h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

... to come on over, offer a cigarette and a nice cuppa...

To be honest with you if been around here quite a while (even pre-bbc) but forgot my passwords and logins and things more often than I can remember. Maybe I am changing jobs and computers too often.

I have read this 'Don´t want to annoy you, Ben' quite often around here. Sad, isn´t it.

So far you are one of the few people I have seen around the web who stand up to their beliefs. Who can articulate their feelings/opinion without starting a flame-war. And who can acknowledge being beaten and not just b*gger off into cyber-space.

You are a very avid (is this the correct word? my mind sometimes just gives me vocabulary without a literal translation...) poster here. You do offer comfort if someone needsit, you fight for things you think fighting is necessary, you are controvers and sarcastic and sometimes ironic, you take notice and care about the world around you and you are funny.

Just wanted to let you know:

I appreciate that.

There is not that many around like you. Not in real-life and not at all here on the net.

I really don´t know why I am writing this. I reckon, it is just because your last post made a bit sad and I think you need some motivation.

Oh, and if you need someone to help you by sticking his head out, give me a holler. If it is my cup of tea, I will stick mine out as well...

One more thing: I am not at all into buddhism and stuff like that, so I did not really get Kaz insult.... But personal insults is usually wht it ends up in....

Ouzo

Hi

Thanks for dropping by. What you said has heartened me considerably.

"And who can acknowledge being beaten and not just b*gger off into cyber-space" - that is one of the many things that irritates me to be honest. I have answered the points made, and owned up when they have made me change my mind. I always say that I would prefer any kind of truth, to lies or to silence. And most of the time it is true!

The Buddhism crack? One of the key tenets of Buddhism is loving-kindness. Actually tolerance does not seem to be that important a concept in Buddhism, but absolute respect for all life is important, and so I guess tolerance comes in under that heading.

No-one likes being called a hypocrite in public, and particularly when it is not in that instance true. There is stuff I am hypocritical about. I am the world's worst vegetarian, for example. And I have had some sexual relationships which were based on - well - sex, rather than on morality. But I do at least own up to my own hypocracies.

Thanks for your comments. They made a difference. The rest of today has been rather bizzare, to say the least. In fact I might sling something in my journals about it.

Bavaria? I was working in Munich from April through July, (Ismaning, actually). I very much enjoyed it. Munich is a great city in every respect, and one I would like to return to. Who knows where the wind will blow me next?

vielen dank

bis spater

Ben

Nichts zu danken!

Ismaning, really? Should I try and guess the company you worked for? Nah, I won´t think about my job after 2200. Even if it would be just to hide that I have been working until half an hour ago.

Thanks for letting me make a difference.

This is alos a point that I hate about the net. People don´t seem to care about you. The get you heated, they argue you with you, they have fun with you... whatever, but eventually they´ll wander off.

This is one reason, why I don´t really like online-friendships. (The other include meeting those people in person and hating them on first sight and a very bad experience about long-distance-relationships, online-acquaintances and being cheated...)

As I don´t have a dictionary around me, babelfish is just turning out cr*p and my english is getting a bit rusty: hypocracy => pretending somehting you are not? At least thats what I think it means. If it doesn´t just skip the next part or keep making jokes about for ages

Calling someone a hypocrite is, in my eyes, a hypocracy in itself ( I like to use new big words ). You know the one about the stones and being free of guilt... I reckon thats just what it boils down to. As we Krauts say: Everybody has a few corpses to hide in the basement.

It just matters if you yourself are aware that they are there.

Oh, hypocracy is something that Pheloxi is guilty of, I think.

And before you say it: Yes, I am as well, but I will not say anything about => this post would be getting wayyyyyyyy to long if I did.

Hope your job and travel thing works out....

Take care...

See you around

Ouzo

Hmmm. Let's just say I was working for a multinational around the block from the MiniMal.

People don't care about you on the internet? True. There is sometimes the feeling that the entire thing is a giant Artificial Intelligence programme, and that there aren't real people behind the posts. This cuts both ways of course. One of the things I like about the h2g2 meets is that the UK and Dutch ones at least tend to be big enough to find enough people who are interesting and who you would like to meet for the effort to be worthwhile. And I have been through some fairly heavy-duty spats before on-line. (Hard to imagine I know!) But my fellow survivors have forged some close friendships, which have been helped by meeting in rl, I guess.

But by and large I don't have major expectations of on-line acquaintances, especially here on h2g2. I have come to regard it as an online pub; a couple of close friends, a lot of acquaintances, and even more people I met only once or twice. One thing that IS interesting is that there are people who are much more interesting on line than in RL, and vice versa too.

"Hypocrisy => pretending something you are not?" - exactly. Sometimes there is an element of self-deception there, and I suspect that is the kind of hypocrite that Pheloxi runs the risk of being. Other hypocrites are knowing hypocrites, which is worse. I guess I come into that category with regards to vegetariansm. But meat-free in Bavaria??

I am not too worried about the contract / move / somewhere to sleep tomorrow night. I am probably too laid back for my own good these days. I don't feel anguished or worried about the contract - I have been contracting for multi-nationals for far too long to get worked up about a day here or there, it is just that the timing is so bad with having to move out of the flat tomorrow. And I genuinely have no idea whether or not I will be travelling then. I have a bed lined up for Wednesday, but Thursday will be more difficult.

Anyways, it has been nice making your acquaintance, I will be checking my u-space regularly, but posting considerably less. Take care, and keep prodding the complacent.

MFG

B

Teeheheehe... Ok´, so I guess I know my clients in Ismaning pretty well

I have never been to one of the h2g2-meet-ups here. And to be honest, even I had known of them I wouldn´t go there. Couple of years ago, when I was young and innocent, I had a lot of "friends" online. We all used to hang out in MUD playing an online RPG. It was fun. I even regarded some of the as friends after we met in RL. But when I couldn´t access the MUD as often (like, 4 hours a day) anymore, they dropped me like a hot potato. Mind you, one of them is still living just a 5 minute stroll down the road.

OK, my fault, I could have gone to see him. But all my phone-calls went unanswered first, and when we met, all they could talk about was the MUD. Guess, they were real geeks.

You really are way laid back. I would at least be little worried about not having a place to sleep and about the contract. But, then, this seems to be normal in your business. And bad timing cqan seriously ruin your day. Just funny how experience changes your view of certain things.

Anyways... need to start working, or I will not get my paper-work done, before I have a couple of appointments...

It was a pleasure meeting you....

I´ll drop on in for a fag, a cup of coffee and maybe a little chat once in a while. And in the meantime, I am going to smite the infidels to smitherens. Or maybe not

See you

Ouzo
(=> btw: this the name of my dog => I am not (yet) a full blown alcoholic )