My Addiction

I have a problem. An Addiction. And today I am going to share that with the world in hopes that I can cure myself.

I remember when I first heard of it. A friend. Mentioned it in passing. Told me I was really missing something. He told me he was really into it. He said it really got his blood pumping and I should try it. 'Just once', he said, 'you'll love it'.

That was in the US, now in Europe it came up again. A different time, different place, but the same offer. But this time it came with even more peer pressure. 'What?! You're from the states, and you haven't....I can't believe it,' proclaimed my co-worker.

The next Friday was my downfall. He approached my desk, a little box in his hand, handed me the box and said, 'It is supposed to rain this weekend, try this, you might like it.'

I opened the box on Saturday. I injected it, and 7 hours later, I was still sitting in front of the TV. Watching episode 8 of the first season of the TV show '24.'

What planet was I on when this first aired? This series is fantastic! Luckily I was sick over the weekend so my total of 11 hours over two days in front of the tube watching 24 didn't make me feel too guilty, but regardless I don't think my wife was pleased.

I heard the later seasons were not as good so maybe I won't taint myself. But for now I need to get back to the show. I'm at 1:00 pm and there are still 11 hours to go.

Accents - Why Don't They Understand

I find that working in an international environment can be a challenge with accents on the English language. Anywhere from 25- 50 percent of a conversation can be just trying to figure out exactly what was said because of difficulties with Accents. The more you work with individuals however the more you get to know how they speak and form words and it becomes easier over time.

I was thinking about this as a result of a post a friend had on his blog about accents. He found a simple test to see what kind of American accent you have. Of course I had to give it a shot.

I generally agree with the results and I am sure those who know me would also agree.

What American accent do you have? Your Result: The Inland North You may think you speak "Standard English straight out of the dictionary" but when you step away from the Great Lakes you get asked annoying questions like "Are you from Wisconsin?" or "Are you from Chicago?" Chances are you call carbonated drinks "pop."
The Midland
The Northeast
Philadelphia
The South
The West
Boston
North Central
What American accent do you have? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

A Long Week

For me it was only a 4 day work week because of the Easter Monday holiday but it feels like the week had dragged on forever.

Last night we went to the opera in Zürich. It was the first time I had been to the opera house there. It was a nice small venue. We were in the second to last row, still I was closer to the stage then I usually site in most opera houses.

We saw Cosi Fan Tutte. An Italian language opera, with German subtitles of course. I managed to read the subtitles for about the first 20 minutes and then I was just too tired. It ended up being about a 3.5 hour show, which was a little long for my taste on a week night. We ended up catching the 11:36 train back to Baden and I didn't arrive home until around midnight.

On a positive note, the Baden Burger King opened yesterday. That means I now have two options for a taste of Americana in Baden. McDonanld's is of course right across the street. There is a McDonanld's logoed trash can in front of the Burger King. It has been there since they started the renovation. I was expecting that the Burger King staff would move the trash can once the store opened but they haven't. I'll be interested to see how long that lasts.

Entertaining in Zermatt

Matterhorn in Zermatt

I have not posted for a while because we have had visitors. My wife's family is here and we have been doing things with them for the past week. The Easter weekend was the highlight with a 4 day stay in the Zermatt area for some winter fun.

I did some skiing, and got in one morning for photography. I'm glad I took the morning to shoot some photos. I wish I just would have had some more time. Instead I spent a good portion of the time skiing which was just as fun.

More photos to follow....

Skiiing Yesterday, Taxes Today

This weekend I am a bachelor. My wife and her sister took a trip to Milan to so some 'Shopping'. I find that funny. My wife being as thrifty as she is would probably have a hard time even coming back with a pair of socks. I can't wait to see what she 'buys'.

Since I had the apartment and the weekend to myself I used the opportunity yesterday to going skiing at Flumserberg. I spent about 3 and a half hours on the slopes with a 30 minute lunch break before I was completely drained. The last run down it really felt like my legs were barely holding me up. That is when I decided it was time to go home. I would have loved to have stayed longer but I didn't want to hurt myself since we have a another ski weekend coming up.

Changing topics to taxes. It is the time of the year to prepare tax returns. As a US citizen I have the pleasure of preparing my taxes twice. Once in Switzerland and once in the US. Since this is the second year I am doing this (and since I use a tax service if both the US and Switzerland) I thought this year would be easier. And it was, just a bit, but it is still a major pain.

As an example both tax preparation companies ask for the same information in totally different formats. So while this year I had been collecting all the necessary documentation, I still spend the better part of 2 working days entering information into their crazy websites, and excel sheets.

A comment about accounting firms and teh application user interfaces. Accounting firms have a fabulous way of making user interfaces terrible. They are so interested in getting the information that they forget that regular people have to use these applications they build, and the applications stink.

A perfect example, one of the tax companies sent an Excel worksheet to fill out. It wasn't really excel but rather a full fledged custom built application based on excel. I am sure it had thousands, if not 10's of thousands of lines of code behind it, and it was sooooooooo sloooooooow. The file iteself would take sometimes 2 to 3 minutes to open on my computer. Now my computer is about 2 years old, but a 3.5 Mb file should not take 2 to 3 minutes to open. Or how about the 5 minutes it seems to take to save the file. The thing is so customized and bloated, and I barely put any data in the thing. I put more data in excel when I try to draw up a quick household budget.

So be greatful if you are living at home and only have to do taxes once. For me, I'm going to celebrate the completion of my second set of taxes today. Maybe I'll have one of those German beers I've been saving from Waldshut with my burger tonight.

When Advertising Goes To Far

Advertsing on a Shirt Collar

Okay, I've seen it all. I was watching hockey this evening on the the Swiss National TV station SF1. During the 2nd intermission there was an intermission with some interviews and this guy comes on with something on his shirt collar.

A closer look reveals that the yellow thing is an ad for a bank and I'm not sure what the blue sticker is for. He looks ridiculous.

The guy has a terrible German accent too. His German sounds as if he is a Canadian trying to do Swiss play-by-play. He surely isn't a native speaker and he doesn't look 'swiss' at all. I wonder where he is from.

Where Did You Find Those Cheerios?

Last night I have a dream about Cheerios. Cheerios are by far my favorite cereal. I love them. When I was a kid my mother use to buy only generic cereals. In most cases I really didn't care, crispy rice and Rice Krispies, Raisin Bran, and bran flakes with raisins, same difference. However Cheerios and tasty ohs are not the same. There is something about General Mills Brand Cheerios that can not be imitated.

I used to have long arguments with my mother about this but she still hasn't come around. To this day she likes to taunt me with this by telling me that when she has grandkids she'll buy them all the Cheerios they want.

We'll it has been a while since I've had Cheerios. Since January 9th to be exact. And I've got a craving. Last night I had a bizarre dream that someone in Switzerland and finally found a store that sold Cheerios. The told me the name of the store but it was some strange long foreign name and I couldn't understand and didn't know where to find it. The rest of the dream I was frantically trying to figure out where I could get my Cheerio fix.

I woke up this morning and thought about my emergency cabinet of American food. I have one box of Cheerios left. I was really saving the box for the end of the world. But, I think that time might be coming. I find myself itching to rip open the box. Lets see if I can hold off or if I'll break into it this week.

Excited to Go to the Dentist

We got a letter in the mail recently from the dentist that has an office below us. He was inviting us to stop in. Now you may think this was a piece of junk mail to get more patients, and on one hand it was, but on the other it was something like I had never seen before.

The Doctor and his team were inviting us to an 'open house' of their newly renovated practice. The event was billed as a 'website launch' and 'Art Exhibition'.

Now how these go together I was not sure until we arrived. It turns out the doctor was launching his new website (complete with new branding) and he had redecorated his practice with all of his own artwork, mostly pencil drawings and paintings. We only discovered that that Doc was the artist after we started talking to him (in German) at the event.

This explained the strange front picture on the invitation, a pair of mushrooms and an onion. I didn't quite get how this matched with the concept of dentist, but know I understand that it was some of his own work.

The event was not like anything I had been too before. In the foyer in front of the elevator he had tables set up with food and deserts. There was also a 'bar' where you could get a drink (including a small selection of wines.) When we arrived there were a few others in the foyer speaking Swiss German. I couldn't really understand much but we grabbed a few snacks and then headed into the office for the tour.

The office was the cleanest dentists office I had ever seen. All the office and visitation rooms were open so you could walk in and check out the various equipment. It almost felt like a house tour, except, well, there was a strange drill and x-ray machine next to the recliner in the living room.

We spoke to the Doc for a bit and he was very animated and explained everything to us including his art. He showed us his website as well. At one point we were asked to participate in a 'video' of some of the attendees speaking to the Doc. If I understood correctly it may be posted on his website. That will be funny. Me and the wife, quietly nodding a smiling, acting like we understand. God, I hope that doesn't make the website.

I guess the best take away from the event is that while I'm reclining in the chair in my living room, I can think about those poor patients in the recliner right underneath me getting their 'microsurgery.'

Athens Flea Market, Potbelly Tanning

Athens Flea Market

I love flea markets because of the wide range of people there. Flea markets are the best places in the world to people watch. I love to find a corner of the flea market and just lean against the wall and watch the people go by.

These are just a few of the many strange photos I captured while wandering around the flea market. Nothing like a German army helmet to keep the sun off your head.

Boats at Aegina

Port on the island of Aegina just before sunset



Last Saturday we took a fast boat from Athens to the island of Aegina. The 17 mile boat trip takes about 40 minutes in a flying dolphin hydrofoil boat. The island is famous for among other things the pistachio.

The boat trip was interesting, it was packed with a bunch of American tourists. They looked to be of college age. One was wearing a hat from my alma mater. Among all the greek it was nice to hear a little english.

We spent the better part of about five hours touring the small costal town visiting a archaeological site (pile o' rocks) at one end of town. And sitting on the sandy beach at the other end.

We stopped at a ocean front resturant for lunch and had a table right on the waters edge. One thing that I find interesting about greece is the number of stray dogs there. As an example we were eating lunch at our ocean front table and a dog walked right up to the table next to us and lifted a leg. Luckily no one was at the table.

The one thing I was annoyed by at all of the outdoor resturants during our stay were the vendors walking around. The most popular 'entrepreneurs' walk around with stacks of pirated CDs and DVDs they probably copied and burned at home. They will walk right up to your table and ask you if you want to buy something. The resturant owners don't even try to stop them and it one meal you might be bothered 5 to 10 times.

Returning Home to Swiss Culture

I have been out of town for the last week or so. I had a business trip to attend a conference in Athens and we decided to go a few days early to spend a long weekend in Athens as long as I had to be there. I'll post some pictures and share more stories about the weekend but for now I am tired but I wanted to make sure I wrote about my homecoming.

I was on the train platform in the Zürich airport station. The train had just pulled in. About 6 or 8 people piled out with their bags and then there was a brief pause in out coming passengers. Of course like true swiss we all began to push our way in the train. Just as I was getting on I noticed that one woman was still trying to get off. Of course the guy in front of me didn't even try to step aside and he basically ran her over, knocking her suitcases over and not even apologizing.

I felt sorry for the woman and then she started complaining in heavy accented English that the people were so rude. I turned to her and said 'They are not rude, they are Swiss.' I don't think she liked my humor.

Funny or not this type of behavior does not seem rude to a Swiss, it's just the way things are done.