ammie_warrior

....ALIVE!!!!!!!! :DDDDD

Trying to find black screws in a black computer case is hard.

I've installed the PSU and a bunch of fans so far and now I'm stuck.  I'm still waiting for some fairly crucial PC bitz to turn up (monitor, HDD, DVD burner and a fan) and without them I'm reluctant to put everything else together.The fan is supposed to sit behind my CPU, so until it arrives there's no point installing the MB in the case (plus if I install the beggar and it doesn't work, I've got to remove it to either send it back to the retailer or snap it over my knee in annoyance), and without a monitor I can't check that everything's going to post correctly and behave itself.  Grrrr!  Get a bloody move on Arlt!

In the meantime I'm toying with installing the CPU heatsink now.  It's an after-market jobber, which means it's huge, so there's no way I can fit it back into the anti-static bag once it's installed.  But I'm bored.  I've had a pile of tantalising bits sitting on my kitchen table for two or three weeks now and I wanna play with them, dammit!  *huff!*

It was rather hot and sunny today, and a Friday to boot, so I decided to pick up some delicious-looking sorbet on my way round Aldi this evening.  I am impressed by the sorbet manufacturer's consideration for the health of the consumers of their product.  Clearly, sorbet is full of suger and eating too much will make you fat, so their answer is to make the tubs invulnerable to everything short of a direct hit with an axe, thus delaying your sorbet-eating plans and making you expend copious amounts of energy in your attempts to gain access to the sugary delights within.  It took me five minutes of crazed scrabbling and curses to break into the mango and pineapple flavour!



'S very yummy tho.  Omnomnomnomom...

Is there anything more exciting and nerve-wracking than planning and building a new PC?  Have ordered a significant proportion of the parts for my new core i7 machine and now I must wait and hope that everything arrives safely and behaves itself.  :o :D

Wikipedia reflects its readership.  It has a small but surprisingly comprehensive article on Skerrit, a centaur deity who can be found in the Beastlands.  I'm amazed that someone sat down and wrote that.  Thing is, I can foresee a day when I'll be really glad they did, or at least, be really glad someone wrote an article about something equally minority.  Alas, there's one crucial detail missing from the Skerrit article.  How the hell am I going to decide what colour to paint him if I don't know what colour he should be!!!!!  He's bay in the picture on the back of the box, but for some reason that's just not doing it for me.  Maybe dappled grey instead.......

- Proud/vexed owner of a centaur god.



PS:  Owning him, the other members of the "Powers of Conflict" box set, two mercykillers and two ciphers just about makes up for the aggravating nonsense and dickery I went through yesterday when I wrestled them out of the clutches of the German customs people. Who are all arses with no knobs.

Sometimes, I despise this country I find myself in.  It is full of miserable fucking cunts.  Most of whom inexplicably work in customer service.

I love New Scientist. It's awesome. Today, it told me everything I wanted to know about female ejaculation (but was afraid to ask).  Thanks, NewSci.  For some reason, I was highly amused by one of the journal titles mentioned: The International Journal of Sexology. Brilliant! I also learnt about Ernst Graefenberg, the German scientist who "discovered" the G-spot (among other things, no doubt). Good work, that man.

Shamus Young, of Twentysided and The Escapist fame, is, I have decided, rather cute as well as being a very entertaining read.  Alas, I heard him interviewed on a podcast once and he has the misfortune of having one of the most annoying American accents I've ever heard.  Shame.

Parents.  Why do people assume that they're perfect?  They're human just like anyone else, and you can still love someone while acknowledging that, sometimes, they have absolutely no idea what they're talking about.  Or that they're capable of making mistakes or being wrong.  One might say that loving someone requires accepting them flaws and all.

My next-door neighbours are amazing.  They've hardly seen me for the year and a half that I've lived here, but today, when my EC card decided to break the till at Edeka (dunno why, it's always worked before), they happened to be in the queue behind me and bailed me out.  What fantastic people!  I got to take my groceries home, and I'll pay them back tomorrow.  Am annoyed at my card though, and will take the precaution of having sufficient cash on me next time I go, to avoid further embarrassment.

Despite umpteen promises to fix the aircon in the office, no apparent progress has been made and it was still a furnace today, with the rest of Summer stretched before us like a burning road up which we must trudge until we reach the soothing cool of Autumn.  I wonder if we oppressed, over-heated masses can band together and storm HR and Building Maintenance under the slogan "we shall not be broiled!"?  And then I wonder if that would have any effect and I conclude probably not.  Even if we did have the energy to do it.

Lastly, I suspect that this website may prove irresistable.  The original System Shock?  For free?  Can I get a "Hell, yeah!"?

A decent-ish pic of the grishak I finished painting last night:



Stripes are fun!  :)  It occurred to me after I finished painting that with the reddish desert scrub and the blue tongues, I've got a very Australian feel going on with these guys.  Oh well!  They need the blue for a bit of interest.  I also desperately need some decent sealer (i.e., Testor's Dullcote) - I don't want them to get all scratched and I do want to play with them at some point.

The temperature has risen considerably and with it my desire to eat salady type things.  As a result, I have filled my fridge with things like spring onions, fresh tomatoes and loads of fresh herbs.

I have also had a hankering to try this recipe from the channel 4 food website:  www.channel4.com/food/recipes/popular-dishes/salad/warm-pea-and-lentil-salad-recipe_p_1.html, which I saw ages ago while looking for a good recipe for dhal, but it wasn't something I was up for in the middle of winter.

So, I have just scarfed down a load of asparagus with butter, salt and pepper and the aforementioned lentil salad.  I used Beluga lentils (although I do have Puy lentils too), spring onions and Balsamic vinegar instead of the "recomended" ingredients.  Well, you've got to use what you have, right?  I even chucked in a big handful of flat-leaf parsley - Mum would be so proud!  It was very nice, although next time I will completely ignore the recommended cooking time on the packet of the Beluga lentils.  30 minutes?!?  They were ready in half that time and were a bit mushy by the time I realised.

I can feel a tomato, mozzarella and basil salad coming on for tomorrow, too.  Or maybe green bean salad with sunflower seeds.......

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7946780.stm

Coming to a tentacle-filled robo-vice den near you soon!

In fact, I will.  AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have spent a substantial part of today editing a hefty manuscript (82 pages, I'll have you know), and had almost reached the half-way point when I decided it would be a good time to save and hit the relevant icon.  Everything seemed to be fine, then moments later I got a pop-up asking me did I want to save changes to my document.  Absent-mindedly I clicked "yes" (of course I wanted to save changes!), only to see a day's hard work vanish and be replaced by nothing.  And the file's disappered too.  I'd swear blind that I extracted it to my work folder this morning before getting cracking, but the only thing there now is the original zip folder.  I know winzip and winrar - they ask you if you want to update the files if you work on anything directly in them, and this didn't happen.  I've got System Mechanic deep-searching for deleted files (a shallow scan turned up nothing convincing), but the outlook's bleak.  The really annoying thing is that I have no idea what I did, or even if I did anything at all.  It just... got eaten.  Part of me wonders whether the large size of the document was the problem (when I got to about page 16, Word curtly told me that there were too many spelling mistakes throughout the document for it to deal with, and would no longer do the red wiggly line thing for me), but most of me knows I'm just looking for something to blame.

There's also a delicate etiquette issue here.  I was working at home today (I wanted a big slab of peace and quiet, something I can't get in the big office at work), and now I don't know what to do.  I know that I did the work, but currently I have absolutely NO evidence to prove this to anyone else.  Instead of turning up to work tomorrow with a half-edited manuscript, I will be turning up with NOTHING!  And I therefore don't know whether to put in a time-sheet for my worked hours today or not.  Afterall, I've done the work but I haven't, all at the same time.  I could kick myself.  I really could.  After all, would this have happened at work? I don't know, especially since I haven't the foggiest idea what went wrong.  Argh, argh, argh.

I hope to God that System Mechanic comes up with some ray of light.

(Swiped off Crystal Speedie on FB)

The BBC says that most people will have only read 6 out of the 100 titles listed. Put an X next to the ones you have read and then tally them up.

(x) 1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
(x) 2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
() 3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
(x) 4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
(x) 5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
() 6 The Bible - Author Unknown
() 7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
(x) 8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
(x) 9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
() 10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
() 11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
() 12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
(x) 13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
() 14 Complete Works of Shakespeare
(x) 15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
(x) 16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
(x) 17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
(x) 18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
() 19 The Time Traveller’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
() 20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
() 21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
() 22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
() 23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
() 24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
(x) 25 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
() 26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
() 27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
() 28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
(x) 29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
(x?) 30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
() 31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
() 32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
(x) 33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
() 34 Emma - Jane Austen
() 35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
(x) 36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
(x) 37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
( ) 38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
(x) 39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
(x) 40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
(x) 41 Animal Farm - George Orwell
(x) 42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
(x) 43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
() 44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
() 45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
() 46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
(x) 47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy (unfortunately!)
() 48 The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
(x) 49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
() 50 Atonement - Ian McEwan
(x) 51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel
(x) 52 Dune - Frank Herbert
(x) 53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
(x) 54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
() 55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
(x) 56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
() 57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
(x) 58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
(x) 59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
() 60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
() 61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
() 62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
() 63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
() 64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
() 65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
() 66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
() 67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
(x) 68 Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding
() 69 Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
() 70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville
() 71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
() 72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
(x) 73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
(x) 74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
() 75 Ulysses - James Joyce
() 76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
() 77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
() 78 Germinal - Emile Zola
(x) 79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
() 80 Possession - AS Byatt
(x) 81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
() 82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
() 83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
() 84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
() 85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
() 86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
(x) 87 Charlotte’s Web - EB White
() 88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Alborn
() 89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
(x) 90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
(x) 91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
(x) 92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
() 93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
(x) 94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
() 95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
() 96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
() 97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
(x) 98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
(x) 99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
() 100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

43 read means a big fat HA! at the BBC!  Pretty good for a science geek whose general reading fare is dodgy sci-fi and fantasy.  I've read virtaully no Dickens and I don't like Hardy, so that's a bit of a handicap.  I also seem to be missing a big slab of American authors.  Still, some of the unmarked books on there have been on my mental "to read" list for a little while now, such as The Wasp Factory, the books by the Russian authors and The Time-Traveller's Wife (which is actually sitting on my shelf right now waiting for me to finish Iron Council). H'mm, plan for this year:  Read the other 57 books on this list?  (Well, within reason!  The Complete Works of Shakespeare is likely to be a bit of a mission!)

EDIT:  I did a bit of hunting after the fact.  Apparently, the Beeb actually had nothing to do with this list, which was instead spawned but the Guardian as a list of books that people could not do without.  Linky: www.guardian.co.uk/books/2007/mar/01/news.  Maybe I should check these things first next time!  Still, it's a good list of books with many worthy titles, and I could definitely see myself choosing several to accompany me to a desert island.

For my Christmas present, James gave me rail ticket to Paris.  It was something I've been banging on about doing, so in a surprisingly romantic move he decided to take the initiative.  Getting from Mannheim to Paris is ridiculously easy - one train takes you the whole way in about three hours.  Even factoring in the time required to get to Mannheim from Weinheim (ca. 40-60 mins), it can't have been much different to flying. 

James met me off the train late on Friday evening, or he would have done except that I managed to surprise him from behind by using a guy with a suitcase as cover.  Yay!  We grabbed a bite to eat at a singularly undistinguished pizzeria (where I discovered that my GCSE French is distressingly now almost entirely superceded by Japanese and German), then we headed back to the hotel and got *ahem* reacquainted.  He'd bought me a single red rose!  Bless! 

The next day the weather was miserable - sleety snow.  We pootled round the beach-huts of the dead for a little while (err, we found a cemetery) and then decided to find and visit the famous Paris Catacombs - I've been curious about these ever since playing Deus Ex.  Just like a real "dungeon", the entrance to the Catacombs is surprisingly hard to find.  We thought this was slightly annoying, but not nearly as annoying as big signs and neon would have been.  Eventually we located the small door in the side of a building.  On the wall inside the entrance is a very large map of the subterranean quarries and tombs - it would make a truly authentic dungeon map.  I have a small version on their leaflet, and an abridged version will surely make it into a game at some stage....  We paid the nominal entrance fee and headed down.  And down.  And down.  The tunnels are deep.  Just as well really - I'm sure few people really want to find the bones of their ancestors while planting their carrots. There's a little introductory section explaining the history of the quarries and the catacombs, then the first "proper" section is a through old quarry sections.  We strolled gently through, peering at the inscribed dating system, graciously allowing noisy Americans to hurry past and feeling smugly superior thanks to the comforting presence of my pocket torch and penknife.  We feared no zombie attacks!  The route is quite winding in places, on several occasions you can look through a side passage to see where you've been or are just about to go, and it takes you past such wonders as the Port-Mahon gallery (carved by a guy who was held prisoner opposite it) and the Quarrymen's footbath (a pool tapping directly into the groundwater).  The entrance to the Catacombs themselves is highly theatrical - a proper portal to the underworld.  It sez so right on the lintel: "Halt, for this is the empire of death!"  A slightly more prosaic message on the wall requests visitors to refrain from taking flash photographs, to preserve the sanctity of the place.  We decided that that should extend to ALL photography, so we don't have any pictures of the actual tombs.  The tombs themselves were.... oppressive.  I'm all for tidiness, but you have to wonder about the guy who gave the command that the bones of six million people should be stacked not just neatly, but decoratively.  I felt that the heart motif on one stack was particularly inappropriate, for some reason.  And six million people is a lot of bones - I'm positive we didn't see all of them.  The walk through the Catacombs is probably easily the same length as the walk through the tunnels to get there, but it's twisted like a cat's guts.  The end result is that you wander through endless relentlessly orderly (and decorative!) piles of bones, trying to dodge dripping water from the ceiling and trying desperately not to touch the walls, which were once someone like you.  The initial phrase over the entrance is only the first in a series of short descriptions of human mortality, none of which were translated (except badly by us), but we decided we actually preferred that - it lent a further sense of mystery to the place.  I realise that all this makes it sound like I didn't enjoy the experience, but I did.  It's just not one of those things that makes you want to do cartwheels about it.  We managed to walk through the whole of the Catacombs without once saying "I could put that in a game," too.  For us, that's RESPECT.  The exit from the Catacombs leads you past a couple of interesting subsidence cavities, now diligently shored up by Parisian authorities.  Like I say, it was fascinating, but I was glad to reach fresh air at the end.  Once I'd staggered to the top of the 84 steps to daylight, a friendly chap asked to check my bag for bones.  Amid expressions of horror and disgust, I asked if people often stole bones.  "Oh yes," he said casually, and waved his hand at a small table in the corner that had the day's haul on it:  a skull and several long bones.  It was probably the most disturbing part of the whole experience. 

To restore our spirits (and because it was 3pm and we were starving), we retired to a bar/restaurant and had steak-frites, which were just what the doctor ordered.  After that we went shopping for our picnic supper, then went back to the hotel and ate bread, cheese and salami and watched "Metal: A Headbanger's Journey".  It was a great day. 

Sunday was much better, weather-wise.  We headed over to the Arc de Triomphe and had our first proper go at using our over-priced travel-and-discount tickets, only to discover that the woman on the counter had no more knowledge of such things than we did.  Apparently, there were supposed to be dates on them, or something.  Since we were holding up the queue and because we didn't want to pay 9 euros for the privilege of standing on a monument, we cut and ran, vowing to find a tourist info and quiz them about it.  Then we walked up and down the Champs-Elysees for a bit failing to find the TI that should have been there according to James' guide book.  Eventually we decided to cut our losses and walked over to the Louvre.  It's a nice walk actually - past high fashion houses, over grand bridges and through parks.  James saw an arousing building too (seriously, don't ask).  I really wish we'd had more time to go to the Palace of Discoveries.  You've gotta love a place with octopi demonstrations and a "school of rats".  And it's HUGE!  Something that big must be good, right?  Anywho, we got to the Louvre, and its architecture (which was all we really wanted to see) was suitably impressive.  After oooo-ing at it for a bit, we went to find coffee and cake. One swankyish cafe later, and I managed to somehow order hot wine instead of hot chocolate.  Ah well, it could have been far worse - I don't object strongly to hot wine so I just drank it - but I'm still not sure whether the waiter genuinely misunderstood me or decided to get revenge for my brutal mangling of his native language.  I suspect the latter.  My tip:  Hot wine doesn't go especially well with creme brulee.  After the cake-and-wine debacle, we finally found a TI office (right next to the Louvre - whodathunkit?), figured out the wretched Paris Vistes of doom, then walked over to Notre Dame, where we took the obligatory sloppy couple photo and had a quick shufti inside too.  The last time I went to Paris was when I was about 14, and my overwhelming impression of Notre Dame was not the awesome cathedral but the number of dodgy types wanting to write my name on a grain of rice for ten francs - I had to growl at them.  There seemed to be much less of this now, which was a relief.  This time we actually got to concentrate on the place itself, and it is properly magnificent.  I could put that in a game.....  To round off our day of almost-culture, we tracked down a McDonalds (no, we're not proud or anything) and then wrote up a few characters for Criminal Intentions over an expensive beer (we couldn't find any other kind). 

Monday was home-time, and my train was first.  We got up lateish, packed and had a leisurely breakfast in Gare de l'Est (despite the stealth egg in James' sandwich), then James waved me off on the ICE back to Mannheim.  I was home by 5.30pm.

I bravely stuck a poster up in the entrance hall at work last week.

Why bravely?

Because it announced to the world that I am a player of games of all kinds and am seeking similar for fun, lolz and the playing of gently competitve games in a social, alcohol-lubricated atmosphere.

Surprisingly, I actually attracted a few replies and tonight, the first session of the Wiley International Gamers Guild took place at my flat.

It was AWESOME!!!!  We played Industria, Backgammon and Gloom.

Thanks very much to Adrian and Jose, who came to play games with me.  Here's hoping there'll be plenty more sessions in the future!

Heat 2-3 tbsp olive oil in a large heavy pan and chop some onions reasonably finely (quantities depend on how much you like onions, really).  Sweat down the onions in the pan until soft and goldeny translucent.  While they're doing their thing, peel about 1kg of carrots.  Grate carrots into the pan (or do it in stages on a board or summat).  When all the carrots have been grated and added, put the lid on and allow to sweat over a medium heat for about 10 mins, remembering to poke occasionally.  Meanwhile, dry-toast about 1tbsp of cumin seeds in a frying pan until they smell spicy, then crush or grind them up a little (not so they're powder, just so they're a bit broken).  Add them to the pan with the carrots, then add a stock cube (I used chicken, vegetable would work well too) and plenty of water (or use real stock and don't add as much water), and then chuck in the butt-end of a bag of red lentils (it was probably about 100g actually).  Stir to make sure there aren't any rogue lentil clumps, then cover again and simmer for about half an hour (or until the lentils are cooked and most of the water has been absorbed).  Remember to stir periodically unless you really want lentil goop congealed to the bottom of the pan.  Don't forget to add salt and pepper to taste, either.  When the lentils are tender (or falling apart in my case), get one of those stab-blender things and give it a jolly good blend until the soup looks smooth and creamy.  You could add some actual cream or creme fraiche if you like - I didn't because I didn't have any.

Serve and enjoy!  Works well with a little freshly grated parmesan on the top.  Parsley would be good too.

...that I just watched "40-year-old virgin", and paused it on the two parts where he's painting a miniature, and critiqued his technique?  I mean c'mon dude!  At least thin your paints and use a f*ing wash and layers!!!  Base, mid-tone, highlight, is that really so hard?  And enamel?  Wtf?  NO-ONE uses enamel anymore unless they're painting a fricking plane!  Sheeesh!  Even if they are Testors.* Do you WANT to completely ruin all the details???

*and breathe*

Tomorrow: sobriety and carrot soup, I promise.




*Yes, they do do EXCELLENT matt varnish.  I mourne the loss of my Testors Dullcote.

I am very, very bad.  And not in a good way.  *sigh*

Very.  The answer is very.







Poor ducks!  The worst part is when they rush frantically over to the bridge to see if I'm going to feed them.  I might, actually.  For clarification, all that snow fell last Monday - see my last post for pictures - and  none has fallen since.  It's powder-dry, and I swear the temperature has not been above freezing for the last week, not even during the day.  It's crazy.  Kat sent me a link about the Earth being on the brink of an ice age - this weather makes me think it's already arrived...


Also, I could put that in a game....:

www.panodesign.co.uk/malbork.html
www.zamek.malbork.pl/en/
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donington_le_Heath_Manor_House_Museum
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sir_John_Soane%27s_Museum

I do like a nice bit of architechture.


Fun fact for the day: Wikipedia has an entry for Bangor Cathedral at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bangor_Cathedral.  Awwwwww!  :)

Check it!  I live in a winter wonderland right now:

pics.livejournal.com/ammie_warrior/pic/00017caf
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I took these in the hills above Weinheim this afternoon.  It was a nice walk, even if it was bloody cold, and I really must try and get up there more this year.  I don't make New Year's resolutions, but if I did, that would be one.  Actually, it can be part of the resolution to exercise more that I'm not making this year.

Twice in two days is entirely too many times to be pounced on by complete strangers.

This evening, I was walking up the high street in full-on *leave me alone* mode - my head was down, my earphones were and I was striding along briskly - when I found myself accosted yet again by a shortish curly haired man who asked me, "Bist du touristik?" Cheeky fucker! Use the "Sie" form next time, bitch! Unfortunately for him, I still hadn't quite shaken the New Years's harassment and he looked quite a lot like the previous annoying male stranger. "Nein!" I snarled, barely slowing, and followed it up with, "What gave you the impression I wanted to talk to you?". Then I replaced my earphones to drown out the rest of his babble and stalked huffily off up the street. I can stalk damn fast when required- just ask James what I'm like in a mood. Fortunately this guy got the message. Given his similarity to the other guy, I really hope I'm not being stalked. Not that I'm trying to say that all shortish, curly haired, probably Turkish guys are the same person, more that I wasn't taking notes in either situation, on the first because I was very drunk and on the second because I try never to make eye contact with complete strangers and I felt that staring at him would only be an encouragement I didn't want to give.

Does make me wonder, tho. I've become very adept at dodging approaches from pretty much everyone except people I know - living in or near a variety of cities around the world will do that for you* - and I've been thinking about places and/or situations where I would permit a complete stranger to strike up a conversation with me. And honesty compels me to admit that I mean a male** stranger in pretty much all cases.

I've narrowed it down to:

# If they're a friend of a friend. "Hey, you know George! Well that's ok then!"
# If I'm in a club, but it's almost a given that a guy striking up a conversation with a girl in a club is expecting *at least* a snog and usually more, so how friendly I'm likely to be depends on my current relationship status.
# In the supermarket. Yeah, I know it's odd, but there we go. Maybe it's because supermarkets are brightly lit and contain staff and fellow shoppers that will hopefully be summoned by a scream.
# At work. In a big office block, the chances good are that you don't know everyone, but I'm much likelier to talk to someone I see regularly entering and leaving the same building I do. Stupidly, there's no guarantee that this is a safe assumption. There's a girl at work who's being practically stalked by an ex-coworker. He was due to leave at the end of December anyway, but was "asked to leave" much sooner because of his disruptive behaviour towards her and, by association, towards the team she's a part of. I guess this shows that there are people to back you up at work, anyway.

...and that's pretty much it. If I think of anywhere else, I'll edit this post, but it would appear that my window for meeting new people is pretty small and that's sad. I wonder why I've become this suspicious over time given I consider myself to be a fairly friendly person in general. Admittedly, the guy who stopped me on New Year's Eve probably wasn't just after a chat ("Why yes, total stranger, of course I will follow you off somewhere I've never been at three in the morning, we'll have a nice drink and a chat with our total lack of a common language and then you'll let me go my way with absolutely no expectations of sex *whatsoever*." I don't think so.), but that's not the case all the time. Is it? Has the world become so dangerous or have I been made to believe that it is? (James being punched for no reason on New Year's Eve suggests it is fairly dangerous out there.) Or am I just a irascible loner?

I also want to test out the Japanese "crossed arms" thing over here to see if it will work. In Japan, it's kind of a cultural thing that means "no" in a culture that's bad at saying no directly. I found it very efficient and effective, and it became almost a reflex action if I was approached by someone in the street trying to give me fliers or whatever. Except if they had tissues. I was very accepting of advertising if it came with free pocket tissues. I miss that. in fact, I miss Japan. Anywho, I'm going to experiment round here to see if it has the same effect. I suspect it won't because it's not part of the culture - the Germans have absolutely NO trouble saying what they think very, very bluntly - but it might.


*A glare from me can make a chugger quail and back away- a fact I'm curiously proud of but not sure I should be.
**Yes, I know there are female chuggers. They're just as annoying and I terrorise them too.