Wed, 07 Dec 2005
A new member in the family
After serving as my bedside table for over three months (ever since I moved here) my regular PC is now finally reassembled, equipped with a new hard drive and DVD drive and back in action! It's got a new name, too: Undine. For the illiterate among you, a Undine is a water spirit and this particular one is called after the Undine in the story of Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué. (Full text from the Gutenberg Project, and a summary.)
It's not all set up yet. (Is a machine ever?) Aplayer and xmms still throw errors and it won't go into any kind of standby (sleep or hibernate). But nevertheless the increase in quality of my life has since been enormous. Until then I used my beloved 12" Thinkpad (Dropkick, got it's name from them and the way I treat it) for daily work, which was okay, but somewhat unhandy at times. Now I got 21" instead of 12", a lot more power, sound, and a decent (but filthy) keyboard again. Yay!
Downside: I had totally forgotten how *INCREDIBLY LOUD* that thing is. Maybe I'll go buy a set of these insulating mats. This high-pitched noise drives me insane!
Regarding my last post: I noticed there's an extra-i-that-bears-witness-to-my-favourite-editor in it but decided to leave it as a statement ;) Maybe I'll start a new trend?
The Skatalites concert was as great as expected but unfortunately very full. People where standing shoulder to shoulder all the way to the back wall. So all you could do was stand and listen, dancing was rather difficult or even impossible. :( Also, we left a bit earlier since those $%*#§ing regular work hours have turned me into a total sissy when it comes to staying up late. This needs to be undone!!
In other news: My increasing enthusiasm for Leipzig experienced a first drop when I noticed this morning that somewhen in the last few days someone must have stolen the bungee cord from my bike. :(
I am disappointed and indignant about this!!!
(Especially since only my new springy one is gone, the old, f***ed-up one is still there. Haha!! You me too!)
Last but not least: I got my Christmas leave confirmed! I am off work from christmas until new-year. This means that I can go South over the holidays and be with my ifamily who totally rocks and I very much look forward to seeing again :) (Mom, should you read this: We are having fondue again this Christmas, arent we? Pleeaaase??)
Posted at: 12:26 in /english/misc
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Thu, 24 Nov 2005
Oh it's good to be back home!!
The fair was rather straining, especially since I was there on my own and a normal fair day included about 3 hours of car driving (half of it in a horrible 7 line fair traffic management system) and about 9 hours of standing around, all tarted up with pantsuit, high heels, make up et al., smiling, looking attentive and not as bored (and in pain) as I was. (No, there are no pictures!!)
Anyway, enough whining. I am back and made an almost full recovery (Save some big bruises on my right leg, of which I have no idea where I got them. Probably bumped something against my leg when taking down the booth again.) and there are now much more pleasant times ahead. The Leipzig christmas market opened today and I plan to pay it a visit sometime this weekend. (Yea, I know, kitschy, sentimental, commercialised, ... but it's fun anyway, so shut up and have a gingerbread.).
The second highlight of this weekend will be the Skatalites concert I'll see on Saturday. For those who don't listen to Ska, the Skatalites can be considered to be among the "founding fathers" of today's Ska music. They were most popular around '63 - '65, today they are of course all pretty old guys (And girls they bring Doreen Shaffer, yay!!).
But they still do some considerable rockin! And it is to be supposed that there might even be a fair amount of enjoyable skankin' going on among the faithful followers of the acustic and sensual delight that is good Ska music.
Jiggy-Dah!
Posted at: 17:09 in /english/personal
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Tue, 15 Nov 2005
Off to no-bandwidth land
Wish me luck :)
Posted at: 00:17 in /english/personal
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Mon, 31 Oct 2005
Linux-Info-Tag 2005
We had two copies of Frank Ronneburg's Debian Anwenderhandbuch and I thought it would be a nice idea to give them away in a little contest. Alexander "Tolimar" Schmehl owns a little etch that I asked him to bring along. The idea was, that, in order to promote the name of the next release, people should draw us a picture on the little etch and the best one would win a copy of the book. I'd actually expected to see people fail miserably and in the end crown the funniest try. But I was confuted. Totally!! In fact we had two entries that were so good that we decided to split the first place and give both of them a copy of the book.
Here are (as promised) all contestants:
This entry was taken out of the rating. It was our first entry and was made by Carsten, who was one of the Debian booth people. Of course we know that he could have done much better and only produced this in order to not discourage other contestants.
The third place, personally I don't really agree with the motive but it won a lanyard anyway.
The second place, a rather obvious motive, but well done and a worthy second place. Another lanyard for this gentleman.
The two first place entries: We absolutely couldn't decide between the perfect curves of "Tux" and "A house with garden"'s 1000 little Details. So the first place was splitted and we gave a away both copies of the book.
Congratulations again to all contestants! Well done!
After deciding on the prices I had to hurry to give my talk on user friendly system administration. I had a nice number of people and I think the talk was well received. The (German) slides are now also available online. Please inform me of any usage.
One nice incident was, when after the talk a former system administrator of the Technical University of Dresden approached me and told me that he really liked the talk. He said that he was now retired and really missed talking to the users and helping them when they had trouble with the system. After hearing so many sysads talking about their users like complete idiots, that all seem on a personal quest to annoy their sysads as much as possible, this was a nice change. I sometimes think that the "BOFH-Syndrome" is also a generation problem. But that's a different story ...
After the talks there was a barbecue outside the building, I talked to a lot of people and had quite some fun. Afterwards there was a presentation and movies, a really nice ending for an almost perfect event. (The only problem was, that there had been no Internet access until around noon, but from what I heard it was one of the University's switches that had given up. Apart from that everything worked out perfectly.)
On Sunday we went on a guided tour through Dresden and afterwards to a museum. The museum actually is on Human Biology but there were two special exhibitions, one on evolution and one on games. As expected most of us went for the game exhibition that featured several rooms dedicated to the history of games as well as the different kinds of games that exist (imitation, strategy, gambling, ...). All rooms had games to try yourself and all of us had a lot of fun. (We're such a bunch of kids ;)) After leaving the museum we went for a Pizza (Very tasty! I think, I am developing a weakness for Pizza with Parma and rocket.), which concluded that day.
One last nice incident happened when I was riding home on the train with Tolimar. We asked the guy who'd checked our tickets for a later train connection. His answer: "Oh, did it get too late at the Linuxtag at the Technical University?". Unnecessary to mention that we were most thrilled! Often when talking to "normal people" I get the "what is this all for" feeling, since, how much ever you evangelise, there's such a mass of people who never even heard about the existence of FOSS/Linux. It's these little incidents that are really rewarding!!
Final conclusions:
- Great weekend
- Very good event (Thanks LIT people, you guys rock!! Also a big thank you to our host, Frank, who provided three of us with a place to sleep, really tasty breakfast and also drove us around.)
- Lots of fun
- Lots of interesting people to talk to
- An IXUS II does not work as a USB storage device
- You can do amazing things with an etch a sketch
- Knowing that my talk is being recorded gives me an awkward feeling (I tend to use a lot of "spicy language")
- The rebuilt Frauenkirche looks impressing
- Pizza with Parma and rocket is great!
Posted at: 19:08 in /english/debian/events
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Wed, 26 Oct 2005
Berlinux 2005
When we got to the Technical University on the next morning the first thing I noticed was a huge transparent hanging over the entrance. Upon closer inspection however it advertised some events for this semester's new students, not Berlinux. Shame. We quickly checked with the Information desk, where we were told to check back with them before giving our talks, since there had been some last minute room changes. Given the quite chaotic organisation in the run-up of this event I must say I wasn't too surprised. (There had been quite a mess regarding the preparation of the talks, many speakers only read on the site when - and that - they were giving their talks, deadlines suddenly popped up and then started wandering ... All in all preparations had been a bit confusing.) Also the planned Berlinux CD had somehow not worked out, so there were no CDs available.
With such good news we went on to the Debian booth to set up the usual stuff. The biggest attraction certainly was Frank Ronneburg's Debian-controlled model railway. Kids had to be forcibly moved on and grown-up men were seen regressing to small children again ;) Unfortunately attendance was rather low anyhow and a lot of the people walking by were regular students on their way to some other events.
At least the talks managed to attract a higher number of people. I can't estimate for shit so I have got no idea how many people attended my talk on user friendly system administration. But I was rather content with the number and so were the other speakers I talked to (The only one who was a bit unfortunate was Alexander 'Tolimar' Schmehl who had to compete with Klaus Knopper giving a talk at the same time.) After the talks were over we killed some more time at the booth, playing with Frank's model railway and Wolfgang Borgert's Nokia 770 (It has Mahjong! Yay!). It should be noted that when we were finally taking down the booth a very brave person walked around with a laptop collecting criticism and suggestions for improvement. There were so many of them that I had to help him out with my Thinkpad's power supply :)
I am not sure how much the Debian project benefited from the whole event since the attendance was so low and we got very few questions. Personally though I quite enjoyed the event. The talk went well (I got a few laughs and good questions afterwards), I met a bunch of new and very interesting people and had a really great Pizza. I hope Berlinux Organisation picks up a few of the suggestions they received. For the moment, my conclusion is that I'd probably give a talk there again, I am however not so sure if I'd go there only to man the Debian booth.
PS: Sadly they didn't have name tags either, so I don't even have something to put on my "trophy board" :(
Hint: Most speaker love souvenirs, give them a piece of paper with their name and your logo on it and they are happy people :)
Posted at: 11:23 in /english/debian/events
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Sat, 15 Oct 2005
More events coming up
The first one, next weekend (Fri 21st to Sat 22nd of October) will be the Berlinux which (obviously) is in Berlin. And then one week later, on the 29th of October, I'll be in Dresden at the Linux-Info-Tag.
I will be giving this (German link) talk on user motivation at both events (but I'll try to work up some new jokes for Dresden, so it doesn't get too repetitive ;)). I am really looking forward to these events, not only because they're probably going to be a lot of fun by themselves (There's all the usual stuff, key signing and install parties, a social event plus some funny extras. In Dresden e. g. you can have your picture taken with their giant Tux. If I can overcome my camera-shyness I'll let you see the results. No promises though ... ) but also because it will be an opportunity to finally meet some nice people again, who I only seldom meet in person. (Ah, the blessing that is irc!)
As usual reports will follow a few days after the respective event.
Talking about events: It seems LinuxTag will move to Wiesbaden. Well, I am curious what it'll be like there. I think Karlsruhe was a great location and the local LUG did a great job in hosting large parts of the community in and around the (in)famous AKK. I hope, there'll be something similar in Wiesbaden. After all (at least for me) it has always been this "community-stuff" that made LinuxTag more than just a regular linux congress/fair.
Posted at: 13:33 in /english/debian/events
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Mon, 10 Oct 2005
Settling in ...
So, my formerly dull workplace now features:
- Several tech/programming books. (I hardly ever look into them, but this sort of stuff somehow always gives me a feeling of home.)
- My own tea cup + my own tea (Tastes much better than what the resident coffee machine coughs up.
- A cute postcard I got from a cute guy after moving here.
- Several sheets of paper, taken out of an (I assume) broken printer with notes scribbled all over them. I also had to organise the pen myself, but when I am working and need to take a quick note it's just so much easier to quickly scribble it on a piece of paper than type it in a file. Also, it nicely clutters up my table, which again makes it very homey ;)
Screw the paperless office! - Some food. I decided, that it makes me a much happier person if I can eat an apple or a cookie from time to time, so I usually bring some food with me now.
So, by now I'd say it's still far from an ideal work environment, but it's gotten better.
PS: irc also helps! ;)
PPS: Thanks to Erinn, I know now that my current tenancy is called subletting.
PPPS: Oh, and 7am is still much too ******* early!!!
PPPPS: I like Marc's new meme. :) My results:
- Meike needs him . . . now who might that be? ;)
- Meike needs to help hold up my arm . . . Uhm. Whatever rocks your boat, man ...
- Meike needs some work . . . soo. not. true.
- Meike needs it too . . . [...]
Posted at: 13:32 in /english/personal
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Wed, 28 Sep 2005
Viva Leipzig!!
Well, the biggest piece of news certainly is that I finally moved to wonderful Leipzig! I arrived here at the end of August and have since settled in quite nicely. So far I really love living here! My place is (rather by accident than by intent) in one of the IMHO most beautiful, atmospheric and interesting parts of the city. It's mainly populated by students and young families, most of them with a slightly alternative lifestyle and a rather left-tending (is this proper English?!) political view, which does a lot for the cityscape in this particular area. There's lots of really nice cafes and other places, second hand shops, fair trade stores, ... and basically anything else you might need or wish to have. All within comfortable walking/bike distance.
My place itself is rather small (a little one room flat with a separate bath and kitchen) but I feel at home there and after some "customising" I finally have everything arranged the way it suits me best. It's "interim rent" (no idea if there's a proper English word for that.), which means that the actual tenant keeps the place but leaves it to you for a few months complete with all furniture, equipment, tableware, ... etc. In my case, my "landlady" is a student who also does an internship at the moment, but in another part of Germany. Such arrangements really are a nice thing! The actual tenant avoids paying double rent and the other one doesn't have do move all his/her stuff around for just a few months.
Though, at first it felt a bit awkward, like living in someone else's place, but after putting some of my personal stuff up and replacing Metallica and Franz Kafka with Uma Thurman, the animal and some general Life-and-Linux-Memorabilia, it really feels like my place now and I really enjoy coming back home in the evenings.
My new job is pretty much okay, my workplace isn't the most cosy of all, and the work itself is a bit dull at times, but - considering that this is an internship - I know I could do much worse. So I am okay with it. What took (and is still taking) me most time to get used to are my work times and conditions. My job here mainly consists of coding, and usually I do that when I am in the according mood (which mostly means feeling creative). With some nice music or the radio on, feet on the table and some tea and/or sweets next to me. Now, on the other hand, getting up at 7 am, starting work at 8, sitting nicely on my office chair in an otherwise completely empty and featureless room, surrounded by dead silence, only alleviated by the humming of my computer and the scratching of my chair's wheels on the white tiled floor does *not* put me in that kind of mood! But I guess that's what "normal work life" is like and thus it's something I'll just have to deal with and get used to. :-/ At least for now.
(Any hints on how other people deal with this would be very much appreciated! So far I am doing my work okay. But I know I could do much better if I managed to dig up some more motivation.)
Last but not least, my mood that has lately been a bit melancholic has very much lightened up. My little journey had the desired clarifying effect, though, in a lot of very different ways from what I'd actually anticipated! But, alas, life has this funny way of always *not* doing what you expected it to, so let me just say that - little troubles aside - at the moment I am really happy! :)
Posted at: 13:53 in /english/personal
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Mon, 22 Aug 2005
Back in Hildesheim
Somehow, moving always is a very complex business. A mixture of all kinds of feelings, from anticipation to parting sorrow, everything in between and then some.
Especially if that move doesn't happen under the happiest of circumstances.
But, oh well. To quote myself: Life is just one damned thing after another. So there's not much use in looking back. There's a lot to do, lots of new challenges to rise to, work to tackle, words to say, thoughts to think and bits to move.
Another quote says:
"You cannot alter your fate. However, you can rise to meet it, if you choose."... So, I'll do just that, sort things out and look ahead to whatever comes next.
Wish me luck.
Posted at: 14:58 in /english/personal
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Sun, 14 Aug 2005
Long time no post
I left Frankfurt on Tuesday and hitched a ride to Freiburg, we even made a little trip to France to drop someone off at Strasbourg. After arriving at Freiburg I stayed with my sister for two nights and we were then picked up by my mom who returned from France where she'd dropped off my three French stepbrothers (Oh, did I mention I have a "broad" family?)
The next few days were spent around my home town, staying at my mom's, visiting my dad, walking around town and generally being lazy.
Nice time, but oh, the restlesness ...
Yesterday I left for Ulm where I am now.
Aaand, some random bits:
- A picture from Freiburg:
- It is a good thing to be back in Swabia. It's a wonderful place! Great food, woderful landscape, horrible dialect ;) (Naah, I love it!)
- I had a short ride on my father's new motorbike. I SO need a new one!!
- Yes, I like country music. My mother is the mixer of a country band (It's the coolest thing, she can "techtalk" and I don't understand a word :D ) and gives line dance lessons several times a week. However, I shall be taking no shit from someone on whose hard drive I recently found Alabama - Can't take the Country out of me (Mhuahaha!!)
- Yesterday we had King Prawns with a coconut and ginger sauce. Delicious!
- Currently I am sittinig on (yet another) sofa, listening to some (very loud) Propaghandi, watching two nice gentleman prepare tuna spaghetti. That's life!
- Weather still sucks! Is this what you call summer?!?
- I washed! I have socks again!!
- My time is running out, it's about time to travel back North. Also I have almost nothing left to read.
- After feeling like having lots of different people around me, I think I've had about enough of that now and long for some loneliness. Guess I'll stay on my own for the last week ...
Posted at: 21:48 in /english/travel
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Fri, 05 Aug 2005
Next sofa, next post ...
- This time the sofa belongs to Tolimar and can be found about here.
- I am noticing first flaws in my packing strategy. I prepared for ~20°C up to 35°C. So far I've only had about 20 and mostly rainy weather. Very slowly I start running out of clean warm cloths.
- More wood walking: Joggers. So many! And so ... colourful!!
- 12 angry men is a cool movie!
- There is a Weinfest right in front of Tolimar's house. I fail to produce an English word that adequately describes the concept of German Volksmusik! However, we're trying to face it with loud music of our own. (Current playlist features a weird but cool Queen song.)
- Tolimar does not have cookies but makes excellent coffee!
- Further travel plans are emerging. I'll go farther South. (Should you not be German, and planning to come here: The South is the place to go!! *ducks away from Northern German fish attacks*)
- After mentioning them in my last blog post, the squeezes are increasing.
All: Thank guys!
Some: Who *are* you?! - Sorry, no pics this time. Maybe next time.
- ...
- Ergonomic keyboard ... yargh!
Posted at: 21:36 in /english/travel
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Tue, 02 Aug 2005
Still alive (as promised)
- This post comes right from youam's sofa, which is about here.
- I walked through moor and woods.
- I was in Belgium and the Netherlands.
- I talk(ed) a lot.
- I am being squeezed repeatedly.
- Youam doesn't have (hot) coffee, but great cookies.
- I saw Mr and Mrs Smith, great movie!
- I dismanteled my laptop in order to get rid of that funny "dck dck" noise my fan makes. Didn't work out.
- Wireless works now, but unreliable.
- I am looking at a table covered with cups and screw drivers.
- Apfelstrudel is my friend!
- I forgot my laptop battery. DAMN!
- Weather is okay but could be better.
- I got a tiny glass of syrup :)
- Charles Baudelaire is travelling with me.
- I had a really nice Turkish lunch.
- It'll soon be time to travel on.
- IT IS GOOD TO BE AWAY!
Posted at: 21:30 in /english/travel
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Sat, 30 Jul 2005
There are times in life ...
I used to often go on such journeys in the past and this one really has been overdue for quite some time!!
So from tomorrow on for the next ~three weeks I'll officially be gone. No plans yet where I'll go when and how to get there. I'll just see how things go.
I'll try to drop a few "still alive" posts while I'm on the way. Maybe even some pictures if the opportunity arises.
See you some time soon ...
|
Posted at: 17:53 in /english/travel
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Mon, 25 Jul 2005
A few pictures
Posted at: 15:53 in /english/debian/events/apacheCon
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Sun, 24 Jul 2005
Back from Stuttgart
So on Saturday, after sleeping in and hanging out in front of the tent for some time we decided to skip breakfast and go right for lunch. We chose a thai-chinese place and had a very good (and abundant!) lunch. After that we decided to go to the zoo which turned out to be a really good idea. The rest of the day was spent wandering through the zoo, looking at all kinds of animals, a funny shimpanse, a sneaky elephant and having little contests who first spots the leaf green triple spotted double striped poison dart frog (... and his fellow tiny creatures) in the terrarium. We stayed until the Zoo closed. Still totally stuffed from our lunch we decided to also skip dinner and went back into town to have a drink and wander the nightly streets of Stuttgart making fun of designer furniture and discussing movies (I shall remain silent concerning some people's weird movie taste, but ... *seriously* ... Flash Dance?!). After finishing our round (and some ice cream) we went back to the camping site and kept talking about this and that until the first among us fell asleep.
Sunday featured sleeping in even longer, a small improvised breakfast and The Unbelievable Packing of XTaran's car. I was really surprised, but it is indeed possible to fit a huge tent, three big bags, a camping table, a camping chair, a toolbox, three laptops plus accessories, a computer, a projector, even more hardware, two poster carzons and the $%&*§*# box into XTarans car! There was even some space left to sit :) Granted it took us some time and several tries but we made it and I ended up on the back seat in a nice and cosy nest made out of sleeping bags, XTaran's parka and other stuff. (Of course I fell asleep pretty soon. It was really just too comfortable.)
After leaving the exibition stuff with codebreaker we then went on to Frankfurt, were the guys accompanied me to the train and then went on. There was some delay "due to police investigations" (People, this is the decade of Terror Lunacy. PLEASE stay with your luggage!) but we are now approaching Fulda and I hope to be home at about midnight.
In the meantime, time for some conclusions:
At first I wasn't to sure whether going all the way down to Stuttgart just for these few days would be worth the hassle, but it definitely was! ApacheCon was a really nice event, and we were able to answer a few questions, maybe even convince some people of running Debian and generally show some presence, which I think was a good thing to do, since a lot of people there were also system administrators and we brought Debian back into their minds. Moreover I had a great time. XTaran and Tolimar are two fabulous guys to hang out with and made me laugh all the time. Also, apprently thanks to something called the "Debian Effect", we had really nice weather most of the time, so all in all I had five great days, was with lovely people and did something for Debian. ...
What else could you ask for? :)
Posted at: 22:16 in /english/debian/events/apacheCon
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Wed, 20 Jul 2005
First day
So, yes, I took the liberty to reproduce the famous Mike Poster. :)
Illiad provided me with a larger version of Mike and I then just scaled up the writing from the .jpg, redid contrast, redid the borders and basically just fixed it up letter by letter. (Yes, it sucked. Big time.)
I brought the poster with me when I went to Stuttgart and put it up at the booth before going to the camping site to meet the other two. I was *really* hard to keep the surprise to myself and I was close to letting it slip several times. But I "kept strong" and I must say, their faces were very much worth the hard times I had had the evening before :-) (Still smiling to myself when I think of it)
In other news: After arriving at Stuttgart, finding the "Haus der Wirtschaft" and completing a little odyssey to finally find the camping site I met up with Tolimar and XTaran. The promised three people tent Tolimar brought turned out be really HUGE! I think we could nicely fit in ourselves plus XTarans car :) We didn't stay up too long this evening since most of us were rather tired and I actually fell asleep within seconds when I lay on my sleeping bag. (I was planning to go to sleep, though actually not *that* soon. Oh well ... )
The Expo is going rather well. We set up a nice (and comfortable) little booth and people are quite interested. Usual stuff mostly: People telling us that they used Debian for years and they think it's cool, people telling us they used to use Debian but stopped for this or that reason, some techical questions, ONE DEBIAN-WOMEN INQUIRY (woohooo!).
Currently it's rather quiet. The talks have started again and most people are busy so we are just sitting at the booth, hacking away, fixing stuff, answering long overdue mail or chatting on irc. If it goes on like that this will be a nice and peaceful conference.
Posted at: 14:49 in /english/debian/events/apacheCon
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Tue, 19 Jul 2005
Train ponderings ...
Brain Protocol:
- If there is someone in your compartment with a pipe in his air tube it is rude to make loud comments about him. However it is *just as* rude, to turn to your boyfriend, move close to his ear, cover your mouth with your hand and wisper to him, while (....) staring at said person.
- I need a command line dictionary on my notebook.
- xmahjongg is great! But why does menu file it under Kartenspiele ("card games")?
- Text messages wishing me a save/nice/fun journey make me happy :)
- The Summer Special ticket makes you take ridiculous detours but you save money
- IC trains are so much better than ICEs. They may be slower, but the seats are just as comfortable, you don't have to pay extra fees, there are more power couplings, X20 sized folding tables in the back of every seat and they don't keep them at such ridiculously low temperatures as the ICEs.
- The battery of my mobile phone lasts a few days in standby but only 20 second when actually doing a phone call.
- You cannot recharge your mobile's account within 20 seconds.
- German book translators: Please DO NOT translate deadlock with "tödliche Umarmung"!
- 12:22 Just as boredom and tiredness start turning into deep dispair this wonderful woman enters the compartment, carrying a single cup of coffee on a tray. She stops at every seat asking: "Coffee?" but nobody wants one. I do!! She gives me the cup, I give her some money. I wonder whether she'll go get another cup and finish her round but she doesn't return.
I think I believe in angels now ... - ...
- I want an mp3 player
- Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof brings up memories of a horrible night in lovely company
- ...
- I seriously need to overthink my money_saved/travel_time ratio!!!
Posted at: 15:53 in /english/debian/events/apacheCon
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
I repent, I utterly repent! I shall never, never ever mock Murphy (He, who is the only power there is) again!
I left my house in time to get my train to Hannover and headed to the station through the pouring rain. Luckily, being the daughter of an ex-army member and having gone through several holidays that rather resembled a survival camp than a family holiday, I know how to properly pack a trecking backpack so that the weight is evenly distributed and everything sensitive/important is stored close to the padded back so it cannot be reached by blows or rain.
So, when I finally arrived at the station, my jeans and my chucks were rather wet, but overall I was quite fine.
EXCEPT!
Fsck ...
I'd forgotten one piece of luggage which was still sitting in my room, next to the door. Argh!
Time from my house to the station: about 10 min
Time left: 12 min!
After spending about 15 seconds pondering what would suck more, sprinting back, or going without that piece of luggage I went for the sprint back option.
So, here is how you do it: Turn on your heels, pace back home (*pant pant*), drop big trecking backpack and messenger bag at the bottom of the staircase, sprint up four floors (this was the moment when I think I heared a squishing sound that I assumed was some important muscle of my heart giving up), grab that §$%&*§*# box, hurry down four floors (almost tripping because my legs start acting up), readjust rain coat, big trecking backpack, messenger bag and §$%&*§*# box, check watch, realise you got about five minutes left, leave about 12 seconds for excessive cursing, then run all the way back to the station, hear your train being announced, see it coming in, hurry up the stairs to the tracks, jump into train just as doors close, stop at the first available seat, drop off §$%&*§*# box, messenger bag, big trecking backpack and raincoat, drop into seat and faint without further comment.
Things I learned from this:
- Leaving early, is a good idea, leaving earlier is better
- DO CHECK your luggage when leaving the house
- I seriously need to do something about my fitness!
- You can store an amazing amount of water in a pair of chucks, jeans and a baseball cap.
- Train seats take some time to absorbe all this but will eventually do so.
- My heart can make squishing sounds
- ... so can my lungs
- Murphy is the only power there is and I shall NEVER EVER make fun of him again!!
Posted at: 10:47 in /english/debian/events/apacheCon
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
FSCK #2 This shall be a lesson to me :-/
Just looked out of the window. It's not raining, it's f***ing pouring!
Murphy vs. Meike 1:1 ...
Posted at: 08:32 in /english/debian/events/apacheCon
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
FSCK! Just finished packing for my trip to this year's ApacheCon. Just to be sure I checked my train times again ... Jep, train leaves at 10:00 but - argh! - not in Hildesheim, but in Hannover (This is the moment when I remeber thinking it would be much easier to travel from Hannover since it is the bigger city and I can easily get there with my student ticket). However, getting to Hannover with sufficient time to change trains etc. will cost me another hour. fsck!
Luckily I am totally paranoid when it comes to plane/train/bus times so I actually got up so early that leaving ~1hr earlier won't be a problem.
HA!
Meike vs. Murphy 1:0 !!
Besides that I am really looking forward to Stuttgart. After miserably watching everyone else having loads of fun in HEL it feels good to be on the road again. I just hope the weather won't let us down, forecasts are mixed.
Right, time to run. Next post from Stuttgart :)
Posted at: 08:03 in /english/debian/events/apacheCon
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Thu, 14 Jul 2005
ApacheCon 2005 in Stuttgart
However, I offered to help and within the next day(s) Tolimar and XTaran joined in too, so we got ourselves a nice little expo team now.
There was a little trouble as to where to sleep since the prices at the Stuttgart youth hostel are rather steep (especially since two of us fall in the additional "senior citizen charge" of 3 Euros per night *g*). We then sent a mail to the Stuttgart LUG asking for some space to crash. Granted, a rather bold venture, but the very nice people there actually offered us their floors and sofas! I am once more intrigued by the solidarity of the Linux community! Unfortunately no one was able to host all three of us and we prefered to stay together.
So, we found ourselves an other solution: We'll go camping! There is a campground pretty close to Stuttgart's city centre and Tolimar managed to get us a tent suitable for three people (or so he says).
Well, I am very much looking forward to this. I am sure we'll be worthy representatives of the Debian project and maybe we'll even have some fun in the process ;-)
Posted at: 21:30 in /english/debian/events/apacheCon
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Still alive Haven't written anything lately, mainly because I am quite busy these days. I actually still am, so this will only be a quick update:
- After getting through my final exam it is now "normal" exam season. Next one will be saturday morning (Computer Architecture and Operating Systems) and to say that I feel unprepared would be an understatement. However this is my normal state of mind before exams, so we'll see how things turn out.
- This is again the time of year when I desperately wish I had a balcony! It's wonderfully sunny outside and I am sitting in here, still pale as a dead fish longing for some UV. On a more positive side, I'll have something garden-like in Leipzig, and I am prepared to use it!:)
- I am listening to a lot of music recently. I usually am rather the type that just switches on the radio to get rid of the silence. However, in the last days i kinda "rediscovered" my taste for music. Current playlist features Ani Difranco, Catatonia, Janis Joplin, Anne Clark, Slow Moe, Buena Vista Social Club and a lot of Edith Piaf.
Posted at: 21:00 in /english/personal
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Thu, 07 Jul 2005
One done, two to go
I had my first final (final not as in "end of term" but as in "end of studies") exam today! It was a in my second minor, history. Two topics, 45 mins oral examination ... and I made it! :D
I got a 1.0 (best possible mark). YESSSS!!
Sitting here now, with a dumb smile on my face and a huge load off my mind. I'll take the rest of the day off and just be lazy, drink tea and enjoy myself before I'll start studying again for the regular end-of-semester exams. Thanks to everyone who wished me luck, crossed fingers, thought of me and was happy with me when I had the results.
On other news, I overcame my earlier ponderous mood and things look much brighter again.
Greetings go out to far away Helsinki where most of the Debian people should now soon arrive
(or have already) in order to hold Debconf 5.
Posted at: 11:32 in /english/uni
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Wed, 29 Jun 2005
The Times They Are A-Changin'
These musings however quickly lead to more general pondering. Especially when mixed with a (temporal) change of environment and lots of new impressions (both of which were sufficiently provided at Linuxtag). I actually only went to Linuxtag for fun and to find out, whether the Debian Project really is for me.
Result: IT IS!
However, these four days also were the best time I've had in quite a (looong) while, which leads to the
question, why this happens so seldom ... which further on leads to doubts, which lead to reconsiderations,
which lead to descisions.
Want to know them? Well, so do I!
I've only arrived at the "reconsiderations" part yet.
There however are some things I am already quite sure of: Linuxtag gave me that last "push" to decide that I will make Debian a part of my life. (This sounds weird, but - Hey! - my brain works that way.) I actually have a few nice package ideas already, which I'm planning to tackle once I got over with my exams.
Apart from that, my internship in Leipzig is all secured now and I already found a nice little flat close to the Institute I'll be working at. I really hope things will go well there. And then, spring next year, I'll return to Hildesheim and write my thesis.
And then?
Who knows.
Life is just one damned thing after another ... and at the moment nothing seems as certain as it used to be ...
Posted at: 22:02 in /english/personal
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Tue, 28 Jun 2005
Further days
(July 17th, 2005)
PS: Joey maintains a list of people who put pictures of LinuxTag online.
PPS: I finally put up a small report. Not a fully diary, just a few things concerning the Debian-Women Project
Posted at: 14:49 in /english/debian/events/linuxtag05
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Thu, 23 Jun 2005
First day
The journey was rather nice, ICE of course freezing cold, as usual, but I sat next to a really cool
South Korean net reporter who shared the homemade sushi his wife made for him with me. Delicious!!! Hmmm, best I ever had. :)
After arriving at Linuxtag I first tracked down Fernanda to get my Debian-Women T-shirt. It looks absolutely awsome! Pictures will follow ... The also gave me a FSFLA shirt. Thanks again :)
The rest of the day was spent hacking, talking and meeting new people (or rather people I knew from irc who now finally have a *face*). In the evening I got the promised make tutorial from youam. It was quite fun and I feel much more enlightened now :-)
Due to the really warm weather we decided not to sleep in the gym but on the stands outside. Turned out to be a good idea, the night was pleasantly cool, however we hadn't considered the *bright morning sun* that woke us/me up at 6am (one hour before we'd actually planned to geti up ... oh well ...)
It is now Thursday morning I lack a bit of sleep - but still within normal parameters ;) - had a good breakfast and am about five hours away from my talk and still waiting for the adrenaline to kick in.
Wish me luck!!
Posted at: 11:29 in /english/debian/events/linuxtag05
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Mon, 20 Jun 2005
Everything ready
I'll leave for Karlsruhe on Wednesday afternoon. Unfortunately I couldn't find anyone else to travel with me, so I'll just have to take a good book with me. (I recently started reading Dan Simmons' Ilium and it seems promising ...)
I have a *huge* list of people I want to meet, talks I want to hear, parties I want to go to ... I am especially looking forward to meeting all the d-w people. Youam promised me a little make tutorial and I have to meet Bernhard for an interview. And then there are of course my (first!) booth shifts!
Exciting times!!!
PS: I'll take my little laptop with me and I'll try to give some updates while in Karlsruhe. Whatch this space ;)
Posted at: 19:54 in /english/debian/events/linuxtag05
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Sun, 05 Jun 2005
Some art
From the website:
"99rooms is a unique internet art project that interweaves wall painting,
photography, animation and sound in a manner entirely unknown until now."
If you have flash, some bandwidth and a little time, go have a look!
Posted at: 15:37 in /english/ent
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Fri, 03 Jun 2005
Le poison qui découle de tes yeux, de tes yeux verts
However, I was most surprised!!!
What a great movie! Touching story, beautiful pictures and atmosphere. Granted, the animations *are* more than mediocre but it almost feels like a stylistic device and the beautifully made scenery absolutely makes up for that! Bilal's 2095 New York is at the same time modern and decayed, dark and alive. What struck me most about the movie though was its atmosphere. Kind of morbid/melancholic end-of-the-world, look-where-we-ended-up but without being whiny or annoying. I especially liked that they had some Baudelaire quotes in there. Sometimes even in the French original!
Namely they quoted Une Charogne and Le Poison. Wonderful lines ... I think these really illustrate the movie's keynote best:
-
Tout cela ne vaut pas le poison qui découle
De tes yeux, de tes yeux verts,
Lacs où mon âme tremble et se voit à l'envers...
Mes songes viennent en foule
Pour se désaltérer à ces gouffres amers.
Tout cela ne vaut pas le terrible prodige
De ta salive qui mord,
Qui plonge dans l'oubli mon âme sans remords,
Et charriant le vertige,
La roule défaillante aux rives de la mort!
*sigh*
Anyway, if you get a chance to see this movie, do it! It deserves much more than the little attention it got! Bilal really proves that it is still possible to make intelligent, beautiful and poetic science fiction.
Posted at: 01:47 in /english/ent
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Mon, 30 May 2005
Webite frenzy
Posted at: 23:15 in /english/meta
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Getting green with McD Went to Mc Donalds today (I'd link but their site is an orgy in flash).
I haven't been there since they started their We're not junkfood campaign. I tried a 1€ garden salad and what shall I say? It's actually good! Everything was fresh and crunchy, lot's of different kinds of salad, carrots, tomatoes, tasty dressing (I chose Basilico) ... I am surprised!! Had much worse salads in "real" restaurants! Well done McD ;-)
Posted at: 20:06 in /english/misc
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Tue, 24 May 2005
Next stop: Leipzig!
Posted at: 14:38 in /english/uni
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Fri, 06 May 2005
Harrumph, hear hear!
Posted at: 23:17 in /english/debian/events/linuxtag05
permanent link - this day - comment
on this
Mon, 18 Apr 2005
Linuxtag - Where com meets org
Posted at: 17:40 in /english/debian/events/linuxtag05
permanent link - this day - comment
on this