flaxx's life

in my neighborhood

2006-05-20T22:48:00.000+02:00

Deutsche Telekom, Germany's largest nationwide phone carrier, was very busy the last years getting rid of most public phone booths. Almost everyone seems to have a cell phone these days, so a few booths in heavily frequented places should do it.

When I got home the other day, I noticed they put up a public phone booth on the other side of the street. One of those modern ones you can use with either coins, prepaid cards or credit cards. This alone may not seem noteworthy. However, around the corner, they installed another one, and yesterday, yet another one even closer to my apartment, less than 200 yards away from the first one...

Could someone please explain? This goes beyond my understanding. I don't need to mention I haven't seen anyone use these phones yet.

spring is in the air

2006-04-20T02:28:00.000+02:00

Spring is in the air - tonight after work I went to a nearby park and read in the evening sun. The next days supposedly are going to be even a little warmer. It's about time, this winter has been pretty cold, with lots of snow way into March. Pretty unusual for here. There even was a tornado at the other side of town that killed two, injured some and left several blocks without electricity for hours. A co-worker of mine is still argueing with his phone company because some electronic part in his phone line was damaged and they don't seem to be in a hurry fixing it. That's been like three or four weeks ago. Considering I can't remember ever having had a tornado in town, it's rather unreal. I was sitting in a cocktail bar in the city centre that night, hiding out from the heavy rain outside, and didn't notice anything extraordinary.

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Time lapse.
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I've been doing excel stuff for several hours: I have a large project I have to present this Sunday, and that is due to be completely finished at the end of the month. By then, all bugs ("I triple guarantee...") have to be fixed and everything up and smoothly running. Got a lot done, but still enough to do for the next few days. There will be no boredom anytime soon.

But since it's already early morning, I better get some sleep before. Good night.

m.s.s.

2006-04-18T21:41:00.000+02:00

In a totally unrelated story: What happened to M.S.S. aka "Baghdad Bob"? He seems to have vanished from the world's screens after daily appereances in front of trillions of fans.

From time to time I lean back and remember the good ol' days when information was brought to us by respectable and trustworthy gentlemen. (Re-) Visit www.welovetheiraqiinformationminister.com to catch up on this. Didn't follow the story back than? Wikipedia did.

"I triple guarantee you, there is no humor within 100 miles of this site" - m.s.s., April 2006.

currently reading...

2006-04-17T23:03:00.000+02:00

...Sarum by Edward Rutherfurd, the story of the area around what is today known as Salisbury, Great Britain. The story covers roughly 7,500+ years of history including actual events and facts wrapped in fictional novel-style bits about five families. Progress so far: Stonehenge is on my agenda for tomorrow. 4,000 years to come!

the dot eu disaster

2006-04-08T11:25:00.000+02:00

Starting yesterday, the new dot eu domains could be registered. Before that, only governments, companies and people owning trade marks and the like could register. Now every eu citizen can register... I pre-registered weeks ago so that today I would be the happy owner of flak.eu... but some **§&%*#***$#~xx*** guy from Cyprus (who let them into the Union?) had more luck. Now I'm looking for alternatives.

You could ask: What do I need that domain for? Well, for nothing particular at this time - but in a few years' time, all good names may be gone and since the cost is low, why take the risk? So the answer is: Because I want to have it.

Talking of domains: This blog can also be reached using www.julianflak.info.

welcome to reality

2006-04-06T00:36:00.000+02:00

Though this blog must have seem somewhat abandoned for some time, and I also did not excel at communicating in other ways: I'm still alive and there. There's quite a bit I could tell, but for now I'll keep it to the most recent news:

I got stuck in reality, i.e. am officially out of college and now work full time for the company I've worked for as a temporary and part-time worker for the last 5.5 years. They gave me the responsibility for most of our invoicing and hr/recruiting. I like the job and team, and having been at the company for more than half of its existance, I know most everyone and feel like at the right place. If you like to check it out, I put a link on the sidebar (eventteam). Unfortunately, the page is in German only. We're Hamburg based, operating permanently in Hamburg and Berlin, sometimes in other cities all over Germany, but at this time there apparently is no need for an international version. We're expanding, so maybe a few years down the road...

The downside to it is that I don't yet have a degree, and will not have one for some time. I plan to take evening classes starting in fall at a local university of applied sciences (www.fom.de). Classes will be on Friday and Saturday, my employer seems to like the idea of having me under a permanent contract whilst at the same time allowing me to get an academic degree.

I'll keep you updated. Next post will appear shortly. Promised.

back in school

2004-10-27T22:41:00.000+02:00

This is my first week back in school...

I changed to the University of Hamburg after two years of studies at Bucerius Law School (in Hamburg as well). I didn't take too many classes there lately, and changing over was my way of getting out of the tight schedule at BLS. At UHH I can also take some classes over, which wouldn't be possible at BLS.

Anyhow, Tuesday was my first class in a long time, in a new environment. I'll have to see how everything works there, UHH seems way less structured and is permanently underfunded and overcrowded.

This semester, I'm taking only a few classes to get aquainted again, and depending on how things work out, I'm going to take some more next year.

Hooked up @ blogger

2004-10-26T01:41:00.000+02:00

Hi, hello, buenos dias, bonjour, hiya!

Let's see if and how blogger works for me, getting some updates out there...