new skies...

For one month I'm now living in Austria. Since the 12th of June much has changed. Leaving so many friends is a tough decision and we miss 'em all. We had good times, we had bad times in the North East and we'll always remember how it was as 3 years isn't a short time considering that we're still 'young'. So many things we did first in the UK. Working in a proper job, living in our own flats, ... And now we left. As I'm still not working again, this is one of the downsides I experience here. So I cannot really fully enjoy the new life, as I always have to check on the money.

Nevertheless there are so many things to enjoy. Firstly, of course, the weather. It's so much nicer than in the UK. It's sunny, it's hot, it's grant! Secondly, the people, I have to admit, are mostly nicer, as well. Don't want to say that there are no nice people where we've been living in the UK, there are really good people over there! But especially the youth, is much more the youth I'd like to have my children grow up with. Less riff-raff, less violence... So this is really something I already enjoy. Also the new flat is beautiful, great location, great people living in the house, as well.



Also something I really can enjoy, despite the money bit again :( Yes, money is the big player here, unfortunately. Especially as there is so much to do, and all costs lots. But hey, that's life.
The landscape is just beautiful. E.g. Lake Constance, which is beautiful, too! As you can see here:




So actually there is not much to complain about. Actually, very little. We had already friends coming over, we'll have friends coming over in the future. And we are far better located now, to visit friends in Germany. And the UK is not out of the world :)

Living under the new skies: I love it.


Soon more. Thanks to everybody!
Love.
M.

last move, complete

Hello again,

today I'm writing this blog sitting in a nice wifi cafe in Dornbirn, Austria.

The last weeks have been manic manic manic. There was plans to be made to move, lots of work to do at work and much more, which I'd like to share with you.

On the 21/05 we have been moving to Dornbirn from Chester Le Street. The decision has been made in a quite strange way. Anja just started to looking for jobs, got interviews and finally got the job (as executive assistant). And voila, the decision was made to leave the UK and move once again (and I tell you that it'll be the last move I do myself) after moving 3 times in the last 3 years. So I'm really happy to have made this step, but I'm all but motivated to go through all this again. So here we are and here we stay. Especially when I think back to the 21st of May. In order to move all our stuff, which we really didn't want to sell or throw away or any of this kind, we had to get a van. So I searched for van rentals that would provide me with a long wheel based van to rent and take out of the UK and all this for cheap. Hmm not possible. After several issues we had with this I finally found a rental company that said they would offer unlimited milage for this for a reasonable price. Being there in the morning of the 21st I was told that unlimited milage doesn't apply when taking the van out of the UK. So what the fuck... But we didn't have any other chance but to take it as it stands. So we did and have been lucky in the end as they forgot to charge us for the milage when we took the van back. So the trip started. I wasn't really used to a right wheel drive and certainly not to a huge van. But both together... good fun. So back from Newcastle to Chester Le Street and started packing. 2 stories and looooots of stuff to take. Thankfully we had great support from friends that came and helped moving all the furnitures etc downstairs into the van. After 2hrs everything was packed and we've been ready to go. The trip went really well. Thanks to Anja I was kept awake at all times and hardly got tired. So after 16hrs drive and 100s of times we had to stop for fuel (3.5l engine does consume lots of diesel if you put the pedal down). But we arrived safely without any issues in Dornbirn. There we had help from Anja's parents to unload and get everything sorted. After 2 short days I had to bring the van back. Same trip on my own. But by then I was very familiar with the car and had no issues at anytime. I was so lucky, thankful, releaved and made 3 x's when I got back to the van rental without ANY scratches and whatnot...

After this there have been 3 weeks of work and drink. Without my better half I had lots of time to spend in my favourite pub(s) and was able to re-connect to many people I have seen everyday a few years ago. Also I had to move out of the flat one week earlier than I actually left the UK. So I was lucky to get a nice appartment at a friends home. Which was just 1 minute away from the next pub :) Great stuff. Lots of time spend at friends' and at work. Obviously I had to get handover documents ready and finish off all the work that I normally would have to do in a months time. Especially as my fellow TLs have been off work and new starters had to be trained (wow was I busy).

Finally the day came 12/06 when it was all about leaving the UK for good. Main concern though was that the car (Astra 2) was in a terrible condition. Exhaust loose, radiator leaking, breaks weak and much more. So I was anticipating that this trip wouldn't go well and I might have to arrive in a rented car ;) But as soon as I arrived at Dover, I was glad and sure that the car would actually arrive. But as soon as I was to start the car again to leave the ferry (in Calais) it was considerably louder than before. Obviously the exhaust didn't like the 6hrs drive before and got even more loose than it was before. But hey, it's all about keep going. So I did. I felt the huge power loss and had to gain speed before attacking the next hill or I just was to slow down that much that even little rabbits running along would overtake me. But at least this kept me awake, it did! After another 10hrs drive I arrived in Dornbirn. Totally worn out. No power left. Well enough to say hello and give proper 'love' to my beloved ;)

Since then I was busy sorting the flat out as many things still had to be done. Installing washing machine, lamps, tv, sound system, unpack heavy stuff, sort out furnitures and whateverelse there was waiting for me to do. Now I'm finally looking for jobs as I get 'bored' not to work.

The weather is terrible here in Austria. Despite that it isn't cold it rains all the time and I was so much hoping to leave the Northeast and enjoy a proper summer here, being so close to Switzerland, Italy and the Mediteranian See. Well I'm really not lucky when it comes to this topic. But it's all grant. Hope that I'll be able to add some pictures shortly. So far the flat and the weather are both not worth taking pictures of. But this'll surely change shortly.

So I hope that everybody is good. I miss all of the good people I had to say goodbye to and was moved that so many people cried when saying goodbye.

Thanks for everything.

All my love to the beautiful people that there are in Newcastle and County Durham... the few there are ;)

move...

... we both knew that some time we'll leave good old Chester Le Street again to go forward, to feel the change, to start something new, to undergo the challenge, to learn more, to have a good nights fuck in a different place. Call it what you want - living in the same place is just not yet what we want. It has taken quite long to learn how life goes in the UK and has been great fun to do so. There have been easy parts and difficult times. Sometimes one was lucky, well sometimes not. And from the fact that I already use the past tense, it really doesn't seem so hard to say goodbye. Well is it?

There are lots of things that we'll miss.

• The cheap crappy food from iceland or Saintsburys basics that contains more grease & fat than a 20 year old fryer in a school canteen.
  
• Drunken people at 11am on a Monday morning asking for a tab.
• 12 year old girls that are about to get their 2nd child.
• Actually getting 80% of the gross pay!
• Paying Council Tax for freaking nothing.
• Teenager's dress code that causes nausea.
• Smoke free public areas and pubs.
• Pubs.
• The beautiful weather throughout the whole year that causes approx. 2353 suicide attempts a day.
  
• Absolutely ridiculously overpriced and overtaxed alcoholic drinks and tobacco.
• Being able to talk in a different language that nobody understands (so great for railing fat people) because English just give a fuck about the rest of the world. [no offense my sweet lads & lasses. I love you all]
• Good friends I got to know here!
  
• Health Care System (just pay loads and get nothing)
• Being the strange guy from overseas that can rule just about anything. (oh how self-optionated, dear me)
• Geordies.
• and many more.

But the great thing is that all the above will always stay as it is. So if we miss it too much, we just come back for a week or so and we'll be sick for sure.

Where the new place should be has been discussed for ages. Not because of the fact that we had an idea that we needed to defend against the other's but because of the fact that we didn't have an idea at all. Lots of different places have been taken into consideration:

1. California: great place / nice weather throughout the year / great to start from scratch / drug business / America / you're allowed to have guns / music & art / big cars / good chance to get an ok job - but we'd have to sell all we possess and leave everybody we know behind and travel with a couple of trolleys around the globe to move somewhere we don't really know
   
2. Barcelona: great place / hot hot hot / easy to get & move there as in EU / Mediterranean see - but it's Spain. Not that our Spanish is too bad (well it certainly was better when we've been in Spain for that long) but they don't fucking have carpets in their flats. NO CARPETS - how can they do that.
3. London: shit place (dirty) / too many people / good pay / living in a shoe box and paying a fortune for it - ahh no.
4. Germany: well, we know it already, so it's a bit boring. But there are beautiful places in the south. Just next to the border to Switzerland or Austria. Not that there is much to experience or learn new, but for us it seemed to be the best place to start a family or to get settled from where places like Spain are not too distant. Fucking Christ, once in the UK, always in the UK if you look what the ferries cost. No thanks.
   

So south Germany it'll be. We're now checking the job situation and will send out first CVs to get an idea of how hard it'll be to get a job in this estranged home country. It's for sure, we're really not into the whole Germany stuff anymore. And I can't stand films (or fillems, as we should say) that have been translated into German / or even worse German TV. Also there are so many things more expensive in G-land. More tax on pay. Electronics. Games. Food. So we have to keep the amazon.co.uk account...

I just really hope that we don't get bored in a country we have left for so long (well so long = 3 years). But that's already 1/8 of our life.

Well that's it for now - thanks for reading, if you have any advise, please comment.

Thanks.

Jazz Bar Bereich

From 11/11-17/11 my fiancé and I have been traveling again to Spain.

This time to our good friends H&F, currently living in the beautiful Marino de Sotogrande. Meeting our old friends again being good enough, even the weather has been excellent for Nov. Luckily they were able to get some time off work as well. So therefore we were able to make some trips to Estepona, Ronda, Marbella, Puerto Banus and a few trips to Gibraltar.

Some funny moments we had, including leaving roulette table in Gibraltarian Casino with 20% UP and then to realise that the car has been clamped and all winnings were spent immediately. But funniest thing was the high-class, self-made, excellent service offering, random drinks serving, home-made, laughter-causing, Jazz-music-supported, beautifully arranged, milk-and-jogurt-drinks-containing-alcohol, bar-mix-abilities, men-only-accepted (as not other wanted by women) and finally in-your-face JazzBarBereich. That was created and heavily used continiously by Hannes and me. We just couldn't stop!

Now I'm sitting at the airport and wait for our flight thinking back. It was a very nice week. And we did get the nice weather we wanted as well as to see our friends again. Though we also got to know that this area, as beautiful and wealthy it is, we are not likely to move there as it would destroy the holiday feeling we always get when being there. And we kind of miss the misserable English weather and people ;) Furthermore I have to admit that I deeply injoyed the Casino atmosphere and I'll have a try at our local Casino in Newcastle for some gambling, as well.

Downsides of this trip:

• we got a cold
• we weren't used to smoking being allowed everywhere as in pubs, casinos, restaurants, etc.
• it ended too soon

Many thanks to Hannes and Franzi for fun, shelter, food, drinks and a week off and away from routines we got sick off recently.

Hope to see you soon guys.


Please see my picasa for further pictures http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/ZyklonT
Otherwise please find some below.

THE DRUMS - ohhhhh boy :D

Ok, it finally happened! Long wanted, I finally bought an e-drumkit.

The Alesis DM6

£360 or so, can't really remember. But this provides me - and the project, which I currently plan - with what money can't buy: a drumkit... Ohhh I bought that with money.. *idiot*

Anyway, now we have all we need to get started. Well that's what I thought.

#1 setting it all up with a friend I couldn't wait to get the first tones out of it. Well bassdrum first... and nothing. OMG. This cannot be true. So all is working fine, toms, snare, cymbals, but not the BD. So we checked connections and everything. All as it should be. So I have checked out the drum computer of it the 'brain' all is set up correctly. So it must be a lose connection of the plug maybe? So ok, unscrew it and dismantle all just to see that all is connected as it should. So I want to put it back together and by accident removed one cable connection from the plug inside. OK. what a s***. So getting the soldering iron out, wait 2 min and solder it back on. Ufff. Done. So all back together and I was already Ok with brining it back to the store next day. As I see a tiny little damn switch at the back of the brain for the foot switch. And it worked. My friend and I were burst out laughing - boy are we stupid ;)

#2I decided on this drumkit, as it has easy USB connectivity and not the old MIDI system anymore. So -clever- I thought connected it to my laptop with all the recording software on and ... tada nothing happened. Brilliant I thought. 'You had to go for the newest stuff there is...' So I have been scanning the web for any fix or workaround and there was nothing at all to be found.
So the next day I have been back in store and gladly an assitant was able to do what his job description says: assist, and actually called Alesis who instantly provided him and me with a patch, which actually fixed this issue. JUHUUU. All good now.

So the plan now is to set our 2nd bedroom up as a recording studio.
Issue here the acoustic foam, I'd like to use is hell-expensive so my idea, am I not clever, is:
I'll put up a wall within the room (picture will follow) to decrease the overall size that is to be acoustically damped and viola. So this will still cost. See the litte wall in the middle of the room. This is going to be it...

Ahhh, by the way 'costs'. I found a lovely drum software that allows you to create all sorts of room effects, millions of sounds and billions of nice things to do with your drum sound. It comes with approx. 50 GB of data. AMAZING STUFF. BFD 2.

Such a nice program just comes right in time. Well unfortunately for another £200. Not jet bougth but I know me... This will come.

Anyway. The STONER PROJECT is on it's way. And will hopefully produce some good stuff shortly. I'll keep you updated. Ideas I have more than enough. And now, having all ready at home, nothing stops us. Well Ok, the on-the-wall-knocking-neighbour might. But we still have some slots, in which we can fit this is in. And hopefully the room damping will provide some insulation, too.

As said, I'll put some more picture in, when I'm at home.
So far, many thanks for reading.

Stevens RIP

The story of a Stevens

It has been bought in a terrible time. Living in between two cities, made it necessary to use some kind of transport for a young lad in East Germany. As public transport has been OK, a young boy needs something to celebrate his freedom. A moped was long bought and sold and the car this young boy was provided by his grandma was the perfect thing to be blackmailed with. Didn't I have a great grandmother. Thanks again. Well so the young boy decided to buy a new bike - push bike, of course. So he went in a shop and found this beautiful bike. It cost about £600 which was more or less all this boy had. But he bought it. He used it whenever he could. It was the freedom he needed. Well as it came, this guy moved out from this terrifying, blackmailing, lying, self-seeking family/house. Hardly any money was available cause of the expensive bike, was just bought. But this guy never regretted the purchase of this wonderful bike. It helped to get anywhere he wanted, to stay fit, to clear all thoughts wondering around in this guys mind and helped just to feel better. It has always been taken care of and was always stored safely that nobody ever touches it.

The day came when this young boy was leaving his hometown and country to study abroad. He took his bike with him. Traveling 1400 miles on a trailer, safely stored it was used then so often in order to get to work in the new town he was living. There he moved several times. The current home doesn't allow to store the bike inside the house. Despite it has been padlocked and hidden next to the bins, where normally nobody should be and see it.

Well but somebody did and fucking stole it. After many years of taking care of, it has been fucking pinched by some 12 year old, as only can be assumed. And this guy just grudges this bike anybody who took it from him.

Well you know how this guy is.
RIP my dear Stevens. You will never be forgotten!

2005 - 2009
distance: aprrox. 3000 miles
max speed: 42.6 mph (in Durham)
no hard crashes, ever.

How to be happy enough, without being happy enough

How to be happy enough, without being happy enough.

The following 'advise' is dedicated for my good friend Barry, who will shortly have to endure something, nobody wants to witness personally. All the best to you, Barry. Stay HAPPY! How? Well the following helped me quite a lot!

As we all realised our life has become quite capitalistic and materialistic. We seem to always need more: more money, a bigger flat screen, another car, etc. Maybe that is because of the 24/7 bombardment of advertisement which we receive everyday, if we want or not. Maybe we are too weak to resist or just lazy, or we actually like to have what is advertised all day and night. Anyway I’d say that we’ll get unhappy, if we don’t have what is advertised, that we are not content with our small screen TV when watching ads for a 52” plasma, that we get devastated because we cannot have all there is on TV, advertisement boards, and wherever else.

So does that mean that we shouldn’t concede? Should we be against ads and all they try to influence? Should we work without getting anything in return? Definitively not! We work hard, so we should be rewarded. But is the idea of gaining wealth with money and big TV (sorry for picking on the TV all the time, I love TVs ;) So does rewarding by buying things really make us happy? Maybe. For a short while but the glitter and shiny will soon become boring and obsolete, because it’s just an object. Having many things standing at home from Hifi, TV, consoles, self-ordering fridges, cars, amps and guitars to pool table might be impressive but it is really hard to enjoy all of that alone. So maybe having friends is the key to be happy with what you got?

Find friends for certain stuff. (I’ll get back to that later)

What about the hobb(ies). I often found myself in searching for a new hobby because the previous one was getting boring or I just wasn’t able to do it anymore (e.g. because I moved away from my friends). I suppose that you shouldn’t search for new hobbies non stop when not happy with the old one. Why not try to get back into the hobby that used to make you happy and balanced. If you’re not pleased with the old one that might be because of the following:

- not the right hobby
- nobody to share with
- no motivation left (for example all used up at work)
- unsure about hobby
- too many hobbies

Try to find one hobby at the time to avoid having pressure to follow up all your hobbies within a certain time. Again I have the very same experience. Doing too much in your free time does not actually relax you, which is the whole idea of your free time. Don't do lists for your free time activities. At work to do lists is common. In your free time your wishes what to do shouldn't be written down on a ‘to do list’. This creates pressure to achieve the list's content as it would be at work. Enjoying the actual parts of the list wouldn't be possible. You would be already thinking about the next one which needs to be done. So far we know that materialistic wealth is no must to lead to happiness. Furthermore the right hobby, shared with the right people can lead to a more positive attitude.

Be happy with what you have. We want to think positive. But if you think just for a minute if you flat would burn down with all your stuff in it what would you miss most? That's important to you.
So what I am trying to say is - learn to be happy with less. Be amazed by the little things in life, like a happy little child playing in the streets. A nice colleague at work, some nice person in the train. Being happy with less makes you want less. Meaning if your unhappy with things you might get into the buying makes happy thinking. More to buy and to posses makes happy. But is that so? I thing: No. So if other non-materialistic things enlighten your day there shouldn't be a need for a bigger TV or a new hobby?! Think the American way when it comes to celebrating success. But keep it for you, you don't want to be attacked ;) but celebrate what makes you happy to increase you happiness to a maximum.

Be unhappy if you must. Rather short and extreme than everyday a bit. Don't do stupid things to yourself though. That doesn't make things better, at all. But e.g. jogging or cycling to transform your negative feelings into energy and use it up. Again, that is far better then swallowing it down because it'll eat you up from the inside.

Do look out for happy people. Miserable people should be avoided if you're not happy yourself. Talk mainly to happy people or prolonging your chat with a positive person and keep conversation with negative people to a minimum. Listen to happy music, if that works. I personally do get sick, quite quickly, of must-make-happy-music. Do think back to times when you've been really happily and content with what you got. E.g. when you bought something that was very important to you or where you had to save for a long time before it was affordable. Now imagine that moment is now and start to use that 'thing' again imagining that it is newly bought. That'll keep down the need of buying new things because you get bored of the old stuff.

(no spell check performed, apologies for any inconvenience)