Watch out at traffic lights...

or you might get run over. I had green (walk) and the cars red yesterday afternoon, so they should've stopped. Even if it's just a pedestrian traffic light, red means STOP. Or so I thought. Obviously this doesn't apply to Mercedes drivers. (Hear my snarling voice!!!)
If my guardian angel would have been off duty yesterday afternoon I might have been killed or at least seriously injured.
For chrissakes, that bonehead didn't even slow down at the stop light, he went through full throttle. Which had me confused for a second, thinking I was supposed to stop. But no, it was his red light. A**HOLE!!!


I was at my practitioner yesterday afternoon but unfortunately the results from my MRI weren't in. So I'll have to call again later this week. *grumble*


When I got home my new book was already delivered. Gawd bless Amazon and youtube and the internet as a whole. Because after half an hour of digging I finally found out the author and title of two books which I had read a few years ago. And while I remembered the stories pretty well, I had totally forgotten the essential info to find them again. If you liked Dan Brown's "DaVinci Code", then give Matilde Asensi's "The last Cato" a try. I enjoyed it immensely. In fact I wanted to go to my bookstore today and get myself a copy.

BUT there are two reasons why I won't do so. First reason: I haven't finished "The Red Book" or "the Black Swan" or "Collider" (yep I read all three of them, crazy I know!) and not even started out on "the essential Rumi" and "The ascent of money". I want to finish them before I get another book. Second reason: Remember the Disney quote at the end of my posts?! Keep moving forward. Well, this applies also to books! While it's nice to revisit old friends, it's also important to make new ones and broaden my horizon, this goes for the real life and also for fiction. And I've revisited countless old friends (fictional and real) in the last months, time to move on!

In any case I've decided that Winter is OVER!!! Which means I'm wearing my Spring and Summer shoes from now on, whatever the weather is like. Today I'm wearing my Converse, even though it's just 0° C =32° F, I don't give a damn. This Winter lasted way too long, it's time for Spring. This afternoon, I'll switch jackets and shirts too. I can't stand my turtlenecks anymore. Black or any other colour, I'm not Steve Jobs! Since Chris and I will go shopping tomorrow before we go to watch "The men who stare at goats", I'll see if I can get some nice shirts for Spring. It's about time....

(http://www.bbc.co.uk/stoke/content/images/2007/05/21/springtime_blue_bells_470x320.jpg)

Enjoy this wonderful Spring day, no matter what the weather looks like. After all, that's what imagination is for!!!

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!

Everything is falling into place...

Good morning Cupcakes!

Glad you all like the new design, it took a bit of trying to find the right one. I think I had 5 or 6 others yesterday evening before I settled for this. And I really like it. (We'll see how long it lasts. ;-)

Yesterday evening I finished my application for the really cool Apple related job and send it out. I'm just hoping now, that I was on time because when I checked the job ad, it was taken down. In any case it might lead to an internship and then to a job. We'll see.

The weather was really strange yesterday evening, it snowed, then it stopped and the sun came out and it started snowing again but there were no clouds over me! And it was FREEZING, it was warmer at six in the morning. It's March not April, St. Peter seems to confuse the months. What do you think, did an airplane hit him over the head and he suffers from craniocerebral injury?! The weather today is just as weird today as yesterday.

I hope that St. Peter recovers for the weekend, so that I can go on Photosafiri shooting store windows in the evening. Since I haven't figured out how too shot at night with my Lomo (too dark) and since I can't put it on a tripod (the only thing I dislike about my Lomo), I'll take my Nikon F90 for it and get 800 ASA films today. I'll even get the lighter lens from my fathers Nikon F60. Because the F90 and my lens (zoom 35 to 150) are too heavy for me (yeah, I should do some strength training) and I still have no good tripod for my big cameras. (The good tripods start at 150€, I don't want to put in that kind of money at the moment.) In any case I just love that I seem to have hit a nerve with my photography project. It's so much fun to make the pictures, wait for the development and then share them and talk about them. Eventually I'll change my flickr - account to Pro, but that has to wait until I have my new job.

Falling into place!
Tomorrow afternoon a friend of mine will celebrate her birthday, since I'm invited I'll hopefully have time to talk to her husband. D is also deeply concerned about the environment and so am I. Do you remember HOPENHAGEN?!

It was a campaign initiated by the United Nations to kick the worlds "leaders" into action at the climate conference in Copenhagen last December. It didn't work out, as we all know. Which pisses me off on a very high level and probably not only me. Now why do I tell you this? Because this morning when I went by streetcar to the city I had a kind of epiphany. I think I know now how to tackle this whole environment/stupid politicians - issue. To get started I need to talk to D. First we need to lay out a rough road map and then we need to take action, internet style "Ready, Fire, Aim".

This is what I meant when I said, it's all falling into place. I've pondered the question for years and made some frustrating experiences over the past few years, but it all blends into a bigger picture now and I finally know where to start. It will take time and a lot of work, but like in Triathlon it's one step at a time, one day after another.

Cheer up and have a wonderful weekend!!

KEEP MOVING FORWARD AND DON'T FORGET TO DREAM!!

It SNOWS!

Bright day? Hah. Looking out of the window makes me feel like its January. But for gawds sake it's bloody March. Stop it. NOW!

I don't want to go out there!!!

Hey, good thing I'm not allowed to run, so no speed training this evening. Hah. I knew it had a good side, I just had to find it...

Still, I'm thinking of relocating to California. "Seems it neeeever rains in southern california. Seems I often heard that kind of talk before. It never rains in californiaaaaaaaa... " I definitely haven't heard of snow....

Hope you have lovely warm sunshine.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD.

It's snowing...

And the sun is shining still...

Well, I have no new training schedule so far, because I've decided to give priority #1 to my job search and #2 to my secret plan (shhh, the one that I don't talk about). So we'll see how training will be this month.

The good thing is I already have my MRI appointment for tomorrow morning. That was fast, I would have thought that it would be at least a week until I get my MRI. Unfortunately it's 6 o'clock in the morning, that's the time I normally snuggle deeper into my bed for another few minutes. (This morning I had a really weird but also really funny dream in the 15 minutes until I had to get up. I enjoy my weird dreams, because they show that I'm fine. When I get stressed out they dry up.)

This is NOT MY KNEE!!

(http://www.cheltenhamimaging.co.uk/casestudies/images/knee-bakers-cyst-big.jpg, but this is how it will look like, though mine will be a lot smaller.)

This morning I walked through the city to my class and had the idea for my next photography project part. Store window design. Store windows show a fleeting part of our city environment, time to pay attention. The photos will be posted on The Man-Made Project from Saturday on.

Hope all of you are well and thank you for your comments.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!

Winter still

Seems like we don't get rid of the winter that fast. It snows. AGAIN.

>:-(

So no running.

Anyway, I've made the decision yesterday to buy myself a iBook battery today. Since the old one is REALLY through now and since I don't have the necessary money for a new MacBook at my disposal (and I won't pay in parts), but for a new battery... And my iBook works still just fine.

This get's some of the financial pressure of me and that's definitely a good thing.

Since it's the second Wednesday of the month and therefore admission free day at the museum, I'll go to the Museum of Arts after class. Yep, I'll take some pictures for you.

Okay, yesterdays Mampf Diary:

Chocolate proteine shake, 1 Nashi pear, 1 1/2 apple, 1 doughnut (I can't help it Keith, I just like them), 1 white chocolate cookie, hand full of nuts, 2 grilled fish sandwitches (yummy), 1 hot chocolate, 1 orange

Tea and water all the while. And I walked about 2 k + 130 stairs.

Yesterday I started drawing again, due to massive boredom in class. I even bought myself a book of John Howe, "Forging Dragons" and ordered a book by Richard Taylor, "Learn to draw in a weekend". I even drew a little fire demon in the evening. (I'll post it as soon as I get home.) Friday I'll go to an artists supply with my dad. Can't wait. Since I'll have a drawing class at the end of march, I feel the need to improve my sketching skills. That's one of the reasons for me going to the museum tonight after class.

Keep running!

Second Miss and an off-topic question

So there are places were we runners have to struggle with snow already. And they feel bad about it. Here is what I thought when I read their blogs: You lucky bastards. To me running in snow is a lot easier than running in cold rain when its already dark. But that's just my point of view.
Weather has gotten worse, it's raining heavily and I'm in a foul mood.

Today I drove to a town, that's about 100 km away. First I got lost because there were no signs, would you believe it? No, the car of my parents has no navigation system. (When I buy my car, this is the first thing I'll install. By the way it will be an Audi A3 TDi with at least 120 PS, colour doesn't matter as long as it isn't red. I HATE RED CARS! Have you seen the new ad for the Audi A3? This spot is awesome!!! Have a look. Oh and I LOVE THIS CAR!) And then it rained all day long.

My off-topic question is related to this town. If a city has only 6400 inhabitants does it qualify as a town? And would you want to live there? These are the questions that I'm pondering right now, since I have an interview in this town on Monday. The job offer is intriguing, but I'm not a small town person. I wouldn't have to skip speed training since it takes only an hour to get to Leipzig by train (car 2 to 2 1/2 hours). But there is no cinema and I couldn't figure out if you can get DSL there. If I couldn't have internet there I'd be lost. I don't need a tv (in fact I haven't watched tv since October), but I NEED internet access.

I chose to skip speed training today in favour of my right knee (and to think about the town). I had problems with bending it this morning and when I got back from my drive, my knee hurt really badly. So I decided, I'll do my speed training tomorrow alone in the afternoon. There is a track a few blocks away, so I'll go there and do fast and slow laps.

Seems like this week is a bit off.

And since I stray so much, why not go all the way. Here are three pics I took in London in November 2007. I was there 3 weeks after I started in my job and yes it was a business trip. On it I shook hands with Gordon Brown the British Prime Minister! (I don't have a photo to prove it. But it's true. Impressing, huh?) If you ever go to London, do yourself a favor, go get a good hotel, that means at least 90 Pounds a night, Hotels cheaper than this are a nightmare.

I took these pictures in the ? Park, as you can see. I only know it was near Oxford Street.

This is my favourite picture of this trip.

And this is what I did on Tuesday: I build an earring board!

Okay, before I start talking about what moisturizer I use, I better quit this post.

KEEP RUNNING!