The Exploits of a TurboGeek!

Today’s post should be fairly short. I’m on the phone, on hold, with those lovely agents over at Ver1zon. I’m trying to get my old phone number back, so I can transfer it to V0nage. The goal, is to set up my IP phone on my old number, so that people can call me here, like they used to call me in CA. No additional charges, and I don’t have to worry if I forgot to give my forwarding number to someone, since it will be the same as the one I always had.

Work has been fairly uninteresting, which is good. I’ve been working nights, which is a transition. Actually, my shift starts at 3AM, so I’m not really working nights. However, since I havent’ transitioned to a normal sleep schedule yet, I stay up all night, go to work and then go to sleep when I get home. It isn’t an ideal schedule, but it works for now.

I move into my apartment this week, which will be a lot of fun. That means I need to pack up here, which I don’t want to do since I hate packing. Also, it is another slice of reality… I really live here now, look at my apartment! Silly, but it is a bit hard to make that step, so I’m procrastinating on the packing. Ultimately it isn’t a problem, I can be packed up in an hour or so. Also, if I forget something, it isn’t like I’m going far. I know they’ll hold it for me here and let me know to come pick it up.

For now, I’m just enjoying the 30+ minutes I’ve spent on hold at Ver1zon… Given that they’re probably just messing up whatever is being requested of them, you think they’d at least have the common decency to foul things up quickly! Ah well. Muzak….

Hey There,

Today was a blast. Work was slow, so I went home early, which is allowed when work is slow. I immediately started playing video games, which isn’t the best habit I’ve developed. Actually, I debated whether I’d take a nap or not, and since I knew I’d fall asleep without something to do, I elected to read for a while. Then when I’d grown tired of reading and realized that laying in my bed reading was really a big risk when I was tired, I started playing video games. That isn’t true either though…

Before that, I decided to get off my duff and work out. I’ve been slacking recently and it has become more and more apparent. I’m eating yummy food every night, and quite a bit of it. I’m still responsible all day long, but I’m probably over-eating despite that. So, I went to the nearby pool and went swimming. One of the pools is outdoors and heated, so I started out in there. Swimming in slightly too warm water, while snow fell… It was one of those amazingly entertaining and odd experiences I’ll remember fondly for a long time.

I moved indoors and banged out a kilometer… It was way more work than it should have been. Memory of that difficulty should inspire me to work out more, since I miss being able to knock out a mile in about a half hour and not feel too worse for the wear. After this, I was beat. Then, I finally played some video games as a reward, until dinner time. I did pretty good, too! Now, I’m going to play some games for a while as I digest, then hit the sack at a sane hour

The other interesting detail is this: My old bosses are in town for work, and I’ve been entertaining them. They’re good guys, actually, but I’m again reminded that I’m happy I don’t work there anymore. At one point, while talking shop over dinner last night, they realized that neither was entirely certain on the exact details of a certain work related item. They debated a bit, and decided to call up one of the engineers at home to see if she had an answer for them. So, while at dinner, one boss pops out his Bl4ckberry and calls her up to ask this question… Mind you that this wasn’t an essential or important question, nor was there a pressing need for resolution over dinner. Further, it was 7:30PM on Sunday night here, meaning it was 10:30AM on Sunday morning back in LA…

Looking at my day today, after the reminder of what my life was like back there… It was a great day all around!

Nothing too interesting happened at work… That is okay, since I don’t want work to be my daily source of intrigue. I did have fun and I did both learn a bit, and display some of what I have already learned. I figure that is perhaps the best I can hope for in a day of work. Another success at work was that I took some time out to call about some apartments!

A few of the land-owners I spoke to started off on the wrong foot. I won’t say exactly what they did wrong, since I don’t want to talk too much about my circumstances here. However, they did say pretty much the exact wrong thing to A) Get my business. B) Instill my trust in them as the keeper of my estate to be. C) Encourage me to question their ethics and integrity. I did find an agent who showed me two apartments and also took me out to the phone/internet shop to help me figure out if the places we visited could have DSL as well as get pricing information.

Apartment number one is a single level in a 3 story building. The delightfully old land-lady lives on the ground level, mine would be the first floor, and the second floor is rented by another… Two Bedrooms, 1 Bath, kitchen and other niceties. Almost fully furnished, 900 Euro a month (Utilities included). Apartment number two is a two level half of a house. 3 Bedrooms and 1 Bath. Less fully furnished, but much nicer and larger 750 Euro a month (Utilities excluded) . The land lady there was also delightful, but a bit younger than the other. Both spoke almost no English, and I somewhat look forward to being forced to use my German.

I like the larger unit more, but I will only get use of the extra rooms when people visit (which they should do, often!!!). It is less well furnished, which means I’ll have room to start building my own furniture repository so I am stocked fairly well when I want to move to an unfurnished place. It is also closer to work (good and bad), and walking distance to some bars and restaurants (also good and bad). The unit I like better is hoping for a longer term rental… Right now, I want a 2 month lease that I can extend… That may be a stumbling block.

I hope to find a few more places to look at in the coming days. Kouros, the agent who found these places for me is checking his contacts for more possible units. I shall keep you posted!

On the musical front. I think I am also in love with Annett Louisan. She is German, and there are a few websites available, but I didn’t check for fr33 13g@1 d0wnl04ds (that is your job). Her voice is captivating. Her music is a sort of Folksy beat, with her singing/speaking in German. I don’t know what she is singing about, but I find her entrancing. The one song that I know the name of is “Das Spiel”.

Be good, and have fun!

Today was my first full day at work. I must say, it was largely a success. I was actually pretty productive, and I had a good time at it. Of course I found myself bored a bit and wondered why it was I wanted to get out of my hotel room and stop playing video games all day… Sometimes it seems that I am a “grass is greener” kind of guy. In any case, I did have a lot of fun at work and I’m looking forward to another action packed day tomorrow.

I was going to write something but I have been side-tracked by one of my favorite songs. I listen to Music TV a lot while I’m here. “Ich bin Schnappi das kleine krokodil…” is playing. I don’t know if that is the title, but it is in the chorus. It cracks me up. The song is very cute, and the video is a cartoon of a tiny little crocodile trying to eat all sorts of odd things, and singing. I like listening to foreign music…

In fact, I’m making a mental note right now to write down all the songs I’ve heard here that I’ve liked. Many may be available through normal means in the US… The rest you might not heard of without my mentioning it.

ARGH! I have a confession. I can’t take this anymore!!! Sometimes in life, you make mistakes. It is just best to be honest about it and own up to it. Your friends will love and respect you no matter what you did. At least I hope. When this first happened, I made kind of an oblique joke about it at a party, and everyone laughed. Then a guy there stopped me when I was alone and let me know he could help me out if I was serious… Have you heard the Britn3y $pear$ song “Toxic”? The first time I heard it, I really liked it. I had no idea it was her singing, and when I found out, I was appalled. I still really like that song! It is freaking great. What is worse is now I’ve heard another song off the same album (I think) called “Do Something” and it is really good too! I like Britn3y $pear$ and I can’t stop myself.

I have the CD too. I didn’t buy it… Jason at the party let me copy it. I joked that I could never buy her CD online or the song on iTunes because that sort of commerce is strictly a “cash purchase” in my book. I don’t want my credit card company knowing I buy that stuff, it is embarassing. I have the whole CD, mp3′ed into iTunes, so far I haven’t listened to any of it, but “Toxic” has 5 stars. I will look for “Do Something” when I’m done typing here and upgrade it as well.

It snowed today, and it was glorious. Also, I went to the Gym and ran 3 miles (walked some too). I love it when it snows. I’m writing this down now, so when I am driving on some snowy road and I go out of control and crash into a frozen water buffalo I can’t claim to hate snow. I love snow. I love it, I love it, I love it, I love it, I love it, I love it, I love it!!! And also Britn3y $pear$…

Good night!

Today was a success! I’m allowed to go to work now. I’m not sure why I’m happy about that, but for now, it is a success! I’ve also been giving some thought to what I am doing, and should be doing with this blog….

Part of my intention here is to be entertaining. I would like to have something interesting to write about, every day. The more I think about that, the less reasonable that seems to be. I don’t want my life to be exciting every day. I want some days to be boring and slow. I want to recharge and relax in between my adventures. So, I need to accept the fact that I won’t have something to write about every day.

But I should still write. The other thing this blog should do is help me and my friends keep up with one another. What is missing from my life, and is painfully obvious, is personal contact. I don’t have any casual conversations with anyone right now because there is little casual about our time together. We’re online and typing, or on the phone long distance or somehow limited, so there is a sense that we need talk about something “important”. What is missing are the conversations like “What are you doing right now? Want to go see a movie? Sure, right after I run to the store to pick up some turnips. You need turnips? I have some, I’ll bring them when I pick you up…”

Somedays it is okay to write about nothing… Though “I didn’t do anything today.” is never true, I can write the truth… “I slept late, downloaded some music and ordered a pizza… Not much else is going on.” What this will hopefully restore, is the minutia of life, the little quirks and transactions that we all share, and will help maintain some of the familiarity in relationships that are stressed by time and distance.

So, in addition to going to work today, I also finished off a bag of “Chocolate Chewy Chips Ahoy” (not so good) and cleaned up my hotel room… How was your day?

Oh yeah, Happy Valentine’s Day!