More dreams

On Tuesday I had many strange dreams. In one I was having a big argument with someone about some arcane part of the English language. Difficult to believe, but as a native English speaker, I am often asked to help with English. This would scare my more literate friends in the UK, who would trust me to choose between the word "bastard" and "wanker" in a text, but little else.

The next part of the dream involved me walking into a Doctor's surgery. The doctor was dressed in tweeds and Scottish. There was also a couple at a separate table in the same room, so the consultation was not private. Luckily I woke up before he could ask me about my drinking.

Dreams of people past

Last night I dreamt that I went to the pub with a person I grew up with. This person sadly died a few years ago. He sat down with some women and started to chat them up. I went to the bar and got the drinks in. For some reason he wanted cider. I bourght two pints of cider, but started drinking both, so I had to get another pint for my friend. I had just started to talk to one of the women, when I woke up.

This was a strange dream, because my friend gave up drinking 20 years ago and was happily married. I expect it was a guilt deam for not staying in contact.

On alkohol frei Bier

You have to be very careful with what you drink in Germany. When I last stayed in Germany, perhaps over 10 years ago, I did try to search out different things in German culture. For example, I would try out many different beers from the supermarket. Sometimes I would open a new can of beer only for the beer to taste like shit. I would then look at the label and see the dreaded words "alkohol frei".

This time around I keep seeing adverts on TV for "alkohol frei beer". I kept thinking that I should try out this beer -- just to see if it tasted any better. The world is in such a terrible shape - nothing ever seems to get better. I just hoped that technology that produces alcohol free beer has at least improved to the point where it is drinkable.

By accident I ended up buying two bottles of some brand of "alkohol frei beer". The accident was that I didn't read the label on the bottles. The taste was OK, perhaps slightly weird. Given that I sometimes drink Carling beer when I am in the UK, it wasn't so bad. My faith in human progress is restored.

Thor

Last week I went out with a group of friends to see "Thor" on Tuesday last week. We drove to Cologne where there is a cinema that shows films in English. This was the first film I have seen in 3D. Parts of the 3D stuff was amazing, but the quality wasn't always consistent. The film was fun -- which is the important part

The director of the film was Kenneth Branagh. He started out as Shakespearean actor and director, so you could say that Holloywood has broken him. Luckily Mark Kemode has dealt with that issue.

Mr Nice

My brother gave me "Mr Nice" by Howard Marks for Christmas. This was story of his life. He was a big smuggler of dope into various countries. He certainly had a lot of fun setting deals up, but in the end he was busted by the DEA from the US.

The main thing I got out of the book was the importance of an Oxbridge education. When ever things were going badly, it would be brought up that he had attended Oxford in the late 60s and everything would be smoothed out. This is why I could never be a drug smuggler. Even though Imperial College has shot up in reputation since I was there, I don't have the connections with the establishment to get me out of trouble.

Hair gel

On Friday I had my hair cut. I go to a barbers close to the railway station, where I don't need an appointment I thnk most of the people who work there are from Turkish familes.

Even in the UK I am never one for giving detailed instructions on how I want my hair to look like. In my home town of Knutsford, there was one barber, where he didn't even ask me how I wanted my hair cut. He would just do "short back and sides." Perfect for me. In the barbers on Friday I heard one man ask for 1cm of hair to be cut. I have read that giving detailed measurements is normal in Germany for the amount of hair to be removed.

Anyway the young woman cut my hair on Friday was satisfied with my saying "Kurz". At the end of the cut, she put her electric razor on my eyebrows. This has never happened to me before. And then she put her hands in the hair gel. In the UK I always refuse hair gel. What if need to get into a fight -- I can't do that with hair gel on. Anyway I didn't know how to say in German, "no fucking way to hair gel." But I ended up with slightly spiky hair. I felt modern perhaps even a little "hot."

On non-thinking

I was reading an article on the Guardian on intellectuals over the weekend. I vaguely thought, I would mind being one of these intellectuals, so I thought I should bang out a post about some pressing issue of the day. Unfortunately, my mind went completely blank. I was free of any thoughts, let alone any deep thoughts.

What I need is some grand theoretical framework such as Marxism that I can use when my brain stops working. I could have put the recent electoral results in my framework and that would have hidden my idea less state. Is this a profound insight, or just traditional intellectual bashing by an Englishman?

On the death of bees in Germany

Yesterday I felt a bit strange. I was constipated for most of the day. Things were not helped by the fact that the University seems to want to close many of the toilets close to my office.

Although I guess that any readers are not particularly interested, or perhaps even slightly revolted by my struggles in the restroom, I should say that it is traditional for an Englishman to answer "as regular as clockwork -- there are no problems with my bowl movement", when he is asked by a doctor how well he is.

So I was feeling blocked, as I walked into the forest that I must walk through to get home. I suddenly saw a lot of dead flies on the ground. There were a huge number of bees and flies flying around 10cm from the ground. I thought that perhaps some beehive had been destroyed and the bees were just confused. I was slightly nervous that a bee might sting me, but I usually just press a cold can of beer on the stung area, and the pain is usually minor anyway.

I tried to remember what I knew about bees. There was a Dr Who series that had as a subplot, the death of lots of bees, which some implication for the end of the Universe. I had read that bees were dying out in reality for some unknown reason. So essentially I had no useful information, so I carefully walked through the forest of dead insects, went home, and closed my door. As Voltaire tells us "we must cultivate our garden", even though this may be hard with no insects.

Anni Rossi

The video is of Anni Rossie. I think she is playing a Viola, something that the web tells me is a violin with a non-standard size. I like her sound anyway.

About the royal Wedding

I didn't read any newspaper articles about the ceremony. Hoverer, my yahoo email reader flashed up pictures from news sources of the wedding. I did see a picture of Kate and Will kissing. The kiss that Diana gave Charles on their wedding day is very iconic. However, with the knowledge of future events, it does look like Diana was kissing in a needy nymphomaniac way. Kate is kissing in a sensible manner -- so that is good.

More importantly I understood what Kate's role is in the Monarchy. England is in a mess at the moment. The public school boys are in control and they are driving everything too the ground, so that they can sell the UK off, and retire rich to the South of the France.

England ia a pagan nation. What do we need to get England back on its feet. We need a sacrifice! Haven't you seen the Wickerman film? Kate you are so sensible, therefor your downfall will help the flowers and animals prosper on England's fair shores. A few years of wealth and attention, so Kate will be ready for her end.

If someone had explained to me the Royal Weddding as the above metaphor, I would have been more interested.

Thanks Kate!

The wrong Richard Burton

Dear Lord Melvyn Bragg, You shit head! I enjoy listening to your radio show "In our time." I was looking for a book about the history of the English language and I saw that you had witten one, so i ordered it (second hand at 1p).

However, I see that you have written a book about "The Life of Richard Burton". Why? I would have thought that a person of your learning would have written a book about Sir Richard Burton: the explorer and translatoe. You would rather write a book about a film actor rather than the person who translated the Kama Sutra. Why write about popular culture when you could learn about exotic things

Pull yourself together man!

Regards, Craig

Classics: A Very Short Introduction

Last week I read the book: Classics: A Very Short Introduction by Mary Beard and John Henderson. This was a small book about the study of ancient Greek and Rome culture. It was very clevery written, being based around a small temple in the countryside of Greece.

If I was one those ex public school boys I would have known all about the classics, perhaps before I reached my teenage years. I now know a little bit more-- better late than never. I now want to go to the British Museum to look at all the looted statues from ancient Greece.

(Not) opening a wine bottle with a shoe.

Because I essentially do nothing, but sit on my balcony and watch he leaves on the forest in front of my building, i find it difficult sometimes to maintain conversation. After reading books on human communication I try to bring a few party tricks to a social occasions -- just to stop any awkward breaks in the conversation

Last weekend I was invited to a barbecue. I had seen on German TV, a trick where you could open a bottle of wine with a shoe. I thought this would be a good party trick, to show what a cool dude I am.

As I prepared to open the bottle, I could feel the excitement in the air. Pictures were taken. Unfortunately I couldn't get the trick to work. The cork stayed in the bottle!

I felt such a failure! Once a party trick has failed, on one takes any notice of the views of the person who tried the trick. I convinced no one that the earth is hollow, or that the pollen falling on use was spore from Mars. It can be good to be unable to open wine bottles. On one recent occasion, it was pointed out to me I had no idea how to use a waiters bottle opener, I was happy and put on my well-this-proves-I-am-not-a-raving-alcoholic face. I should take this as a learning experience. I should practice any new party tricks, before I try them out of an audience. Fuck it, perhaps I will just use hypnotism to make them to think I am a top fellow.

Last call

Last night I finished reading "Last Call" by Tim Powers. The novel was based on a game of cards that allowed the winner to take over the body of the losers. It was mostly set in Las Vegas and it also mixed in a small amount of Egyptian myths. There was a great deal of paranoia and occult ritual, so the ideal book for me.

Balcony blues

Many people are envious of the German economy, The neocons and free-marketers hate the success of the German economy, because they prefer a highly unregulated finance based economy, of the kind that has just massively failed in the US and UK.

The main surprise I have about Germany is how anything gets done when most flats have nice balconies. I wanted to do a little work yesterday, but instead I spent most of the time reading on my balcony. It is pleasantly warm and it is relaxing to watch the leaves rustle in the light wind. It is a holiday I suppose.

The Google Resume

I spent part of the week reading "The Google Resume: How to Prepare for a Career and Land a Job at Apple, Microsoft, Google, or Any Top Tech Company" by Gayle McDowell. The book contains a lot of useful advice on how to get a job in one of the big tech companies. Rather depressingly, I would still need a lot of work to get my foot in the door, including writing some kind of open source program.

I will be a dark matter detective

I have been thinking about changing carers. However, some jobs are clearly not suitable for me. I was watching a DVD for the first series of Luther. This is a detective series. One of the criminals was a physicist who worked on dark matter detection. The idea was that she was super intelligent, so she could outwit the police.

I would make a really crap police interviewer. "Where is the dark matter bitch. I don't care that you murdered your parents, but what about finding wimps!", before burtsing into tears, and starting to rant "there has to be more than the Higgs -- there has to be."

On hot beverages

I drink a lot of tea, but when I go outside my flat or office, I usually drink coffee. This is partly because I like a change. One problem with drinking tea in Europe is that they very rarely sell any decent tea in a cafe. There is usually a vast choice of terrible fruit teas. And then, as after thought for the odd British person who might wander in, there is Earl Grey tea.

I will drink Earl Grey tea, but I don't really enjoy it. I would much prefer a nice cup of harsh black English tea. This is the real reason that the British don't feel like we are part of Europe. After all our work on providing a Universal language that glues together the continent, we can't get a decent cup of tea, but are insulted by a nasty cup of Earl Grey. This last week I found out, from the BBC, that Earl Grey was actually a prime minster. His tea is still shit though.

In my the UK I sometimes like to drink hot orange. I made this from concentrated orange juice. But I have been unable to buy any concentrated orange juice in Germany. There is no point in complaining, because the locals will just point that concentrated orange juice is just full of chemicals and probably no oranges. Then they will tell again, "that English is food is shit."

So you can imagine my happiness that I found some powdered orange juice, in my local supermarket, that I can use to make a hot orange drink. Yummy -- you don't know what you are missing Johnny foreigner.

I just need to find a way to get bacon butties for breakfast.

You Are Not A Gadget (but maybe I want to be)

Last week I finished reading "You Are Not A Gadget: A Manifesto" by Jaron Lanier.

Lanier is worried about the way the Internet is progressing. He has had an interesting career that includes music and virtual reality.

His main concern is that the new web technology is dehumanising people. He is very worried about robots taking over manufacturing. This sounded like AI hype to me, until in my German class on Friday, we discussed the creation of cars that was done mostly by robots.

He doesn't like Linux, partly because it is old fashioned technology, because it is based on UNIX. I felt sympathetic with his view, if the old UNIX heads had their way, there would be no windows/GUI based machines, that makes the use of computers possible for my mum. He is very anti-open source in general, and he makes the claim that no new computing paradigm has come from open source. Only business's have new things such as Iphones. No mention is made of Microsoft's monopoly on windows stopping innovation. Also the success of the Iphone is only partly due to technology, but mostly due to marketing (I don't mean this comment in a bad way).

At the end of the book he presented some ideas for radical new VR based technogy for computing. Call me a luddite, but these seemed a bit impracticable to me. Computers are a tool for me, so if they don't work that is bad.

Doctor Who: The Coming of the Terraphiles

Occasionally I would fine myself in the science fiction section of a bookshop. I would see "Dr Who" novels and I would wonder who actually buys them.

So imagine my surprise when I clicked on buy for Doctor Who: The Coming of the Terraphiles. In my defense, the book was written by the famous Science fiction author Michael Moorcock, whose books had shaped much of my adolescence. The book started out a bit rambly in the Moorcock Universe, but when Dr Who entered it calmed down settled into an entertaining story. Unfortunately, Moorcock likes the multiverse idea that as a physicist I really can't stand, as an idea, or even as a word.

Oh to be England next Saturday.