Journal Entries
a year on
Posted Apr 30, 2005
Boy I'm no good at this web journal thing. Once a year I kind of remember to log on and see where I left off ages ago... but anyway. Quote for the day: In an uncertain world, it's good to know that somethings never change. Thanks Billy Connolly! 
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Latest reply: Apr 30, 2005
no dargons!?
Posted Jul 4, 2004
now hang on a minute, what do you mean there are no dragons on DNA sites. There's pretty much everything else being talked about, so why is there no discussion on dragons? Time there was- maybe I'll start one
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Latest reply: Jul 4, 2004
festivals
Posted Jul 24, 2002
Good grief, it's that time of the year again... Every summer, the festival plague descends on this lovely city, and there's something or other going on EVERY weekend. It starts in early May: at first, lots of harmless little flyers and posters crop up in the bars, on the billboards and in the public venues. You never pay much attention to them, there's always some apper flying around... Then all of a sudden sometime in June, you leave your office on a Friday afternoon and walk into town - and bang, there's the fat trucks, the PAs, stage, food stalls and ten million people all over the shop. depending on the kind of day you've had, you turn and run - if you can. If you don't happen to be one of the lucky few who actually LIVE in the middle of town and consequently have the party on their doorstep. Or you whoop with joy, abandon all plans for a quiet weekend in and join the fun.
And sometimes, if you're vene luckier, you get to be part of the whole shebang. When someone comes up to you and asks you all innocently what you are doing on the weekend, it's advisable to make sure he/she isn't in charge of one ofthe stalls in a festival. Otherwise, you're in for it.
Yours truly has the pleasure this weekend - 3 days of no sleep, little food and lots of fun and after-hour drinking... and the smell of fish, since our stall has the unique feature of smoked trout sandwiches.
I can't wait.
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Latest reply: Jul 24, 2002
funny thing about books
Posted Jul 19, 2002
Has anybody ever had the feeling that books have a life of their own? Every time you turn your back on them, they multiply!
I'd have to admit now I'm an old-fashioned book addict. I love the smell of books, I love the feel of books, I love the sound they make when they hit a wall. And great though online reading and writing is, it's a lot more difficult to sniff a computer, throw it at someone or prop it up against a teacup than it is to do the same things with a book.
I also love shopping for books - those completely aimless, afternoon-long expedition down all the aisles of a well-sorted bookshop, preferably with a café attached so that you can flop down in front of a cuppa and a muffin at the end of a perfect browsing day and watch the rain outside over a pile of just-bought books.... Hodges&Figgis in Dublin springs to mind, as well as the countless other cosy, friendly bookshops on the planet that make life in any city so much more comfortable.
Until not so long ago, this town had one of them. Located in a beautiful old building right down one of the little lanes of the city centre, the place had it all: three floors of books in every size, shape and fragrance known to man, and pretty much on every subject as well. A coffee bar with cream-cheese bagles. A map and geography department whose biggest attraction was the little globe that lights up when someone goes past it. A lovely spiral staircase and no elevator. And even a bathroom down a few more winding stairs in a prefectly spooky basement. You could spend whole Saturdays in there, if you're the kind of daft get who enjoys that sort of thing. But alas, sic transit gloria mundi - the thing has moved. To the new shopping centre by the railway station. It now occupies a small space at the top of the (ugly) long monster that bills itself the best shopping centre in town. Gone are the stairs, the coffee shop and the creepy bahroom. Gone are the endless shelves of books. They are now transformed into little islands in a sea of neon-blue carpet. Tough. The new shop has, at best, all the appeal and atmosphere of a W.H. Smith in an airport - and yes, I think W.H. Smith's in airports are very important and useful places, they've saved me from dying of boredom quite a few times - but for a good long expedition into the world of books, they're just not the right environment now.
So what to do? Thankfully, we have a second bookshop in this town. And the people there seem to be catching on to what a good bookshop should be like. They've already done away with the elevator and most of the little islands in the sea of neon-blue carpet. Just wait until we have a coffee shop....
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Latest reply: Jul 19, 2002
German As A Foreign Language - "MITTE"
Posted Jul 18, 2002
Now as we all know since Mark Twain, German is a terrible language that nobody except the Dead have enough time to master.
Having just taken my last exam in German Linguistics, I tend to agree. However, since I finally discovered just a little bit of what's behind the bloody rules and exception of this language, I'd have to say that it is quite a lot of fun as well! You can do amazing things in German: write plays and poetry in, perform plays and poetry in, order a drink, curse, tell someone you love him, ask for a cigarette, complain about the weather... Oh really? Can't you do that in any language? Weeeelll.... yes...
Anyway, the point of this drivel is that there's an amazing new magazine for people who teach German as a foreign language, and judging by the number of websites on the subject there must be a lot of us out there. And since I happen to know that in a small town in Germany and a small town in the Czech Republic there are people busily putting together the second volume of this mag and making friends in the process, I'm making a mental note to tell them - well done, great job, hope everybody in the universe reads it. And if we get our act together, maybe we'll have the thing - "mitte" - on the web before long, too.
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Latest reply: Jul 18, 2002
rainqueen
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