The Peter Principal

Here is a short from the holiday post, I prepared for you ;). A while ago a colleague told me about the Peter principal. Apart from being reminded of Office Space I also ended up reading about the Dilbert's principle.
Personally, I don't care which of the two principles you enjoy more but I found that the old BBC series visualises both principles quite well.
Just sit back, relax and enjoy:

Brave New World

It was an excellent idea to buy mom a UMTS surf-stick. Unfortunately, the network coverage was plainly horrible at her home. Coincidently they finally managed to install broad band internet thus we inherited the stick. Otherwise I couldn't write blog posts now ;).
I just got to know a funny tetris game I want to share with you. It's called "first person tetris". Expect something different ;)

Finished the socks

I finished the socks yesterday. The pattern is really easy and if you want try it out too you can find it here.
The pattern calls for 48 stitches but I used 64 with normal sock yarn and 2.5 needles (US 1.5).

I also invested some money in brand new needles from knitpro. Generally the needles are great but unfortunately I killed one already :(. Thus I'll visit the knitting shop this afternoon again to get new ones in exchange for the broken one.

Vegetarian food

I should take my camera with me when I go to lunch more often. I don't know why the vegetarian lunch schedule is so horrible. Some weeks ago I met the canteen's chef and we had a conversation like this:
I: If you don't mind could you introduce a vegetarian burger into the meal plan?
Chef: Why?
I: Because I really would like spend my lunch time here more often but the vegetarian schedule is scaring me off.
Chef: You make my heart cry.... Wait we had salad this week and French toast and ....
I: Yes and you had the horrible carrot celery thing too.
Chef: I'll think about the burger.
Today I had formally deep-frozen peas, corn, carrots and Brussels sprouts with pasta and Hollandaise sauce.
Maybe a look at VegCooking.com would help to find meals that are slightly more interesting than French toast and veggies with Hollandaise sauce.

A starving little blog...

First and foremost, I'm sorry for not writing anything in the past days. I was either busy preparing for university or more likely very busy relaxing or knitting.
At the moment I'm often tired, I guess it's the "week before holidays" syndrome. Apart from that I'm sick of snow. My sister send me a great picture I like to share with you:

All in all a great pre-set to pass the upcoming holidays in a skiing area, isn't it? I just hope that my mood will boost up a bit if not I have to include Jagertee or hot spiced red vine ;).
Now I'll head to my fabulous violin teacher who is excellent in expressing everything wanted or not in a figurative manner. If I'm confronted with a new picture, I'll let you know later.
I'll probably writing a new post later anyway because I have to finish my homework for my Spanish class and that's always a reason for procrastination :).

I am singing in the snow ;)

I went to work by tram and made some pictures. I had plenty of time to do so because on the one hand I was early and on the other hand the train was late too.

Since it will be snowing the whole day and night we decided to got to the Vierordtbad which is a Latin bath.
They reconstructed the original parts:

Also the bath itself is beautiful, we usually go there to enjoy the different saunas, and spa area. It will be a great contrast to the snow.

Pictures from Ischgl

The winter is still here and tomorrow I will go to work by tram. I am fed up with driving, everybody is driving as slowly as possible and the conditions are bad too. I heard a rumor that the township ran out of salt. That could be a valid explanation why the roads had been in such a bad shape today.
Here is one of my favorite pictures from Ischgl the snow monster ;)

What a day....

Somehow I come to the conclusion that February is the most boring month of the year. Well at least I feel like that. There is nothing new at the moment or nobody is writing about the new stuff. The German Federal Court of Justice came to the conclusion that the money paid for children living in on welfare is  too little. Who wouldn't have come to that conclusion, hmm?
Apart from that I encountered a new word creation by Westerwave today: "duckchiefed". Most of the time I don't get the riddles right at the first glimpse. "Duckchiefed" is a straight translation from German into English. The right word would be "beheaded". Well at least I learned a new word today.
Speaking of new words a few days ago I learned that "to gift" has a different meaning than to make a present". After posting the entry about my sisters' and the general difficulty of finding gifts for them I got an e-mail with the headline "to gift is not a verb".
I looked it up and found out that the verb "to gift" exists but it's British English and it's only used in journalism. The example was something like: "They gifted their opponents a goal." 
Thanks for the advise to check on my language. If you want to check you ideas too please use the OALD as a first point of reference ;). 
Maybe I should write about the weather, many bloggers do so at the moment :) but apart from the fact that it is gray and cold there is not much to say. Tonight after comming home from donating blood I'll take a look at at the pictures I made in Ischgl last weekend maybe they are inspiring for a new post.
Take care.

Marion's present

Since the package should have reached the destination by now I'll update you on what I sent. After writing about cheap make up my sister complained that she has no clue how to make day friendly looks. Thus I went shopping and bought her a small set eye make up to start with. I printed out some blanc face charts and designed 4 different looks to start with.

These two ones are the "natural every day" looks, she longed for. Therefore I also bought a "Alverde" eye-shadow pallet with cream and brown as colors.

To reduce my stash a bit I compiled a set for the other looks consisting of white, sparkling grey and black, light brown and mauve colored eye-shadow. The box is a self made magnetic make up pallet small enough to fit in nearly every handbag.

I really hope that the set will be loved and used ;). Maybe she will upload a new picture of herself in her blog soon. If you are disparately searching for blanc face sheets I found mine from a great how to video made by Kristina.

Boon and bane of birthday presents

Usually I don't have a clue what to gift to my sisters. They already own everything. I really like to shop clothes but I figured out that it's not a good idea to do so without the person who shall wear it ;).
During the year I sometimes find something worthwhile to gift but it usually either forgotten or was already purchased by the next birthday. To short cut this dilemma I'll send my sister Marion a gift without any reason. For the first time I know what she can use at the moment so I went shopping, wrapped it in, and I will mail it today. Here is a picture of the gifts:

I'll post what's in the packages as soon as it arrived. I also had an idea for my other sister's birthday present but she wants to have a fat free frying machine, and I thought frying is all about fat :).

The power of "thank you"

When I was a child I hated to write "thank you" cards. I guess I didn't like it because of the effort of doing so and because I didn't understand why to do so. Maybe I would have liked doing so if I understood how powerful a "thank you" can be.
First of all saying thank you means that there is something to be thankful for. Sometimes we forget that there is so much we should thank for. Last Wednesday I was quite irritated because our students thanked us for being their mentors in a university project. On the one hand that was one of the nicest gestures I ever experienced at university but on the other hand it might had been a strategy to boost the marks. In general I believe that most humans are good and thus I take the "thank you" for real.
Somehow this compliment made me think about all the things I am thankful for. Here is a summary of my personal list. I am thankful for:

• my family and their support. Everyone in our family has a certain character. Thus it can be difficult from time to time but in general we stick together.
• friends. What would we do without friends?
• health. I guess sometimes I have to learn it the hard way but today I'm convinced that health is something to be thankful for.
• the health system. Another point I learned to appreciate. Also our health system is considered to be gross it still works when needed.
• education. It's still kind of free here and with some effort everyone can make something out of his/her live.
• my job. Also strategical issues sometimes make me wonder, I like what I do at work.
• my garden. I love to see how the plants develop even if I forget to care for them. Nature is quite robust.
• you reading my blog ;).

I could fill in more but I don't want to blow up the post. I decided to have a list of that kind ready to read whenever I feel blue.

The day you find out that your house is too small.

When we moved in we had to buy furniture and after unpacking our stuff we still had plenty space for other things. That was some years ago now we are trying to put all our DVD's and Blue Rays into the same cupboards and also we are very creative with second rows etc. they don't fit anymore.
Lately I saw a nice chair I want to have but we probably don't have space for it :(.
One day, either when we moved into another house or when we got rid of stuff I'll have that chair: