I wake up, but my eyes stay shut. Through the half open window I hear a quiet, nearly infrasonic, rustling of the leaves through the wind. Raindrops fall softly on the window pane. Is it raining into the room already? I do not know. Then a loud sound. It is a vehicle, gunning its engine, probably from a school bus. Because only a few seconds afterwards a “Bye, Mom” from a young girl follows. The doors of the school bus squeak open, close even louder and the wheels spin on the wet street, until the school bus finally drives on. The raindrops turn louder. Car doors slam shut and I periodically hear the clattering of high heels. And they are so fast that the people are probably running, to get out of the rain. A bit further away in the distance, I hear a long honking of a car horn. How sirens of an ambulance drown out the car horn by far and how they then get increasingly quieter and disappear in the distance again.

The rain starts to stop. The patter of rain has turned into silent drips. A car, from which hip-hop music sounds out, drives through the street. I crawl out of bed, walk to the window. What I see are many little puddles. In them, there are green, brown and some yellow leaves. I see a small boy, how he jumps through the puddles in his sneakers with a big smile. And how his mother pulls him with the words “Will you get out of there NOW!” A slight wind passes and causes me to get a shiver over my arms and back. While I close the window, I know: it is fall.

During my last visits to NYC I did not need one, but now I do: an American cellphone number. Paying high fees for calls from my German cell provider? Thanks, but no thanks. But there were a few obstacles on the way…

I informed myself on the internet and chose a provider, who was recommended to me because of the coverage. According to the provider’s ads, 97% of Americans have it. Wow. For me it should be a prepaid card plan. But which one? While I was clicking through the different plans, a pop up window appeared. “A sales representative is ready to help you out with your order. Would you like assistance?”. I clicked on OK, without actually knowing, what will happen next.

Continue reading “Operation cellphone number”

The departure in Frankfurt was everything else but fast and great. Not even 12 hourse before my flight was supposed to depart to JFK, I recieved a short message from my airline, saying that my flight was resceduled from 8:30 am to 09:55 am. Later at the airport I was told that it may be even delayed more. After the goodbyes (note to myself: I still hate saying goodbye and letting go), I went through security rather quickly and waited at the gate. And waited. And waited. Boarding only started shortly after 10 am, in the end the plane took off at 11:15 am.

The flight itself was not the greatest either. Not only that there were strong headwinds, but there were also bad turbulences. So I could not really sleep and arrived at JFK rather unsettled. But I did get my suitcase fast and warm sunbeams tickled my skin. And I landed safely, after all that is the most important thing.

Continue reading “First post from New York City”

With my only 21 years of age, I have traveled alot. Once a year at least. And still the question always arises again: how do I pack, as little as possible, but as much as is necessary, in order to not stand without X or Y in another city? The check-list is written, although not in any thematic order. But how am I supposed to get all that into a small, but very fine, bag? Do I really need everything? More importantly: did I really not forget anything?

Continue reading “Final rehearsal: I’m going on a trip and pack…”

What would Bryan Adams possibly say to this ad? Thank you to my personal blog helper and best friend Simon for sharing this discovery.

Time. Every individual has the same amount of hours and minutes daily. And still, every one of them uses this time differently.

Some wake up early on their own, make coffee, have breakfast and make a list, what one has to do throughout the day. Those things are then done one by one, lunch is eaten and then the to-do-list is worked off further until the early evening. Then there is time for anything, whatever one wants to do. A stirdy, eight to nine hour sleep ends the day.

Others however also get up relatively early. Breakfast and coffee also are made. But there is no list. At least not a specific one. Things are done, many thousand other little things are done in between, which are not that important, the important ones are shuffled off. Latter pester one in the head until the pressure is just too huge. They then need to be done (often it has something to do with studying/work or something boring) and it does not happen seldom that it will be a long night. With a little less sleep.

And again there are others, who sleep long. Really long. Breakfast turns into lunch or it is not eaten at all. The morning, no the afternoon, begins with coffee. Lots of coffee. Because it is a different take of the day when one’s day begins in the afternoon. A lot should be done. Should. But still half asleep things are done, which should only be done, once everything what is important is done. Therefore everything is delayed into the night; prior to 4 or 5 a.m. one does not lay into bed. And in the end, not much has been done. Or sometimes maybe even nothing at all. The rest was somehow more interesting.

Which of these types I am – there are definitely also mixed forms – I am, can be guessed. But with what I will be spending my next days, one can define once one saw my purchase from yesterday:

10:25 p.m. Brush teeth. Lay into bed.

10:35 p.m. Not really tired yet. New night stand lamp on. Reading a few pages.

11:15 p.m. New night stand lamp off. Eyes shut.

11:17 p.m. It’s warm. Turn. Roll over. Eyes open. Eyes shut.

approx. 01:30 a.m. Eyes open. Still warm. Right ear hurts again. Awake.

02:14 a.m. Thought: You need to sleep. Eyes shut.

approx. 06:00 a.m. Eyes open. Bright. Tired.

06:10 a.m. (buzzing coffee maker)…

(picture source: ikea.de)

Never in my life did I think I would list him (or anyone else from the show) in my weekly post for my song of the week. But after hearing him live in an unplugged session, my mind definitely changed. He has an incredible nice, mellow but also strong voice, which really grabs you. And he made my train trips to university this week far more pleasant. Please, don’t get yourself freaked out by his, let’s say, individual style ;)

This week (04/12 – 18) I listened to Adam Lambert’s “Whataya Want From Me” about five times (*click*).

This week I re-discovered Robbie Williams for myself. I have all his albums in my CD rack (except his recent one), but for some reason I don’t listen to him that often. He doesn’t have the best voice in the world, but he does have something unique in it. And his “I don’t give a “*%#!” – attitude makes him very likable. Simply also because he is that way, although being one of the best-selling artists ever!

This week (03.01 – 07) I listened to Robbie Williams’ “Let Me Entertain You” three times (*click*).

If you leave out the music I listen to while I work at the radio station, I don’t really have much time to listen to any other new music. This time I also don’t know the exact number of times I listened to this song, since I can’t scrobble the radio station, but I felt like they played the song around 10 times within 5 days. And that doesn’t make the song any better…

This week (02.22 – 28) I listened to Ke$ha’s “Tik Tok” around 8-10 times (*click*).