Berlin/Uni / work

Papers, papers, papers

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Oh boy, so many papers to shift through… Not only that, but two more books, a seminar to prepare and a paper I would like to contribute to the 2007 RoboCup…

Plus there is so many things to do every day in Berlin. The city never sleeps, the opportunities for some cool night time undertaking never cease to be pop up… So many people to meet, so many concerts to go to, so many pubs to stop by. Oh, how I love that city.

If only I didn’t have to get up half past seven the next morning. But that’s part of growing up I guess. More things to do, less time for it, more responsabilites, less room for trivial stuff. But why not, I like it. That’s what we’ve all been working towards, right?

It’s always humbling to remember that anytime you think you’ve gotten away with something, you really haven’t.

Photo

My new camera

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As I told you, I got myself a new, decent camera. It’s a Sony Alpha 100, Sony’s first DSLR (Digital Single Lens Reflex) camera. Well, “first” is not entirely true, as at some stage Sony bought Minolta of course including all the intellectual property…

Anyway, I’m super-happy with it, it’s just so much fun to use and the pictures are great. I know that’s rather superficial and subjective, but who of you really cares about more details ;-) Along with the camera I got the standard Sony 18–70mm lens, a 70–300mm Tamron zoom/macro lens and an old Minolta system flash, besides a bag and some memory.

What I like most about the camera is the built in anti shake system. It physically moves the sensor in opposite directions of your shaking and allows you to take pictures (depending of course on the focal length and how well you can hold still) of up to 0.5s of exposure without a tripod, i.e. from bare hands! That way I could take some nice, crisp shots in low light conditions, such as the rose on the left (1/6s exposure at 70mm focal lenght, bare handed!).

As you can see, I would recommand that camera to almost everyone right away, and it’s not that expensive either!

It’s easy to get married; it’s hard to be selective.

Podpourri

Podpourri #26.5

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And again it’s been yonks since I last published a new episode of Podpourri…

And, even worse, all I do in todays episode is ask for some more patience, mercy, or whatever you want to call it.

In fairness, I don’t think there will be a new episode before February, as right now my MacBook Pro goes to the “doctor” (Apple technician that is) to fix a number of issues, and also I will be super busy getting an annoyingly large number of things sorted concerning my semi–permanent move to Ireland (which will happen on 1 Feb.). All will be good… I hope…

How to make a cat drink: Put it in a blender, strain off the fur.

Berlin

HAPPY NEW YEAR

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Happy New Year everyone, I’m off to paaaaaaaaaaaaarty ! First going to a friends friends place in town, then we’re off to the Hauptbahnhof — there is a large open area pretty much in the middle of the city and rather close to the Brandenburger Tor for the big fireworks :-)

Anyways, I’ll catch you guys next year,

party hard and stay tuned

Floz :-)

By day, enlighten; by night, endarken.

Miscellaneous

Babel

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Floz went to the movies again, woo-hoo :-)

I’m not going to bore you with Christmas or the presents I got (although I might comment on some of them at some other stage ;-)) — lacking anything better to do tonight I went to the movies with a friend, and we saw “Babel”.

It’s from the Mexican director Alejandro González Iñárritu of whom I’ve already seen two other impressive and captivating movies, “Amores Perros” and “21 Gramos”.

“Babel” is pretty much in the same style, fascinating and sometimes very intense pictures, interesting characters and an enthralling mood (you can read about the plot elsewhere ;-))… Two big thumbs up from me — go out and watch it!

A duck walked into a bar and quacked his head.

Miscellaneous

Merry X-mas!

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With this nice little Christmas scene that I took this afternoon I would like to wish you all a Merry, Merry Christmas.

Enjoy a few quite days with your family and loved ones, let go of the stress once and relax … Also, hope you get some nice presents and at least a hug from everyone that loves you.

Speaking of love, that is without any doubt the greatest gift for me this year … More on that later. Anyway, so have a good one, talk to you soon,

Florian :-)

A wise man will make more opportunities than he finds.

Uni / work

My new office

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Finally I’m getting around to telling you about my new work place. As you might know, after graduating I’ve started to work at the Technische Universität Berlin.

My first task was to redo the horrible, old website of the institute. It’s important to have a good web presence, as many sponsors usually first take a look at the web page to learn a little bit about the place — and if that web page is already untidy, ugly or out of date, then it obviously leaves a rather sloppy first impression. Based on the MediaWiki software, this is what it looks like now :-)

Anyway, I though I finally show you a photo of my new office. The dude on the left is my lovely office mate Raafat, and Egyptian Ph.D. student who’s just arrive. The photo was taken with my new camera by the way, which I’m super excited about… I’ll tell you more about it later.

I became a professional fisherman, but discovered that I couldn’t live on my net income.

Berlin

What a party

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So Saturday was that big communal birthday party… Communal as in there were several people celebrating their anniversary.

After a big cooking session — kindely supported by Sarah and Julia, my two guests from Magdeburg (where I went to uni, yonks ago) — fixing large amounts of pasta salads and chili con carne, we went to the party in Moabit (a fairly central district of Berlin).

It was a bit slow to take off (but the reason was that we went there relatively early to help with the usual party prepartions), but then it became pretty crowded :-) As the evening went on, people even started dancing!

Shame on my Aussi friends — none of you showed up! Come on! ;-) Thanks anyway to my dear guests from outside of Berlin for coming!

Famous last words: Gee, that’s a cute tattoo.

Berlin

Quarter Century

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Oh boy, and here we go, another year in my life has passed — actually, the first quarter–century…!

To celebrate this event (I won’t tell you exactly when I will turn 25, you should know that ;-)) I’ll join in some massive birthday party of a bunch friends that all have their birthday this week as well.

So if you’re reading this, click on the link to the invitation and I hope to see you there (only the Aussie may excuse themselves ;-))

If you are given an open-book exam, you will forget your book.

Berlin

Sing, sing, sing!

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To get a bit of a change from the (in cases) slightly dry day to day work in the office, I’ve joined two choirs a wee while back — a church choir and a gospel choir. I just love them and can’t wait for Tuesdays and Wednesdays to get my voice going again (I’m singing bass, for those who are curious).

Last Sunday, we had a concert in my local church. We sang a “Kantate” by Johann Sebastian Bach, and the “Historia der Geburt Jesu” by Heinrich Schchütz, which I both liked a lot.

To my surpise, our church (isn’t it impressive that even for the curch there is a wikipedia article?!) was pretty much full! Wow. They must have somehow known in advance that I was singing ;-) Nah, not really, I guess…

Dad always thought laughter was the best medicine, which I guess is why several of us died of tuberculosis.