Miss Cellaneous

Back from the annual office Martinsgansessen: that bird was pretty yummy, same for the Kartoffelklöße und the Rotkohl (even though the latter does not reach the one my Mama prepares). Cheerful chats with old(ish) colleagues were had at two different tables, too.

Speaking of workplace associations - I think I mentioned before that absolutely everybody should have an English office-mate. They make work life a lot more hilarious.

First, there's the phone conversation between sandynotlisa and his girlfriend in Brussels, where she interns - he started to laugh uncontrollably and immediately told me what had transpired:

gfnotsandy: By the way, I'll see my first Shakespeare play tonight! Very excited.
sandynotlisa: Sounds great. Which Shakespeare play are you going to see?
gfnotsandy: King Leon!

And then there's the story of this girl-pal of his, whose taste in men is not always...ideal:

galnotsandy: It's 10pm - you know, I'm getting hungry. How about dinner?
datenotsandy: Sure thing, babe.
datenotsandy: *goes, buys pack of crisps at the bar, and very proudly hands it to her*

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( Real life: family & work )

In the mean time, I have changed my blog layout. Y'like?

Also, with my first From Mona To Mona gift, I've made a couple of DVD Screencaps of SGA 1x01 "Rising." Have at 'em, if you like. Yes, I am icon-making as I post.

Finally (for this entry), new default icon.

This entry was originally posted at DreamWidth and has comments. Feel free to comment there using OpenID.

sandynotlisa: Thanks for lending me your umbrella!
monanotlisa: Sure thing.
sandynotlisa: Just - you want it to dry, right? Could you open it, perhaps?
monanotlisa: I could, but why?
sandynotlisa: Well, it's an English thing. We don't like to open umbrellas inside: It's bad luck.
monanotlisa: Bad luck?
sandynotlisa: I don't walk under ladders either.
monanotlisa: You're really buying into that?
sandynotlisa: No, no - I'm not superstitious, mind you. I just - I avoid certain actions if at all possible.
monanotlisa: So basically, you are a Superstition Agnostic: This could either have mysteriously terrible consequences or not, so if it's no effort, you avoid it just in case?
sandynotlisa: Just in case! Exactly.

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Schlecht ist, dass meine Heizung mich immer noch triezt, indem sie immer um 23 Uhr ausgeht. Gut ist, dass ich dadurch nett mit meinen Nachbarn auf beiden Seiten geplauscht und Erfahrungsberichte ausgetauscht habe, sprich: Unterstützung eingeholt. Irgendwie sind warme Wohnungen doch hoch im Kurs. Ich wusste ja schon immer: Thilo Sarrazin hat am Thema vorbei gepöbelt.

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Nachdem meine Schwester mich auch schon bezüglich der Schweinegrippenimpfung (schönes deutsches Wort) ganz kirre gemacht hat, habe ich mal ein wenig gegoogelt und diesen gut zusammenfassenden Eintrag gefunden:

Squalen und das Golfkriegssyndrom

Mein (natürlich nur ganz persönliches etc. pp.) Fazit: Aus rationaler Vorsicht - kaum Tests, keine Langzeit-Untersuchungen - diese spezielle Impfung auszusitzen, ist sicher eine valide Entscheidung. Aus Angst vor Golfkriegssyndrom oder Krebs oder AIDS wegen populärer Panikmache sich nicht impfen zu lassen? Ist einfach nur nur paranoid. Thema einer der längeren Konversationen mit meiner Schwester dieses Wochenende war auch die generelle Wissenschafts- & Technikfeindlichkeit der westlichen Welt, speziell Deutschlands und der USA, mit dem traurigen Aspekt der vor allem auf Kinderimpfungen bezogenen Verschwörungstheorien bar jeder Vernunft.

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Brief summary for the English speakers: Radiator still broken, but bonded with neighbours. Also rolling my eyes at swine-flu vaccine conspiracy theories (but not, mind you, at reasonable doubt, emphasis on the reason part), with a segue into the main topic of a talk with vervealemania about the anti-science and anti-intellectual attitudes so prevalent in Western societies, or at least Germany and the US.

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solvent90 wrote me this gorgeous little promptfic to the tune of, John/Rodney, outflame. :D

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I watched Latter Days and couldn't help but be glued to the screen. ( Spoilers for Latter Days, with fanfic parallels )

For context, tinnny over in her LJ has been going through After Elton's list of 50 Greatest Gay movies, and I proceeded to buy this one and Shelter. So far, I'm pleased.

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I'll be in Munich for the weekend, to see the best sister in the whole wide world. But she goes by vervealemania, still.

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Weekend was - I want to say lovely, which it totally was, but mostly, it was about food. ( At a) a conference, b) a dinner by invitation, and c) my parents' 40th wedding anniversary )

In less food-y but still family-related news: This Sunday, Mama, Papa and I sat down to play Memory, and then Sudoku at my mother's little laptop. Turns out Papa knows some mean tricks, and my mother - also a scientist, after all - may be quiet but is v. sure-footed around those numbers. Nostalgic activities: sitting at the big wooden living room table, dusk - not to mention drizzling rain, sigh - falling outside, the three of us (sans sis, sadly) with our games and conversations and little thrills of victory.

All of which reminded me of a conversation I once had with three of my uni friends who persistently argued that board games were the Official Herald of Boring Parties (With Even More Boring People). As someone who'd spent not just Sunday afternoons with the family but also many, many nights with my friends and quite a bit of tequila/vodka/other-drinks-one-only-has-when-still-under-twenty-oh-GOD playing board games obsessively cheerfully, I could not agree...but have wondered ever since.

View poll: Board Games?

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Predictability is the bland basis of life, no?

Londonoct09

Do feel free to leave comments - I'm quite proud of a few of them and might post them to photo comms. Criticism also v. welcome! :)

I didn't include the pics taken with kangeiko, solvent90, and hesychasm, but they're what made my brief trip so awesome - from the tastiest-omelette-ever brunch in that tiny place off the local high street to the Ice Worlds show in (and stroll through) Greenwich over the Moctezuma exhibition in the British Museum - plus tea at the restaurant: always, the tea - over a trip to Oxford to see how far along she's with that doctoral dissertation to drink wine and chat and watch The History Boys (slashy and queer) over dinner/drinks in this tiny French place in SoHo over watching Let The Right One In(♥) for a proper vampire/Halloween time over strolling through London and going wine-shopping at Fortnum & Mason's and also eating the tastiest veggie cuisine at Food for Thought to, finally, parting (sweet sorrow etc.).

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RL

I wish I hadn't gotten up today. ( Whine, whine, whine )

Wine at the end of it, though: my colleague two doors down did think it necessary (he's a smart fellow in every regard). Sandy still had that bottle of Mosel-Saar-Ruwer Riesling in the fridge, the Founder of the Friday drink-a-palooza still had two bottles of sparkling wine, and the rest is history.

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SGA

After signing up for remixthedrabble as a remixee-only on a whim, a fellow author did remix me! \o/

Original Fic: Indulgence, by monanotlisa
Remix: The Luxury of Touch (The Taking Care of Geeks Remix) [John/Rodney, Jack/Daniel, 100 words, rated G], by goddess47

Oh, drabbling: I miss it.

Bin brutal sarraziniert worden -

kam gestern nacht nach Hause, und meine Heizung war (bzw. ist) kaputt. :(

( For the curious English-speakers, with a snidenote )

I wish the guys at the gym would pull up their track-pants so I didn't have to see their ugly underwear when they sweat at the six-pack-machine in front of mine.

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Works sucks right now. On the plus side, today I booked a flight to London to spend a long weekend with kangeiko - and athena25, and solvent90, and queenspanky and wingsmith, if they're up for it! (Alas, ciderpress will be on holiday. Alas-just-for-me; I'm thrilled she's enjoying some long-deserved time-off, not to mention -away.)

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For you under that rock there, a revelation: Sexual Assault Prevention Tips Guaranteed to Work. Triggery, but all others, trust'n click.

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Pattern recognition: A dialogue on racism in fan communities. I'd say "mandatory reading," but folks bristle at being told what to do, myself very definitely included. So yet again, just a strong recommendation.

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I thought about grouping her post with the above, but I'm pretty sure that immediate notion reflected all too perfectly how we tend to group things that should not be shoved into one corner. ciderpress wrote a thoughtful, utterly thought-inspiring post about fandom...but in line with one of my pet theories, she's not writing about fandom but society, fandom being just a micro-cosm reflecting general issues that we wish we've cast off. Oh, we wish:

"We are politically, geographically, economically and religiously disparate. We are women and men, young and old, queer and straight, able-bodied and disabled, different shapes, sizes, heights, we grew up happy and sad, we are survivors and we are those who have never known that kind of terror. To some, fandom is a political movement in itself and to others, it's a hobby. To many of us, it's both because we, and the world, are complex like that; fandom is a solace, a shelter, a community, an expression of subversion, a space where we may find like-minded people to geek out about bands and shows and books and share a particular reading of media. Sometimes, out of this, individually and communally, we create art."

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Y'all Anglo(ish) peoples have a long history of integrating German words outlining complex concepts into your languages. May I offer fremdschämen, too? I do have an example in mind, which sparkymonster mentions in this post.

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Via Sociological Images, The Good Guide -



which lets you see which companies contribute to the Republican or Democratic party. God (and pretty much the rest of the world) knows I don't believe the Dems are sent down from heaven to save us all, but I really don't feel the need to let my money pay for crazy crap like abstinence-only education, the Iraq War, anti-health care propaganda, and other fun-fair activities the Republican party in the US come up with.

Vote with your dollar - populist, yes. Sensible? Very, very definitely.

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I have more bookmarks. But as I think YOU have no more time, I'll postpone more...posting.

Came home from work only now, mostly because I'm not much into early Monday morning stress, as I'm strongly suspecting that sort of thing is what gives people ulcers. Of course, just when I left, there it was: the boss's email from the US that said he was fine, we were fine, everything had gone great.

Ah, well. Me and my sake, we're having a great time right now.

SGA folks, do have a link to friendshipper's excellent proposal-slash-poll:

What about kicking off 2010 with "100 Days of Episode Tags"? [...] I'm thinking low-pressure/no-pressure -- people sign up to take an episode and do (at their own discretion) a fic or art or vid, wallpaper, etc for it (with super-easy minimum word count on the fic, like 500 words or something).

I know I shouldn't sign up for - anything, basically; I inescapably have Deadline Issues. And yet. 'tis SGA, and also the perfect opportunity to re-watch favourite episodes and bask in the glory that's John and Teyla and Rodney and Ronon...

Boost the signal, yeah?

I agree with this review + picspam of The Vampire Diaries 1x02. You might too.

( More on VD 102 & the show )

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The reason for my aborted post is this: C₈H₁₀N₄O₂. Or, rather, the absence thereof. After I slept so badly lately, I've decided to let this litre of of strong tea in the morning be the only one...and so far, it's worked like a charm (only that I'm a bit less charming in the afternoon, when I miss my Sencha or Yunnan or Keemun).

"Don't you dance the salsa at Rico's on Wednesdays?" is not that bad a line, as pick-up ones go. And the little Spaniard - David - who asked it was so sweet about the whole thing that I chatted with him for a moment, exchanging names and such. Alas, the sad truth is that Salsa is easily my worst dance - I can do the Cha-Cha-Cha like you wouldn't believe, and if you give me someone with a more spirit, less shuffle, rumba's fine too (although honestly, I'm not entirely sure there are able-bodied people who cannot rumba). My tango skills are...there. Somewhere. Overall, when it comes to feet and moving them to the rhythm, I'm exactly as Middle-European as I look, and a lot better at the so-called standard dances than any Latin dance. Aw, Waltz. Or a Viennese Waltz, with a good partner.

...I miss ballroom dancing. Never mind the heart-related trauma my teenage self suffered at the studio. & ;-) Still, one thing hasn't changed since then: male dance partners are hard to come by - the standard ratio back in the day was 2 to 1. I'm not interested in one night of dancing based on the guy's hope of "dancing" later on: I'd want to do lessons again, find events, and so on and so forth.

Ack, I can't brag about my measly Tanzabzeichen in Bronze at this point because there is no English term for it. WTF?

Birthday party was great, birthday today was good too, and the present from the parents was nothing to sneeze at: a new television set. I'll admit to being thrilled - 60% is the flatscreen, 40% is the fact that I can watch tv at all again. That hiss & crackle and the smell emerging from the old set were not pleasant, let alone the forever-dark screen.

Der neue Fernseher wäre allerdings NOCH besser mit Ballauf'n Schenk, Kölle, von Ende letzten Monats. Kann mir da jemand helfen? (Nein, honeymink, hat nicht funktioniert. & :-/)

Media-relatedly, I'm backtracking through vervealemania's Twitter entries, which are hilarious (and true) and got stuck on passiveaggressivenotes.com.

( This one made me laugh for reasons that had nothing per se to do with said note. )

Tomorrow's my birthday party. Bummer, I'd thought, I should have sent the invitation before my US vacation - with only one week to go, no one will have time. Then I thought, Just as well quality, not quantity!

...only that almost there were still quite a few who could come, after all. Which puts me in a bit of a quandary: wine I have (you are not surprised), beer I will get (German, standard, Bitburger was suggested).

That said, what food should I serve? ( Numbers, musings )

But apart from that? Any simple, no-cook (but bake is fine) foods good for a party?

Poll #1453267 Party Food Suggestions
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 5

Oh yeah -

You could/should/might wish to make...

monanotmona said her good-byes a little while ago - she'd come by for dinner after both of us had left work - not the same any more, alas - at reasonable hours. I think we ate a whole goat's camembert on rye, not to mention baby tomatoes and crunchy carrots. There was also a very smooth 2005 Merlot-Tempranillo (Spanish, of course; it's...it WAS this one here).

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Found on fandomsecrets:

( Shipping a Federal State has nothing to do with vessels or the postal service, it seems. )

I totally have to finish unpacking my suitcase and begin vacuuming my apartment before the dust bunnies start to gnaw at me in my sleep, but:

alizarin_nyc linked me to this all-too-true clip by Bryan Safi: so gay: the ratings gold of lady lip-locks

Sociological Images has a longer article on the same phenomenon: Lesbians Are Hot, If They’re Hot.

Both the post and the comments are worth reading - nothing new, but illustrative:

"This may sound outlandish, but consider the disgust or outrage that is often aimed at lesbians who do not conform to this standard of beauty. When lesbians are not thin, do not wear make up, or refrain from dressing in ways that reveal and feminize their body, they are “dykes.” These women are not unacceptable simply because they are sexually attracted to other women, they are unacceptable because they are refusing to acknowledge and accept that they exist, first and foremost, to please men."

Taped smack-dab in the middle of the mirror in the women's bathroom at the office?

( INSTRUCTIONS HOW TO WASH ONE'S HANDS )

Yeah, definitely back in Germany. :P

Home in Germany again, safe and sound, in my little apartment after being picked up from the airport by the best parents ever.

More about the rest of the trip - and those WriterCon add-ons - later.

♥

I finally got the hang of Los Angeles traffic: You either go early-early in the morning (not an option for me), or you wait until the first peak hours are over - around noon - then drive to a certain part of town, and stay there until at least 10pm.

Thus, today, ( Mona wrote in various places with various drinks and foodstuffs )

Also bought an utterly gorgeous burgundy-red, pure-silk dress in a boutique (Pull My Daisy). ( Clothing & size talk )

Despite going to Silverlake in a lovely grey dress (that had RoomieC's colleague compliment me and the cute waitress at Cafe Stella flirt with me, or possibly just be extra-invested because of the 20% tip I gave; who knows), I did not meet Chris Pine. My facial impression, it resembles the one in the icon. Less posed, though.