Thursday, June 30, 2011

The plastic is getting thicker.

Saw this this morning.

DSC_0010

Your guess is as good as mine. 
It’s doubtful that the runners had to go out for a smoke,  so I’m thinking there’s some other form of stink happening here?

Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Dealing with “Updates”

I know that updates to the computer are necessary.  We’re pretty sure the reason the PC crashed when we were living in Delden was because it wasn’t hooked up with Big Brother and ultimately died a lonely, solitary death.  Wasn’t part of the “collective”,  if you know what I mean. 
For those who might be wondering, I’m actually referring to the “Blue Screen of Death”,  with which I’m intimately familiar.


Tuesday, June 28, 2011

The days go by.

And let’s face it,  there are times when I don’t have a whole heck of a lot to say.  I go out and snoop around at other people’s efforts on the blogging end of things,  and most of the time,  those who think they have something to say,  should probably just leave well enough alone as well.  If it’s too boring for me to get overly excited about,  I’m sure you’re not going to give a rat’s tiny behind.
We haven’t started a count down yet until we go home at the end of August,  but that could happen soon.  June is very nearly a foregone conclusion,  but it’s really never a good thing to wish one's life away.  It slips by fast enough as it is.
Travelling Companion slept a quite a bit over the weekend, and realised that the amount of running around she did last week wasn’t really such a great idea.  She was even trying to squeeze in trip to Romania in there as well!  I just shake my head some times.


Thursday, June 23, 2011

Trying to come around.

Here it is the middle of the afternoon and well,  my motivation to do anything but guzzle coffee and surf is somewhat lacking.
Travelling Companion called last night from Geneva airport to say that she was at her gate,  but that the flight was looking to be delayed for about an hour.  Gee,  that’s a surprise!  Mind you, it wasn’t the “discount airline” syndrome as I’ve alluded to in the past,  but rather a bit of a storm front that was messing things up.

Wednesday, June 22, 2011

The Longest Day.

This isn’t any kind whining and complaining about some sort of a rough day or anything.  I’m just saying,  yesterday was the Summer Solstice,  and we had 16 hours and 5 minutes of daylight.  I know this.  I looked it up.

Here’s a little visual,  in case that works better for you.




Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Eating a little crow.

And I’m not talking about Sheryl either.

The following is in no way any sort of admission that my faith in human nature has been restored,  but only an attempt at setting the record straight.

This was one of the emails in my inbox this morning.




Monday, June 20, 2011

Dealing with idiots.

I was going to take a little break from blogging,  since most of the time I have very little to say,  but I need an outlet,  or I’ll be blogging from jail.
See,  one of the reasons that I hate booking sh*t on line,  is that once in a while something goes ever so slightly wrong.   First of all,  it seems to take forever to do enough research to try and make a decent choice,  and then you get a note like this:


Thursday, June 16, 2011

The Penultimate Lesson.

I’m a bit torn between what to comment on today.   Yesterday afternoon I had my penultimate* lesson with German Teacher Dude.  It was the usual two hours of yakking.  I suppose I should put “lesson” in quotes,  since the vocab sheet that I get at the next meeting is a list of all the obscure terminology that I might have had trouble coming up with in our conversation.  The range in vocabulary can be quite far reaching,  and I’ll not bore you with the details.  So we scheduled our last session for two and a half hours for next week,  and then we’re done!  He was hinting a while back that it would be a shame to waste the hours that Travelling Companion is supposed to receive,  but I’m not going to jump through any hoops to get her remaining hours transferred to me.  Sorry.  I think I’ll manage.

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Shouldn’t laugh.

I realise I shouldn’t laugh at the misfortune of others.  Once in a while though, I just can’t help myself.  Maybe “misfortune” isn’t quite correct.  Maybe we’ll go with “stupidity”?  Not sure.

Now,  I choose not to comment too much of some of the silly little things that pop up in the news from time to time.  Things like,  Congressmen thinking it’s OK to send pictures of their skinny little selves to their constituents,

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

That “year” thing.

Funny how we can look on a year and see if from different perspectives. 
When we lived in Puerto Rico, (have I ever mentioned we lived in Puerto Rico?) it turned out to be for only about a year,  and it seemed to go by really fast.  Of course,  Travelling Companion’s boss at the time used to tease me by saying, “Never know Bob,  it just might be five years!”  See, one year in Puerto Rico was just about enough.  Don’t get me wrong,  for any of you who were able to visit (and you know who you are)  the weather was pretty darned nice,  and for anyone from the North,  it was actually a little difficult to keep track of time.  See,  as “Northerners”,  we do tend to relate certain events to the weather.  You might not realise that.  Such as, “Remember the Easter when it snowed"?”   That kind of thing.


Monday, June 13, 2011

Mmmmeatloaf.

And no,  I’m not talking about that “Bat out of Hell” guy either.

I’m talking about the meatloaf I made two nights ago,  half of which was left over, and which I just now had a slice of in a sandwich.  I’m pretty  sure there’s another one calling me any minute.  It was almost an “onion” loaf,  since I wanted to use up the three onions I had, so I chopped up all three and put them in!  The cooks out there are just cringing,  and I’ll admit that I’ve been known to do some boneheaded things when cooking,  thinking that if, “a little bit” is good,  then “more” must be better?
Right?


Sunday, June 12, 2011

Eat a big meal.

Wait,  isn’t that the name of some singer from the East Coast?  And what’s worse,  I just now started to write,  “eat” coast.  Oh man,  talk about subliminal messages.

I’m perhaps feeling the effects of just maybe one too many glasses of wine.  Again,  almost wrote “whine”.   Need to stop that.


Saturday, June 11, 2011

Why she doesn’t like bugs.

This is one of those,  “Right here,  ladies and gentlemen,  you’re looking at a real idiot”, kind of stories.

That unfortunately,  would be me.

See,  for a few weeks now,  maybe longer and I’d really prefer not to speculate,  I’ve been seeing these tiny bugs from time to time,  and have been dutifully crushing them or sucking them up with our cheap, noisy vacuum cleaner.  (Hoover,  for those who prefer the UK jargon)


Friday, June 10, 2011

Chatting with an old friend.





DSC_0004
yes,  it's a duplicate.  I know.




Last night was one of those “red sky at night” type of evenings,  so I nipped upstairs and grabbed a quick photo.
I’m still having some slight issues with using Live Writer,  but if I desperately want to have something appear a certain way,  then I can always re-open the post from Blogger and make my changes.  The page break thing and the size of photos are two issues. The top image is what I get if I load directly to Blogger,  whereas the lower image was loaded first onto Live Writer.   You can appreciate the difference if you click on either one...


Thursday, June 9, 2011

The Canadian Citizenship Test.

This is one of those thoughts that plop into my brain more or less out of the blue.  Think of that plopping sound in your toilet bowl.
OK never mind, that might not be the best analogy*. 
We did manage to get to the Doctor’s office with about 10 minutes to spare yesterday afternoon,  in spite of leaving an hour ahead of time.  My crazy planning was vindicated,  since the traffic was just as horrid as I had imagined.  There was one point there when the radio announcer might very well have said that the entire city wasn’t moving,  since there were so many streets,  “tangents” and “curves”  being mentioned,  that there was really very little else left.


Wednesday, June 8, 2011

Some things are beyond me.

Maybe I’m just too naive when it comes to things like the economy or matters of political expediency,  but there are times living here in Wienerland when I just have to scratch my head and wonder what the fuss is all about. 
I just happened to hear on the news the other day in the car,  while trying to decipher traffic reports,  that sections of the first district were going to be closed off due to the WEF?   No,  that’s not WTF?  That’s WEF.  That was one of my fleeting thoughts as well.  I understand.
No,  the WEF is the World Economic Forum.  If I go to the website,  which isn’t necessarily something I’d recommend,  unless you have an overwhelming urge to be bored to tears,  the very first line in their mandate goes like this: “The World Economic Forum encourages businesses, governments and civil society to commit together to improving the state of the world.”
OK so,  I’m not really too sure just how they’re going to go about doing that,  but hey,  “Fill yer boots!”,  as I’ve heard said.   So the part that I don’t get is,  what’s with all the protests?   I think I’ve touched on this issue before,  since I vividly recall the same bunch of raggedy assed losers protesting whatever they thought was some sort of “injustice” back when I went to school.  I didn’t get it then either.  Sorry.  All you’re doing is pissing people off.   That’s your big accomplishment.
wefdemo2_big
Well, and perhaps to others,  I’m sure there’s the entertainment value.   I can just imagine what the two cops are saying to each other.  You can make up your own dialogue.  The notable thing too is,  these cops aren’t in riot gear.  For all intents and purposes these protests are supposed to be peaceful.  That’s a good thing I suppose.  There are enough issues at football (read: soccer) matches when it comes to the destruction of property to balance things out.
Now,  why do I even bother mentioning this?   Well,  today was a drive my wife to work day once again,  since she has a doctor’s appointment later on at 5:30.   With the parking situation the way it is in Vienna,  it’s usually best if I chauffeur in these situations. Plus  it’s nowhere near where she works,  it’s all the way over by the Belvedere.  I told her I’d pick her up at 4:30,  since I just have this sinking feeling that the traffic is going to be a nightmare.  She didn’t like that one bit,  since what started out as day on which a doctor’s appointment wouldn’t be such a big deal, turned into one of those days when there simply won’t be enough hours to get it all done.  She’ll have to continue working later from home.
This appointment is a normal routine kind of thing, and mostly an opportunity to renew prescriptions.   I seem to recall mentioning doctor’s appointments way,  way back in the very beginnings of the blog,  and there was a flurry of emails wondering about the health of Travelling Companion.  Every thing is fine.  Plus,  after last night’s more sensible meal,  this morning’s number was right back down where it was supposed to be.   Funny how eating sensibly can make all the difference?  And well,  I hate to admit it,  but I do feel better too.
Damn I hate being “sensible”!

.

Tuesday, June 7, 2011

Ease up on the carbs

Trying to get back to some sort of routine here,  since we’ve really been getting away from the types of foods that we should be eating.  It never helps when we have guests it seems,  and over the last few days,  things went downhill somewhat precipitously. 
For my part,  I can eat just about anything my little heart desires.  That isn’t to say that I should,  it’s just that nobody has come up with any dire medical reason why I should be overly cautious.  Now,  having said that,  I have come to the conclusion that I absolutely cannot eat raw bananas.  You probably think I’m a bit of a nut job,  but I think it must have something to do with the potassium or something,  but if I eat one banana, I’m in contortions.  Further elaboration will not be forthcoming, but it hurts,  that’s all I’ll say.


Monday, June 6, 2011

The Beer Truck at Work.

Y’know,  I’ve been living in Europe for three years now, and there are still times when I see things that make me stop and say to myself, “Huh, would ya look at that??”. 
Honestly.  Maybe if we moved to Asia or China I’d start to see some more really weird shit,  but that’s not going to happen, of that I am sure.  So Europe will have to do when it comes to lighting up my “weird shit-o-meter”.

Friday, June 3, 2011

What is it??

No really,   my first question was,  "Hm,  what is it?"    I mean,  I did figure it out by going to the maker's website,  but I was drawing a huge blank at first there.


Thursday, June 2, 2011

Just chilling out.

It was sure nice to be back in our own beds last night.   Man,  I haven't driven that far for that long in a while.  Be nice not to do it again for a few weeks at least.
All in all we were on the road for around 11 hours.   That wasn't exactly non-stop,  since I do tend to get fidgety after a couple hours and need to stop,  plus there's some eating and other such time consuming things that have to take place.