The Root of All Evil

Okay, I’ve said it before and I’m going to say it again – money is the root of all evil. At the least, it’s a big pain in the butt. Check this out…

I’ve received my tax assessment from my German accountant and it appears that I still owe close to €1000.00 on my 2006 taxes. That’s not too much of a surprise; unfortunately I have no way to make this payment. I am paying a German accountant to basically handle my German finances although I am beginning to wonder why I am paying her. I guess the money was to get the taxes filed correctly as I would never be able to figure out the German tax forms; although I guess that’s where the service ends. I’ve made several inquisitions as to how I could make this payment now that I have returned back to the states and the only advice received has been useless.

The standard routine for making this tax payment is to transfer from a German bank account. Unfortunately for me, I had closed my Dresdner account just prior to leaving the country and therefore have no German bank account to make this payment. I figured this wouldn’t be an issue – how could sending money for a payment be complicated? I mean, as far as I’m concerned, if anyone wants to send me money I’m positive that I would make it simple for them. The Germans, on the other hand, must think a bit differently. A simple process is anything but what I have experienced … oh, and by the way, my taxes still aren’t paid. It’s not that I didn’t try; I just have not discovered the secret to getting this transfer completed. The due date is next Tuesday and I’m about 95% sure that this cluster-fuck won’t be resolved before that due date is long gone…

Now, to add to the confusion, I’m currently spending some time with my parents in Michigan. The added issue that this causes is that Wells Fargo has a total of zero branches in Michigan and, since a branch visit is required to complete an international wire transfer with Wells Fargo, a three hour drive to Angola, Indiana was required to even attempt this payment. I attempted several other payment techniques (a transfer from my American Express, Money Gram, Western Union, etc…) but got absolutely nowhere. As a last ditch effort, my father and I decided to drive the three hours to the closest Wells Fargo branch today. Surely the bank would be able to make this transfer, right? WRONG!

I guess the official tax documentation that I received from Germany didn’t have the correct information on it to make an international wire transfer possible. Or, more true to the point, the “Lead Teller” at Wells Fargo wasn’t able to use the information provided to get the payment made. I guess an IBAN number, a BIC (which looks to me like a SWIFT code) and two account numbers with separate BLZ numbers for each wasn’t sufficient. What all those numbers and codes are is unknown to me; but I am not a banker – I would think that a “Lead Teller” for Wells Fargo would be able to figure out how to get the payment made; but I would be thinking incorrectly as Deborah was unable to figure it out. Bottom line here is that, even after a six-hour round trip to Indiana, my German taxes are still not paid.

Not only that, but I also took the remaining €4400 with me to deposit. They were more than happy to deposit this money into my account at a buying rate of 1.2648. After checking the foreign exchange rates for today, I now completely understand why there was no problem with this – the exchange rate of USD to EUR is currently at 1.358. I lost over $400 by depositing the money into my account! I personally think that it’s a bit unfair to lose over $400 by depositing MY money into MY account but I guess that Wells Fargo must really need the help or something. Why else would they so blatantly screw one of their own customers?

Oh well, I guess that’s just America these days – banks that aren’t even able to correctly do a transfer to pay due foreign taxes but are more than happy to screw their own customers on a simple deposit of funds that happen to be in a foreign currency. It’s fucking pathetic…

bis später,

Coriolis

Tschüß, Germany

Well, I’m sitting on my final train ride here in Germany – at least for this trip… We just left Hannover and now I have five hours to kill before arriving in Amsterdam. How will I use up this time? I guess I’ll write a blog entry. Heck, I’ve been getting a bit behind on writing up blog entries (you can blame Tiger Woods PGA Tour ’07 for that…) so I think I’m a bit overdue…

I guess this is the perfect opportunity for me to basically write up a final summary of the nine months that I spent living in Braunschweig – you know, the whole “things I learned” type of summary. I’m not going off of any notes here (nothing new there) so you will have to bear with me if this article starts deviating courses rather randomly. It seems that there was quite a bit that I wanted to mention on this blog but I’m positive that I won’t hit everything. I’ll try to do my best…

I’m sure most of you have seen the movie Pulp Fiction, right? Do you remember that scene where Vincent is talking about the time he spent in Europe (Amsterdam, I believe) near the beginning of the flick? He mentions how it’s basically the same as the states however it’s the little differences that seem to stand out so much. I always liked that scene however I now appreciate it at a much deeper level. According to Vincent, a Quarter Pounder is called a Royal in Europe. This is true – of course … metric system and all – however in Germany, if you order a Royal (actually called a Hamburger Royal) the default sandwich that you are actually ordering (at least currently) would be a Hamburger Royal TS (the TS stands for Tomato and Salad – the German word for lettuce). If you want the equivalent to a standard Quarter Pounder in the states, you need to order a Hamburger Royal ohne TS (without TS). There’s no need to worry about the “with cheese” addendum as cheese is also the default. The Hamburger Royal TS also comes with mayonnaise instead of ketchup … it’s not bad, but it’s just not the same… A Big Mac is a Big Mäc and no, they don’t have Whoppers at their Burger Kings.

Another interesting thing about the McDonald’s is the way they do the “value meals”. They’re called “menus” and, if you want large fries (Pommes Frites) and a drink, you order a “maxi menu”. The thing about the menus is that they are the same price (not much of a bargain, either) for whichever of the six sandwiches you choose – Big Mäc, Hamburger Royal TS, McRib, McChicken, 6-piece McNuggets or McFish. The price also remains the same regardless of the drink – one of the various sodas or even a shake. To give you an idea of exactly how much of a bargain these menus aren’t, a “maxi menu” with an additional sandwich on the side runs €8.18 (I placed this order quite often to use up the 70-some Euros of change that I acquired). That’s about $10.88! And to me, the beef just wasn’t the same quality as the beef used in the states. (Now there’s something I never would have imagined saying – a ringing endorsement to the American McDonald’s beef…)

I believe that I may have briefly alluded to the next little difference in at least one of my earlier postings; however I do think it is worth revisiting – the population density. No matter the time of day – or even the day of the week (except Sundays) – the main city squares are teeming with people. It’s pretty much like you are constantly living at some sold-out event at a major American sports arena. I guess this all ties in with the more laid-back work ethic and the lesser dependency on automobiles for transportation (bikes and feet seem to be the predominant transportation modes) yet I was always amazed at the number of people that were out and about. I suppose it’s a much healthier lifestyle as I did lose quite a bit of weight living here; it just seemed so interesting to me – a guy that’s lived his entire life hopping in a car to pretty much go anywhere (regardless of the distance…).

I suppose one of the negative little differences is the amount of graffiti. Sure, America has its own graffiti problem however it seems to be limited to the large cities and slums. Over in Europe, the stuff is everywhere! Not that it’s all bad – some of these masterpieces appear to be works of some pretty decent artists. It just soils what is still a beautiful countryside enough to stand out to me. I guess this could be no more than a byproduct of the large population densities however the multitude of idiots creating this graffiti aren’t really showing too much respect for their own homelands…

Smoking is most definitely much more accepted in Europe. You can smoke in any restaurant or bar and very few of them even bother to have a non-smoking section. The number of smokers is also much higher than you would find in any American city these days. Heck, I would say that, overall, the smokers appear to be the majority. It definitely wasn’t a positive aspect for me as I must admit that I’ve actually started smoking more than a pack a day since moving here – I guess that’s something I’m going to have to work on a bit when I return home…

It’s a bit strange in a way because (at least in Germany) the price for cigarettes is rather high. A pack (sold only in boxes – you can’t get soft pack cigarettes) will run you €4 (about $5.32) and there is absolutely no discount for buying in quantity – a carton (which, interestingly enough, doesn’t come in a box) sells for €40. Not only that, but the packs only have 17 cigarettes in them as opposed to the 20-cigarette packs sold in the states. So you end up paying $53 for 170 cigarettes. If I remember correctly (and it’s possible that I don’t), a 200 cigarette carton sells for $30-$35 in Colorado. I guess this is a pretty good counter-argument for raising the “sin tax” on cigarettes in the states – apparently the die-hard smokers (no pun intended) have no problem paying the higher prices. Many over here choose to “roll their own” cigarettes (in fact even I was doing this for a little while … until I got sick and tired of the hassle) to save some money as you can pick up a canister of tobacco (about one carton worth of pre-rolled cigarettes) for about €30. That’s still close to $40 American…

As far as sporting events in Europe, I only have to say one word – soccer. Soccer is HUGE in Europe! I mentioned in an earlier article that you could always find a large number of fanatic soccer fans at pretty much any train station on any weekend and this is absolutely true. Most of the yelling and screaming fans that you find at the train stations are the younger adults (I would say late teens to early twenties) but, upon living directly above a sports bar, I also discovered that this fascination with soccer is not only limited to the kids. It was common on a soccer night to have the yelling and serious noise making continue very late into the night – sometimes until 4:00 in the morning… Hindered my sleeping a bit, but there wasn’t anything I could do about it … I guess soccer fans will be soccer fans…

Recycling is big in Germany and the people living there seem to have no problem going through the efforts required to facilitate this. At several places throughout Braunschweig they have these recycle bins where you need to separate your recyclables into their correct categories (clear glass, brown glass, green glass, cardboard and some other ones that I never bothered to figure out) and deposit them into their corresponding bins. No “reward” is dulled out for going through this effort (although I do believe that you could get money back if you returned the recyclables to the stores – much like several places in the states) however these bins were often times seen full to capacity. The reason behind this, I suppose, is my next topic of discussion – German people always follow the rules.

I heard it said several times that when you are in Germany, you need to follow the rules. This statement is absolutely true and it appears as though the German citizens have taken the “rule following” to heart. Countless times I would notice people waiting at a crosswalk for the crossing signal to turn green. It didn’t matter whether there were any vehicles around at all, they would always obediently wait for the signal to cross. I attempted to wait with them, most of the time; however I will admit that there were several occasions where I just crossed the street leaving the crowd behind me. I realize that this is not proper traveling etiquette (when in Rome…) but standing there waiting for the light to change when no traffic was even visible just seemed silly to me. I actually almost got run over by a tram a few days ago due to my impatience, but that’s just because I’m an idiot and forgot about the added danger that the trams provide…

This brings me to my next topic – walking in Germany can be dangerous. Not quite as dangerous as Athens where the people seem to have a rather bad habit of driving on the sidewalks; however there are many more things to watch out for than one would find in a typical American city. You’ve got the horde of people, a lot of bikes (they ride in the same territory as the walking pedestrians most of the time), automobile traffic and trams. You basically need to keep on your toes at all times to assure that you make it to your destination safely. Perhaps this is why the crowds constantly wait for the crosswalk signals … yeah, it’s starting to make sense now…

One thing that actually surprises me a bit is the difficulties involved in dealing with German banks. And it wasn’t just the bank I used (Dresdner), two other contractors had similar experiences and all three of us were using different banks. I could understand a time delay for international transfers and such, but even transferring funds to German banks became multi-day (if not multi-week) ventures. And there’s nothing quite as satisfying as having funds withdrawn from your account and spending a few days in some unknown void before arriving at their destination. The worst part about it is, even if you go to your bank and enquire about the transfer in progress, the only thing you’re ever told is to wait because they apparently can’t tell you where your money is. When I tried to pay my German accountant her fee for my tax preparation, it wasn’t until a week later that I noticed the money somehow returned back to my account. I was never notified of the problem and actually needed to go back to my bank and re-send the funds. It’s a good thing I was able to check my account online (oh yeah, the website is only available in German so you can image what a hassle that can be) and notice the returned funds or I guess my accountant never would have been paid…

And get this – I closed my Dresdner account yesterday. There was €5133.24 in it, so I brought along my Wells Fargo checkbook expecting to have the funds transferred to my American account. Unfortunately Dresdner Bank doesn’t do that. Sure, there were several occasions in the past where I was able to successfully transfer funds between these two accounts; however when an account is being closed, the funds can only be transferred to another German bank. The result of this is that I ended up walking out of the bank yesterday with €5133.24 in cash! I also received my €900 security deposit back from my landlord yesterday which brings the total that I am currently carrying with me on my trip home to well over €6000! That’s damn near $8000!! I sure hope I don’t get robbed or anything…

Well, my train is currently arriving in Amersfoort which means the next stop is Amsterdam Centraal Station. I suppose this is a good point to stop writing and start preparing for the assuredly difficult task lying ahead of lugging my two wardrobes, an extremely over packed suitcase (it weighs about a ton…) and a very large notebook computer (and case) from the station to my hotel (it’s across the street – kinda – from the station however it’s a pretty long walk…). Thanks for reading my blog – hopefully you found it a little interesting…?

bis später,

Coriolis

Excess Baggage

Okay, first off, no – I am not coming home in a hot-air balloon. That was (as I am pretty sure anyone would have concluded) an April Fools joke. Sloof Lipra is, after all, no more than “apriL foolS” spelled backwards. It would have been an interesting trip, I suppose; however I am going to be returning (as mentioned earlier) on a Polish steel freighter. Yeah, I know what most of you Americans are thinking; however the Polish people have accomplished much in their history aside from just becoming targets for purely American jokes… Who knows? Maybe I’ll discover a new joke that begins, “So this American boards a ship run by a Polish crew…”

But that’s not what I am going to be telling you, the valued reader (all three of you…), about today. Today I want to share a rather interesting experience I recently had involving some of the luggage that I was needing to get home. And that last sentence is correct – I “was” needing to get this luggage home. I don’t need to any more; and if you read on, you’ll discover why…

Here’s the thing – as I’m sure I have alluded to in several earlier postings, I’ve actually lost quite a bit of weight spending the last eight and a half months over here in Germany. This, by no means, should be taken as a negative review of the German cuisine – far from it … the German food I have had has all been very good (except for this meat-gelatin dish that I accidentally had for lunch once). The reason that I lost so much weight (at least 50 pounds, although I do believe it is more as the 34 inch waist jeans that I purchased to replace my old 38” jeans aren’t quite as snug as they used to be) is a combination of the walking necessary for life over here (I never acquired any sort of vehicle other than public transportation) and my own unwillingness to go through the complications that always arose when acquiring food in eateries where English was not understood. (And yes, I am completely aware that learning German would have been a great thing – and I tried, half-heartedly – however the German language and I just don’t seem to get along very well…)

The way that this relates to my luggage issue is that I actually bought a couple suits (with two pair of slacks for each), something like three sports coats, some shirts and a couple ties prior to flying out here thinking that I would need them for work. I had four suits that I purchased some 14 years ago when working at EDS however they no longer fit the larger Americanized version of me and I donated them to charity before shelling out the $1800 plus for my new wardrobe. Turns out that I didn’t need the new suits – I could have shown up at work in shorts and a T-top and nobody would have even raised an eyebrow… I was unaware of this though and came prepared – a bit over-prepared…

It made the initial trip out here a bit more difficult as I needed to (by myself, mind you) haul two over-packed wardrobes, one rather large and completely stuffed rolling bag as well as an oversized laptop (my 17” screen HP Pavilion dv8000t desktop replacement machine) along with all the little accessories through the Denver International Airport and the Hannover Airport. I got very lucky and, as fate would have it, was able to get picked up in Hannover by my two cousins, Dale and Russ, who just happened to be vacationing in Europe at the time. They were nice enough to actually drive me to the Hotel Café am Park in Braunschweig and even helped me lug all the baggage up the three flights of stairs to my initial room. My trip home is going to be a different beast all together. I will be taking a train from the Braunschweig Hauptbahnhof (main train station – see, that German language is something…) to the Hannover Hauptbahnhof; switching trains in Hannover and continuing on to Amsterdam’s Centraal Station where I will be staying in a hotel for a couple nights before taking either a cab or a ferry to the Police/Customs station in IJmuiden followed by yet another cab ride the final two miles to the actual port where I will be boarding my ship. I think you can easily see that this trip is going to be much easier if my load is lightened a bit…

Due to all the weight loss, it ends up that the money I spent on the clothing prior to coming out here was a waste. Everything that I bought is now way too large for me. Taking this into consideration, I decided that I needed to somehow make it so that I wouldn’t need to be transporting these now over-sized outfits with me on my return trip – that would lighten my load quite a bit. My first idea was to ship these suits home beforehand and just pick them up again at my parent’s house in Allen Park, Michigan. Good idea, huh? Well, here’s how that went…

From all of the information that I was able to gather on shipping large items, it appears that you need to start off by getting large boxes. I packed up all my suits and sports coats into the two wardrobes that I brought with me and then needed to located a box (or possibly two) large enough for me to pack these wardrobes in. But I’m in Germany and have no local support. Where would I get boxes? It’s not like you can just go online and find a store that sells boxes; and, from what I had been informed by Jon who was doing pretty much the same thing for his return trip, the DHL (the European equivalent to UPS) office didn’t have any boxes that were large enough. Last Saturday I decided to just go for a walk and see what I could find…

As it turns out, I ran into what appeared to be the German version of a Home Depot about a mile or so down this main street from my apartment. They’d sell boxes, right? I headed in and started looking … and looking … and looking… I finally found where a couple of cardboard boxes where on display; unfortunately they were way too small for my needs. I then decided to go attempt to inquire with their Information desk. The first question I asked was the standard, “sprechen zie Englisch?” with an obviously negative response. The lady working the desk then made an announcement over the PA system and motioned for me to stay and wait. Shortly thereafter, this guy showed up from the back that spoke a little English and I, once again, went into my charade-talk mode and inquired on whether or not they sold any larger boxes. I got the impression that he understood as he asked me to wait there while he headed off back towards the back of the shop once again.

As I was waiting, another lady appeared and the first lady behind the Information desk motioned her toward me as well. This new lady also spoke a little English and I, once again, attempted to explain what I was looking for as well as tried to explain that there was already a guy trying to help me who instructed me to wait where I was. This didn’t seem to make a difference to her as she then told me to follow her and took me back to a display of these small metal boxes that they were selling. I then explained that I was looking for much larger, perhaps cardboard boxes for shipping purposes. She then began leading me toward the boxes that I found earlier and I was doing my best to explain that they were far too small when the first guy returned with two very large, rather beat-up cardboard boxes which he then gave to me. I asked if I needed to pay for them and it was made clear that I could just take them. Sweet! Although the boxes seemed a bit excessive, I figured I could make them work. I thanked the nice employees and headed out of the store with my found treasures…

So there I was, a mile (perhaps a mile and a half) from my apartment now in possession of two very large (they were folded at least) boxes that I awkwardly hoisted onto my head and started walking to the nearest bus stop. I hopped on the next bus and took it a large portion of the way back to my apartment then wrestled these boxes up the elevator and into my dinky little apartment. It wasn’t until returning to my apartment that I was first able to see what kind of boxes they were. The first one was a huge rectangular box that happened to be missing one very crucial flap and the other was some sort of strange-shaped box that I was never even able to figure out. In the end, these boxes were not going to work. Oh well, it was nice enough of the people to give them to me; however my next move was to drag the boxes out of my apartment, back down the elevator and straight to the recycling bin that I knew of a few hundred meters away…

A large portion of the rest of that day was spent lying in my bed as I had screwed up my back wrestling with those boxes. I’m thinking that I somehow re-triggered the injury suffered when bruising my tailbone in Amsterdam a couple months ago as the pain came back with a vengeance. It started off mild, but as time went on the act of merely walking became a choir. I’m very glad to say that everything got better the next day; but I took this as a sure sign that I don’t want to be lugging all this extra luggage with me on my farewell journey. I guess I am getting old…

Okay, so the box idea was pretty much shot now – I wasn’t about to attempt that again. What was I going to do then? I was thinking I could ship the extra weight back by just shipping the actual wardrobes, themselves; but this is Germany. When you’re in Germany, you follow the rules – that’s just the way it is. I didn’t think that DHL would ship the wardrobes unboxed and my previous attempts to find some sort of luggage concierge service came up with a $600-$700 price tag. There’s no way I was paying that much to ship clothing that no longer even fit me. I remembered visiting a couple second hand shops here in Braunschweig a few months ago with a fellow contractor that was looking to buy a sports coat for the Christmas party. I briefly considered trying to sell the stuff there about a week ago but decided to avoid the hassles of communication that I was sure to encounter. Whilst speaking with my brother on the phone after the box ordeal, he got me to reconsider. He suggested I sell the stuff rather than risk throwing my back out attempting to bring it home. Okay, so my next attempt was to sell it…

Early Monday I decided to remove all of the extra crap I stuffed in one of the wardrobes and took that wardrobe along with all the clothing from the other wardrobe with me as I headed out to the second hand stores. Upon entering the first store, it was made very clear to me that they weren’t interested in purchasing anything from me. They didn’t speak any English; however I clearly got the impression that they weren’t interested. Okay, fine – I’d try the other store I knew of. Different store – same results. The proprietor of this second store appeared to speak English pretty well and I asked him why a second hand store wouldn’t be interested in purchasing damn near brand new suits and he mentioned something about some sort of large corporation that does all their purchasing. I told him that he could have everything (including the wardrobe) for €500 but he wasn’t about to buy anything. Remember, this is Germany- you follow the rules…

Well, what I did next is a bit crazy – I’ll be the first to admit it. I headed back to my apartment, went directly to the room where my garbage is collected and threw away damn near $1800 worth of brand new suits! I kept the shirts as they’re not very heavy but everything else went in the trash. I also kept both wardrobes as carting the suitless wardrobes with me on the trip shouldn’t be too cumbersome…

Lesson learned through all this – never bring more than needed on any trip. After all, at my age, traveling light might actually save my back…

bis später,

Coriolis

See the World

Well folks, here’s an interesting twist – I’ve decided not to travel home on a working freighter; instead, I’m going to be flying home the old-fashioned way – hot-air balloon!

It’s going to extend the trip a bit as I am going to have to basically go east rather than west and the length of the trip is going to be governed completely by the various weather conditions encountered; however I do believe that this little bit of “thinking outside the box” should most definitely assure an interesting journey. There is always the possibility that I might not make it, but life’s full of risks and I think I’ll be okay…

I met this guy – a Mr. Sloof Lirpa – at this Irish pub yesterday evening and he informed me of this rather interesting bet that he made with is buddy. You see Sloof’s one of those eccentric multi-millionaires with a LOT of free time on his hands and he’s a well-seasoned balloonist. He’s completed many rather time consuming (and distance consuming) trips in the past, but he has yet to try the coup de grâce of the ballooning world – the round the world trip. When mentioning this to his buddy just a few weeks ago, he pretty much got dared to do it. He mentioned that a wager was involved however never actually told me what the stakes were – I’m assuming it’s quite a bit; although Sloof seems to me like a guy that would do pretty much anything if anybody’s fool-hearty enough to doubt that he actually would…

The coolest part is that, although Sloof usually does these trips as a lone traveler, he invited me along for the ride (well, a large portion of the ride as I will be leaving the balloon at a still to be determined landing somewhere as near to Detroit as we can manage). I was telling him how my work here has now ended and that I was planning on heading back to the states soon and he seemed more than happy to invite me on his little trip. He said that it would be a nice change to actually have another along for the ride since the conversations he usually has with the voices in his head are becoming a bit repetitious as of late. I’m hoping that the many stories of my own life (many of which can be read earlier in this blog) will be enough to keep him interested so that he doesn’t decide to throw me out of the journey somewhere in the middle of the Ukraine or anything… Nah, this guy seems pretty “on the level” (well, if you discount the conversations he frequently has with “voices in his head” and all, but we all have our little idiosyncrasies, right?) – I’m sure he won’t leave me abandoned…

Not only that, but the trip ends up being no cost to me! How sweet is that? Sloof said that he would gladly cover all the provisions for both himself and me – he is, after all, a multi-millionaire. I figure that he would be more than happy to pay my way just for the added companionship he would be getting. Heck, I’m worth it!

So anyway, we’re currently scheduling departure in the next couple of weeks. This changes my plans a bit as communication during the journey will be extremely limited. I figure I’ll just try to keep in touch with my parents at any rest locations we end up landing in and pretty much take it from there. I’ve always wanted to “see the world”, and what better way is there than by hot-air balloon?!

bis später,

Coriolis

not me ... not now...

Well, today was my last day of work here in Germany. I was given a travel book of Braunschweig and a bottle of something (I believe it’s Jägermeiſter although I haven’t opened it yet to check…) as parting gifts. The guys that I worked with over here were your typical fine German citizens and I really will miss the sometimes awkward (purely in the social sense – they are all business professionals) interactions. However, that’s life – you need to continue on the quest. It’s time for me to get back to my home and begin work on the next phase of my life. I said my farewells to the crew here in Germany however I do not believe I will ever truly forget them. I wish nothing but the best for each and every one of them in the future.

As for me, I’m actually in a rather interesting (if not slightly troublesome) situation. The work here is done (which, of course, means the income is done as well), I’m signed up to be heading back to the states via trans-Atlantic steel freighter sometime early next month followed by a rather extended visit with friends and family back in my hometown … but then what? You see, that’s the question I’ve been wrestling with… Exactly what crazy and mixed-up scheme am I going to partake in next…?

I’ve always believed that the only person truly responsible for anybody’s choices in life is that person. For me – since I have no immediate family to support – this belief seems to ring absolutely true. I completely understand that any bad decisions I may make could have negative impacts on other’s lives – my friends and family who have always been there when I truly needed them – however it has become very clear to me during this latest venture down the “path less traveled” that mine is, by and large, a lone journey.

Try not to read this the wrong way … I’m not complaining. What is is. My current life is just a culmination of all previous decisions made and, to be honest with you, I think I’m doing pretty well. I’ve actually been able to earn enough money to pay off most of my debt (there will always be the mortgage … that one’s kind of tough…) which basically can be looked at as a financial reset. I now get the often desired opportunity to start over fresh and see if I’ve learned anything from the sometimes ill-advised choices previously made when originally acquiring said debt. But here’s the rub, I feel that I’ve completely burned out in my chosen profession. The thought of needing to – once again – go through the rigors of finding a new job, jumping through the hoops required to secure any open position found and devoting a large portion of my life to the execution of said job is enough to bring tears to my eyes. It’s already making sleep a bit more difficult … nothing like lying awake in bed trying to figure a way out of this – especially when the way can’t be found…

I actually had a technical phone interview with a company in Fort Collins last night. Put aside the fact that it was on my cheap cell phone and the signal strength was almost constantly fluctuating (making even basic communication challenging), I realized something a bit shocking – I didn’t want the job. Yeah, it is true that I most definitely need a job; but I’m becoming more and more of the opinion that what really needs to be done in order to have a fruitful life is to somehow get your desires in line with your needs. I have very little desire to become another overworked and underappreciated line item for yet another corporation. There’s got to be a better way…

I guess the real trick in life is figuring out how to make your desires pay off. I think that all (well, at least most) of the successful people in this world have done just that – they’ve been able to prosper on terms that they, themselves, came up with. Their path to success very well may have included periods where effort was spent on sustaining the lifestyles of others that were further along in the game; however their own success was reached by never forgetting the reasoning behind these periods – to obtain the resources required to live their lives on their own terms. Perhaps their own terms are to stay in that 9 to 5 job and sacrifice a portion of their own life to support loved ones – there’s nothing wrong with that, in fact I believe that a decision such as this very noble and anyone choosing to live this way is a success. It just happens not to be my desire – not me … not now…

bis später,

Coriolis

Excretory Openings

You can actually learn quite a bit when you decide to live in a foreign country. It’s interesting to see how different cultures live; and the myriad of hassles that will inevitably need to be dealt with are great ways to discover things about yourself that may actually surprise you. This completely unexpected trip to Germany that I have been on for the last eight months has taught me quite a bit about myself and has actually changed me in many ways – most notably in the way I look at people, in general (myself included).

No matter where you go, there seems to be two general classes of people – people that are genuinely concerned about the well-being of others and people that are only concerned about their own; or, nice people and assholes. I realize that this is a very broad generalization; however, I honestly believe that it is true. The thing is that the assholes are almost always hiding behind the façade of a nice person; however, without fail, their true colors will slowly (sometimes rather quickly) erode that façade and the nice person that you thought you were dealing with will be replaced by just another asshole.

The thing about this that I still don’t understand is why somebody would chose to be an asshole (and it is a choice). Is it ignorance? We all want the best for ourselves – wanting anything less would be silly – but why can’t the assholes out there (and there are many) understand that the best thing they can do for themselves (and the world) would be to stop being assholes? No, the sad fact of the matter is that, once someone decides that he is the only important being on this planet, he has made an almost irreversible decision to be an asshole for the rest of his life.

Interestingly enough, the urge to become an asshole is usually taught at a young age. Parents, as well as educators, are always teaching that a child needs to learn how to fend for himself. I believe that this is true – one must learn how to take care of one’s self – although the technique of getting the child to think of themselves as “the most important person in the world” needs to be stopped. All it’s accomplished is increasing the population of assholes. Besides, it’s an absolute fabrication. If you honestly believe that you are the most important person in this world then you really need to reassess that belief by analyzing yourself from someone else’s point of view – is it possible that you’re just an asshole? I’d wager that it is…

The truly frightening aspect about this overabundance of assholes is clearly seen when they group together. As the saying goes, “Birds of a feather flock together,” and when this “feather” is an artificial sense of superiority, bad things are sure to happen. A few groups come to mind right away (the Nazis, the Ku Klux Klan and the Bush administration to name a few) and I doubt anyone can show any good that’s come from these groups…

It’s obvious that assholes have always existed – if you’ve ever wondered what the true reason for the foundation of the plethora of religions was, I’d argue that it was the existence of these assholes. I mean religions have been around forever (well, at least since man decided to create them) and I honestly believe that the purpose behind these religions was to basically reign in these assholes a bit. If you have a bunch of people ignorant enough to think that the world revolves around them, trick these people into behaving better by creating some fictitious being that will punish them for their selfish behaviors. You already know they’re ignorant, so getting them to believe the fairy tale wouldn’t be too difficult. (Of course any of you that have read my Most Intelligent Creatures? and Who’s Your Daddy? posts are already aware that I think the time for religions is over; however I do believe that they once were very much needed…)

So, where exactly am I going with this? I’m not really sure… I’ll tell you what inspired this post though: Not a day goes by when I don’t receive at least one email designed to do nothing more than perpetuate this self indulgent superiority complex. As of late it’s been masquerading as patriotism (and yes, it’s always us Americans) but what is being spread by these chain-letter emails is really nothing more than thinly veiled intolerance –intolerance of foreign cultures and intolerance of foreign people. I think it’s about time that we start considering the well-being of others before America becomes nothing more than a nation of assholes.

Now I realize that all of this is merely my own personal opinion. I also realize that people reading this blog may not agree with me … and that’s fine. If you’d like to add a different perspective, please feel free to post a comment – I completely understand that there are always several ways to look at any issue and perhaps I am the ignorant one here. If that is the case, I would be eager to learn. Perhaps I should start thinking of myself as the most important person in the world… Would becoming an asshole myself somehow make dealing with other assholes easier? I doubt it…

bis später,

Coriolis

The End is Near

Well, as the saying goes, “All good things come to an end.” It appears that this cliché will be ringing true for my income over here in Germany a bit sooner than I was hoping; but that’s life, I guess… I was actually hoping to be able to continue working until the end of June (this was the initial stop date on my contract renewal); however, due to lack of clearance to work with the latest and greatest (and still pretty much top-secret) technology here, it looks like I’ll be heading back home a bit earlier than expected (most likely in the next couple of months).

To be honest, I’m actually not that upset about this development. Eight months of living in a country where the language barrier makes any attempt at self expression a completely futile effort is, in my opinion, at least six months too long (and yes, I am completely aware that not learning the language is nobody’s fault but my own; however Deutsch just doesn’t seem like a language that my mind is able to easily embrace). The money I was earning pretty much more than cancelled out the frustrations; however, once the income stops, I’ll be eager to get back to my “real” life…

I am hoping to head back to Amsterdam for my last hurrah on what has most definitely been the most interesting and surprisingly educational trip of my life thus far; however I have decided that I’m not going to take this trip alone. Although the five previous lone ventures to Amsterdam (well, I headed out with Jon and Cindy on trip #1 but returned alone) where all very interesting, I’ve already done that. I think that the money I would save by not doing it again may prove to be very beneficial on the resumption of my life back in the states – I will, once again, be unemployed when I return home. My buddy Joe, as it turns out, has expressed what I believe to be a sincere interest in flying over here and joining me on my farewell venture. If we can get all the arrangements in order for this trip (I will be calling Joe to speak with him about this over the weekend – assuming he ever actually answers his phone…), I most definitely will go. I believe the cost for that trip would absolutely be worth it. I figure that this may be the best opportunity for this as I am living in Germany and who knows if I will ever be returning…? (It’s possible though – this current trip wasn’t even a consideration prior to a month before I left. Life, you see, is funny that way at times…)

For yet one more interesting twist on what was a rather spontaneous trip to begin with, I’m actually considering (and currently looking into) heading back to the states via boat – not an actual cruise ship, mind you, but by cargo ship. I’ve found a company (the PZM Polish Steamship Company) that offers passenger service (for up to six passengers) on their 656 foot “I” class cargo ships from Amsterdam (which, of course, would make one more trip to Amsterdam necessary whether Joe can make it or not) to the Great Lakes via St. Lawrence Seaway – with Cleveland as a final destination – for about the same cost as a one-way flight. It would lengthen the approximate 10 hour flight to a 24-25 day cruise; but, since there’s really nothing requiring my immediate attention in my life, I’m actually considering it. It might make for an interesting experience and, after all, shouldn’t we strive to include as many interesting experiences as we can in our pathetically short lives?

I don’t know … maybe this is just one more sign that I may actually be loosing my firm grasp of sanity that I’ve always considered myself to have (well, minus the short departure back in ’87); although lately I’ve actually been wondering if sanity is all that it’s cracked up to be. Perhaps a bit of insanity is what my life needs right about now. I could always justify it as an opportunity to “think outside the box” and, from what I’ve experienced, thinking outside the box is often looked upon as a good character trait…

However I decide to travel, I will be doing it rather soon and it’s somewhat reassuring to finally be able to see the light at the end of this tunnel. Let’s just hope that the light I am seeing isn’t the front of an oncoming train. I’ve been hit before (haven’t we all?) and I’m beginning to wonder if I’d be able to survive the impact…

bis später,

Coriolis

Hitting the Deck!

So it’s looking like my stay here in Germany is just about coming to an end. I have been informed by management that, although he is trying to arrange things so that I can continue working through the end of June (as planned), it looks like getting clearance to work with the new (still rather confidential) technologies might not be easy for us (Jon and myself). That being the case, it’s looking like my contract work may no longer be needed past the end of the first quarter (end of March).

It’s a bit of a shame that I will most likely be missing out on another three months of pay; however I really must admit that I am looking very forward to heading home – if I’m lucky enough to survive until then…

I’m slightly concerned about a couple instances that have recently occurred. I mentioned earlier about passing out in Stone’s Café (Amsterdam) and bruising my tailbone rather badly – that injury seems to be just about healed now. Last night, however, instance number two occurred. I got out of bed around 1:30 to “drain the main vein”, climbed up my spiral staircase, used the facilities and then headed back to bed. I remember starting the decent down the spiral staircase although I do not remember finishing this trip – the next memory that I have was coming-to lying on the floor with a bloody nose wondering “where” as well as “who” I was.

It’s obvious to me that I must have somehow passed out while descending the stairs. I have no idea why I passed out (perhaps I need to eat a bit more than I have been) but I sure as Hell can tell you that coming-to with your face planted in the floor and your legs (complete with several new rug burns) sprawled up a spiral staircase is absolutely no picnic. I apparently planted my face rather forcefully into that floor (or possibly smashed it into something else on the way down – I really don’t know…) as my head felt like it was going to explode, I was sweating bullets and my nose was bleeding like a stuck pig. Add to that the trauma of not knowing where you are and having to come to grips with suddenly waking up and having an up close and personal view of your shoes that appear to be stuck on a large wall (the floor) and I think you can understand that last night was a rough night for me…

It actually took quite a bit of effort for me to figure out what had happened and successfully move my torso back to the bed – the pain was rather overwhelming. I probably should go visit with a doctor however I really don’t see that happening. I have absolutely no medical insurance and it appears to me that I’ll survive. I’m in a bit more pain than usual but I guess I’m just going to have to “man it up” and let my body repair itself in its own time…

Oh well, I guess nothing ever goes smoothly with me – this new habit of randomly “hitting the deck” is something I’m going to need to pay attention to. That one rough trip down my spiral staircase will hopefully never be repeated again. It could have ended up much worse (necks tend to break in situations such as that). I’m going to start eating more food (stop skipping meals just to avoid the awkward situations that assuredly arise when one doesn’t speak the local language) and will hopefully be able to put this habit of passing out behind me. Wish me luck…

bis später,

Coriolis

Another Night in Amsterdam

Oh well … once again, I headed back over to Amsterdam last weekend. Here’s the video:



Not much new to say about this … however I did bruise my butt bone rather badly when my legs just gave out in Stone’s Café… I do actually believe this to be my best video so far … enjoy…

bis später,

Coriolis

Addendum 2-11-07

Okay, so I’m not very happy with the quality you get with this streaming video. I actually have very high quality versions of all of my videos but they’re just too large for me to easily post somewhere.

If you’re interested in seeing these, all you need to do is catch me on Yahoo IM (coriolis364@yahoo.com). I’m usually online…

'Tis the Season!

Well, here it is once again – the holiday season! Christmas! The portion of the year that is designed for happiness. It can become stressful for some (okay, pretty much everyone) but we need to be careful not to let these stresses take over and ruin this opportunity. It is my belief that the reason for the season is to let everyone take a break from the everyday chaos that is life and get together with friends and family in an effort to keep the insanity figures from getting a bit out of control. The smart people will understand this and heed the advice. The ignorant will get lost in the stresses and turn this time into no more than another choir.

Of course the retail sector is aware of the season – I think they start paying close attention to it earlier and earlier each year. Yeah, the day after Thanksgiving is the official start to the number crunching; however I think that the non-official beginning for the Christmas shopping season starts a bit earlier – somewhere around the 4th of July it seems… The thing that one must remember is this: Christmas is not about the amount of money that one spends; it’s about getting the chance to spend time with those you actually want to spend time with. Buy these people gifts if you want; however the time spent with them is completely free and a hell of a lot more rewarding than a new tie or a pair of socks.

You see, Christmas is the grand daddy of ‘em all. It’s the holiday that trumps all other holidays. (No offense to Chanukah, Kwanzaa or even Festivus but I consider these to be no more than Christmas renamed…) Whatever you call this part of the year, the meaning remains the same – happiness and cheer! After all, I am an atheist and even I understand the need for this time. Do I believe that, a couple thousand years ago, a child was born (to a virgin, none the less) that was the one and only son of god? Hell no! Many do, but I don’t. Does this change the fact that every year, around this time, I am presented with the perfect opportunity to head back home for a bit to meet up with people that I am always happy to see? No! And so far I have always taken advantage of the opportunity and taken that trip back to my hometown. I’m sure that I would survive if, for some unknown reason, I was unable to head home for the holidays; however my heart would be there even if my physical body wasn’t.

As I mentioned in my Now What? blog post, I am once again heading home for the holidays. I’ve made it home before from Florida (once) and from Colorado (many many times) but those trips were simple – a few hours on a plane. It’s a bit different from Germany – a much longer trip and quite a bit more expensive – but the trip will be made. It would be stupid of me not to go. I’m looking very forward to a couple weeks where my life is once again my own. It’ll give me a chance to relax a bit and get back in touch with people who have “been there” throughout my life. These are the important people and time spent with them is absolutely priceless.

It’s actually very interesting being in Germany at this time of the year. Not to be too hard on us Americans, but the Europeans seem to have a better fundamental understanding of the holiday season. The Christmas markets have been erected and opened in all of the major cities (there’s a rather interesting one in Braunschweig) and the crowds have been flocking. People are gathering, glühwein is flowing and sweets and trinkets are being bought and sold. Everyone seems to be enjoying themselves. Perhaps I am not seeing it, but the hectic shopping frenzy that is Christmas in America appears to be toned down quite a bit over here. Granted I might get a different opinion if I were to actually participate in the Christmas shopping here; however I am definitely not feeling the pressure to go out and spend money that seems to be ever-present in the states at this time. Who knows, maybe not knowing the language is an advantage here…?

I will say this though – I now understand the existence of Bronner’s Christmas Wonderland (the “World’s Largest Christmas Store”) up in Frankenmuth, Michigan. I always wondered why such a large Christmas themed store was associated with a city whose motto is “Michigan’s Little Bavaria”. Granted I am actually living in Lower Saxony here in Braunschweig; but if Bavaria is anything like Lower Saxony then I completely understand it. Christmas is a big thing over here in Germany… (Bronner’s, by the way, is a well known place – I remember seeing a billboard for it on I-75 in Florida. It said something like “1300 miles ahead”…)

Anyway, here’s to you on this Christmas season! Try to enjoy your time and don’t let the little hassles become more important than the true meaning of the season. Remember that, although the commercials will be telling you otherwise, it’s not the actual gift that matters – it really is the thought that counts. Remember that when you receive a “bad” gift from someone. Be happy in receiving the gift – for the gift that you are actually receiving is the comfort that comes from knowing that the person giving you the gift was thinking about you. And really, could you ask for anything more?

bis später,

Coriolis

Now What?

I headed back to Amsterdam over the weekend. Unlike my previous trips (Trip 1 [A][B][C][D], Trip 2 [A][B][C], Trip 3 [A][B][C]), I decided not to visit with any prostitutes. You read that right – I did not purchase any sex. I was most definitely planning to – even brought the Viagra with me – but the way things turned out, I didn’t… I’ve come to realize that sex for the sake of sex just isn’t much fun (at least not for me, anymore) and actually paying somebody for the opportunity to not have any fun with them is asinine.

Not to mention that the whole “red light district” scene is getting old. Yeah, it was interesting when it was all new to me; however I’ve now spent many many hours in Amsterdam’s red light district and can now see what it really is – completely from first-hand experience, mind you... The best way that I can describe it would be to call it an adult-oriented Disney Land. There are plenty shows to see (sex shows, mainly), rides to ride (prostitutes) and foods to eat. The thing is that Disney Land even stops being fun if you go there too often.

So what, you might be wondering, was I doing in Amsterdam then? Well, that’s a darn good question. I really don’t know… I was pretty much there because “that’s where I go” every month or so. As I’m sure I’ve already mentioned, this “traveling by myself” thing isn’t working very well for me – I usually end up wasting way too much money and have little to no actual fun. I always figured that Amsterdam was the exception in that it was a place that I could pretty much guarantee myself some fun whether I’m traveling with someone or, as is usually the case, alone. I’m now beginning to wonder if I can even remember what “fun” is…

I did create a video while I was there. It’s nothing fancy or anything – just me chatting with myself and the camera whilst sitting in my hotel room a couple hours after eating a box of Philosopher Stones (a.k.a. Truffles – a shroom variety). Maybe I’ll post this thing somewhere and share it with you – with today’s technology it shouldn’t be too hard – however I really don’t know how interested people would be in seeing it. I mean, to sum it up, it’s really nothing more than me beating myself up about being the loser that I am.

Here it is:


So I guess that’s why I was in Amsterdam over the weekend – to make a video of myself emotionally beating myself up. That can’t be healthy… I don’t know – have I lost the ability to enjoy life? It seems to me that I’ve run out of things to look forward to. I’m looking forward to heading home for the holidays but then what? I’ll be returning back to Germany to finish my work and after the contract’s done heading back to Colorado to resume my “life as normal”… My life has turned into nothing more than an endless series of nothing. I exist for the sure purpose of existing…

Oh well, I really don’t have much else to say right now. Maybe I’ll head home this evening and start working on converting the video into a format that’s easier to post. Yeah … at least that’ll give me something to do… now done...

bis später,

Coriolis

The World's Oldest Profession

My buddy, Todd, sent me a rather interesting article from the Associated Press explaining that Amsterdam city officials are going to be shutting down about one third of the prostitution “windows” in the famous red light district. The new measure designed to “revoke brothels’ licenses when it suspects operators have used them for money laundering or other illegal financial activity” goes into effect on the 1st of January. (For anyone interested in reading the article, it can be found here…)

Something tells me that this move is going to be completely misconstrued by the morally righteous out there. The shutdown is actually not a condemnation of prostitution in general; rather it is an attempt to battle the illegal financial activities that the prostitution industry is currently teeming with. The goal is laudable; however I worry a bit about the negative implications that this is going to be placing on an industry that many believe shouldn’t even exist. I do, however, think that “the world’s oldest profession” will survive. Who knows? Maybe this is a step in the right direction? Perhaps if all of the illegal activities associated with prostitution are controlled more thoroughly, prostitution might be able to become a more reputable industry.

The thing is that (apart from the rather large crowd of – usually religious – naysayers out there) I think any educated person can easily understand the benefits that prostitution actually provides to a society. It gives men a sexual outlet to utilize rather than forcing these same men to find their own way of obtaining sex – seems to me that this should have a positive impact on rape and other sexually related crimes. Other benefits of legalized prostitution are currently being stressed by the Croation People’s Party. They believe it would cut the spreading of sexual diseases by imposing better controls. Prostitutes would have to report to the authorities to get employee status, social security and health care. They would also be required to get tested for venereal diseases on a regular basis. This would give the prostitutes more incentive to practice safe sex as catching a disease could very well eliminate their source of income.

Unfortunately this issue is really only arguable outside of the United States (the “land of the free” … indeed…) as the US government has already made it very clear that prostitution, itself will always be a crime. (Well, except for Nevada … and why, exactly is it legal in Nevada? I need to look into that a bit…) In fact, back in May of this year, Rep. Christopher Smith, R-N.J., chairman of the House subcommittee on global human rights, urged Germany to re-criminalize prostitution (prostitution was legalized there in 2001) and suggested that the nation should be reclassified as an “egregious violator” of human trafficking. Interestingly enough, the 2006 Trafficking in Persons Report gave Germany its highest overall rating for compliance on efforts to stop trafficking. Is it possible that Mr. Smith is using something other than facts in his recommendations? Perhaps he feels that his morals are so pristine that he is compelled to forcefully impose these morals on, not only his actual constituents, but foreign countries as well…? Once again, the arrogance of the US government shows its ugly face…

I’m interested in hearing what your thoughts are on these issues.

bis später,

Coriolis

Grammar 101

Since I’ve decided to write this blog I’ve been noticing something rather interesting about the “blogosphere” in general. It seems to me that the quality of writing in a blog has absolutely nothing to do with its popularity … in fact it appears as though there might even be an inverse relationship between quality and popularity. This makes no sense to me. I mean why are so many people reading and responding to blogs that appear to be written by third graders? Is this the educational level that the majority of our population can relate to? I hope not … that’s not saying much about modern society…

Granted the small (almost non-existent) amount of comments I receive on my blog is what started my interest in this. It makes me wonder if anything that I am posting is even worth commenting on. Maybe I need to shorten my stories a bit and pander to the short attention span syndrome that modern society appears to be going through…? That, however, just doesn’t seem right to me. No … I’m going to continue writing complete and detailed stories – that’s just my style, I guess. I suppose I should just be happy that anybody’s even reading this stuff. This is mainly just a way that I can get the same story out to several interested people without having to re-hash the story again and again upon re-connecting with friends at different times. I kind of thought that some of these stories might be interesting enough for the general public to read but I guess reading about the silly adventures of a person that you don’t know isn’t very interesting…

The other thing that is now becoming very clear to me is that old saying about leading a horse to water – drinking is a decision that the horse needs to make on its own. I’ve informed pretty much all of my friends about this blog but usually discover that the blog has not been read by these friends when I actually am able to speak with them. This, of course, leads to the exact situation that I am trying to minimize with this blog and the stories need to be re-iterated verbally. I suppose this really isn’t that big of a deal. If all of my friends have read the blogs then that would merely limit the amount of new stores that I am able to tell – limiting my conversation options rather greatly. Ah, but this actually doesn’t worry me much as there is always a myriad of details left out of any story and these details can be discussed with people that read the blog. Not to mention that the number of stories that I haven’t yet written about is rather immense – things, in general, are always happening…

For instance, Anna (you remember Anna, right? – the one from Club Love in Athens…) is once again making a bit of a presence in my life. There was about a one month period where we basically stopped communicating and I just kind of figured that that was the end of that. I mean, after all, we knew each other for a grand total of maybe 10 hours over the period of two days. Is this enough time for two people to actually build a lasting relationship? The realist in me says “no” however there’s that hopeless romantic in me that screams “maybe”… just think of what a great “how we met” story that would be…

It was about a week ago when I received an SMS from Anna saying that she had been going through a really “fuck top” (you need to remember that she’s Russian and I think this is supposed to read “fucked up”) period in her life and that she was sorry for the long period of non-communication. I apparently made some kind of impact since she did get back in touch with me. We’ve been in contact since and she wants me to head down to Athens to visit her – she’s saying that Christmas is coming and that a visit from me would be the best present. Who knows? Maybe I will take a little trip… I could always fly down there for a night on the 16th of December, but I need to make sure that Anna can get the 16th and 17th off from work – I’m not about to head back down there and pay the outrageous prices required to be able to speak with her at her work… I’ll be calling her shortly to see what she thinks about this idea.

Now we get to experience one of the idiosyncrasies of written communication – time shifting… You see, quite a bit has happened since I wrote those paragraphs above – I headed back to the STD clinic to get my HIV test results (negative, thank god…), got myself a Döner Dürüm for lunch and called Anna. I actually had a rather interesting chat with Anna that changes things a little bit – she’s going to be letting me know tomorrow whether she might be able to leave Greece for a couple days around the holidays and head on up to Germany to spend some time with me. That would be cool! Unfortunately, for this to happen, the Greek government is going to have to give a guarantee that Anna can not only leave Greece for a couple of days but also be able to return afterwards. From my limited experience with Greek people, in general, I really don’t see this happening … all I can do is hope… Heck, I think that Anna actually taking the time and expense required to fly to Germany would put to rest most of the concerns that some of my friends have about Anna just playing me for monetary gain. I’m sure I’ll be letting you guys know what happens with this…

bis später,

Coriolis

Happy Thanksgiving!

It’s Thanksgiving. Does the fact that today is Thanksgiving mean anything to me? I suppose not … I’m currently at work like any other day. It appears to me that the Germans really don’t care that the pilgrims once ate a large feast with the Native Americans prior to beginning the mass genocide necessary to steal the land of their gracious hosts… As a matter of fact, I’m willing to bet that the only reason Americans care about this holiday is because it gets them a couple days off; and since I’m currently at work on this holiday, I guess I don’t care.

I suppose the true meaning of the Thanksgiving holiday is really for people to take a good look at their lives and try to come up with at least a few things to be thankful about. Number one on everyone’s list should be that they weren’t one of the Native Americans that got slaughtered by their European guests shortly after giving them food to survive; but that should go without saying… Apart from that I’ve decided to come up with ten things that I am thankful for this year. Following are my ten items and a small explanation of exactly why I am thankful (in no particular order):

1. I’m very thankful that I was able to get this contract work opportunity over here in Germany. I was having a very hard time finding work in Colorado and this contract work is giving me the opportunity to keep my house – sure, I can’t live there for a while; but at least I’ll have a house to move back to when this is over…

2. I’m thankful for the scientists that discovered the amazing drug Viagra! I’m pretty sure that this needs no explanation…

3. I’m thankful that the rash I currently have on my left gonad is nothing more than psoriasis! You can just imagine how worried I was about this – I was sure it was an STD. Luckily, however, I was able to get it checked and have been informed that it’s not a big deal. That’s a load off my mind…

4. I’m thankful that moving to Germany and deciding to get around with nothing other than walking and public transportation is starting to show positive results. I came here with four pairs of jeans – all 38” waists. For the last couple of weeks I have been having a hard time keeping my pants up – I could actually wiggle my way out of my pants even with my belt fastened in the tightest position. Yesterday I bought two new pairs of jeans (34” waists, thank you very much…), seven new pairs of briefs (I was wearing boxers, but with all the walking I am doing, my boys need a home…) and a new belt. It seems that I am actually becoming less of a man – and that’s a good thing…

5. My friends. Although the group is small, I appreciate all of my friends very much. After all, what more does anybody need besides friends to help them through the rough times and celebrate with them during the good times? Living in Germany by myself for the last four months has really pointed out the importance of friends to me. There really is nothing more important.

6. My family. I really am very thankful for the endless love that I receive from my family. This should go without saying; unfortunately I have been witness to many families throughout my existence that just don’t seem to get it – they’ve let stupid little personal quirks or material issues cause enough friction to actually tear the family unit apart. This, of course, is stupid. Luckily, for me, I was born into a family that understands the value of unconditional love. I’m thankful for this…

7. Finally discovering what I want in this life. It’s become painfully obvious to me rather recently that the one thing that I am looking to find is someone to love (well, besides my blood relatives that is…). I’m thankful that I have been able to figure this out although I now need to actively participate in the search – maybe next year I’ll be able to be thankful about finding that someone … only time will tell…

8. I’m thankful for technology – the Internet, especially. Thanks to the Internet, I am now able to actually move to Germany and still stay in touch with my friends and family rather easily (and far less expensively than it was in the past…). Although the experiences I have been having since moving over here are generally interesting (the understatement of the year), having the ability to share these experiences with loved ones makes them just that much more interesting. I’m thankful that sharing these experiences has become so easy…

9. I’m thankful for my sense of humor. Without it I would most definitely have cracked by now. Too many people are wound way too tight these days – they’re living under this delusion that their lives are so important that they best not do anything silly or people might not take them as seriously as they seem to think they need to be taken. Screw that! People need to loosen up a bit and realize that laughing (often times at one’s self) is a wonderful way to turn bad situations good. I think that I have become pretty good at this and I am thankful…

10. YOU! I’m thankful for the readers of my blog! Granted you are a rather small group (interestingly enough, the total number of visitors to my blog is currently at 666 – eerie, huh?) but that’s okay. Although the number of visitors is small, the loyalty of my visitors amazes me – I’ve had 114 one time visits and some 260 visits from individuals that have visited my blog more than 15 times! The only thing I can conclude from this is that a majority of my visitors find something interesting in my blog. I’ll keep writing the blogs as long as you keep reading them … thanks!

Hmm … I was actually able to come up with ten items – amazing… I think that creating a list such as this is actually a good practice. It lets you focus a bit on the more positive aspects of your life and lets you put the hassles off to the side for a while. What are ten things that you are thankful for?

bis später,

Coriolis

Julie

Well, so far today’s been a rough day… The bus that I like to catch to work in the morning was actually on time today. I suppose that’s a good thing; however it has never been less than 5 minutes late every other time I took it and I actually arrived at the stop today just in time to watch the bus leave – without me on it, of course… What this meant was that I was then given the opportunity to walk to work. No big deal – lord knows I can use the exercise – it’s just that long walks are things I need to avoid when I’m in one of my “deep blue funks”. And “deep blue funks” seem to be commonplace with me lately…

Why am I in a “deep blue funk”? Several reasons… First, I got another credit card statement forwarded to me from back home that had a nice little surprise in it – a $4333.30 surprise! You see this is just one more addition I get to make to the amount of money I “spent” on that Friday night in Athens that I don’t ever remember. It’s now looking like I got taken that night for somewhere in the neighborhood of $8000! I remember very little of that night and what I do remember wasn’t very fun. Apparently though, I paid a shitload of money to not have fun that night. I’m contesting these charges, but we all know what that’s going to accomplish – nothing…

As I mentioned earlier, the trip to Zürich that I was planning on taking this weekend has been cancelled. That kind of sucks; however I suppose it’s all for the better. I won’t be dropping 1000 Swiss Francs this weekend, but I also won’t be spending the night with Surunna. I was actually looking forward to that part, although I really must be realistic here – I’m sure that something would have gone wrong (it’s just the way it is with me) and I am most likely just avoiding more hassles that I really don’t need to be dealing with. So I’m out the non-refundable airline tickets but was able to cancel the hotel reservation. Once again, money spent for nothing…

Of course the main reason that I’m a bit down as of late is nobody’s fault but my own. I, once again, have been stupid enough to think that I actually had a chance with a “real” woman. This time it was Julie. I really don’t know what I was thinking here – Julie is less than half my age. I was trying to convince myself that she might actually like me for who I am (I had no illusions, whatsoever, that she would be physically attracted to me) and that the age difference wouldn’t be an issue – silly, huh? I need to clarify something: I responded to an earlier comment stating that I thought Julie didn’t like me. Let me take that back. I do think that she likes me; however not in the way that I was hoping. I think that she sees me as an “interesting” guy – interesting as more of a psychological case study. You see, Julie is a very smart girl (valedictorian if I am not mistaken) and my openness about my life (as well as what I am being open about) intrigues her in a way.

What I need to do is shut down any romantic feelings that I have for Julie and just enjoy what little time I get to spend with her. Of course she’ll probably be reading this so I might just be destroying any chances of spending time with her at all. (Oh my god, I sound like I’m back in high school again … I guess some things never change…) I’m just hoping that Julie understands that I am, in no way, trying to seduce her (HA! Now there’s something that’s completely beyond my abilities…) or take advantage of her in any way – I would never do that. I really could just use a friend while I’m over here in Germany…

Well, I was planning on writing up another detailed description of one of my life adventures but I really need to get back to my work now. I’m apparently loosing a cell instance by the name of “U64ASTTSINST26897” somewhere between initial cell placement and global route (probably getting removed somewhere in CTS…) and my hierarchy preservation is therefore crapping out. Fun, fun, fun…

bis später,

Coriolis

Life as usual...

Okay, so it’s been a few days since I posted a blog entry. I guess I’ll write one up just for “shits and grins”… I’m not sure what I’m going to write about so I guess I’ll just write and see what comes out. I suppose I probably have a few things that I want to say.

The ED issue. Well, I finally received the generic Viagra that I ordered a few weeks ago. This is a good thing. I was a bit worried that it might have been a scam (reading information provided by Pfizer on their official Viagra site makes it sound like any and all generic Viagra being sold on the Internet is nothing but a scam) however conducted an experiment a couple days ago that ended up rather well. This stuff actually works! I called over an escort (German woman, her name was Julia) and had no troubles whatsoever in the ED area. I’m actually not exactly sure what I should think about this – should I be happy or sad that I now need to take a pill in order to be of any use to a woman? I’m going to go with “happy”. At least I now have some guarantee that I can get around my little problem and, since all of my sexual experiences of late are easily scheduled, the use of these pills is not much of an issue. I just need to take one about an hour before having sex.

I’m actually pretty sure that I wouldn’t need these pills if I were somehow able to do the impossible and find myself a girlfriend of my own. Last night – after our German class – I had Jon and Julie over to my apartment to watch some TV. Julie (who, by the way, is a wonderful person) even mentioned that what I need is a girlfriend. I couldn’t agree more with you, Julie. That, after all, is actually what I am looking for. In fact, it’s primarily why I am so easily taken advantage of by the type of people that I’ve been associating with lately. I think they smell the “want” on me and this basically gives them the green light to play with my desires and manipulate me into doing stupid things. I’ve been doing my best at keeping these meetings on a “nothing more than fun” basis and I think I’m getting better at that; however this deep desire I have to actually be loved is not an easy thing to ignore… I need to spend more time with Julie…

If any of you are wondering what happened to Anna (the girl from Club Love in Athens…) all I can say is we’ve lost contact with each other. I’m not surprised by this, but I’m actually not that distraught either. I mean yeah, Anna seemed like a very nice person; but the logistics involved in us becoming more than just acquaintances are a bit complicated. Not to mention that I only knew the girl for two days. Yeah, I’m pretty sure that what we had there was little more than lust. Anna was fun (and we never even had sex…) although I’m thinking that the fun there was no more than fantasy. She was, after all, a Russian living in Greece. I’m an American living in Germany. Why I ever even thought that there was a possibility there seems absurd. But that’s me, the “hopeless romantic”… What I need to do is focus more on what might be good for me in reality…

Of course this kind of brings up this next weekend where I’ll be flying down to Zürich to spend a Saturday night with Surunna. (You remember Surunna, the girl I met on that Sunday in Zürich, right?) She is a bit different in that I have absolutely no misunderstandings about what this trip is – it’s a night that I am purchasing with an escort (otherwise known as a prostitute) to have some fun. Surunna is a lot of fun but that’s all. I have no false desire to make her my girlfriend. We’re just going to get together and have some fun together – nothing wrong with that…

Oops … please disregard that last paragraph. I just received an SMS from Surunna – I guess I’m not going to Zürich this weekend… Oh well, that’s all for the better anyway … I really don’t need to be spending 1000 Swiss Francs for something that’s just going to make me feel emptier inside. I was hoping to start dealing more with my “real” life anyway and this basically gives me one more weekend for that…

So I now have a free weekend coming up. What should I do? What I would like to do is spend some time with Julie. I really do like Julie and an added bonus with her is that she is American! I really don’t think she’s the least bit attracted to me in any romantic way, but that’s cool. I completely understand that… Still, as far as people that I might be able to hang out with over here in Germany, Julie is easily at the top of my list. Heck, she could help me out with my German a bit as she seams to understand it much better than I ever will…

Ah, but that’s crazy talk. I really shouldn’t be getting my hopes up – nothing this good ever happens to me. I’m sure I’ll be wasting away the time this weekend by myself… Who knows? Maybe I’ll write up a couple blog submissions although I think I’m running out of stuff to talk about… The only trips I currently have planned are to Amsterdam on the 2nd of December and then a two week return back to the states on December 22nd. This whole “traveling by myself” thing is proving to be quite dangerous anyway… I suppose it’s probably about time to get back to my “life as usual” and revert back to my old boring self once again…

Oh well, I guess that’s all I have to say for now.

bis später,

Coriolis

So that was that...

So that was that. So far my trip wasn’t going anywhere near what I had planned. I was able to purchase some sexual stimulants; but they didn’t help. I had no problem in re-finding the girl in the baseball cap (Sarah); unfortunately the ineffectualness of these stimulants made that reunion far less exciting than the last time we met. I had myself a short visit with the “good girl gone bad” that ended up going nowhere – just an opportunity for me to piss away some more money. And the icing on the cake of a wonderful evening was that I managed to get hustled out of €500 by a couple very mean prostitutes and apparently came very close to possibly getting my ass kicked by Benny’s pimp! I just need to go to bed and get this day behind me…

That’s exactly what I did – I headed back to the Dam Hotel, climbed a couple flights of mind-bogglingly steep stairs (not quite as steep as the staircase at the Pink Floyd Coffee Shop, but close … if you’re ever looking for dangerously steep stairs, Amsterdam is the place to go…), checked out what was showing on the television (nothing…) and went to sleep. I was out of money but now knew the location of several ATMs nearby – tomorrow I’ll see what I can do. Maybe the sleep will do me good…?

When I awoke my first mission was to stop by the ATM and get enough money for the day. I was planning on trying my luck once again in the red light district and then just basically picking up some more weed (I already had what was left of the weed I purchased on Saturday as well as a stick of hash) and some more shrooms to take back with me. I decided to take out €400 – €200 for the prostitute and the rest for whatever… This, I did. I then headed back to the red light district to see who might be at work on a rather early Sunday morning…

As I have mentioned in an earlier posting, the red light district just isn’t the same on a Sunday morning as it is on a Saturday night – although I suppose that’s pretty obvious to most… I have since learned that you can always find somebody working. Luckily for me, the one girl that I found was Lek. You see, Lek was nice. She was a cute little Asian girl and I like cute little Asian girls… The best part about it was that she wasn’t trying to play me for the fool that we all know I am. I offered her €200 and everything was cool. She didn’t try to up the price on me for various “extras” not included in the original purchase and we had ourselves a very nice time. She even gave me her phone number when I was leaving so that I could contact her the next time I’m in Amsterdam.

That’s just the way it is in these situations; picking a prostitute is always a roll of the dice. Sometimes you get lucky – Lek, Sarah, Bine – but more often than not you just get screwed (and not in a good way…). You have to be very careful and selective – don’t put too much emphasis on appearance. Well, you need to make sure that the woman is appealing to you; however going for the silicon filled airhead might seem like a neat adventure but (for me, at least) always ends up badly. I’ll take an average looking nice lady over the super-model bitch any day…

Okay, so Lek treated me very nicely and I finally got to get the release I had been attempting to get since 8:30 the night before. I then headed back to Conscious Dreams to pick up a few varieties of shrooms and over to Coffee Shop 36 to chill out for a few hours. Once again, I had a train leaving around 3:00pm (well, 2:54 this time … there was some construction work being done at one of the stations and the regular train schedules were skewed a bit…) and I had a few hours to kill. I killed these sitting at Coffee Shop 36 watching the boats come and go. I took a few videos there and posted these up on my myspace page – nothing much, just a few shots of the boats and a shot inside the coffee shop… It was a nice way to relax and get the crap that happened the night before out of my thoughts – why dwell on it? I was stupid … time to get on with life…

After staying there for a few hours I needed to leave and head over to Centraal Station to catch a train. Jon and Veronica (Jon’s new squeeze) where taking the same train back and, although I was getting no response from them on my SMS attempts, I figured that I could maybe meet up with them at the station. I therefore left Coffee Shop 36 and headed toward Centraal Station.

Upon arriving at the station I quickly noticed that the train I was looking to catch (the IC 145) was not displayed on the boards yet – it was still a bit early. I decided to head over to platform 11A, took a seat on a bench outside of the actual station, ate half a box of one of the varieties of shrooms that I had and waited for the train. Luckily I was smart enough to double-check the board later and discovered that the IC 145 was leaving from a different platform this time (13, I think…). I then moved to the correct platform and was easily able to catch the train.

Upon boarding the train I met up with Jon and Veronica (never met Veronica before – seems like a nice enough girl…) and basically had an uneventful trip back to Germany. It was, in fact, quite a bit more uneventful than I was planning – the shrooms had no effect. I even ate the rest of the box on the train but nothing ever happened. Must have been a bad batch or something … either that or I’m actually building up a resistance to shrooms – now that I doubt…

Although this trip ended up being pretty bad overall, I do believe that I learned a few lessons. First, and foremost, I learned that this little battle that I am currently having with my ED issue is a dangerous thing. I learned that I need to accept the failures and just move on rather than putting myself in bad situations in an attempt to redeem myself – this is most definitely not the shape you want to be in whilst having to deal with prostitutes…

I believe I may have discovered the cause for my current ED problem – well, causes … I think there are a number. I mainly have this problem after a discrepancy arises between what I have actually purchased and what I “thought” I had purchased. I suppose I am going to have to improve my selection methodology to avoid this in the future… I think, however, that what I really need to do now is stop. Yeah, I know that I have a trip to Zürich coming up next weekend to visit with Surunna; however I think I should probably lay off the sex for a while before that. Maybe I just need to rest…?

bis später,

Coriolis