The usual IT babble
Posts tagged Vacation
Winter on Spiekeroog
May 4th
Well, as I wrote last year, I spent some time with my brother on Spiekeroog (that’s where he’s currently living and working). As I left on December 4th, it started snowing like crazy ..
If you read the old article, you might remember that I mentioned Spiekeroog is 100% free of fossil fueled vehicles. That being said, let’s continue with the story I’m about to tell.
Anyway, my brother was walking me back to the hotel boat and we waited a bit in the harbour since we were a bit early. Now, every item is delivered by ship to the island, since there’s no other way (besides by air, which is kinda expensive ..). Anyway, them dockworkers ain’t stupid. They needed some snow-free space, and they started clearing the snow. But how ?
Well, again, them ain’t stupid … You take a forklift and a euro-pallet and you got what ? Exactly, a snow plow!
Spiekeroog'ish snow plow
Spiekeroog'ish snow plow
I know, the images are kinda grainy, sadly I only had my cell phone to take the photo (left the digital camera at home). C’est la vie ..
Short vacation
Dec 3rd
Well, Arne recently (not really recently though .. 
) complained about my blog being waaay to technical, so I ended up writing this lil’ anecdote.
I’m finally on my long awaited, the remaining year lasting vacation. Last week was interrupted by a short job interview in Nuremberg, and also by the flu (not “again“, I still got it in me, haven’t been able to shake it now for about three months).
Today I’m spending the night on Spiekeroog, which is a smallish island in the middle of the North Sea. It’s a real neat island, and if I would have the choice of deciding whether or not to move here for the same salary, I’d probably do it. Spiekeroog certainly does have a certain amount of flair, which I ain’t gonna deny. But it also does have it’s drawbacks.
One thing “neat” about Spiekeroog is, that it’s completely isolated from the CO² pollution. There is not a single car on the island (well, besides emergency services like police and fire/rescue) – only electric cars.
It’s located in the North Sea, so it’s exposed to the raw Atlantic weather of which I got a good taste today. When I was planning the trip a few weeks back, I allotted about 8 hours for the 400km’ish trip to Neuharlingersiel. Due to my driving “skills” ( 
others would say I do have a rather heavy foot – 170km/h or 105.6331 mph for those not able to deal with the metric system 
), I was there about two hours early. So I went eating some crab soup (which was really delicious) and then went down to the harbour, where the hotel boat was gonna pick me up. And then it started raining (as in pouring), with only about 2°C air temperature. So basically I was freezing my bollocks off.
Anyway, after eating dinner worth fifty bucks in the restaurant (well, don’t forget the expensive rose wine – which was a bit sour actually, as well as the three bucks of delicious tea) I’m now all cosy within my bed and all tucked in.
Cheerio for now!
Being back home
Jun 29th
Yessir, I’m back home. Bought a new bed (god, I forgot how good sleeping can feel) and spent the first two days at work already (yes, it’s Friday afternoon already).
I *really* thought catching up after having a 2 week vacation would take more time, but it just took yesterday morning (till ~9am). I’m surprised by the taste of black tea with milk and sugar
(yes, I was like *yikes* initially, but I like it pretty much now ) and by the ability to rise at 7am in the morning
Stuttgart
Jun 29th
On Monday I finally got to do an expanded test drive with my shiny, new car (that is driving it up from Stralsund down to Stuttgart). I really can’t complain, the fuel consumption is like I expected (~6.6l/100km while driving between 160 and 180km/h), the noise while driving that fast is quite low (as in you hear the engine but you don’t really consider it noise) and the acceleration is nearly like the one of a F1-car (at least I’d wish 
). Spent the evening relaxing from the near 950km nonstop trip (yes, only had one stop to put some fuel back into the car), had nice curry (my cousin’s husband made yummy potato curry!!!).
On Tuesday I nearly spent the whole time on a boat driving down and up the Neckar (that’s the river flowing through Baden-Wuerttemberg), being lazy, lying in the sun for 5 or 6 hours, spent time talking to my aunt and to my cousin while trying to listen to the music fluttering out of my iPod nano (“Autobahn – Linke Spur”).
On Wednesday I got up rather late, helped my aunt picking up her car from the car dealer (they had to fix the air conditioner and did the yearly inspection). Afterwards my brother and I went of to see if we could find a nice and gooood bed pour moi at Ikea in Sindelfingen (yes, I admit it .. I like IKEA too 
– which turned out rather, err, shite. I didn’t find a bed pour moi, but I picked up a couple of bookshelf’s and a 2,20m’ish CD/DVD shelf.
On Thursday, I had my complete lazy day. Woke up around 9am, went downstairs to see my brother and my cousin’s husband and his parents were already awake. Ate breakfast till 11am and sat around on the sofa for a few hours and waited till my aunt and my cousin would wake up. In the afternoon I went to see my other uncle and aunt, did some catch-up with them, played a bit with their cutie cats (they are like 9 months old). Afterwards we went shopping for some Maultaschen for my brother’s host family in Belgium/Eupen. Went onwards to see my other cousin’, his wife and his cute lil’ daughters. That was my lil’ four day vacation in Baden-Wuerrtemberg …
Vacation
Jun 17th
Here’s just a note for you people out there, how’re crazy enough and want something from me in the next week (that’s 18th till 26th June):
I’m on vacation …
Means I won’t be around to fix anything (as I’m gonna try and relax a bit), so if you encounter something that you want to fix; consult with the herd (that’s apache/hardened/kernel …) and/or fix it YOURSELF. Just make sure you don’t break it more 