Interesting Times

The God Translation

2007-05-14T21:03:00.000+02:00

Ever since Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion came out (a controversial, thought-provoking, brilliant read, by the way) I've been wondering what the German title might turn out to be. Now I know: Der Gotteswahn (see page 16 of this preview catalogue) Not a bad title I guess. And one that didn't pop up when I myself was thinking about a possible translation.

Not likely to be in any hotel room near you any time soon. Regrettably.

Once In A Blue Moon

2006-09-04T22:51:00.000+02:00

I know it's been a while, but I have spent August in England again and somehow I never really feel like blogging when I'm there. Just trying out the fairly new Windows Live Writer to write this post. Nice WYSIWYG editing.

Exmouth was good. But the two days of the last week I had to spent in bed and I'm still a bit under the weather. So talk to you soon I hope.

Perfect Day

2006-07-27T07:49:00.000+02:00

Great Cat Empire concert on Tuesday night by the way, the culmination of an oral exam day that went exceptionnally well (so they say) so now i am a certified translator of French also waiting for my certificate to come through but actually planning to go to England in ten days' time.

There were a couple of things on my to-do list that had been neglected while i was preparing for the exam, so there is some catching-up to do. Blogging was on the list, too if i remember correctly.

It's not even eight o'clock in the morning and already it's unbearably hot here.. I could do with a gentle ocean breeze ...

Messing With Wikipedia

2006-07-19T22:50:00.000+02:00

Next Tuesday is not only the day of my final oral exam to become a certified translator in French, it is also the day when i am going to a concert of one of my favourite live bands, The Cat Empire from Melbourne, Australia.Their web site seems to be down just now but they have a nice myspace thingie..

Their German wikipedia entry stated that they did their first German gig last year, but it was definitely in August 2004. In Karlsruhe, of all places. I know cause I was there. It was 5 euros and an absolutely fantastic concert with most probably the highest percentage of Aussies or aussiephiles in the audience i had ever seen in Germany .. now the band is coming back with a couple of more German and European gigs. Definitely recommended. First time i saw them was in 2003 on the Edinburgh Fringe. Their gigs were sold out pretty much every night for the whole time they were there.

Sorry about being such a smart alec on the wikipedia entry ...

What Do These People Have In Common?

2006-07-07T19:21:00.000+02:00

Bill Gates
Anke Engelke
Steven Spielberg
Günther Jauch
Peter Handke
Vincent van Gogh
Bertold Brecht
Christoph Schlingensief
Gweneth Paltrow
Siegfried Lenz
Wim Wenders
Barbara Schöneberger
Mick Jagger
(this list goes on and on)

Click here for the answer.

By the way, this reminds me of an inspiring Stanford Commencement speech by Apple CEO Steve Jobs about Love, Death and Connecting The Dots:

Long Time No Scene

2006-07-04T11:56:00.000+02:00

Oh, i feel like posting some incoherent ramblings today, haven't been too prolific over here (again) for a while, but that is mostly due to my French efforts in their final stages with just one more oral exam ahead ..

I went to see United 93 last night and wow, what an impressive, sober, documentary-ish film about the events of 9/11. Not for the faint-hearted, but definitely worth seeing. Glad i could see it in the original version, too. I felt a little awkward at the box office already when the lady behind the counter flippantly invited me to enjoy the movie ..

Only just over four weeks to go before i go to England again .. Yay!

Just That Little Bit Of Extra Motivation

2006-06-22T11:47:00.000+02:00

Cartoon by Dave Walker. Find more cartoons you can freely re-use on your blog at We Blog Cartoons.

Compiling Information with Google Notebook

2006-06-18T13:34:00.000+02:00

I am just compiling some basic info on the German media landscape and decided to start experimenting with Google Notebook, which has been around for a while, but i have not had the time to look into.

It basically lets you copy and paste marked text (or pictures or tables) and automatically adds the corresponding source information with a single click. Makes a task like this a cakewalk. You can then even publish your compilation of notes if you want to (copyright concerns apply of course)

There is a Firefox extension available (i am not sure about IE) that makes keeping your notes in order even easier. See the little pop-up on the right-hand corner?

Like for many Google services, you need to be logged into your Google acount, if you need an invite, just ask me and i'll provide you with one.

Exit: Poles

2006-06-15T21:40:00.000+02:00

No, this is not intended to become a football blog, there are people out there who can do that much better than i ever will, but after Ecuador's win over Costa Rica put an end to all Polish World Cup aspirations, this is a play on words not to be missed ..

On an entirely unrelated matter, you might have noticed this new little category "On my shelf" which can be found in the right-hand column of my blog. LibraryThing makes it easy to catalogue (even though they call it catalog) your favourite books, find more that you might like and even find people with similar literary interests. So here is my little collection from the obvious to the bizarre to the even more bizarre ..

Pheno what?

2006-06-07T11:41:00.000+02:00

I've always had problems with some substance contained in many skin and haircare products but was never sure about what exactly it was. Some nasty rashes in the crook of my arm. Sure, i had been to a dermatologist, but when he asked me in order to detect the trigger substance not to take a shower for a fortnight in the heat of July so that the samples would not wash off, i kindly refused. It was not that bad after all, and when it started to get worse, i could always change my shower gel or then do the test should it get unbearable.

But now i have self-diagnosed (by means of elimination and the remark of a friend who has exactly the same thing) my allergy to phenoxyethanol, a preservative commonly contained in many of these products. Phenoxyethanol, a word that does not even have an entry in wikipedia, that makes me feel so special ..

Ironically, i noticed that i have allergic reactions to most of the Bodyshop products, a company that prides itself in desisting from animal-testing and generally has a reputation for a skin-friendly product line.

So now i can happily browse the shelves scrutinizing the fineprint on all those shower gels, shampoos and so on. Which is kind of annoying but then again, it's better to know and do something about it than to always use new stuff with slight apprehension.

I glanced at the websites of some of the major brands and was disappointed not to find anything on ingredients or possible allergic reactions, not even in the fineprint. Surely there is a need for this kind of information. I assume you can get it somewhere, but wouldn't it befit a company that sells care products to actively show that they care?

One online shop i noticed had a very neat allergy filter feature on its site that lets you mark and filter out pruducts with certain ingredients .. if only that were possible in the supermarket ...

So you could say that i have overcome my little alcohol problem. Here's to that!

English, Anyone?

2006-06-06T19:52:00.000+02:00

As i was trying to clean my coffeepad machine and was reading the instructions on the Detergente Speciale i realised that apart from one or two lines on the packet (Born in Italy Since 1961, how reassuring), they were in Italian only. I sort of guessed what they meant and was only slightly worried when the machine made some weird noises. It went really well in the end, and even though even the button to switch to the English version of their website has no effect whatsoever, the Italians seem to know a lot not only about coffee but also about cleaning coffee machines ...

Fittingly, while i tasted a cup from my newly-polished coffee maker, i saw this hillarious video about being stuck in a foreign country where nobody speaks your language (courtesy of my partner-in-blogging eddy) which i am shamelessly putting on my site also...

See for yourselves:

Ode To My Mother Tongue

2006-06-06T14:53:00.000+02:00

(or: when intellectuals talk football)

I have just come across an interview about football with the philosopher Peter Sloterdijk, and i am impressed and also irritated by the plethora of terms and phrases he comes up with to describe that game. Just a sample:

Torschützenorgasmen
nationale Erregungsgemeinschaften
atavistisch (to my knowledge one of his favourite words)
anthropologische Versuchsanordnung
protoartilleristische Jagderfolgsgefühle
dieses mysteriöse weibliche Universal der Handtasche (ok, not football-related but too cool to miss)
"Ich bin nicht der Maskottchentyp" (no, just iconic?)
permanente Überbelichtung (oh really?, i thought ...)
Hermaphroditisierung

What a great read, and really prominent among all the ramblings that we are being inundated with in the run-up to the World Cup.

YAFRE

2006-06-05T12:43:00.000+02:00

(Yet Another Football-Related Entry)

I can't help it. Strangely, football fever has taken hold of me, also. So here we go: At the end of the day, it's a game of two halves, right?

The great football nation England, cradle of the game, might not have been that successful in the last, say, forty years, at least regarding international competitions, but she is the clear unchallenged leader of the pack concerning football songs.

After masterpieces like You'll Never Walk Alone or Three Lions (Football's Coming Home), now they're at it again: The World At Your Feet and, even better, England by The Darkness' frontman Justin Hawkins, who now calls himself the British Whale. He has come up with an oeuvre that includes lines like "We fought them on the beaches, now we'll play them on the field" and mimics the tune of the German national anthem, replaced by "England, England, England", of course. You Germans out there, get it: This IS funny. Listen. Enjoy. Press the Play button

Another Kind Of Word Cup Challenge

2006-06-05T10:41:00.000+02:00

With the FIFA World Cup only days ahead, i'd like to have a quick look at the linguistic challenge the organisers had to face: its official tagline does not translate that easily (at least not into the languages i can reasonably confidently judge upon):

I am glad that the international audience is not exposed to that rather pretentious notion of Germany aching to be everybody's friend (again). In the context of alleged no-go zones for people of colour and a debate on the deployment of military forces for security, trying hard to get that notion across would have been particularly embarrassing, wouldn't it?

Al Gore Is Warming Up

2006-06-03T13:59:00.000+02:00

After claiming to have invented the internet, Al Gore, who jokingly labels himself "the man who used to be the next President of the United States", seems to have found his new theme: Saving the planet from global warming. Is he also warming up for his next run for presidency?

In a movie that dwarfs The Day After Tomorrow in its visual persuasive power, he advocates awareness and political action to fight global warming and its nefarious effects.

Have a look:

Getting Local

2006-06-02T14:58:00.000+02:00

During my ongoing quest for local news feeds from our "Metropolregion" (don't laugh) Rhein-Neckar, i recently stumbled upon a great blog that has been active now for just over two months.

As the honorable RheinNeckarZeitung, the largest local paper still refuses to provide a feed for their website and i am mostly getting news from the area via its big brother, the Mannheimer Morgen, i am always grateful for interesting news from my region. Kurpfalznotizen appears to be an ambitous news project, another great example for user-generated content. Feel free to have a look or participate, even.

Re.Start

2006-06-01T21:23:00.000+02:00

Hey, i feel like blogging again. It's been a while, i know. And gosh, what a mess! My free image host service ripway has cancelled my account while i wasn't watching. Fair enough. They warned me if i didn't log in at least once a month they would kick me out. And apparently, that's what they did. And of course i didn't backup my images anywhere, so here we go: A new makeshift heading will have to do for now .. it's about content anyway, or is it?

So, let's see. What's been happening? Well, i am still doing my French translator course which should be over and done with by the end of June. Then i am going to Exmouth for the summer (again). And no, thanks, i am not going to write in French, at least not for now.

Well, so i also set up a Flickr account, which is a great tool for uploading and sharing pics. One of the few non-Google services i use by the way ;-) And tagging is such a great way of organizing that huge pile of images out there. I haven't done it with my own pics yet, but i subscribed to the feed of pictures tagged Heidelberg. So every now and again, i am now getting a bizarre or interesting and for the most part touristy photo collection of my home town delivered to my screen. Surreal but nice. (What film was that quote from again?)

Ok, that's it, folks. Why did it take me so long i wonder?

The Academy Awards With Jon Stewart

2006-03-06T12:25:00.000+01:00

Academy Awards / Jon Stewart: Jon did a great job at the Oscars. What do you think?

Ricky Gervais No Longer Podcasting

2006-02-24T11:14:00.000+01:00

To some peoples' dismay, Ricky Gervais, creator of the Office and figurehead of the most popular, i.e. most downloaded podcast ever, has decided with his team to drop podcasting and try a pay-per-episode subscription model.

Even though the format of the show is going to remain similar, the (free) podcast subscription model is going to go. The first 12 podcast episodes of the show had been underwritten by The Guardian newspaper; Ricky Gervais and friends are now going new ways in financing their show.

Harald Schmidt, Germany's Late Night Show TV host has been trying something similar, with questionable success. The success or failure of the Ricky Gervais Show, this most-hyped and most successful podcast content ever, is going to be critical in whether paid audio content in serial form has any chance of taking off.

There has never been such a thing as a free lunch, not even in the podcast world. You can only listen to shows in return for listening to ads or at least for giving away your attention data.

Personally, I think the show was an interesting format, but certainly not worth spending a penny.

Stormy Days in Brighton

2006-02-16T11:54:00.000+01:00

Another clip i took in Brighton last November, thanks to the rudimentary video and audio capabilities of my digital camera. Still pictures could never give you that intense atmosphere, don't you think? So turn the voulume up and enjoy!

OMG

2006-02-15T21:52:00.000+01:00

As I was uploading my own video snippet I came across this:

Trafalgar Square By Night

2006-02-14T18:37:00.000+01:00

Finally, Google Video works in Germany. Feel free to watch my little clip taken on Trafalgar Square in London last year:

Blog ADS?

2006-02-14T12:02:00.000+01:00

This is funny. I just had a quick glance over my Google links on top of my post entries. One of them reads "Blog ADS". For a second I thought it stood for Attention Deficiency Syndrome. Maybe not that uncommon in the blogosphere ...

Music Out Of The Box

2006-02-06T10:57:00.000+01:00

Pandora is an interesting music project that lets you create your own "radio" station with your favourite artists. It also appears to analyze your music taste in an innovative and surprisingly accurate fashion so you can get to know more music you might enjoy. Here is what they say about their Music Genome Project, the backbone of the service:

Together we set out to capture the essence of music at the most fundamental level. We ended up assembling literally hundreds of musical attributes or "genes" into a very large Music Genome. Taken together these genes capture the unique and magical musical identity of a song - everything from melody, harmony and rhythm, to instrumentation, orchestration, arrangement, lyrics, and of course the rich world of singing and vocal harmony. It's not about what a band looks like, or what genre they supposedly belong to, or about who buys their records - it's about what each individual song sounds like.

I created my own little test radio station, Barley Radio. Let's see, oh, it is just playing Neil Diamond, maybe it needs a little more finetuning ...

The service is free to test, stays free if you register with an e-mail address and also has a subscription option if you want to get rid of the (unobtrusive) ads.

Speak The Magic Words

2006-02-05T21:21:00.000+01:00

On a lighter note, my heart jumped when I saw Konstantin's list of One Hundred perfectly fine reasons for loving the English language. Warning: Unsuitable for the light-hearted and the easily offended!

May I add my own six or half a dozen to the list, from the top of my head:

chuffed
dickhead
iloveyoutoo
positively
-ish as in elevenish
Wereawaaheem (I just had to mix some Scottish lingo in)

Also, notice Konstantin's nice little disclaimer at the bottom left of his blog:

No tourists were harmed or injured or shouted at (knowingly) in the making of this website. It's the blogs, stupid!

War Against Caricaturism

2006-02-05T20:55:00.000+01:00

My dear blogging mate Eddy over at Familiarity Breeds Content wonders why the online as well as the traditional media have been so reluctant to publish those controversial Mohammed caricatures:

I can't believe major newspapers and their online editing staff don't have the nerve to show even one small jay-peg of the offending item. Not even with a two-pager legal disclaimer before it, nuh-uh. Nada. Zip. Wasn't me.

Even though I believe that freedom of expression does not make or break with the respectful negligence of these four-month old drawings (which in terms of the mechanics of 21st century media is almost beyond time immemorial), the informed public has every right to be just that - informed. The recent violence of fanatic islamists in the Middle East in response to the republication of the caricatures only proves that point and nullifies every rightful effort of offended muslims to justifiably argue the decency of those works of hatred.

Religion does not follow the rules of logic. That does not make it any easier in terms of having a reasonable discussion about the issue. Christianity has thankfully transformed through the process of enlightenment into taking a rather forgiving stand, and while it would still be in bad taste to mock comparable Christian icons, it would invoke nowhere near the fury we are observing in the present situation.

Now, the blogosphere is catching up and the efforts of those extremists prove to be, to say the least, counter-productive as those artistically questionable drawings get more attention than they ever deserved.

We are now at a point where it would be futile to add insult to injury, but any indication that violence might finally get those caricatures banned and thereby sanctioning the perpertrators' rationale should be avoided. You don't negotiate with terrorists.

We have seen this before. Salman Rushdie had to change his life around and live in hiding for over a decade. With the current political situation in Iran as well as in the Palestinian territories, the situation is even more critical today. Interesting times ahead.

Secrets Shared

2006-02-02T21:59:00.000+01:00

PostSecret is an ongoing community art project where people mail in their secrets anonymously on one side of a homemade postcard.

Inspiring, honest, funny, tragic. A stunning caleidoscope of the human condition.
(Was that too cheesy a description? Nevermind.)

Picture Upload Working Again

2006-01-28T23:20:00.000+01:00

I finally managed to get Picasa upload pictures straight from my harddrive again, which saves me a lot of saving and cutting and pasting. So you can expect more pics soon. This is a drawing i did during a recent phone call. What the call was about you wonder? Was it exciting you ask? Judge for yourselves ...

Mozilla Links

2006-01-27T23:12:00.000+01:00

Hab heute mal wieder das deutsche Mozilla-Links-Blog auf aktuellen Stand gebracht. Mein bescheidener Beitrag zum Übersetzungsprojekt zur englischen Mozilla Links-Seite.

Die Seiten bieten Neuigkeiten, Tipps und interessante Hintergrundberichte rund um Mozillaprodukte, darunter natürlich das Flaggschiff, der Firefox-Browser. Die Artikel sind auch für Laien gut verständlich, bieten aber auch für Profis immer wieder wissenswerte Neuigkeiten und Percy Cabello, der Chefautor des englischen Originals hat einen unterhaltsamen Schreibstil, der die Beiträge nicht allzu trocken werden lässt.

Zusätzlich zur (möglichst) zeitnahen Übersetzung der Originalartikel bieten wir ab und zu auch eigene, für den deutschsprachigen Raum besonders interessante Informationen.

Wir freuen uns über Leser, Abonnenten und Mitwirkende.

Why Rechtschreibung Matters

2006-01-22T19:29:00.000+01:00

Groß? klein? Ge-trennt? Aus einander? Zusammen? Egal?
Gar nicht. Wie die Überschrift dieses Artikels zeigt.

Life Scenes (First Part In A Series, Possibly)

2006-01-22T13:33:00.000+01:00

Place: In front of Heidelberg station
Time: Yesterday around midday

A makeshift bookstand with Dianetics books; in front of it, two suits, eagerly talking to (at) passers-by. Scientology "missionaries", apparently. Enter: a baglady, pleading for a dime. The suits flatly refuse. A whole lot of misconception here, i guess.

How Insightful

2006-01-21T00:02:00.000+01:00

I just took this different kind of personality test. My result:

Which File Extension are You?

So Dark The Con Of Man

2006-01-16T02:23:00.000+01:00

May 19th 2006, the film version of the Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown premieres, almost simultaneously worldwide. Directed by Ron Howard, featuring a cast with the likes of Tom Hanks, Jean Reno, Ian McKellen, Audrey Tautou and Alfred Molina, this is likely to be the blockbuster movie of the year. Let us hope they manage to get a more convincing ending than the novel did.

Now, four months in advance, the first full-length trailer is out.

No Second Chance For A First Impression

2006-01-15T17:00:00.000+01:00

Wenn es denn zutrifft, was Psychologen von der Carleton University herausgefunden haben wollen, dann müssen viele Websites von ihren Betreibern vielleicht umgestaltet werden, wenn sie möglichst große Aufmerksamkeit finden wollen. Die Eingangsseite wird nämlich in gerade einmal 50 ms von den neuen Besuchern abtaxiert – und die erste Beurteilung hält an.

via Telepolis

In Eigener Sache

2006-01-15T14:40:00.000+01:00

Grüße nach Hamburg und an alle namenlosen Fahrräder dieser Welt.

Warum An Microsoft Word (Noch) Kein Weg Vorbei Führt

2006-01-15T14:02:00.000+01:00

Ich bin ja ein großer Verfechter von Open Source-Software. Produkte wie OpenOffice und Firefox sind vielen herkömmlichen Softwareangeboten ebenbürtig oder gar überlegen. Doch es gibt ein paar Aspekte, wie beispielsweise bei Microsoft Word, wo ich auf den Leistungsumfang und Komfort nicht grundsätzlich verzichten möchte. Beispielsweise die weitaus überlegene Rechtschreib- und Grammatikprüfung. Viele Fehler, seien sie aus Leichtsinn oder Unwissenheit entstanden, lassen sich so vermeiden:

Natürlich sind die Möglichkeiten immer noch rudimentär, aber wenn man sie noch nicht so kennt, doch ziemlich überraschend. (Word 2003 mit installierter aktueller Grammatik-Überprüfung Französisch)

Instant Mess

2006-01-15T11:37:00.000+01:00

Sigh. here is a list of instant messengers i use:

Google Talk (my default. It integrates seamlessly with my Gmail account. Also, the only open standard and the only no-frills approach, which i like)
MSN Messenger (most people I know use it, so there is no way to avoid it)
Skype (used to be fun, SkypeOut is cool, if and when it works)
ICQ (someone i know still uses it)
Yahoo Messenger (Ok, i have an account)

Yearning for Interoperability. Yahoo is soon going to be talking to MSN, so that's a start. Google Talk is going together with AIM, but the user bases there could not be more different, so that's going to be interesting. Well, it's a start. But the times when i can just use ANY client to reach ANYONE (in the way a traditional phone works, or e-mail, for that matter) appear still to be in the rather distant future.

I know there are clients like Trillian or Gaim, but somehow i haven't taken to them. It's still an account mess and not all features of all the messengers are supported.

Von Steve Jobs Lernen Heißt Präsentieren Lernen

2006-01-13T17:40:00.000+01:00

Eine detaillierte Analyse der der Keynote von Steve Jobs auf der diesjährigen Macworld findet sich auf Kawasaki on Steve Jobs' keynote. Seine Präsentationstechnik, so Kawasaki, besticht unter anderem durch ihre Übersichtlichkeit. Da fragt man sich natürlich schon, warum Präsentationsprogramme wie Powerpoint, Impress oder Keynote eine solche Unmenge an Funktionen bieten, die eigentlich nur kontraproduktiv seien können, wenn das Ziel eine überzeugende Präsentation sein soll.

Street Price Of Alcohol Rises

2006-01-12T02:03:00.000+01:00

via London Leben

Quick Feed Update

2006-01-11T21:28:00.000+01:00

I am rather busy just now, so only a quick necessary update concerning tech: If you are receiving this through my atom feed, I urge you to update it to my new feedburner RSS that i am using as of now. I will be switching the old one off soon. The new feed is availiable through the feed icon in the right-hand column or through the autodetect feed icon in the address bar of your browser (if you are using a decent one, that is, of course ...)

Großartig

2006-01-08T18:10:00.000+01:00

Kin Hubbard: "'The only way to entertain some folks is to listen to them.'"

Tech Ahead

2006-01-03T14:51:00.000+01:00

Arguably the most interesting time of the year in terms of consumer electronics. Watch out for Larry Page's keynote at CES and Steve Jobs keynoting (is that a word yet? Google says yep!) at Macworld.

Kurt Tucholsky Ist Frei

2005-12-31T14:55:00.000+01:00

Einige der bekanntesten Essays und Gedichte Kurt Tucholskys sind seit heute copyrightfrei. Das nehme ich doch gerne zum Anlass, eine seiner bissigsten und treffendsten Veröffentlichungen vorzustellen. Man beachte dabei: Satire darf ja alles.

Der Mensch
Kaspar Hauser, Weltbühne 24, 16.06.1931
Der Mensch hat zwei Beine und zwei Überzeugungen: eine, wenns ihm gut geht, und eine, wenns ihm schlecht geht. Die letztere heißt Religion. Der Mensch ist ein Wirbeltier und hat eine unsterbliche Seele, sowie auch ein Vaterland, damit er nicht zu übermütig wird.
Der Mensch wird auf natürlichem Wege hergestellt, doch empfindet er dies als unnatürlich und spricht nicht gern davon. Er wird gemacht, hingegen nicht gefragt, ob er auch gemacht werden wolle.
Der Mensch ist ein nützliches Lebewesen, weil er dazu dient, durch den Soldatentod Petroleumaktien in die Höhe zu treiben, durch Bergmannstod den Profit der Grubenherren zu erhöhen, sowie Kultur, Kunst und Wissenschaft. Der Mensch hat neben dem Trieb der Fortpflanzung und dem, zu essen und zu trinken, zwei Leidenschaften: Krach zu machen und nicht zuzuhören. Man könnte den Menschen geradezu als ein Wesen definieren, das nie zuhört. Wenn er weise ist, tut er damit recht: denn Gescheites bekommt er nur selten zu hören. Sehr gern hören Menschen: Versprechungen, Schmeicheleien, Anerkennungen und Komplimente. Bei Schmeicheleien empfiehlt es sich, immer drei Nummern gröber zu verfahren als man es gerade noch für möglich hält. Der Mensch gönnt seiner Gattung nichts, daher hat er die Gesetze erfunden. Er darf nicht, also sollen die anderen auch nicht.
Um sich auf einen Menschen zu verlassen, tut man gut, sich auf ihn zu setzen; man ist dann wenigstens für diese Zeit sicher, dass er nicht davonläuft. Manche verlassen sich auch auf den Charakter.
Der Mensch zerfällt in zwei Teile:
In einen männlichen, der nicht denken will, und in einen weiblichen, der nicht denken kann. Beide haben sogenannte Gefühle: man ruft diese am sichersten dadurch hervor, dass man gewisse Nervenpunkte des Organismus in Funktion setzt. In diesen Fällen sondern manche Menschen Lyrik ab. Der Mensch ist ein pflanzen- und fleischfressendes Wesen; auf Nordpolfahrten frisst er hier und da auch Exemplare seiner eigenen Gattung; doch wird das durch den Faschismus wieder ausgeglichen. Der Mensch ist ein politisches Geschöpf, das am liebsten zu Klumpen geballt sein Leben verbringt. Jeder Klumpen hasst die anderen Klumpen, weil sie die anderen sind, und hasst die eigenen, weil sie die eigenen sind. Den letzteren Hass nennt man Patriotismus.
Jeder Mensch hat eine Leber, eine Milz, eine Lunge und eine Fahne; sämtliche vier Organe sind lebenswichtig. Es soll Menschen ohne Leber, ohne Milz und mit halber Lunge geben; Menschen ohne Fahne gibt es nicht. Schwache Fortpflanzungstätigkeit facht der Mensch gern an, und dazu hat er mancherlei Mittel: den Stierkampf, das Verbrechen, den Sport und die Gerichtspflege.
Menschen miteinander gibt es nicht. Es gibt nur Menschen, die herrschen, und solche, die beherrscht werden. Doch hat noch niemand sich selber beherrscht; weil der opponierende Sklave immer mächtiger ist als der regierungssüchtige Herr. Jeder Mensch ist sich selber unterlegen.
Wenn der Mensch fühlt, dass er nicht mehr hinten hoch kann, wird er fromm und weise; er verzichtet dann auf die sauren Trauben der Welt. Dieses nennt man innere Einkehr. Die verschiedenen Altersstufen des Menschen halten einander für verschiedene Rassen: Alte haben gewöhnlich vergessen, dass sie jung gewesen sind, oder sie vergessen, dass sie alt sind, und Junge begreifen nie, dass sie alt werden können.
Der Mensch möchte nicht gern sterben, weil er nicht weiß, was dann kommt. Bildet er sich ein, es zu wissen, dann möchte er es auch nicht gern; weil er das Alte noch ein wenig mitmachen will. Ein wenig heißt hier: ewig.
Im übrigen ist der Mensch ein Lebewesen, das klopft, schlechte Musik macht und seinen Hund bellen lässt. Manchmal gibt er auch Ruhe, aber dann ist er tot.
Neben den Menschen gibt es noch Sachsen und Amerikaner, aber die haben wir noch nicht gehabt und bekommen Zoologie erst in der nächsten Klasse.

My Favourite Photoblog

2005-12-28T22:51:00.000+01:00

David J. Nightingale lives in Blackpool/England and takes the most amazing pictures. His site is RSS-enabled so you can get a new pic every day and if you want you can order prints directly from the site.

Empy Winter Trees

2005-12-28T19:13:00.000+01:00

Pictures taken by the lake close to my parents' place. They have been living around there just about since i was born. This place is so familiar to me. Most beautiful this time of the year.

Namensänderungen

2005-12-26T15:38:00.000+01:00

Prince Charles erwägt, bei einer eventuellen Thronbesteigung seinen Namen in George umzuändern. Könige namens Charles hatten in der britischen Geschichte nicht gerade ein glückliches Händchen. So versucht er also mit einem Rebranding seinem vorbestimmten Schicksal zu entgehen. The King formely known as Charles.
Namensänderungen sind ja groß in Mode. Kardinal Ratzinger ließ sich ja auch anlässlich seiner Papstwahl gebenedeien. Auch Madonna und Christina Aguilera aus der Popwelt betätigten sich ja kräftig am Namelifting .. Und Putzfrauen sind jetzt Reinigungspersonal.

Spiegel Online Archaisch

2005-12-25T17:54:00.000+01:00

Heute im Spiegel Online:

Verfassungsrichter schilt Schröder

Da musste ich doch erst mal stutzen und ins Nachschlagwerk schielen. Es handelt sich wohl um eine ungebräuchliche Form des Verbes schelten. Wieder was gelernt.

Ja Ist Denn Heut Schon?

2005-12-24T16:06:00.000+01:00

Allen Leserinnen und Lesern und nicht nur denen ein Frohes Fest.
Irgendwas zu feiern gibt es ja immer.

This Guy Rocks - Not Only The Suburbs

2005-12-22T16:59:00.000+01:00

Ben Folds - "Live In Perth" :

Ben Folds ist nicht ganz normal. Gott sei Dank.

Extensions For Firefox

2005-12-21T18:02:00.000+01:00

My Top Five Firefox Extensions:

Google Suggest suggests search terms as you type
LiveLines adds RSS feeds to your RSS reader of choice
Blogger Web Comments to post and read comments on any webpage
Performancing, the drag-and-drop blogging tool
ImageZoom, adds zoom functionality for images

With this functionality (and for plenty of other reasons) there is no changing back to IE6.

Sprachgefuhl

2005-12-20T17:56:00.000+01:00

sprachgefuhl:

A feeling for language or a sensitivity for what is correct language.

Nice one. Never came across that German language export before.

Why Learn Foreign Languages?

2005-12-19T18:03:00.000+01:00

Excellent article in Spiked: What's lost in translation:

Promoting foreign language learning as a functional business skill won't inspire anybody to go beyond 'au revoir'.

Make Love, Not War

2005-12-19T16:45:00.000+01:00

Britain is now the world's fifth country to legally allow gay marriage. Welcome to the 21st century! As a celebration of tolerance i am going to link to an article of this breaking news in French.

Make Poor Translations History

2005-12-19T16:18:00.000+01:00

Hab gerade eine Mail von Bob Geldof persönlich bekommen. Der ist ja echt aktiv, der Mann. Aber schon bei der Überschrift wurde ich stutzig: "Kritischer Job für Weihnachten". Sollte da ein allzu idealistisch, allzu stümperhafter Aktivist seine Übersetzungsdienste angeboten haben? Wo wird es kritisch? Vielleicht wenn ich auf den angezeigten Link klicke? Bisher konnte ich deutschsprachige Spam ohne jegliche Filter am eher ungebräuchlichen Sprachgebrauch erkennen. Jetzt bin ich nicht mehr so sicher. Grübel.

Really Interesting Stuff

2005-12-18T13:31:00.000+01:00

How do you know if you bore a native speaker of English in a conversation? "That's interesting" they say in such an absent-minded manner that leaves no space for speculation as to their disaffection. I was talking to an American girl at a party last night going on about this, that and the other when she enthused: "That's really interesting!" Made me wonder ...

Opinionated Topicality

2005-12-16T22:56:00.000+01:00

Nice name for a blog, isn't it? And not even taken yet.

Luhmann for Dummies

2005-12-16T18:21:00.000+01:00

Jenseits des Tellerrandes:

Hab mich grad auf dieser "multimedialen Einführung in die Systemtheorie von Niklas Luhmann" umgeschaut. Lässt sich auf diese Weise ein solch komplexes Gedankenmodell veranschaulichen? Ein gewagter Ansatz. Schön bunt und bewegt, ja. Und interessiert hat mich Luhmann schon länger. Vielleicht leg ich mir die CD ja mal zu...

Subscription

2005-12-15T11:23:00.000+01:00

Do you feel my postings here are something you could/should be able to subscribe to?

If not, do not bother reading on. This is going to be a bit technical.

If you want to get notified whenever i submit a new post, i am now offering two options, straightforward or geeky:

If you just want an e-mail whenever there is a new entry and not bother about any geeky feedreaders, hit the R-Mail button at the bottom of the right-hand sidebar and enter your e-mail address. You should be pretty safe. This service usually does not spam you. And of course you can unsubscribe at any time.
If you already use a feedreader, you can easily add my feed to it by copying and pasting the orange XML button link.

Rudeness

2005-12-14T23:42:00.000+01:00

"Rudeness is the weak man's imitation of strength." Eric Hoffer

via The Quotations Page

Mensch 0 - Maschine 1

2005-12-14T18:28:00.000+01:00

Ich hab nicht so verfolgt, wie sich die Text-To-Speech Software weiterentwickelt hat, aber das ist schon beeindruckend. In Französisch steckt mich diese Lesesoftware locker in die Tasche. Beim Schreiben hab ich hoffentlich noch leichte Vorteile ...

Spread the Word

2005-12-14T11:40:00.000+01:00

Have you come across the usage of the term evangelism in a non-religious sense? I guess that would make any Christian cringe (nice alliteration ...)

Planning Spontaneity

2005-12-13T16:36:00.000+01:00

Practise the art of spontaneous reactions. In conversations, say the first thing that comes into your mind - without evaluating if it is right or wrong. Practise this with strangers in low-risk situations such as when shopping, checking into a hotel, riding in a taxi and give yourself 10 points every time you make a stranger laugh.
Collect examples of witty replies. You may be able to use them yourself one day. Great wits such as Oscar Wilde, Mae West, Winston Churchill and G.B. Shaw were said to have memorised many of their so-called “spontaneous” remarks.
Believe in yourself. Develop confidence in your ability to amuse and entertain others by telling yourself every day that you are witty. Kurt Vonnegut wisely said: “Be very careful who you pretend to be, because you are who you pretend to be”.

via Paul Smith

L'Essai d'Ecrire un Essai

2005-12-11T15:54:00.000+01:00

Dass Wörterbücher, selbst gute, nur bedingt eine Hilfe sind, wenn es darum geht, fremdsprachliche Texte frei zu formulieren, ist ja hinlänglich bekannt. Irgendwie passen die Anschlüsse nie, die Legosteine wollen einfach nicht aufeinanderstehen, und farblich passt es auch nicht, um das Bild noch etwas auszudehnen.

So versuche ich mich gerade an einer neuen Methode: Klingt eine Konstuktion zweifelhaft, so gebe ich sie zur Überprüfung komplett und in Anführungszeichen in mein Google-Suchfeld ein und bei überzeugend hoher Trefferquote kann ich davon ausgehen, dass sich das nicht ganz falsch anhört. Mal sehen, ob ich damit weiterkomme...

What Barry Says

2005-12-11T14:31:00.000+01:00

Watch this award-winning animation on American supremacy and its possible consequences. Highly controversial, yet more than a grain of truth in it.

Two Quick Reminders About Anything, Really

2005-12-11T13:43:00.000+01:00

The current problems cannot be fixed by the behaviors, processes, and relationships that caused them.
Not completely fixed is better than completely broken.

via Garrick Van Buren, slightly adapted.

Meta-Morphose

2005-12-09T12:27:00.000+01:00

Heute wäre die Welt
Ohne mich
Auch nicht ärmer.

Ohne heute
wäre ärmer
auch nicht die Welt.

Auch ohne Welt
wäre ich heute
nicht ärmer.

What I Listen To - Was Ich Höre

2005-12-07T01:05:00.000+01:00

Deutsche Geräusche zum Mitnehmen:

Das Ende der Welt (lebensecht)
Der Tag (so geht Journalismus)
Topthema (auf den Punkt)
Hotel Freund (gemütlich, satirisch)
Schlaflos in München (schon fast ein Klassiker)

English Take-Away Audio:

Simulacrum (utterly surreal)
Mark Kermode (eloquent, informative)
Gillmor Gang (manly, geeky, visionary)
Acts of Volition Radio (gazing at your navel)
The Theory of Everything (the name says it all)

Un peu en français pour l'apprendre:

Europe 1 - l'Essentiel de l'Info (...)

Two Is A List

2005-12-05T21:12:00.000+01:00

You Lucky Pod

2005-11-30T22:03:00.000+01:00

You Lucky Pod: "Ricky Gervais is launching a free podcast."

The ingenius maker of "The Office" is definitely something to look out for even though i have not been too keen on his stand-up comedy stuff yet, so let us see what he is up to audio-wise ...

An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump

2005-11-28T21:19:00.000+01:00

If a good picture is one that you look at for more than a minute as some famous photographer once said then this painting by Joseph Wright of Derby, who lived from 1734 to 1797, is of utmost quality as i was fascinated by it so much that i spent a good five minutes looking at it in London's National Gallery.

A splendid observation of how different people react to modern technology differently. At the time it was some weird technical aparatus, nowadays it might some other technology, the looks on our faces might be similar. At the National Gallery website, you can even get a high resolution version to scrutinize. The best option - should you have the opportunity - is to go there and see it of course.

Zitat der Woche

2005-11-28T12:10:00.000+01:00

ZITAT DER WOCHE:

'Angela Merkel zitiere ich ja am liebsten wörtlich, ich hab noch keine bessere Möglichkeit gefunden, diese Frau zu beleidigen.'

Volker Pispers, deutscher Kaberettist

My New No-Frills Phone

2005-11-27T15:20:00.000+01:00

As my old mobile phone has been acting up for a while now to the extent that it is hardly usable any more, i have decided to get a new one. But browsing through all those fancy new multi-whatever gadgets with incredibly useless features have resulted in me taking a radical step: With my new phone (ordered today) i am going be able to phone. And just about that. Yes, you heard right.

Here it is: the Nokia 6030

And here are the amazing features it lacks:

Inbuilt camera with crappy resolution
Triband to make it work in the US and other places i am not likely to go to any time soon
Bluetooth, wifi or infrared connectivity. If i should ever need to transfer data, a cable will do just fine.
Large memory (what for? It's a phone ..)
MP3 player (nothing beats my ipod)
Any other feature that would never come to my mind if i thought about a phone

Here is what it does have:

Long battery life
Good sound quality
Ease of use
Simple, stylish design
OK, there is a radio, but believe it or not, thats one of the few features i actually did use on my old phone.
I can still use my old charger

(Was that six of one, half a dozen of the other ? )

On top of all that, no more long-term contracts with my phone operator. Who knows what the phone operator market might look like in two years time?

Wundersame Teemischungen

2005-11-25T19:39:00.000+01:00

Hab neue Teebeutel erstanden. Bin ja auf exotisch besonders neugierig. Hier also meine aktuelle Auswahl:

"Sonne des Buddha" mit Honeybushtee, Schwarzem Tee, Lemonmyrthe, Lemongras, Sternfruchtaroma, Ingwer, Süßholz, Verbenenkraut, Vanillearoma, Ginseng
"Vier Jahreszeiten" mit Apfel, Hagebutten, Brombeerblättern, Hibiskus, Zimt, Anis, Orangenschalen, Pfefferminze, Zitronensäure, Zitronengras, Johannisbeeren schwarz, Sonnenblumenblüten
"Sommernachtstraum" mit Apfel, Hagebutten, Brommbeerblättern, Zitronensäure, Ringelblumenblätter, Sonnenblumenblüten, Lavendelblüten.

Sind das nicht ein wahre Druidentränke?

Inflatable You

2005-11-21T22:33:00.000+01:00

This is Heaven sent and hardly suitable for children:

Tim Minchin, an Australian comedian i saw and enjoyed on the Edinburgh Fringe, is blogging! Here is an excerpt from one of his hillarious songs he also performed at the show i saw: If he ever comes round your part of the world, you just have to see him:

Inflatable You Lyrics:

Inflatable You

Your love for me is not debatable
Your sexual appetite’s insatiable
You never ever make me waitable
Delectable, inflatable you.

You don’t have problems with your weight at all
You never steal food off my plate at all
I never have to masturbate at all
Unstoppable, inflatable you.

You never seem to menstruate at all
So you’re not angry when I’m late at all
I feel permanently felatable
Unpoppable, inflatable you.

With you in my arms I feel we could just fly away
With the right kind of gas I might even try it some day
In this ocean of life I’m never afraid we might drown
We could just float forever whatever the weather
Whenever my inflatable lover’s around.

Your thighs and buttocks are so holdable
You always do what you are toldable
And if we argue you just foldable
Controllable consolable you.

My mates all reckon you are suitable
I took you ‘round to watch the footable
And Steve and Gary said you’re rootable
Commutable, refutable you.

You’re never sensitive or tickley
When I rub you my skin goes prickerly
It’s know an static electricity
Felicity when I’m kissing you.

Your skin is so smooth – I couldn’t afford you with hair
You have all the holes real girls have got plus one for the air
Your problems are simple, I don’t need my Masters in Psych
To know if you get down I just perk you right up
With a couple of squirts from the pump off my bike.

You never wake up when I snore at all
A trait which I find quite adorable
You have a box and you are storable
Ignorable, back-doorable you.

Any sexual position’s feasible
Although you don’t bend at the knees at all
Your hooters are so firm and squeezable
Increasable, un-creasable you.

You don’t complain about my hairy back
Or ‘bout the inches that downstairs I lack
You’re not disgusted by my furry crack
Burt Bacharach, Jack Kerouac ooo.

Now birth control is not an issue
I clean it all up with a tissue
I bet my jealous friend all wish you
Were insatiably inflatably theirs.

Don’t let me down.
Don’t let me down.
Don’t let me down.
And I won’t let you down.

I Feel Terrible

2005-11-21T22:12:00.000+01:00

in every possible way. Hope this helps:

Some flu experts believe that cold drinks increase congestion, whereas warm drinks loosen secretions and are more flu-friendly. Try sipping a hot toddy before bed to help you sleep and clear your stuffy head.

	Steps:
1.	Boil a cup or two of water and pour into a mug.

2.	Place an herbal tea bag or a decaffeinated tea bag into the mug and steep for 5 minutes.

3.	Add 1 to 2 tsp. honey to the tea.

4.	Add one shot (approximately 2 oz.) of bourbon, whiskey or rum.

5.	Stir thoroughly.

6.	Breathe in the steam from the hot toddy as you sip.


	Tips:
	One hot toddy a day is plenty. Too much alcohol is bad for mucus membranes and will be counterproductive.

Source: howto

Another Round of Brighton Pictures

2005-11-20T14:17:00.000+01:00

in high resolution this time

Jackie Leven

2005-11-19T21:33:00.000+01:00

Went to see Jackie Leven with my brother last night. "There is a little King of the Barley in all of us men" (referring to the lonely whisky drinker standing at the bar refusing to talk to anyone). More insights and hilariously perverse stories along with a great collection of songs. Inspiring stuff.

God is the Greatest

2005-11-19T18:53:00.000+01:00

God is the greatest metaphor
Nothing more
Nothing less
And i am blessed
By its poetry

Stadtimpressionen

2005-11-19T18:11:00.000+01:00

Blick vom Main und der Zeilgalerie

Autobahnimpressionen

2005-11-19T17:58:00.000+01:00

Gestern auf der A5 auf dem Weg nach Frankfurt ...

Das Schwerste Überhaupt

2005-11-19T15:29:00.000+01:00

Intoleranz nicht mit Intoleranz zu begegnen.

Burt Bacharach

2005-11-19T15:03:00.000+01:00

Burt Bacharach: "'A synonym is a word you use when you can't spell the word you first thought of.'"

Oscar Wilde

2005-11-18T11:51:00.000+01:00

Oscar Wilde: "'Only the shallow know themselves.'"

The National Gallery is "Free"

2005-11-17T22:22:00.000+01:00

There is no such thing as a free lunch, i knew that much. But museums?
When i was at the National Gallery in London, they made it pretty clear that free was not what it said on the label and when i went in without paying an extra "donation" of three quid for the "free" audio guides, i got more than just a grumpy look (Did you know swear words can fly?) So, be careful when people ask you to donate .. You might not be able to refuse their "offer". Hey, do not mention that to the organ "donation" organisations .. Body snatchers revisited?

Anyway, with this in mind i got a bit suspicious when i looked at this photo of a Deutsche Bahn info sign i took earlier this summer. Is the travel information you get there really free or just "free"?

Face Recognition For Everyone

2005-11-17T21:16:00.000+01:00

This blog is not intended to be another tech geek look-what's-new blog, but this is too tempting to miss out on: The most scary and at the same time exciting piece of software for public use in a long time: You have probably never heard of Riya, a photo facial recognition startup, that does not even have a product out (till tomorrow), already to be snapped up by Google. See what it does, it's amazing.

Source: GoogleRumors

Past History of This Blog

2005-11-17T19:22:00.000+01:00

This blog did not come just out of nowhere. If you are interested just have a look at its old spot.

A Fresh Start

2005-11-16T07:37:00.000+01:00

After some technical struggle (some of you might have seen my first couple of test entries, which i deleted) I should now be ready to move over here. So welcome!

It is all still a bit shaky and by no means a finished design but feel free to observe how things develop ...