspective, somehow. Anyway, we have the bookshelves set up, the couch set up, the kitchen set up, the TV hooked up to a rabbit-ear antenna, which means we get ORF 1, a fuzzy ORF 2, a b/w ATV+, and a very fuzzy local Linz channel. That's it for Austrian channels, really. The first two are state-owned media, and ATV Austria's first private TV channel. They only liberalized the broadcast media a few years ago, which means most of your selection on TV and radio is government-owned. But it also means that it's top-notch and not interrupted by commercials every 20 seconds. To receive any other channels, including the German ones that are so popular here, you need cable or a satellite dish. Plus, Austria is switching over to digital transmission in like 6 months. And they only told the public about it, oh, about last month. Which means that now everyone has to run out and buy a new TV or a converter for the digital format. What a rip-off!
Anyway, enough about TV. Soon, I also hope to have a telephone and internet connection in the apartment. It takes 3-4 weeks, though I don't know why because theoretically they just have to flip the switch in their HQ to activate the exisisting phone jack in our halllway. But maybe the room with the switches is very far away, Siberia perhaps, or New Zealand, and they have to travel there by donkey. It's the only explanation I can come up with.
Anyway, I should probably go wait for my student. He called 15 minutes ago, i.e. 20 minutes before the lesson was due to begin, and asked if we could postpone till tomorrow. The secretary essentially told him to get real, and so now he's just going to be a few minutes late.
Next update: the sublimnity of having an oven and a dishwasher.
Current Location: Berlitz Linz
Current Mood: ![[mood icon]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/charitycam/suns/awake.gif) awake
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