Anyway, I thought it prudent to at least quickly write something up, so people know where I stand when it comes to the advent of new and the goodbye to old decades. Well, here I stand: I don’t give a fuck. What I do give a fuck about, though, is the way some people manage to use that man-made concept of time, calendars and new-years bashes to create a sort of sense-inducing narrative for their own lives, something which I have never managed to do and which I truly envy.

Which is yet another reason why I’ll never be writing an autobiography.

To you, on the other hand, my dear and loyal reader, I wish a fantastic new year. May all your plot-lines work out the way you once envisioned them in that head of yours.

So there we go. We’ve all spent weeks collecting presents and honing our social skills to survive the getting together of large quantities of human beings only for it all to be over in a mere two and a half days. That’s Christmas for you.

But, as always, it’s two and a half days that are quite rewarding. Spending time with people you like and/or are related to seldom leaves you in a bad mood, especially if it involves trees adorned with shiny stuff, little sweet things commonly referred to as cookies (biscuits for the Brits among you), obscene amounts of poultry, tiny little nativity scenes you can practice your camera’s macro-mode on and of course brief bursts of thunderstorms on Christmas day.

For graphical representations of above ramblings, click the picture on top. For a brief glimpse of what the rain accompanying a thunderstorm looks and sounds like, watch the gripping feature presentation below. Enjoy.

40 Seconds of Rain from Richard on Vimeo.

I had planned on writing a longish post about the various meanings of Christmas, from people actually believing that there was someone born a couple of thousand years ago to a carpenter whose wife insisted that “no, it wasn’t anyone from your company’s Christmas party who knocked me up, ’twas this mythical creature that sent an angel did the job” to those thinking that Christmas is mainly something to enjoy what the entertainment and dumbing-down industries put on their platters, no matter how awfully insipid it might be, to finally those who just enjoy the free days that allow them to spend time with their dear ones.

I decided against it, simply because I can’t find the time between going to church every two hours, listening to “The Best of Wham” (a wonderful record consisting of just this one song) and playing “do you need to pee or not” which my little Swedish nephew.

So instead I’ll just leave you with a hearty Merry Christmas and all that stuff.

Cheers.

So after more than two years of absence, I returned to Stockholm last weekend to visit my sister, her husband and two unruly but fantastic little Swedish kids. Contrary to my usual ways of taking at least 5000 photos, bugging everyone and their grandma to death, I actually took but a moderate amount of pictures, saving myself from being slaughtered by an angry mob of Swedes and half-Swedes.

As always, my days were dominated by my quest for food and drink, which is nicely reflected in some of the pictures I did take. I also met up with an Austrian friend, whose cousin introduced us to traditional Swedish saturday-night entertainment highlights such as one-room appartment skinhead parties somewhere in the outskirts of Stockholm, complete with pint-glasses of Captain Morgan’s and face-tattoos. One thing I learned that evening is that nights out tend to be so much better when suddenly your only hope is getting out alive. I need to find myself some perilous places in Vienna for jolly good evening entertainment.

Anyway, I did survive the party as I did drinking (another Swedish specialty) at Kvarnen, a pub/club in the heart of Stockholm’s Södermalm. Which reminds me: if you go and smoke a cigarette outside that place, make sure to not sway in any way, because security guys might think you’re too drunk and bar you from going back in. Which in no way happened to me, of course. Oh, and if it happens to you, simply walk away and go back in. Which I heard might work.

And finally, just to prove that I did not spend my days and nights on food and booze only, here’s something for my fellow Stieg Larsson fans. There are tours organized by the city museum called, aptly, Millennium-tours, where you’ll see many of the places featured in Larsson’s Millennium Trilogy. They are Sundays only, but you can buy a map of the tour, complete with explanations of the spots’ relevance in the books. Which is what we did, and, yes, I did take a few pictures. I felt like a fanboy, which, I’m unfortunately obliged to say, I guess I am.

Well, that was my rather concise but nonetheless extremely witty, entertaining and as always dramatic recount of my three day weekend in probably the cleanest city of Europe, if not the world. Enjoy the pictures.

That’s right, people. It’s similar to the movies, really. You come to see and hear someone or something, and most of the time your enjoyment is hindered by someone else who has come for the same reasons but, unlike you, is an inconsiderate or stupid bastard. Or both.

So let me run down a few things that tend to make me want to shoot someone in the head (”shoot in the head” is of course a figure of speech – I’d actually bludgeon them to death with my plastic beer cup):

• Dancing: Yes, I have heard from people that moving your body in a fashion resembling the way the schoolgirl-zombies move in STACY is something to be enjoyed. I am inclined to believe that notion, but I’m als extremely annoyed when people think it’s their prerogative to move that way in a crowd that’s already as packed as a can of sardines. I don’t exactly care for your idea of feeling the music through weird movements of arms and legs, so bumping into me repeatedly with a look of bliss on your face is not something I take to lightly. I might make use of that plastic cup.
• Cameraphones: Yes, it is perfectly alright to take pictures of your favourite band. I’ve done it! But it’s not alright to constantly take photos with your crappy cameraphone, thus obscuring everyone else’s view behind you, forcing them to watch the whole concert through the crappy lense of your crappy cameraphone. Enjoy the music (don’t dance!), and try to forget about posting crappy pictures off your crappy cameraphone to facebook once in a while, willya?

Actually, that’s it. Apart from the fact that I’m really not into handing in my coat, therefore being envious of all those people who prance around in their tshirts and don’t have to either carry or wear their coats and sweat like a pig, there’s nothing else I’d like to add. I guess I’m only half-way to being the bitter, old man I’m aspiring to be.

I was quite ecstatic, and for solid reasons. First of all, I was in the fortunate position to interview lead-singer Mike Vennart, which in itself is always a nice way to start a night. And second they simply played a fantastic set, seemed to be really into it and, last but not least, the audience seemed to be too.

Last Monday, they played again in Vienna, again at the same venue. The vivid memories from their last gig still fresh in my mind, I went there with great expectations, sky-high I’d like to think in retrospect. Can you guess what happened next? In case my powers of dramatic storytelling have failed me once again, I’ll tell you. It was disappointing.

First of all, they didn’t seem to be too taken with their audience, and the audience didn’t either. I think it didn’t help that lead-singer Mike Vennart repeatedly told them that he’d appreciate if people went outside or to the back to smoke. While I do understand that it must be tough to sing in a smoke-filled club, it’s never a good idea to tell people to do one of the two things that people do at clubs, namely smoke and drink. Especially in Vienna.

Apart from those rather unhealthy dynamics, they also played a set-list with many either very new or yet unreleased songs. They didn’t play a single song off Frames, their latest LP, which I think is their best (which is of course no reason for them to think so too, but fuck, I’d have loved to hear “Trail of Fire”. Or at least “Only Twin”). And after a rather short concert, they played just that one encore. Which actually was quite awesome, I must say.

Didn’t help, though. In the end, it was a great band’s disappointing concert. Which I think is somehow worse than the other way round.

The more loyal of my readers will know that I’ve had yet another blog for a while now. Called “Death by Martini“, it celebrates the greatness that is food and drink.

My latest entry, written mere minutes before this one, is sporting scrumptious pictures of the traditional goose served up on or around St. Martin’s day. Click here to see it with yer own eyes.

The location was amazing, not only because private Modul University is allowing you a fantastic view all over Vienna but because it somehow manages to motivate some of their student so far as to spend their spare time working at a Barcamp. And even though I’m always a bit spooked out by that sort of efficiency, I must admit that the organisation was absolutely flawless. Hell, they even had a name tag printed out for me!

The sessions were quite mixed but I managed to find a couple that turned out to be rather entertaining. Especially the last session on Saturday about the venerable Austrian “Internetrat” was both enlightening and madly amusing.

And I also managed to be a bit social, expanding the list of Twitter followers I’ve met in real life by, among others, @liechentecker, @sueholzer and @leyrer, not to mention all the new people now showing up in my Twitter stream.

Thanks again to the organizers and all those people who prepared sessions, you did a very fine job.

Here’s a couple more pictures, for the more graphically inclined.

Anyway, since this is the Intarwebs where unboxing is not a term used for ex-boxers trying to make amends for all the broken noses and shattered brains they caused but rather for the act of removing a gadget or any other fantastic item from its paper or plastic confines and documenting the process, I will do the same here now with said Arobie (if you’ve ever wondered whether I’ll grow tired of huge sentences, here’s your answer).

Well, let’s get started:

The wrapping. I’m not familiar with any other Frisbees sent by mail so I can’t say a whole lot about the quality of that packaging. But it’s sleek and fulfills its purpose. If Linux wasn’t just an operating system but also a computer manufacturer, I guess this is what their packaging would look like.

Ha, removed the adhesive tape that held together package body and flap. Yes, that is a piece of the Aerobie peaking out! Aren’t you excited? I know I am!

Yes, here it is. Please note the ingenious paper inlay, creating the illusion of an ACTUAL HAND holding the ring. Those package designers are genius!

The backside holds not only a very handy guide on how to use the Aerobie, it also shows what other genius devices Aerobie has produced. Like the Orbiter, a superfantastic Boomerang! (disclaimer: Orbiter not shown on above picture. Just imagine what it would look like if Aerobie produced a Boomerang and – tadaaa – there’s your Orbiter)

But now on the actual Flying Ring!

The material surrounding the super carbon ring is soft and will probably not cut off my fingers when trying to catch it. That’s a definite plus in my eyes!

Please note the elegant yet fierce curve of that ring. If you’ve ever seen a throwing device as perfect, drop me a note in the comments. Even though I won’t believe a single word.

And finally:

The Aerobie Flying Ring in all its glory. I’m sorry, but I need to stop writing now and go weep with joy. Oh, and Thursday will see me throwing that piece of art at Augarten park. In case you wanna join.

Photo by benteka/Flickr

The campaign created quite a stir and currently the organizers are raising more money to fund similar projects. Which leads me to the point of this very entry. In Vienna it was planned to have an adapted German message cruising the city on buses of the “Wiener Linien“, the municipal transportation service.

Only turns out it won’t be so, according to the website of the Austrian bus-campaign [DE]. Seems like Wiener Linien, usually not so shy about ads on their vehicles, refused the banners. There’s no official statement yet as to why they did, but according to organizer Niko Alm a written statement is expected later today.

I’m not terribly surprised, really, but I’m looking forward to the ensuing hilarity.