| C'est bon |
[25 Jul 2008|04:19pm] |
So, Wed night I met 4 Aussies, staying at the same hotel, also bound for Wacken. Hung out and had some nice long talks about the awesomeness of our pilgrimage and metal in general. One of 'em is a huge Metallica fan, he about dropped his jaw to the floor when I disclosed that I saw 'em with Cliff, just 3.5 mos before the bus accident. All good.
Dropped by the local firestation this AM, but they asked me to come back at 1400. Coudn't manage then, will perhaps pop by again after work. Starting to run out of time here, it's Fri afternoon and I'm off to Belgium Monday morning. Good though, I had my fellow French employees help me out with my pronunciation for Au Fond du Temple Saint, which I'm singing in November. Also need to find time to hit a laundromat pretty soon, starting to run out of clothes. And of course Sunday is occupied with seeing the finale of the Tour de France.
Will be nice to get into Germany, I think I'll do better at conversing with the locals there. My French is pretty appalling after a decade of neglect. Oh, the boss agreed to let me expense part of Defcon too, that's welcome.
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| Awesomeness |
[25 Jul 2008|03:58pm] |
Sadly, the audience seems to have no clue at the excellence of this 11yr old kid totally ripping YYZ on organ.
And, the same kid doing Carry On My Wayward Son, apparently about a year before YYZ:
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| Peekatures |
[22 Jul 2008|12:07pm] |
http://www.hintz.org/gallery/main.php?g2_itemId=334
Eiffel Tower from my hotel room, and the amusing contrast of the small, poorly presented beer aisle vs the very swank and well stocked wine selection at the local supermarket. The French certainly love their wine.
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| Wishmaster-the misheard lyrics |
[21 Jul 2008|02:39pm] |
This is utterly genius...
If you're not a Nightwish fan, here's the actual lyrics...
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| Bonjour. J'ne parlez beaucoup francais. |
[21 Jul 2008|11:18am] |
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Makes AM chitchat in the coffee room quite limited. Curious custom here, everybody seems to shake everybody's hand first thing in the am. Cute. Also, arriving at 1000, nobody's here. Rather a contrast from NZ or the US.
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| Home |
[21 Jul 2008|03:09am] |
It's definitely NZ.
Leaving AKL, I *felt* it. I was leaving the place I belong. Approaching LA, where I lived for 5 years, and visited regularly as a child because my grandparents lived there, indifference. Catalina Island was the only place that stirred anything, it's always been a unique place for me.
On the ground at LAX I was mostly annoyed by the US being stupid. Though I did catch a whiff of the ocean, which curiously smelled different from NZ. No idea why, it's the same ocean, but yeah, it was different. On the flight out we circled Palos Verdes, I was able to pick out the general location of my grandfathers place (the private school across the canyon has a large soccer field which I could spot). Too high to make out his place directly but still able to pick out familiar landmarks. Will be fun to be there in a couple weeks.
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| Randomness |
[21 Jul 2008|03:06am] |
Lufthansa: no inflight entertainment (well, ok, 1 17"ish display, about 6-7 rows away). Very surprised by this, expected much more from Germans. Big win to AirNZ there. The first two hours of the flight out of AKL were toast while they tried to sort out the misbehaving entertainment system, but after a reboot of the system it worked brilliantly. I'm *sure* that the fact it's running 'doze underneath is entirely coincidental(yeah, I'm being snarky, but in all fairness it could be bad code, benefit of the doubt and all that).
In 1912, at the ripe age of 12, Edmund Hintz left Bremen Germany for the US via Ellis Island/NY. Ed begat Bob, who begat this Ed(named for that Ed). For many years I've felt a tie to DE. Back at Uni, German was the language I most grokked. Italian, I can manage, French is a mess, but German, I get. Indeed, back in the days when I still planned to be an opera guy, I had the intention of going to DE to sing in the opera houses. So finally being in DE (even just for a plane xfer) was cool. Looking forward to a lot more of it in a week or so at Wacken.
Frankfurt: trees. Lots of trees. Very green. Me like.
France: Everything's closed on Sun. Inconvenient. I expect that in NZ, but thought FR would be more 24/7. Mind you, I'm in the 'burbs, city center is apparently still going. Still, the burbs of BFE in the states are at least open at 1600 Sunday so a guy can get a razor. Another interesting observation: farms. The approach into CDG goes over lots of farms. In a striking contrast to the US and NZ, the houses clump. You'll have 6-10 houses with fields all around, like circling the wagons
against the injuns. I didn't see a single lone farmhouse.
This sort of mundane observation is what happens when I'm at the end of 33 hrs of travel.
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| Xmas in July |
[19 Jul 2008|06:04pm] |
One of the xmas pressies this year from Pops and Suellen was Phil Lesh: Searching For The Sound. The epic air adventure is finally giving me time to read it. As a well studied deadhead I'm of course well aware that Phil had significant training and background in classical music before he caught on to jazz and later became a founding member of the Dead. But reading his firsthand accounts is pretty fascinating. Particularly his recollections of his first times on pot and lsd, which had the very respectibiggle soundtracks of Stravinsky and Mahler, respectively. That's my kinda hippie.
Rather enjoying the book, gonna have to exercise some self control and study my music whilst idling the time away. Could quite easily devour it in one sitting if I'm not careful.
In AKL now, next leg is to LAX. About 2 hrs there, then Frankfurt, and another couple hours then Paris. Roughly 36 hrs after leaving home. *sigh*
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| Well well. |
[19 Jul 2008|10:56am] |
4 hrs from my flight out of WLG. Which means that in less than 24 hrs I'll be back in the ConUS for the first time in 4.5 years (though only to transition through LAX on to Frankfurt). Still, will be odd to be back after such an absence.
Pity I'd not known the company travel policies before I booked. Turned out they'll happily give you a layover if your flight time exceeds 12 hrs, I could have taken a few days layover in LA on the way out as well. Next time.
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| Huh, cool |
[04 Jul 2008|05:52pm] |
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My last full day in Paris is 27 Jul. Just discovered that's also the final day of the Tour de France. I'm hardly a big bike racing fan, but hey, may as well go check it out. It's not every day you get to go to something like that.
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| Heat! |
[25 Jun 2008|08:30pm] |
At long last, the heat pump is fully operational.
Heat at the touch of a button is a wonderful thing. So good to have re-entered the 20th century.
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| i can has? |
[20 Jun 2008|10:37am] |
Judas Priest. 7 Sep. Vector Arena, AKL. NZLive says it's the 20th, but I think Ticketmaster has it right on the 7th. The band site shows the 10th in Sydney and the 21st in Korea, so 20th in AKL would be a lot more difficult that 7th.
Priest are awesome live. Besides being one of the legends of metal, they put on an awesome show. Pretty sure it was '88 when I saw them with Slayer opening, which is one of the all time best double bills I ever saw. That show kicked serious ass.
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| Final piece of the puzzle |
[15 Jun 2008|10:57am] |
Booked a flight from Brussels to Hamburg this morning, that's the last of the travel arrangements for Europe. I'm working for 2 days in Brussels, so Monday the 28th I depart Paris in the AM on the TGV for Brussels, and the holiday time starts on Wednesday the 30th when I fly to Hamburg. Ticket was $105NZ, which seems quite reasonable for a ~300k ride on a Canadair regional jet. But get this; according to expedia's site, the airfare was $34, the taxes were $71 (!!). Gotta love Europe.
I get in to Hamburg at 0950, so plenty of time before the Feuerwehr Musikzug opens it up that night. Sehr gut.
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| Almost 20 years to the day... |
[14 Jun 2008|03:32pm] |
I last saw Iron Maiden on 10 June 1988, San Diego Sports Arena... Fri, 13 June, (which would be 12 June in the US) my Wacken ticket arrived from the kind gentleman in Italy who ebay'd it.
\m/ !!!
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| The joy of naming |
[13 Jun 2008|10:20am] |
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We got a kbox today. Were trying to come up with a name for it. Big Brother themes naturally came up (MinInfo, various totalitarian leaders, etc). Someone suggested "jesus". I pointed out the advantage of this name is that if it dies, we know it will be back in 3 days...
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ehintz's journal