in love

summer in berlin is the best thing. and i noticed how cool it can be walking through the city on your own doing things that you  always
wanted to do. and it's quite cool taking a stroll through the city when everyone else is working.

last week i went to see the body worlds exhibition at postbahnhof. i have literally wanted to see it for ages and although it was dark and a bit stuffy and the creaking of the floorboards was sometimes unbearbale i found it really cool. i knew many things before but to see the actual exhibits was an impressive experience. i liked the woman that is stepping out of a rock and kind of "undressing" her skin best. from ethical views i could hardly understand the fuss that is made. it's not as if you would realise all the time that those were actual alive human beings cause the exhibits look so artifical owed to the method they are plastinated.

yesterday i decided to finally take a boat trip on the river spree. i have been living in berlin for more than nine years now and i have not once been on a tourist boat. i got on board of summerwind at the berliner dom riverside and was greeted by the captain who asked me whether i was on my own. when i said yes he said "well, in this case you're sitting next to me." the guys on the boat were both very nice and funny and i had a really great time. the captain was maybe 60 years old and told me he was originally from rostock and grew up with boats and ships. we talked a lot about where i was from to how life was in the GDR and how the refugees tried to escape the system in the east by trying to swim the spree and how many of them got shot. he told me that in the winter when the boats are not going he's travelling. this year he's off to travel through asia. his flight is on december 27th to bangkok and "then i'll see what happens". i envy this way of life a little bit because i always need a safety net. sometimes i wish i was a little more relaxed about things. i often stand myself in the way.

after being back on shore i took a walk through mitte where i spent so much time with kay almost ten years ago and paid a visit to lush at hackescher markt. i picked my friend alex up for her lunchbreak and we sat among all the tourists in the sun eating ice cream. later i left some money at h&m and then met my friend yvonne for beer and burgers and fries. and when we were sitting at kreuzburger i told her that this day has been fantastic and that i cannot help but being so in love with berlin at the moment.

seems the dodgy work situation in my office and a part time move to darmstadt has added some spice to my relationship with the city.

the f-word (not ramsay-style)

at least six weeks went by in which he almost every day had the chance to just mention it. in a clause. like you do when you play by the rules.

it took me so much overcoming and courage to ask him whether he fancied going for a beer sometime. i wouldn't have done it had he mentioned the f-word. at least not just him and me on our own. i started to really like him and after more than six months i felt like i maybe could move forward. just a little bit. because - as astonishing it was for me - i felt he might like me too.

and then he came up to me and asked "how about the weekend?". we agreed on saturday night.

i was a bit scared we would not know what to talk about. but after a little while it started getting easy and the tension dissolved. i just sat there, smiling at him, me and the world. and then - in an answer to a just normal question - there it was: the f-word. i was stunned. i was not even able to make fun of it or get to know more. i just felt terribly embarrassed.

although the night was cool i am still angry. at myself. at him. and at the situation. and i hear b's words from two and a half years ago: "you did not honestly think that we could ever be going out together, did you?!"

please god, spare me the humiliation this time.

unspoken. yet.

with every word i write i kill the pain a little more. i will see how long i'll be able to leave the 1322 words, 6523 characters (without spaces), 7823 characters (with spaces) on my desktop. they are not in my head anymore but have not been sent to the person they were actually written for.

and again i'll find myself waiting. for the next day. for better times. for the confession. for happiness. for the one i want to be my significant other. for the definite end of the tunnel.

i'm desperate to see the sun again. but at first the clocks will be set back on sunday.

undecided

bright blue sky, a weather to escape the routine in the city. we'd almost escaped when we saw that the junction to the dogwalk place was closed. next junction: miles away. cee said: "alright then, let's go to hamburg!" in that second i was thinking about escaping completely. we had only 25 quid cash but we'd have had my credit card. cee just wore the hoody, not even a jacket. we had the dog and each other. what else could we have forgotten? fuckin nuffin, yea right.

but we didn't go to hamburg nor did we get out of germany. not to france and onto the ferry, over the channel and to good old england. it's no beer in the pub tonight. everybody is where they should be. not everybody.

the doors were not fully open today. or maybe i just pushed at an open door. it's those days you expect the best things to happen but all will be just normal. is this what puts me in this strange mood? great expectations? and when they don't fulfill i get nervous, is that right? jesus, sometimes i feel like a very sad creature.

i can't decide whether i'm happy or sad today. two days ago i said that if i must walk this long steep road i will walk it. no matter how long it takes. i will not give in, i will not stop loving and i will not stop living. today all that bugger feels rather useless.

my fingers have gotten thinner again. at least one good thing that happened today.

this strange effect

you've got this strange effect on me
and i like it

you brought me back to life. to real life. for the first time in ages i am able to feel again. you move me and touch me although you are not close to me. i cannot help looking at you and when i get aware of it i feel a bit ashamed and look the other way. your face is in front of my inner eye anyway.

i have never been short of words but i cannot think of anything i could say that would express what is going on inside me.

except for

oh god i feel for you.

being the incredible hulk

nice one, paula

everything in its right place

god what a day this has been. again. i just blame my period, i can blame it all on this. it's just fucking hormones racing around in my body causing trouble. i'm too tired i really need to sleep. but i have to try whether i can recall the lyrics of that song.

stay with me forever and a day
if i could be near you
for a lifetime i'd never want for anything
hearing your voice
is like icicles down my spine
and touching your warm skin
starts electric storms through my mind

you put a strength in me
i knew something was missing
just take me everywhere you go
this girl's in heaven

feeling this way about someone like you
couldn't be clearer or dearer
or so overdue
so sure
so pure
somewhat what i was looking for
here you are
filling up my life
my life

you put a strength in me
i knew something was missing
just take me everywhere you go
this girl's in heaven

life is light and everything around you when you ask what
everything i touch is gold
couldn't be a better place to be than just around you
no no no
no no no no no

you put a strength in me
i knew something was missing
just take me everywhere you go
this girl's in heaven

lamb - gold

i knew it by heart. i swear.

i'm so glad you know who you are.
shite. it's monday already. i'm not allowed to say thank you anymore.

w as in we / w as in wrong

the wrong one again somehow like h i never wanted that again to be scared of touching in the end i was glad when i was allowed to put my feet under his thighs when we were sitting on the sofa.

be close but not close that way i'm not like that your cuddly one i can live without a relationship can't live without feeling other peoples bodies next to mine. a touch just a slight touch to feel the other one's there i'm not asking for more is it too much asking for? get it straight sort out your feelings sort out what you really honestly want someday the right one will come someday someday can't bear hearing it anymore shut your mouths you're talking shit leave me alone.

the wrong one again in a long line of wrong ones that came and wrong ones that are still to come. got to get over this one now without destroying the good about the wrong still can't get my hands any warmer i still long for the embrace i can't help it but it's never going to be we it's only two people not matching. wrong track i'm on wrong country wrong life.

no more w's today. i'm sick of them.

i feel numb

shiver cigarettes no food can’t eat. smoking makes it worse i know don’t tell me it’s bad for me i’m all grown up i can decide for myself can i really? tea always helps a cup of tea solves every problem they say i try it doesn’t solve anything just makes me run to the toilet every ten minutes. my hands are as cold as ice don’t want to turn the heating on it’s only september it’s already september camping is over he is back everything’s changed. the good is gone the bad is here bad feelings inside me i need a warm embrace and another hot cup of tea need action not words can’t move the same sounds over and over and over i sound like mike skinner by now. where can i deliver what i don’t want and don’t need i didn’t order anything didn’t order pain my life was fine before now it’s shite feelings are a bugger noone needs them really would be better to live in a world without any just footy and beer that’d be enough work work work pub club sleep what else does one need. scaring people away good hobby has always been just painful sometimes for the others mostly for me really love the pain k says you love your bit of drama, don’t you? yea i must admit i do but not now would kill to be no drama queen just be normal and behaving no ups or downs boring but sane mature a bit dull that’s what i want to be not smart not sensitive not tempted to step into the very well known unknown it’ll never work never so i can continue boozing and smoking nobody cares but i i don’t need to look good for myself i don’t care i get wrinkles around the eyes anyways sooner or later i’ll be all wrinkly with having had no shag in ages and still having not been courageous enough to invite the good looking delivery bloke inside.

what a sad figure i am.

short black hair

i have had the worst night ever. if i slept five hours - with interruptions - it's a lot. i haven't had those pictures in my head for a while. those pictures resulting from thoughts that just won't get out of your head and just won't let you sleep. it's amazing and frightening at the same time how my whole body reacts to something happening before the inner eye. but i would rather forget what i saw last night, because i know it is still there and might very well come back in the next small hours.

when i decided to get up and make myself some tea it was only 9.45 am. which gives me some time to try to wake up properly (not going to happen really) and to be in a better mood. i really feared it would be 12 pm and i'd have to rush with a head still full of thoughts and a body craving for rest.

as i'm writing this something is very lightly tickling my arm. it's a black hair. could be from one of the dogs. not necessarily.

just in case you read this: good morning, cee.

pathetic

505 always makes me sad. it's one of the best songs arctic monkeys have ever written. i feel like something is ending right now. to be honest i did feel it a several times before but i always closed my eyes before it. j. has been giving me the shit for more than two years and i was never sick and tired enough of being dragged around, being given the shit, of biding his text or e-mail. i was so willing to believe that he could be the one i completely forgot considering that he might no be it.

i know my friends would love him. he's handsome and smart, he's funny and charming. a guy you would want to have next to you. a guy i would want to have next to me.

he did trap me again. how important is it to have the last word? can i leave it at this? is it worth fighting and giving it another go just to be disappointed again?

i don't want to play this game anymore. because at the end of the day all that matters is that you know who you want to put your arms around. it's not him anymore. or at least i'd like to think that.

stop and wait a sec
oh when you look at me like that my darling
what did you expect
i probably still adore you with your hands around my neck
or i did last time i checked

hands off of americans

in the picture that he uploaded he's leaning against a wall. crossed legs, a drumstick in his right hand. i did even forget he was a drummer. that was maybe why i fancied him. and because he was a journalist. he's wearing suit trousers, a light blue shirt and a tie. he looks like the camp version of john mcenroe.

he's a self pitying moron.

he didn't even realise that a few months ago i came and disappeared after a couple of days. i did leave no traces. i deleted every mail i sent and everything that he sent me. in his mails he didn't bother to ask about me. he just told me that a girl walked into his life and fucked it up. he is forty-something and the girl he shagged is four years younger than me.

and now - without a warning - he tries to creep back into my life. without an explaination. without an apology.

sod off, chris. and come back when you're all grown up.

the aussie

who would have thought that i would see this bloke ever again in my obscure life? omg, it was like half one in the morning and we were proper drunk!

don't fear me baby, it's just justin

ex-people on the radio

when i drove home from work on monday evening i tuned in to radio fritz. normally i listen to motor fm but there were news or a shit song, i don’t know. and on fritz there was bluemoon on, a radio talk show. the dj’s voice was somehow familiar to me, although it took me about half a minute to realise it was h. to whom i once had given my heart and soul and much much more and who never loved me the way i wanted him to. his voice sounded strange and much higher than i remembered. a question popped up in my head: „does your voice get higher when you quit smoking?“ for two or three minutes i listened to the conversation he had with the caller, then i changed the frequency. it was okay to hear him. it was so him. it didn’t hurt the whole three minutes. phew. enough for at least one year.

when i was on the way to my gp today i was feeling a bit dizzy and so not listening to what dj max spallek was saying. „generation praktikum“...„neues buch“...„zwölf stunden sind kein tag“... and after the last sentence i was wide awake and thinking „please, no.“ but it was too late. he was already announcing my not too beloved ex-fling b. who was invited into the studio to talk about his book. (i wrote about this earlier.) fortunately i was already parking my car when b. started talking in his bored sounding voice so i did not have to listen to what he was saying. i know what you think – but those things are like car accidents: you just cannot take your eyes – or in that case ears – off of it. but if it has come that far – b. is allowed to talk on the radio – it’s high time for me to leave.

p.s.: what was supposed to be the first sentence of his book became the last.

p.p.s.: of course i'm envious. of course i compare. but i'm still the better person.

guilty conscience

i don’t know what’s going on. normally i get those mood swings when i’m shortly before my period but today i’m psychially in the middle of nowhere and my period is more than two weeks away. but i feel like throwing up all the time, i cry when i look at my two slices of toast, i spill the milk for my tea because i’m shaking like a leaf. the last two and a half days i was sick in bed. my boss sent me home and as soon as i could lay down i got a temperature. i admit, i was not looking like a pretty flower but actually i don’t start crying over a bloody piece of toast.

i managed to get myself to work today although i wasn’t feeling too well. berlin tried to cheer me up – it was dressed up as london in it’s big-grey-and-fluffy-white-cloud-gown. the air was warm and the wind blew the smell of the building site next to our office right into my nose. it stank like it always does. any sirens? no? there were always sirens screaming when i was in london. oh berlin, next time you have to be better prepared to convince me.
when i arrived at the office i immediately felt sick again. i didn’t want to, it just happened. my boss was not happy to send me home again because the probably most stressful weekend is lying ahead of us, but he just said „if you’re sick, you’re sick and now you’re going home. that’s that!“

because he was mad at me for not having gotten myself checked when i was sick at home i went to my gp. and he told me i was suffering from circulation problems and low blood pressure due to the weather and the fact that i was still a bit weak from my flu. he gave me a prescription for a med against sickness and another to stabilise my circulation and handed me a sick note on top which says i should not work before tuesday. instead i should sleep much, drink much and have healthy food. and rest. no stress, please. my gp’s sweet. and funny. he makes me miss out the most fucking weekend of the year and when i told my boss he was totally unimpressed. but he sticked to what he was saying earlier, i’m not allowed anywhere near the office before tuesday. thing is: i have another two regular non-sick days off on tuesday and wednesday. and now i’m having such a guilty conscience because i feel like someone might think i did it on purpose, which of course i didn’t. could be a nice holiday, couldn’t it? for fuck’s sake, i’d rather go to work than get bored watching shit on the telly. seems this is a problem that only i have.

dreams are my reality

today i downloaded the new keane single spiralling from keanemusic.com and i can’t get it out of my head anymore. when i listen to it i feel like wanting to take a walk in the sun with j., embracing him and sliding my hands into his back pockets. this is a song i’d like to have a bath tub full of. i’d like to wrap myself up in it, close my eyes and get caressed by tom chaplin’s voice. he can make you think you’re flying. or that you’re a famous movie star. or madly in love with a bloke that - by chance - is madly in love with you, too.

now that i think about it i really like the thought of grabbing someone’s arse by putting my hand in their pocket first. just the way i like kissing someone between the shoulder blades when they are still sleeping or have just gotten up to make some coffee and you come lurking into the kitchen and cuddle up behind them.

i feel like spiralling. i wish i would be with j. but this is never ever going to happen.

when we fall in love
we’re just falling
in love with ourselves
we’re spiralling
we’re tumbling down

what a shame.

how did it come to this?

as i read in the daily mail yesterday a man has been accused of hitting a boy with a hedgehog and now faces five (!) years in jail.

jesus christ almighty. they take what they can grab.

this reminds me of 2002 when some barcelona-fans threw a pig's head at luis figo as he was on his way to take a corner kick for his at this time new club real madrid.

there are things going on humans would not possibly believe.

strange habit - back then

when i today for the second time forgot to bring a book my mate david wants to read i remembered, that it somehow got out of "fashion" to write notes on the back of your hand. when i was much younger we kind of tattooed our whole arms with ballpen writings or paintings - mostly during boring lessons at school.

anyway, i made a note on the back of my left hand, saying: buch für david. i hope it helps. i could've taken it out of the shelve yet but honestly i'm too lazy to get up again. if i don't wash too much it will stick long enough to not let him leave disappointed a third time.

eels@volksbuehne 20th february 2008

and so the story goes...

last time i saw mark oliver everett aka mr. e in concert with his band eels he was not very friendly to the fans. more than once a mocky "fuck you!" was shouted in direction of the audience.
when i went there yesterday i was quite excited, if he had turned into a "normal" person again.

the concert started with a bbc-documentary ("parallel worlds, parallel lives") about e., who was tracing the life of his father, who died when e. was 19 years old. "i remember seeing my father lying on the bed. he was fully clothed, with his glasses on and all. and i leaned over the bed and embraced him with both arms. he was completely stiff. that was the clostest i've been with my father. when he was dead."

44 year old e. starts looking for people that knew his father. people he had worked with. hugh everett III. was a quantum physicist who first proposed the many-worlds-interpretation.
as e. had never understood what his father was doing, the bbc showed him meet all those physicists and gets an explaination of the thoughts his father had. and he seems to have understood now.
the documentary takes a spin through all parts of e.'s life as well, the suicide of his sister liz, the death of his mum. it showed his quite lonely life with his dog and gave a quite intimate insight into his life.
not a bad way to start a concert, but 60 minutes were just too long.

after the film finished, the white sheet that covered the stage, was torn down and revealed a look onto at least six or seven different instruments. then e. came, sat down with his guitar and played the first song.
the first part of the concert was a bit sad, with "elizabeth on the bathroom floor" (which is abouth his sister's suicide) and "it's a motherfucker". but thank god was e. not depressive all his life and so we could hear beautiful songs such as "i like birds", "souljacker part I", "novocaine for the soul", "last stop: this town" and "flyswatter".
what impressed me most with "flyswatter" was, that in the middle of the song during a drum solo of his partner chet atkins III. (who by the way played the steel pedal, the piano, the drums, the guitar, the zither AND the musical saw) e. left the piano, went over to the drums and then first took one drumstick out of chet's hand - continuing playing - and then the other one, sat down and took over chet's part. chet meanwhile wandered to the piano, played a little, and then they changed it again. it was AMAZING!!

as e. has also written a book (things the grandchildren should know - his autobiography), chet would read some parts out, while e. would just sit there, listen and make some funny comments now and then. he even pretended to read out fan mail ("hello e. you scum, thank you for playing in perth and treating your fans like shit, you cunt!") and concert reviews (which turned out to be one of the eagles'...).
talking about other bands...after playing "novocaine for the soul", chet did a led zeppelin cover of "good times bad times" which was awesome!

including the documentary the concert was nearly three hours long (they did two encores) and was one of the coolest gigs i've ever been to. at some points it was a bit too obvoius that it's all acted but it was funny and seemed very honest.

and oh, e. seemed to have learned a new phrase just for his germany-gigs - danke schatzi!

likewise. a pleasure.

HE is the chef

seems like this blog is more about tv than about anything else, BUT i really have to go on about this subject as it's - again - about very good british tv.

you know all that cooking shows on telly? forget them.
forget johann lafer (although he's very cute with his styria-accent), forget horst lichter, forget tim maelzer.

and please forget that rubbish rach der restaurant-tester that aired on RTL. it's another bad copy of great british tv that just didn't work in germany. because you cannot replace a fucking cool chef with a pitingly looking guy whose profession by chance it is to cook. not gonna work.

a few weeks ago i discovered gordon ramsay - chef ohne gnade on DMAX and found out that it was the source material to rach der restaurant-tester. only with a funny plot, swear words and a bloody good looking chef who is verbally misbehaving all the time. the slight resemblace to dieter bohlen gets put on the backburner as soon as the scot opens his mouth. he's just cool.
the original title of the show is ramsay's kitchen nightmares which nails it. and again shows the boring translation german producers thought of for a really great programme. at least they only spoiled it halfway by only doing a voiceover and not fully synchronising it. this way you get a little bit of what everybody's originally saying.

you can watch gordon swear on thursdays at 9.15 pm (two episodes) and sundays at 11.15 pm on DMAX.

remembering chris r.

the minute i saw her face
the second i caught her eye
the minute i touched the flame
i knew it would never die

sting - saint augustine in hell

faq

i have had certain complaints that i started writing my blog in english. everyone's aking me:

are you ever going to write in german again?

whereas i ask myself:

am i ever going to live in england?

answers anyone?

bolly knockers

last thursday the life on mars spin-off ashes to ashes aired on bbc one. i loved life on mars and sam tyler who was played by wonderful john simm, so i couldn't hardly wait for it to start.

ashes to ashes moves from manchester 1973 to london 1981. this time sam tyler's psychologist d.i. alex drake gets shot in the head and goes back in time. dressed as a prostitute she wakes up on a boat where a massive drug party's going on. not much later she meets her new boss d.c.i. gene hunt who tenderly begins calling her bolly knockers.
as alex is also a profiler she has studied sam's case very thoruoghly and knows that there is a connection to the present, the real world. she tries to influence her fate in facing the man that shot her in the head, because she's hoping to break a spell and be able to go back to 2008. i'm not saying too much if i tell you that she has to stay a little longer in 1981...

i was watching it in the middle of the night because i could not sleep, and i have to admit that it was a little bit spooky. alex's hearing voices, faces quickly appear and disappear again, she's haunted by a sinister clown who she finds in her wardrobe and discovers that it was only a dream. was it?
but it was also very, very funny. the combination of heavily built gene and gorgeous and fuckingly smart alex (played by beautiful keeley hawes) creates new excitement for the audience. not to forget that d.s. chris skelton kind of grew up a bit. he's still a bit dull and still not as keen on being a copper like gene is, but he now has a girlfriend who is shy and sweet and who adores him. one is tempted to hug him and pat him on the shoulder.
in contrast to chris his partner d.c. ray carling has not changed much. he's still very sarcastic, sexist and tries to play it cool. the only thing that has changed is his hairdo: he's having a perm now.

while writing this i remember, that philip glenister (who plays gene hunt and who i secretly adore) was a guest at the chris moyles show this morning. you can listen to the interview here.

world hold on

it was 2005 when my friend franziska told me, that her friend yvonne was diagnosed with a brain tumor as big as an orange. i remember the day we went to visit her in hospital. a few days before that visit yvonne shaved her hair because she did not want it to fall out in tufts when combing it. i knew that she would be nearly bald and i had the worst imaginations of her with no hair and a big scar over her head.
but then everything was not too bad. she wore a scraf around her head and she laughed and said she was sorry if she could not answer right away because she was having a hole in her head now and the things she wants to say seem to fall in there and dissappear. i let her explain the operation to me and was quite astonished how calm she was talking about such a serious topic. she could have been dead. but she wasn't.

and nobody was expecting her to die. she was treated with chemotherapy and radiotherapy. she put off her apprenticeship to become a nurse and tried to get well again. we met at the beergarden during world cup 2006 and while we were drinking beer she would have apple spritzer, even if she was tempted to drink alcohol.
at the end of 2006 doctors found a relapse in her head where the tumor was. the cancer cells had started to grow again. this time she also was tested positive on a preliminary stage of cervical cancer. she had some of her eggs taken out and frozen, because she could not be sure if the cancer would damage her ovars.
i met her in spring 2007. she was in a chemotherapeutic cycle and often feeling sick and tired. it was a nice day, the sun was shining and i fetched her from home. she was wearing a woolen jumper to prevent her from freezing all the time. on our way to nymphenburger château park we bought ice cream. we spent almost one and a half hours in the park, watching people and i listened to the latest progress she had made in defeating the cancer.
after she had finished she asked me how i was and i told her that i was feeling very uncomfy with my studies and that tv was a bunch of shit. it's funny how your own big problems can feel so small and unimportant when you're talking to someone who has real problems. i almost apologised for telling her.
when we said goodbye i did not think that she could die. she was very, very sick, yes. she was suffering from brain cancer which is not a broken foot. but i never considered that it could end deathly. she was always too fun-loving, too alive and much too sarcastic when it came to the death-topic that i would ever have thought about her never getting well again.

yesterday franziska told me that yvonne is in extremis. in october 2007 doctors found another relapse which was growing very fast. her tumor is inoperable. it's growing into the cerebral tissue (instead of repressing it), which means that in an operation you would have to cut into the brain. one by one her brain functions will fall out and at some point there will be a cerebral haemorrhage that will cause a coma and death.

she is almost unable to speak anymore. she forgets things. she cannot understand why people are crying. franziska says she's not sure if yvonne is aware of the fact that she will die.

i don't know how it comes but again i underestimated the cancer. it is too abstract to believe or understand although i saw my father die from cancer. and there are enough people i know that had or still have cancer. it's hard to keep in mind that it is a bloody dangerous disease and that you're never never safe from getting it.

when it comes to death the absurde thing is that everything will continue. you will still laugh and cry and be hungry and shower and go to work. all people around you will act like nothing happened, cars will go, traffic lights will switch from red to green and back to red. everything will go on and on and on and act like nothing happened.
and what's left is a stupid feeling of being not worth this normal life. because there is absolutely nothing you can do.

people come and go
it's just the way of the world
love just ebbs and flows
what's left for us to rely on?

yvonne turned 28 on january 6th. her life has almost come to an end.

oh, bugger!

i think i have told nearly everybody - even the ones that are definitely not interested in the topic -

that my bike was stolen last week.

i just wanted to mention it here too, just in case i forgot to tell someone.


i'm still quite pissed off at the subject. :(