Friday 25 December 2015

M&M: Home Alone

Dear reader,

most of you will already know Home Alone from the year 1990 with Macaulay Culkin, one of the child actors of all time. If no, go watch it. If you missed it yesterday, there's a repeat this afternoon, much like every Christmas. (At least this applies to the German television program.)

Kevin begins rather pitiful. He's the youngest of an extended family and is either ignored or gets riled up. The older siblings don't even grant him a piece of cheese pizza! When he gets attention, then it's in a bad way, at least for the others. While the mother is totally annoyed with Kevin, sending him to the attic, Kevin wishes some quiet time from the others before the Christmas days.

When he comes down from the attic the next day, he finds that his wish was granted. In the haste of the departure for the holidays in the early morning, the others totally forgot about him up in the attic and he's home alone. Naturally this is like an invitation to make just everything he was never allowed. Eating ice cream as much as he wants, also his beloved cheese pizza, without sharing it with anybody at all. But things like doing the laundry, and the washing machine is in the basement, together with the scary heating boiler and shopping has to be done as well. Kevin manages being brave and clever. Just like when Kevin meets an elderly neighbour, he has to pull himself together a bit so he doesn't ran away in panic. But since he's alone now, he can't afford avoiding everything and running away.

But his cheese pizza order already hints that Kevin is by far not a little angle. He scares away the deliverer away in such a way that he runs away and is actually scared for his life!

Cleverly wrapped as a comedy, the viewer hardly notices just how sadistic (yes, sadistic) Kevin already is with his 8 years. He shows absolutely no compassion, but is full of creativity and a high rate of malicious glee, when he protects his home from “wet bandits” Harry (Joe Pesci) and Marv (Daniel Stern) towards the end of the movie. The two burglars against Kevin are almost like a real-life Tom & Jerry. Like Tom & Jerry, Kevin's traps against the “wet bandits” are pure comedy and you better don't think at all about what such injuries would do in real life. An interesting article with assessment of the injuries by a doctor can be read at The Week.

“Home Alone” is a very strange movie. It shows the experiences of a boy, who days before Christmas, the celebration of family and love, is simply forgotten by his own family and has great fun, as he protects his home in the most brutal ways. If you look at it like this, that's basically a movie in all points a movie that can ever get you in the mood for celebration of love and yet... and yet it manages just that every time, at least for me. Who of you, at the time of screening, is not busy with your own family, should go and certainly treat yourself with this movie. Although made for children, it's also a nice entertainment for adults as well.

Until next blog,
sarah

Thursday 24 December 2015

Headless Christmas!

Dear reader,

all right, I know that Christmas is at a bad time this year. For us at least, you can go shopping up until 2 p.m. on the 24th though. Friday and Saturday then are Christmas Day and Boxing Day and the next “normal” day is stupidly a Sunday. Which, in my humble opinion, doesn't explain or justify the panic buying, some certain people are currently doing. While I was standing in line at the cash register for lettuce for my guinea pigs, I overheard the female cashier at the cash register next to me, tell a buyer that they are actually out of some stuff even at the headquarters, because certain things were bought so often. While some people were speaking of shopping “like for a war time”, others were talking of shopping like for a nuclear blast that was ahead. In any case totally insane. Yes, there are some holidays and most people probably have visitors coming over and are cooking a couple of courses, rather than the usual single meal plus maybe a small starter and/or dessert. And yet...

On the way back from shopping I came past a house where a group of people were going back and forth between the car and the house entrance. In the hallway I could see four six-packs of water. After I told that to a friend of mine, he suggested, I should have asked what they need all that water for. Even if one partied three days straight with 30 people, I could hardly imagine them drinking all that water up.
 
By the way: a Christmas hat I searched for on the 24th for in about six or so shops, including toy shops and as well as variety stores, turned out to be utterly unsuccessful. Christmas hats were of course sold out.

May we all survive the long four days without possibility of shopping head of us! Merry headless Christmas to you all! ;-)

What kind of shopping experiences before Christmas or on Boxing day did you have this year?
Until next blog,
sarah

Saturday 19 December 2015

Fortune cookies

Dear reader,

I'm always at certain friends on New Year's Eve and I always like to get a small present with me for that circumstance. Now I always get a bunch of glow lights and the year before last and the year before that I had made caramelised nuts. Years before that I once thought I could make fortune cookies myself. Judging from the pure recipe, they're relatively easy to make. My sister, who is more experienced with baking, helped me dividing egg white and yolk as well as getting the cookies on the sheets and removing them. The really difficult part with that is that you have to work fast, because the dough on the one hand has to be baked to a certain degree to be able to shape the circles you put on the sheet to their typical fortune cookie shape and of course you've got to put the slip of paper in as well. On the other hand the fresh cookies, when they come right out of the oven are of course very hot and if you wait for too long, they get hard and you can't quite shape them anymore.
I don't remember anymore which recipe I actually had used, but the following one from allrecipes.com is an example of how it's typically done. I spare me copying the recipe here and just give you the link instead:

I'd suggest looking up the fortunes ahead of everything else and either writing them by hand or on your computer and printing and cutting them out. I forgot which fortunes I used. I'm certain there are many pages with fortunes for fortune cookies to be found with your preferred search engines. Just look for fortunes that you like best.
I still have a small note on my cookies though: of course I wanted to make a test run (or rather test baking) before my visit with the friends. So I made a few cookies just for us as family, but already with the fortunes in the cookies. So I had a small bowl with cookies sitting in the living-room and my father, who didn't know about the cookies, saw them and put one whole one as it was in his mouth. I cried out in horror that there was a slip of paper in! He fumbled with his finger to get the paper out of his mouth and threw it in the waste without a further glance on the paper. After that experience I told the friends and everyone, who grabbed one of the cookies on New Year's Eve, that they have a slip of paper in them. Contrary to my father, the friends took it for granted and ate the cookie accordingly with caution. ;-)

Until next blog,
sarah

Saturday 28 November 2015

M&M: The Kingdom

Dear reader,

The Kingdom is a movie from the year 2008. Whether a movie is good or bad is certainly always also a matter of taste. I found this movie, because I like the composer Danny Elfman, who wrote the soundtrack for this movie. More about the soundtrack below.
I don't find the movie as such particularly good, actually rather bad. It's been a long time since I've seen it and I had forgotten most of what happens at first, so I had to read up on some of the things. Why am I writing about the movie, if I didn't like it? At the end of the movie, two characters make a statement, which shows very clearly the absurdity of war. What they said was, at that moment, scarier and more frightening than any thinkable war scene. But let's start at the beginning. This is what the movie is about:
As an introduction certain key moments between Saudi-Arabia and their relationship with America are shown in a quick walk through history from 1932 up until the attacks from September, 11 2001.

The actual story of starts with a softball game of Americans in Riad, where a terror attack happens and Americans get killed. A female FBI agent gets note during a conference that her friend is among the dead Americans. A colleague whispers something into her ear, which makes her calm down. The two of them and other FBI agents go to Riad, to investigate the circumstances and to find the people involved in the attack. Towards the end of the movie the group gets in an ambush and one of them is kidnapped. The others follow the kidnappers to an abandoned house, where the showdown takes place. A grandfather is present on the side of the Saudi people and he gets a fatal wound. He whispers something into his grandson's ear. The case is closed for the FBI and they go back to America. One of them in the group asks his colleague and the woman, what he had whispered back at the conference. Meanwhile the aunt of the Saudis asks her nephew, what his grandfather had whispered into his ear before his death.
Caution: If you want to see the movie, you should make your own choice whether or not to read what they whispered.


Both of them reply with: “Don't fear them. We are going to kill them all.”

The way I see it, The Kingdom is a rather typical, American war movie. I personally agree with the negative critics that (once again) Americans celebrate themselves with with movie and lots of action and Islamic people, like so many times recently in real life as well as in movies, are used as representation of evil. There are exceptions in The Kingdom, but they are, in my opinion, almost meaningless. Americans are the greatest and Islam and Islamic people are the enemies. I find that very sad, unnecessary and needless in the end. That was the case back then when I watched it already and in sight of the current conflicts, in which America (once again) is involved, even more so. I watched the movie once, because I wanted to sort of see the pictures to the soundtrack and the last line impressed me a lot. It's the meaninglessness of war in a nutshell in a very good way, for me anyway.
A few final words now about the soundtrack: Danny Elfman is mostly known for his collaboration with Tim Burton and his movies. The soundtrack here is very different. Very electronic, mostly simply to be called loud pieces alternate with calm (electric) guitar sounds. The latter has much more melody and structure. A very unusual mix, which one would probably not necessarily listen to a lot. The electronic tracks fit probably mainly with the movie, than for listening to them just like that. The guitar tracks remind me personally a bit in their way they are of the soundtrack of “Thelma & Louise” by Hans Zimmer.
Until next blog,

sarah

Wednesday 18 November 2015

A probably valueless statement

Dear reader,

I've been thinking for quite a while now about ordering a certain t-shirt on amazon. Years ago I've read a book which was set partly in the time of the Vietnam war. There were accordingly protests and I read for the first time the phrase “Fight for freedom is like fucking for virginity”. I liked that phrase, because it reflects the absurdity of war. Especially with the current wars now, a t-shirt with that phrase seemed a good idea to me. Granted, if t-shirts with phrases would stop wars or could change anything, that would be more than fine. I am aware that a t-shirt like that is meaningless in the end. On the same night when the attacks in Paris had happened, I checked amazon nonetheless and found the following one and as you can see, I've received it, too. Be patient about the picture of me. I rarely make selfies and it's even rarer I use delayed-action shutter release. I bought the t-shirt on the German amazon website and will give you the link to it below. I will also link you to the American amazon website for a similar t-shirt, if you like to buy it. The American amazon website doesn't sell the exact one I have. It's not exactly the phrase I have read, but it's close enough. Because the t-shirt reads: “Bombing for peace is like fucking for virginity.”

Thinking about sense and senselessness of certain actions, I keep thinking about the following statement by the writer and political activist Ward Churchill, although it seems maybe somewhat contradicting the t-shirt phrase:

"What I want is for civilization to stop killing my people's children. If that can be accomplished peacefully, I will be glad. If signing a petition will get those in power to stop killing Indian children, I will put my name at the top of the list. If marching in a protest will do it, I'll walk as far as you want. If holding a candle will do it, I'll hold two. If singing protest songs will do it, I'll sing whatever songs you want me to sing. If living simply will do it, I will live extremely simply. If voting will do it, I'll vote. But all of those things are allowed by those in power, and none of those things will ever stop those in power from killing Indian children. They never have, and they never will. Given that my people's children are being killed, you have no grounds to complain at whatever means I use to protect the lives of my people's children. And I will do whatever it takes."

Until next blog,
sarah


did it with delayed-action shutter release, so be patient judging the photo

similar t-shirt on amazon.com and my t-shirt on the German amazon (sadly not available exactly like that on amazon.com)

Friday 6 November 2015

Pumpkin jam

Dear reader,

while most people I know dart for pumpkins for pumpkin soup, I prefer another way and make pumpkin jam. It's super easy, super fast and super tasty!

Ingredients:
1 butternut pumpkin (some also call it “squash”)
1 pack of 500 g jam sugar/jellying sugar
2-4 cups of water
additional ingredients you like

You'll also need a hand-held blender.

Many use a hokkaido pumpkin for pumpkin soup. I used it to make the jam last year. It's working, but I find that the hokkaido is tough and inconvenient. I therefore recommend the butternut/squash, which is softer and longer in shape. Advantage with the butternut is also that the seeds and fibres are only at the bottom part of it, whereas the hokkaido has the seeds and fibres “eveywhere”, because it's rounder.

By the way: both pumpkins have a bark that can be cooked and is edible! Although I'd suggest that if you do something else other than the jam, it may be good to peal the bark and cook it a bit earlier than the rest, which is softer and will take less time to cook.

1.) Cut the pumpkin in half and take the seeds and fibres out. I like to take a table spoon for that. Cut the two halves once again and than those halves again as well. So all in all three times cutting in halves. Divide the slices into smaller pieces to get square bits. They don't have to be small, thin squares. But keep in mind: the smaller the pieces, the softer they will be after they're cooked. So cut them not too big, but also not too tiny.

2.) Put the cut pumpkin pieces in a large pot with a few cups of water. Don't measure the cups as such, the water is just there so the pumpkin is softer faster. So it doesn't have to be exact cups. Cook it until it's boiling and then set a timer for 10 minutes. Stir every now and then. Put the lid of the pot on top, if you like. That's optional.

3.) When the 10 minutes are over, take the pot off the stove and blend the pumpkin pieces with the blender. If you like, you can keep some of the pieces, of course.

4.) After that, put the pot back on the stove. Add the jam sugar/jellying sugar and keep stirring while it's heating up again. Stirring is important. Otherwise the sugar will either burn your pot or the jam. Feel free to set the stove on maximum at first. But the jam will be thick liquid and towards the end it may produce bursting bubbles. So it may be better to set the stove back a bit then. When the jam is bubbling evenly, set the timer for 5 minutes.

When the minutes are over, fill the jam in jars. Alternatively you can (carefully!) add a bit of cinnamon for the taste. It's easy to add too much cinnamon. So be careful and take only a little bit at a time and keep tasting it. You could also add pieces of apples or grate one apple or add a glass of apple sauce when cooking the pumpkin pieces the first time or whatever else that comes to you mind.

As you can see: the jam needs only 10 + 5 minutes of cooking time. Once the pumpkin is cut into pieces, the most time-consuming part of the recipe is done already. The jam is something like a 15-minutes-jam.
American recipes on the internet take white granulated sugar instead of jam sugar/jellying sugar, depending on the taste either in the same amount of what the cut pumpkin pieces weigh or a bit less sugar. I only made it with the jam sugar/jellying sugar so far.

Have you made pumpkin jam already? And if so, how did you make it?

Until next blog,
sarah

Saturday 31 October 2015

M&M: The Devil's Backbone

Dear reader,

The Devil's Backbone from the year 2001 is another great movie by Guillermo del Toro. It's sort of the first part of Pan's Labyrinth, which I already wrote about. I saw Pan's Labyrinth first, so that's why I wrote about it “in reverse”, even though The Devil's Backbone came first. While Pan's Labyrinth was set shortly after the Spanish civil war (1936-1939), The Devil's Backbone is set in the time of the Spanish civil war.

The movie tells the story of Carlos, who arrives at an orphanage, which is far away from the city. He befriends some of the boys and learns that there's a ghost haunting the orphanage. The orphanage is led by Dr. Casares and Carmen. Both are Republican loyalists and keep gold for the Republicans. Jacinto working at the orphanage and was raised there. Now he wants the gold.

Over the course of the movie, we learn that Jacinto wanted to take the gold once before already, but one of the boys, Santi, caught him. Jacinto pushed Santi so hard that Santi fell and hit his head very much. To hide this act, Jacinto takes rocks and binds them to the body of the dying boy and throws him into a supply pool of the orphanage.

When the war comes nearer to the orphanage, Dr. Casares and Carmen decide to leave the orphanage with the children and the gold. Jacinto, who wanted to take the gold again, is chased away shortly before that. He comes back though and wants revenge by spreading petrol (gas) in the kitchen and setting it on fire. This leads to a big explosion in which some of the children as well as Carmen die. Dr. Casares is also injured and dies a short time later.

Jacinto comes back the next day for the gold. But the surviving children show a great amount courage and ingenuity, similar to Pan's Labyrinth, and fight against the adults. How and if they manage it, you'll have to see for yourself.

Much like in Pan's Labyrinth, The Devil's Backbone is created in a visually very beautiful way, I find. Although Santi is a ghost in the orphanage, I wouldn't say that The Devil's Backbone is a ghost movie. For me, strange as it may sound, it's more a movie with a ghost than a ghost movie. The ghost in his appearance is somewhat resembling a zombie with its slow an, awkward looking movements. He's got very little of the otherwise typical soft coloured see-through features of ghosts, but has dark colours instead and blood is still streaming from his head-wound in a sort of cloud of steam. Although a ghost is not a solid figure and, in theory, could not harm a person, his looks and manners appear somewhat scary and menacing. This only changes when it's obvious that he isn't dangerous deep down. A refreshingly different ghost from what I'm used to otherwise. And anyway: who or what is a ghost? What is a ghost outside the traditional literature or movies? That's a question which The Devil's Backbone is about.

The Devil's Backbone is all around a rather quiet horror movie and is more about atmosphere than effects. Fans of pools of blood and slasher movies will probably be disappointed. The very real horror doesn't come from the ghost, but from individual adults and because of the war. This is seen in similar ways later in Pan's Labyrinth.

To stay with the subject of the movie: what's the meaning of a ghost for you? Write that to me in the comments, if you like.

Until next blog,
sarah

Wednesday 21 October 2015

Apophis

Dear reader,

Apophis is a near-Earth asteroid, which was discovered in the year 2004, in which it caused quite a fuss. At first it was assumed that it would get very close to the Earth. Now more data is known about it and the fly path was determined more precisely. The probability of a collision with the Earth is very, very slim to rather unlikely.

You may wonder now, when Apophis will come so dangerously or un-dangerously near? According to current calculations, it's going to be on April, 13 2029. Don't laugh, when I'm going to tell you which day of the week it's going to be: in all seriousness, it's a Friday, the 13th.

As a child, naturally I've been sceptical about Friday, 13th and bad things happening on those days. But when I was in primary school (elementary school, for my American readers), we had a rehearsal on a Friday, 13th, for a play of our recorder group and the rehearsal went without any problems. So I lost my fears about this specific day at a quite early age.

What could happen, if the asteroid does in fact come too close to the Earth or does in fact hit it? Well, that depends on the entry angle and the area of impact. If it's going to go down in deep water, we should expect high tsunamis. Although the asteroid has definitely potential to cause certain damage, should it hit the Earth, it's not expected to be a global catastrophe. Like I said, current status is that there's not going to be a collision anyway. I guess we'll literally have to wait and see what's going to happen on Friday, 13th 2029.

Until next blog,
sarah

Tuesday 6 October 2015

Faster reading

Dear reader,

some readers have been more or less waiting for this entry. I hope I can finally help you now. I think that there is no “the one” method, to read fast or faster. With this entry I'd like to share with you some thoughts and introduce you to different approaches.

Some claim that it takes longer to form words with the mouth than to just see them with the eyes. I don't necessarily mean reading out loud with this. Also the unconscious forming of words in your head take time.

Generally you should have in mind what you want with the text and what you want to read it for. I have my own method to read fast and created it out of different ideas and suggestions. I don't know certain scientific words or expressions for kinds of reading. I only want to share ideas that helped me.

At university we had a seminar about working scientifically, in which the teacher told us that we should first check the headlines of a text for a first broad overview. Of course with books the table of contents is naturally helping with that. (With scientific texts or non-fictional writing, I realised that a look at the last pages or respectively lines of the text helps as well. Most good non-fictional books and scientific books anyway, have a list of references, where you can see how up to date the used literature is now. Depending on the topic I also like to check if certain authors and their works have found their way in or not.) The next good advice was, that the text immediately at the pictures or graphs talk about them. So you could skip that text and just look at the pictures and graphs and work them out on your own.

How much do you trust your unconscious to help you with reading and being useful? Maybe you know the following study already:


Depending on how well you are with reading, it's easier or harder to unrevel this “letter salad” of the study and reading it so it makes sense. Texts are generally not a letter salad like that and so it's easier to take those in then. At first it will be unfamiliar, but with experience you'll take in more and will be able to take in the words faster.

Maybe it was similar for you as it was at my primary school (“elementary school” for American readers). We were told to put our finger under the line respectively word we were just reading. For my method to read faster I use the bookmark turn it horizontally under the line I'm currently reading to go through it faster and not jump lines.

Some suggest to read a certain part of the beginning of a line and a part at the end of the line. Our brain would be able to sort of think up the middle part of it. Whether or not it's true, I don't know. My thought about this would be that with this method, I'd jump too much with my eyes. Namely from the beginning to the end to the beginning to the end of lines. My feeling tells me that a calmer movement of the eyes would be more comfortable for me.

The magician Derren Brown had a series years ago called “Trick or Treat”, in which he gave the applicants a blind choice between a positive experience (trick) or a darker one (treat). Glen Brighton is an ordinary man, who enjoys taking part in pub quizzes. Derren Brown signed him up for a certain one and wanted to prepare Brighton to make the first place. That means, he has to read a lot and take knowledge in at a very short and liminted time. For this Derren Brown lets him make a hand to a fist and then stretch out the index finger and pinky. Glen Brighton is only to concentrate on the area between the outstretched fingers. I personally favour that sort of eye movement down the middle part of a text, instead of concentrating on the beginning and end of a line. Also it's probably more text to sense and take in that way.

If you're interested in that episode: part 1, about 10 minutes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycHhiv5g_8k and part 2, also about 10 minutes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DcVCrALes58.

I often use my bookmark in the way described above to stay in the line I'm reading and not explicitly reading every single word when going along that line with my eyes. It's not reading as such, more a visually taking in the words with the eyes. I guarantee you, that this method alone will make you take in faster. Trust that you don't need to read every single word exactly, to understand the content. You will notice individual important words anyway. Trust that you don't need every single detail, to understand the whole. Much like language teachers at school talk about not needing to understand every single word in a foreign language text or film. Start slow. Use the bookmark, like I do or to start with use your finger for individual words. Go through the line in a constant speed and take in the words without reading exactly.

If you need or want specific information from a text, be aware of the words. Have an image of the word in your head. And then it's like with those crosswords where there is seemingly letter salad in a square (German: Quadrat) and you are to find given words horizontally or vertically or whichever way. If you need to find the word “dog”, you don't need to go through every line looking for “dog... dog... dog...”, but look for “d” and if you've found a “d”, look around it for an “o”. If that's not the case, go to the next “d”. If it's got an “o”, look if it's followed by a “g”. That's quick, because it's just a square Quadrat with few letters.

For a longer text with sentences, it certainly makes more sense to search “bigger”. I'm quite certain that if you were to look for a capital letter “q” in the paragraph above, the word “Quadrat” will literally jump at you, even just roughly scanning the paragraph. Check that paragraph and trust your unconscious with that. The capital letter “Q” is an unusual enough word within a sentence, even in English where “q” is generally a more common letter than in German. But even if you're looking for a less unusual “c”, like for example in “crosswords”, you will find it within that paragraph. All you have to do is to have in mind what the “c” looks like. Have an image of the small letter “c” in your mind and do an image search. With a bit of exercise in this, you can also search unknown texts for information, even if it's not precisely in your head and irrelevant words vanish from your conscious perception. That happens quite automatically, just like when sometimes sometimes a word is written twice within a text, and when you read it unconsciously, you don't notice, only when someone points it out to you. Or did you notice that I wrote the word “sometimes” twice in the previous sentence? If you want, write that in the comments or also if those suggestions helped you.

Until next blog,
sarah

Wednesday 30 September 2015

M&M: Wag the Dog

Dear reader,

especially with the crises and wars of the past months in several regions, we should, in my opinion, be more sceptical about the reports we believe and think how much and what to believe. Granted, the movie “Wag the Dog” from the year 1997 with Robert de Niro and Dustin Hoffman is satire and meant for entertainment. Maybe there's still a bit of truth in there also and could as well change your view of reporting and make you see it in a new light.

Imagine if you will that you're in America and it's shortly before a presidential election. Of course the current president wants to be president again. But suddenly he gets accused of having sexually harassed an under-age student. How could one lead the people away from this scandal? Conrad Brean (played by Robert de Niro) has an idea: a story, which leads to even more talking than a sex scandal would, which is a war. A war against which country though? Well, how much do you know about Albania? Probably as much as I do: which is nothing. So why not use this lack of knowledge and spread the rumour that America is at war against Albania. In a studio, with the help of Stanley Motss (played by Dustin Hoffman) some staged eyes witness reports are produced and get spread and the conflict with Albania is out on the news.

The CIA hears that the conflict is faked, and they go and have a serious talk with Brean, but he manages to talk himself out of it and save his own neck. Sadly, shortly after that news breaks out that the Albania conflict is solved. Brean and Motss however are enjoying their fiction so much and want to get the upper hand again. So they quickly invent a story about a lone soldier, who's still back in Albania and needs rescuing. His name is William Schumann, nicknamed “Old Shoe”. The story is supposed to be ending innocuously and sympathetically with the rescue of Schumann and return to America only days before the presidential election. Up until that point the movie is funny, entertaining and has moments of dark humour. It gets really exciting however when we learn that the actor, who is supposed to play Schumann, is in fact a high-risk offender. He gets flown in with a plane, to celebrate Schumann's triumphant arrival, but the plane crashes. Brean, Motss and the criminal survive the crash, but the psychotropic drugs that are supposed to keep him in check are slowly but surely wearing off.

How will the story of William Schumann end? You've got to watch it for yourself. By the way: it may be hard to believe with all the many similarities, but the movie was all finished when the ”Lewinsky scandal“ hit the news.

Until next blog,
sarah

Sunday 20 September 2015

The sparkling inventor: Nikola Tesla

Dear reader,

I didn't enjoy Physics at school at all. Biology was more interesting for me and even the Chemistry basic course was enjoyable for me. We once made sparklers ourselves. Something I'd like to do again. It seems that at least some of the ingredients are not that easy to get your hands on as a normal person though, because they're classified as dangerous. Sad actually. I'd especially like to make sparklers that burn in other colours, but exactly those substances are the ones that are difficult to get. Also I'm not certain which of the ingredients are responsible for the colour and would need to be substituted. I hardly remember anything from my Physics class. I can remember we had to calculate stuff with formulas. What exactly we did calculate, I don't have the faintest clue anymore.

I caught up on a bit of Physics later on reading a couple of books by Stephen Hawking. I came across a special Physicist, Nikola Tesla, in the movie Prestige. In the movie he helps a magician. In the book, which I only read several years later, there's much more on what Tesla achieved. Of course the book and the movie tell a fictional story and what's happening in the book as well as the movie, could at least not have happened during Tesla's time. It's been several years since I got curious about Tesla after reading the book and I watched documentaries on Tesla on the internet. Most of the details I already forgot. But I promise you this: if a Physicist of Tesla's time had been able to do what happens in “Prestige”, then it would indeed have been Tesla. Just so you have an idea on what time we're talking about: Tesla was Serbian and lived from 1856 to 1943, so he lived when Thomas Edison was alive, too. In fact Tesla worked for Edison for a while. There's even a rumour that says that Tesla invented the light bulb, not Edison.

If you look at Tesla's life career, it seems to be characterised by a certain restlessness and reoccurring periods of lack of money. 1883 to 1884 Tesla was overseeing the installation of the new electrical light system at the train station Gare de l'Est in Paris and with that he was sort of working for Thomas Edison's European branch of the company. Without any means he travelled to America after that to work for Edison directly. But the two of them had different ideas of Tesla's payment, so the work relationship didn't last long. Tesla went on and got together with two other businessmen and found the Tesla Electric Light and Manufacturing Company. For some readers, who are more knowledgeable about this sort of stuff than I am, the two-phase electric power, may mean something. That's one of Tesla's inventions. With his new found company also started the registration of Tesla's first of many patents. As far as I know Tesla is among the people with the most patents. I heard some day that a Chinese or Japanese guy caught up and topped him now. The English Wikipedia reads “over 300 patents” as a number of Tesla patents in an article specifically on them.

Tesla was repeatedly lacking money. But the industrial magnate George Westinghouse heard of him. Westinghouse was in a dispute with Edison, which was later called War of Currents. I barely know anything about Tesla's personality. But I could imagine that Tesla found stimulation working with Westinghouse and in a way against Edison. Who knows.

In 1893 Tesla was approached and questioned how the powers of the Niagara Falls could be used. He suggested an alternating current system in cooperation with Westinghouse, which was then implemented. To use the powers of the Niagara Falls was a dream project for Tesla for a long time, which finally was finally reality.

There's something else that fascinated Tesla, which was the use of wireless energy. Tesla foremost thought about the sun as an energy source. But the earth is also surrounded by a magnetic field, which could be used as a source as well. More recent documentaries on the universe talk about antimatter, which supposedly can be used as a fuel for spaceships. For now we only know very little about this power. If only the machines existed to collect this energy and transform it for us to use as electricity. Free energy is seen as pseudo-science and there exist (conspiracy) theories that there are already scientists, who managed to build machines, but the knowledge about that is suppressed. I heard Tesla is said to have built such a machine, but destroyed it again himself. I don't know if those things are true or fiction. I like the idea that that energy is free and usable for everyone though. Sadly I know nothing about Physics really. Regardless of how many “knowledge about that is suppressed” stories are true, I do believe that this knowledge would be an actual threat to huge energy companies indeed. Because who would willingly pay even just a penny for electricity, if you can use energy that's free of charge and surrounds us, for free and unlimited?

Until next blog,
sarah

Thursday 17 September 2015

Whoever has the choice has the torment

Dear reader,

"whoever has the choice has the torment", is how a German saying goes and it's true.

This is shortly before a mayoral election. This time it's not combined with a council election. For those of you here or if you have a political election in your area some time but don't know, who to vote for: go vote and give your vote to Scorch the dragon and partner of ventriloquist Ronn Lucas!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIYInw2y6IQ

Only a while ago I read that it's not that good to have many possibilities. Of course it seems at first bad when you only have one option. What if you don't like that option? Without at least a second option, you're forced to take that one option and be happy with it, even if you don't like it.

On the other hand, I once needed something to clean the plughole. Since I don't have that problem often, I stood there and was just overwhelmed by the selection of what felt like 20 things to clean the plughole. Something similar happened the first time I had to get more washing powder. Everything is advertised as the perfect one for your cloths. And which of the 40 powders do I actually buy now?

The solution is fairly easy for me when it comes to movies I see on the TV program for the night and I want to watch several of them and have to decide which to watch. Is one of them unknown to me? Chances are good that I will watch that one. Have I watched all of them already? Chances are good that I'll watch none of them and the TV will be off that night. Have I seen none of them already? Chances are good that I'll watch none of them and the TV will be off that night as well. I like movies. They're one reason for my M&M posts, to introduce you to movies I like once in a while. But I know that when there are several movies I know already or several unknown movies, it's just easier for me to decide to watch none of them. It seems simple, even laughable with movie options. One can't seriously talk about "stress" there. The fact is though that we're more relaxed, if we have only one option and don't have to make a decision.


In his article Why too much choice is stressing us out Stewart Jeffries describes a study where samples of jam were set out for customers to taste. If they bought a jar, they were also given a dollar coupon. One time they had 6 different samples of jam, another time they had 24 samples. 30% of the customers with the smaller set bought a jar, but only 3% of the customers with the larger selection bought one.


Until next blog,
sarah

Thursday 10 September 2015

Magnetising magnetars

Dear reader,

everyone of us knows what a magnet is. But I myself have only recently heard of magnetars. To be clear: there are no known magnetars anywhere near to be a danger to us. So, whatever you'll read now and may get you scared: don't panic!

I understand very little about physics and astronomy, to tell you exact details anyway, so it can't get too scary today. Nevertheless I want to give you an idea of what I understand what a magnetar is. In the universe there are planets, meaning objects that move around, like the earth for example, going round itself as well as around the sun. Planets don't shine. The sun however is not a planet, but a star and stars do shine, but don't move. Stars like the sun have much energy, which at some point is used up. Some of you may certainly have heard the word supernova. That's what happens to a star when the energy is used up: the star shines one last time really bright, while it explodes and at least the shape and everything it had until then is destroyed. Sometimes the things left over after a destruction of the star with a certain strength of a magnetic field, turn into a neutron star, a magnetar.

Magnetars are relatively small stars, just about 10 to 30 km (12 mi) in diameter (which is about the size of a smaller city). They turn around themselves in an incredibly fast time. A rotation period is the time a planet takes to turn around itself to get to the starting position again. The rotation period of the earth is 24 hours. Magnetars are often found with partner stars. Wikipedia has as one of the rules to call a single star a magnetar, among other things, the rotation period of 1 to 12 seconds! Sure enough something small of 10 to 30 km in diameter can rotate around itself in a faster time than the earth anyway. Still I find 1 to 12 seconds for a rotation period pretty fast. Even though they're relatively small, magnetars have the mass of 40 times that of the sun!

The dangerous thing about magnetars for one thing are the x-rays and the gamma rays, which come up every now and then. X-rays aren't healthy for us anyway, which is why they try not to make a person take x-rays too often. Gamma rays are the shortest wave length we know so far and they're the most dangerous, too. Even if they don't kill us right away, they change the molecules and that kills us in the medium-term, similar to tumours. But not only that. When a magnetar is as far away from the earth as the moon, it's magnetic field would pull your coin money out of your trouser pockets. A magnetar half the distance of the moon and the earth would destroy the magnetic strip of your credit card forever. I don't even want to think any further about people with a pacemaker or other metal objects in them...

I can't tell you much more about magnetars actually. Like I said, I don't know much about physics or astronomy. I just find it fascinating to have learned about stars, which are just about the size of a city, but have considerably more mass than the sun and a strong magnetic field so it can pull your coin moneyout of your pockets. I'll tell you a little bit more about magnets and magnetic power anyway... in another blog post.

Until next blog,
sarah

Monday 31 August 2015

M&M: The Terminal

Dear reader,

considering the growing number of refugees coming over to Europe, it probably makes sense to watch the movie The Terminal from the year 2004 once or again.

In it Tom Hanks plays Viktor Navorski, who comes from the fictive Krakozhia to America. But due to a revolution in his country, he's seen as stateless. With no proper passport, barely able to speak English, he's unable to travel further in America, nor allowed to fly back to his country. Viktor Navorski is stuck at the JFK airport. But he's not idle. He tries to make himself comfortable at the airport and find a job to get something to do. But because he has no passport, many don't want to employ him. So he needs to be creative and find things to do on his own, to get money to at least pay for food and something to drink. Only when builders are working on a wall and Navorski finishes the wall in the middle of the night, he gets employed. Other foreigners befriend with him (one Afroamerican, one Latino and one Indian). He also befriends with the stewardess Amelia Warren (Catherine Zeta-Jones). He even invites her to, believe it or not, an actually quite romantic dinner at the terrace of the airport!

Then the revolution in Krakozhia ends and Navorski can finally leave the airport. Before he flies back to his home though, he's got a task to finish from his father. He had found a picture of 57 Jazz legends in a newspaper and set himself the goal to get an autograph from all of them. Only one, that of Benny Golson, is missing. Will Navorski be able to find Golson after his long stay at the airport and finally get the autograph? See for yourself!

Probably not always quite realistic, but still with lots of heart and humour, this movie is a nice pastime. Like I hinted at the beginning, because of the growing number of refugees and asylum seekers, it's still up to date even in these days.

Until next blog,
sarah

Thursday 20 August 2015

Sleeping multi media and interactive

Dear reader,

with the tags/keywords sleep and sleeping problem, which I included here, you'll find my previous entries on what helps me when I want to go to sleep fast. Assuming I think about those methods. I want to make the entry today a multi media and interactive one.

For one thing, I'd like to introduce you to Holmes (actually a promo for the second season of "Elementary" with Jonny Lee Miller and Lucy Liu) the clip shows a series of methods of how Sherlock wakes up Joan in all sorts of different ways, although all of them could generally just be called "mean". The clip is meant as a sort of "When you've got problems waking up, use the Holmes system". Here's the clip:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-aB2hU3axc

Fans of Benedict Cumberbatch certainly know the radio series "Cabin Pressure" by and with John Finnemore. He suffers repeatedly from insomnia, which lead to the piece "Insomnia Ballad" in his other radio series "Souvenir Programme". Here's the original (roughly 2 min. 19 sec.):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OrYGSlEmt_I

Of course there are fans, who create their own version and publish that. I find that the musical is so well done, that I want to share it with you, too. It's a bit less than 3 minutes long and you can find it here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZzSqubuZ7H8

And the interactive part? Well, that's your turn. What do you do, when you can't fall asleep? Or what could you suggest for others, who can't fall asleep fast or who can't fall asleep well? Anything is welcome, from music you like to listen to, to videos you have created to help others. Post it in the comments.

Until next blog,
sarah

Thursday 13 August 2015

One hell of a city

Dear reader,

American readers of my blog may know the town of Centralia in Pennsylvania. I want to shortly introduce it to everyone else in this entry. No, I haven't been there ever. I haven't been to America ever actually. But I found out about it in a documentary on television and think it's pretty impressive.

Centralia is a very small place. According to wikipedia, effective 2010, the town only had 10 residents. In 1986 it had been "over 1,000 residents" (German wikipedia). The reason for so many residents moving, are the fires underground since 1962. Yes, you read correctly. The residents of Centralia lived from anthracite coal mining. This coal caught fire and burns ever since in the mine pits underneath the town. Anthracite coal burns long and steady. That's why tries to extinguish the fires failed, because the fire ate its way through the barriers. Now they stopped trying to extinguish the fires.

There are two theories (on the German wikipedia page) on how the fire started. In the documentary only one was mentioned. Members of the members of the volunteer fire company wanted to clean up the town landfill, so they burned it all up. The landfill was relocated to the abandoned mine pits, which didn't have coal anymore. But the fire went also to the pits with coal.

Another theory is that the coal just selfignighted. Scientists, according to the German wikipedia, suspect that the 15 km² fires will probably burn on for another 100 to 200 years. (According to the English wikipedia 1.6 km², 400 acres and about 250 years of fire.) Although the quality of the air isn't worse than that of Lancaster, a place further away, the residents were asked to relocate. The last residents though have "permission to stay in their homes for as long as they live", as can be read on wikipedia.

Centralia has its own homepage, among pages is an article Weird Centralia, which discusses just how weird or not, the town actually is. Check it out! There are also some funny pictures of people taken in cracks on the street with smokes coming from the cracks.

Until next blog,
sarah

Thursday 30 July 2015

M&M: Footloose

Dear reader,

I can't dance and don't have much interest in dance movies, although I've seen some of them out of interest and watch some of the older films like “Flashdance” and quite enjoy them. On the other side there are the newer films, which somehow seem pretty much the same mostly: a teenager/young adult, first a kind of outsider, dreamy and/or misjudged by the end of the film has a breakthrough and is accepted at the dance school or established as the dance genius that they have been from the beginning. The film “Footloose” from the year 1984 however is different, which makes it interesting for me, others are criticising precisely that. But more about that later. Here's the story first:

Ren MacCormack (Kevin Bacon) comes from the metropolis Chicago to the town of Bomont. Due to certain circumstances of the past, alcohol, rock music as well as dancing are forbidden. Especially Reverend Shaw Moore (John Lithgow) wants to keep it that way very much. The Reverend lost his son in an accident, which he believes came because drugs and alcohol come with rock music and are therefore the cause of his son's death. So dancing of any kind is forbidden in the city. Ren likes to dance as well as listening to loud music, which gets him into conflict with the conservative people in town shortly after his move there. Ren also falls in love with the daughter of the Reverend, Ariel (Lori Singer).

Ren wants the dance ban to be lifted for the prom of his school. He prepares a speech for the city council, with quotes from the Bible, which moves the Reverend, but the council votes to keep the ban. The wife of the Reverend (Diane Wiest) makes her husband even more thoughtful. When some town members want to burn books, because they think of them as dangerous for the youth, the Reverend can just about stop the book burning and realises that the banings and rules in this town have gone too far.

Will the students be able to dance at their prom? You've got to watch and see that for yourself. Chris Penn (the brother of Sean Penn), can be seen in an young role as a friend of Kevin Bacon. Reportedly Chris Penn couldn't dance, but had to for the film. Probably this is what lead to the short montage in which Kevin Bacon's character desperately, but ultimately successfully teaches Chris Penn how to dance. A quite amusing montage, I find. Speaking of young actors: Sarah Jessica Parker plays Rusty, one of Ariel's friends and has one of her first film roles, for which she was also nominated with the “Young Artist Award”.

Strange as it may seem, but the story of a dance ban in a city has some true story behind it. In Elmore City, a town in Oklahoma, dancing was indeed forbidden from 1861 until a rebellion of the youth in 1980 led to the ban to be lifted at last.

Roger Ebert wrote in the Chicago Sun-Times about “Footloose” that the film tries to depict a conflict situation in a small town, as well as showing some glowing teenage characters and wants to be a music video, failing with all three. Certainly “Footloose” isn't a dance film like the new ones I described earlier. But with the background of a true dance ban in a town, I enjoy watching it anyway. Contrary to many modern dance films, this one isn't exclusively about dancing and showing others how well the students can dance, but it's about the right to dance and the montage with Kevin Bacon teaching Chris Penn to dance, for me, is worth watching time and again. Dance enthusiastic viewers, who expect many dance parts, will certainly be disappointed. I however enjoy watching “Footloose” every once in a while.

In 2011 a remake of it came out. The remake is close to the original story, sometimes even word-for-word in dialogues and a bit more modern and with more overall energy than the original. For me however the spirit of the original is lost and it touches me close to not at all compared to the original. It is, for me anyway, just a modernised, bad remake.

Until next blog,
sarah

Saturday 25 July 2015

Language of sensation

Dear reader,

similarily to my entry on organ language, there isn't just one way of expression, when it comes to the organs and the body. People interested in Neuro-linguistic Programming (NLP) will also have noticed that we use expressions having to do with our senses. NLPers (people using and studying NLP) like to point out this fact that a person, who uses a lot of visual words or words about seeing, would be a “visual type”. You could then get a good connection and build trust to that person, by using similar expressions and wordings yourself.


I think that people shouldn't make that mistake and use only expressions and wordings of one sense though. It's certainly good knowing those expressions and being aware of them. I'm sure I can help in the beginning of a connection to a person to listen more carefully and noticing phrasings and pick up on them. I don't however believe in, for example, a purely “visual type” as such and I think it counterproductive to consciously only use visual phrasings based on that belief. Something like that can come across as stiff and manipulative, which in my opinion, it then is. That's certainly one of the accusations about NLP, that it's manipulative.


During my studies a teacher in the English course once handed us work sheets around the topic of learning. Of course it was about what “learning type” we would be. As we were working in pairs, discussing those papers and types, the teacher walked around and addressed me. I told her that I didn't learn best by repeatedly hearing in recordings or films, also not by repeatedly reading and/or writing the words or frequently saying them myself, but with a combination of all of these options. Yes, but when we found out what type we are and which of these methods make us learn best, we could use that advantage and learn more effectively.


Yes, probably there is a learning method for languages, which is more effective for each individual than other methods. I would really limit this to certain things which should be learned. Mathematics requires a different kind of thinking and probably also a different kind of learning. Still I don't believe in the learning type x. Much like a person can be a purely “visual type”. That's my opinion anyway.


Until next blog,
sarah

Wednesday 15 July 2015

The most important thing in life

Dear reader,

the other day I went shopping and stopped shortly when I saw that a woman was deeply absorbed with her smartphone and walking right towards me, apparently without seeing me. I said nothing and just stood there. Only when she almost collided with me, did she look up shocked, said sorry and walked past me.

Several years ago one of my aunts (actually great aunt) was visiting us. Nothing against my aunt, I like her. But she was regularly phoning someone on her mobile and writing SMS to others or was on the internet writing emails to others. That went so far that my mother, who otherwise was really patient with others, once told her to put away the phone, please. Said a sixty-something to her 80-years old aunt! That was quite something!

I once heard of a group of Asian people, who reportedly went in a museum with a video camera recording everything. I assume it was to have a look at the art „in peace“ at home or in a hotel later? But who knows if that story is actually true... Hopefully not! Maybe it was just a photo camera. I'm not sure if museums would allow video cameras for security reasons.

On the train there are a lot of people busy with their smartphones. When somebody was sitting next to me, I was looking at what the person was doing. Some chatted, many were playing. Mostly something like Tetris where bricks where coming down and had to be put in certain order at the bottom or some balls were coming from above and had to be shot with a sort of „gun“. So all in all games, which are solely there to kill time. Nothing against those sort of games or people, who play them...

I'm member of a forum where someone has a signature under each of his entries. I found out now where that line is from, namely „Fast & Furious 5“. A character there says, “But the most important thing in life will always be the people in this room. Right here. Right now.“ I like that quote and I can understand that someone would choose it for their signature. I don't know the movie and I'm not sure how it was meant in the scene. But I like the thought that the most important thing in life are the person around me at that moment or the persons I'm with. The screen-society so to say, which is currently existing, where many people only scare on their screen and sometimes even walk into others, because they don't notice their surroundings anymore, I find that very sad.

The other day I came across an article online. A 14-years old girl was injured after she had crossed a street starring at her smartphone, busy installing updates, when she didn't see a car coming. It was only said that the girl had been injured, not how much. Luckily the girl was only injured and at least the car driver had paid attention.

The doctor and psychiatrist Heinrich Hoffman published a collection of stories in 1845 under the title „Struwelpeter“, one of them is “The Story of Johnny Head-in-Air” (German: “Hans Guck-in-die-Luft), a boy, who's so busy looking up in the air in stead of anywhere else, that he first runs over a dog and then, to the entertainment of the fish, he falls into the river, including his writing-book, which is then lost. Maybe the story is exaggerated and fictional, but on principle, it doesn't seem that unrealistic at all.

My mother sent me a picture once, which she had received from somebody else. The question underneath it read something like, “What is he doing there?”

Here is the picture:
(source: http://i.imgur.com/oHuAH.jpg)

Until next blog,
sarah

Tuesday 30 June 2015

M&M: The Flying Scotsman

Dear reader,

yesterday I thought: which movie am I going to review tomorrow?!

Then, unrelated to that, purely because I like Jonny Lee Miller in “Elementary” and wanted to see him him in other roles, I watched “The Flying Scotsman”. All right, I've seen him also in “Trainspotting” and “Hackers” before. So I don't only know him from “Elementary”.

The Flying Scotsman. A flying Scotsman? Oh no, I don't want to watch fantasy like that tonight. Okay, let's see what the movie is about. Aha! Based on the true story of the Scotsman Graeme Obree (Jonny Lee Miller), who loves riding his bike and sets a new world record – with a bike he build on his own! A bike, which consists of parts of a washing machine. Now, that does sound quite interesting. It does have a dark side to it though: Graeme has moments of depression and attempted several suicides.

In the movie Graeme is married to Anne (Laura Fraser) and the two have a child. In “real”life the two are divorced now and in 2011 he had a “coming out” and revealed that he's gay, as The Guardian for example reported: http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2011/feb/02/graeme-obree-cycling

As a child, he was bullied by other boys and one Christmas Graeme's parents gave him a bike for a present. He used it to get away from his bullies at first, but he enjoyed riding his bike in later life, too. So it's not very surprising that after he has to close his cycle shop, he starts working as a bicycle courier. While working there, he meets another courier, Malky (Billy Boyd), who's equally enthusiastic about bikes. When Graeme wants to set a new world record, he hires Malky to work as his manager. Because he builds his bike himself, sponsors of expensive bicycle companies fear for their money, so the Union Cycliste Internationale do their best to disqualify Graeme and make life difficult for him. But Graeme is creative and ambitious enough, to give them parole.

The film spares us many an amplified story telling and cliches and shows the enthusiastic biker Graeme Obree and his ambition. That certainly makes a movie well worth watching for other people, who enjoy riding their bike. The only sad bit about the film is that it starts well, and later seems to just rush through Graeme Obree's life. The childhood and beginning with Malky are in part very humorous. Then again he's just sitting there doing nothing at the harbour or at home. Seemingly depressive phases. (Today he's diagnosed as bipolar or manic-depressive.) But then he gets on his bike again and then the film ends. A bit sad for a film with such a good start. Especially worth mentioning for those daring to watch the film with the original audio, is the convincing Scottish accent of Jonny Lee Miller. Jonny Lee Miller was born in Kingston upon Thames, England, so truly a different accent.

The Flying Scotsman, for me, is a film well worth watching, despite the weaknesses towards the end, especially for bicycle fans (and fans of the Scottish accent). Quite worth watching and maybe also motivating for the viewer to get on their own bike a bit more again. We don't have to set a new world record though. Enjoy the ride!

Until next blog,
sarah

Who is “one" anyway?

Dear reader,

years ago we were sitting on the balcony as a family and had a BBQ. My sister told us about last night. I don't remember her exact words, but something along the lines of, “I had a mosquito in my room yesterday. It was flying around and buzzing. And when one turns on the light, it's gone!” To which our mother asked, “Who was the 'one' in your room, who turned on the lights?”
Even today I'm surprised that it was my mother, who jumped on the phrasing. Normally I have quite good ears for such things. In this moment my heart was turned on however, because we all know those nights too well, don't we, where mosquitoes are humming and annoying, when we want to sleep. My father is also fairly good, hearing discrepancies in what was being said and commenting on it. He too hadn't reacted on that that evening.
Who is this unknown, undefined person “one” anyway? You can find them in recipes and other instructions and guidelines, in German, at least. Probably not so common in cooking recipes in English. (Sometimes one has to think hard to come up with good examples in a language that's not their native one.) At least in English it's more common for “you” to take the table spoons. So that's good. I think.
They” can also be charming and very intelligent people. “They say...” Who's doing the research for those people?
They say that lots of stuff on the internet is stupid. Maybe so is this entry. I don't know. I only thought of that evening on the balcony the other day, when I heard a mosquito in my room buzzing around an when I turned on the light, it was gone most of the times. The times I did see it, I was sadly unable to crush it.
Until next blog,
sarah

Thursday 25 June 2015

Organ language

Dear reader,

no, organ language isn't something bad or rude. It's the manner of expression of our organs, to show us that something isn't right. The theory goes that, based on which organ gives us trouble, we could also identify more precisely what kind of problem we have.

That doesn't seem that odd at all, although I have only very barely dealt with that subject. Some of it seems, even without deeper knowledge of organ language, almost intuitively finding expression included in our word-language, too.

The next time when you're thinking very hard about something, maybe also think of this entry and don't be too surprised that you've got a headache. Even though I can't tell you, why precisely you've got a headache from thinking a lot, there's still the phrase of “causing quite a headache”. Alternatively things can “cause somebody an upset stomach”.

Especially woman have fun when cooking, to also prepare the food on a plate in a nice way or enjoy it when someone serves them a meal that's set in a pleasing way, because “you eat with your eyes first”!

When once I was in the hospital for a surgery to correct my nose, many of us had tamponades in our nose and we joked some days after the surgery that we were “fed up” with it. Actually that one doesn't translate very well in English, because in German we say something like having a “full nose” literally.

Maybe you've heard of pheromones before, chemicals that are exchanged between two people and make us and the people next to us react to each other in certain ways. All of it is unconscious, but still there's some truth about the saying of “hating someone's guts”. Again, that one is a bad example in English, because in German we say that someone “smells good”, if we like them or doesn't smell good, if we don't like them. But still works in English with the “gut” as an organ in the saying.

Is it so surprising that some people develop asthma, when we've got the saying that something “takes my breath away” or something is “breathtaking”?

Maybe it's worth looking more into this organ language and what it may mean, especially if you've got problems with one or more organs time and again.

Keep a stiff upper-lip!

Until next blog,
sarah

Tuesday 16 June 2015

The quagga and the woolly mammoth

Dear reader,

did you ever see a quagga or heard of them? Of course not seen it „for real“. They've been extinct since about 1883. Quaggas have been relatives of plain zebras today. Although the quagga wasn't white with black stripes, but light brown with almost no white stripes except on the head and neck. They have lived in South Africa and have been hunted mostly, because they were seen by the Dutch settlers as natural competitors of the cows. Only much later, after the last quagga had died August, 12, 1883 in the Artis-Zoo in Amsterdam, it was realised just how far the hunt had gone. By the way, the quagga (Equus quagga quagga) was not a separate species of zebras, but a subspecies of the plain zebra (equus quagga).

In 1987 The Quagga Project was started. The idea is pretty simple: when two plain zebras with few stripes mate, they (hopefully) get a child with few stripes and eventually the zebras of the project will then have so few stripes that they resemble the quagga. These could then be settled back in South Africa. So a mistake once made over 100 years ago would, at least in part, be put right. One could argue that a zebra, which looks like a quagga, because it has few stripes, doesn't make a real quagga. The people of the Quagga Project actually thought about that, too, and argue against that on the subpage Criticism of the Quagga Project. They say that because the quagga is extinct now, no other specifics other than the reduction of stripes can be made out. Also the grasses the plain zebras eat today are very close to those that existed in quagga times and would. So really it isn't a very strong argument to say that the reduction of stripes alone will not make a real quagga. You are free give your thoughts on that in the comments.

The Quagga Project has a whole bunch of photos with zebras, which already have visibly fewer stripes already. You can check out the photos at the following link: http://www.quaggaproject.org/Quagga-Graphic-Elements/PhotoGallery/PhotoGallery/slide.html

Woolly mammoths were pretty common in America as well as Eurasia before they went extinct. Because they have been living and gone extinct in a cold stage, many remains have been mummified because of the ice and remained relatively preserved. Maybe you can imagine what some scientists think of or are actually more or less working on. Correct, the mammoth would raise from the dead. Similarly to the quagga one attempt is get close to a mammoth through selection of existing elephants. Another thought is to use available DNA from mammoths and use them or even creating the necessary DNA, that is the sperm, to plant it into a living elephant. The cow elephant then would idially give birth to a mammoth baby. The anatomy of elephants and other aspects such as the suspected long gestation period like living elephants today (which is about 21 to 22 months) would make this very difficult and would make this a really long and time-consuming project. To create an artificial egg cell, the chromosome science isn't quite ready yet and the needed specimens of existing cells of mammoth findings are too fragmented.

I could sort of understand to create a quagga. This zebra-quagga would at least live Africa in an environment close to that of the actual quagga. A mammoth however... Where should the mammoth live and what from?

Surely it's an exciting thing, whether it can be possible to recreate animals again. But what for? To have again what isn't anymore and existed once before? To be able to say and show that we could and die make it happen? It would certainly be a sensation and impressive. But I think, it shouldn't be forgotten that the real natural environment of the animals doesn't exist anymore. The so called civilised humans will destroy the world more and more and with it the animals that (still) exist today. Wouldn't it make more sense, instead of recreating extinct animals, to make it so that endangered and critically endangered animals live can live on?

Until next blog,
sarah

Sunday 31 May 2015

M&M: No Reservations

Dear reader,

after the dandelion recipes, even though it would probably have been more fitting last month, I think the movie “No Reservations” is a good addition. In the movie from the year 2007 with Catherine Zeta-Jones and Aaron Eckhart in the lead roles, there's loads of cooking!

Kate (Catherine Zeta-Jones) is top chef in a restaurant and also totally a perfectionist. But even though she sets high standards for herself as well as her cooked food, she cannot handle critics on either her as a person or her food well. So her boss Paula (Patricia Clarkson) eventually sends her to a therapist.

Her perfectly organised world is put to a test, when her sister and her 9-years old daughter, Zoe (Abigail Breslin) have an accident. Only Zoe survives and Kate decides to adopt the girl. Kate tries hard to treat Zoe with exceptional food. In doing so she seems to forget that children don't necessarily want to eat extravagant things. To top it all, a new cook is recruited to help Kate in the kitchen: Nick (Aaron Eckhart). Nick has a completely different cooking style (with music!) and is full of enthusiasm and passion. Of course Kate doesn't like that at all. It takes some time for Nick to not only stir food for Kate, but also her blood. Certainly one crucial moment is when Zoe visits the restaurant and kitchen one time and Nick manages finally to make her eat spaghetti with relish.

Paula is so happy with Nick's work in the restaurant, that she offers him to replace Kate as top chef. Will Nick take that offer and what does Kate think about the possibility of maybe not being the no. 1 in the kitchen anymore?

“No Reservations” is a remake of the movie “Bella Martha” from the year 2001. The names have changed and so has the ending. Personally, I like the actual ending of “No Reservations” better. The ending of “Bella Martha” is a bit too fantastic for my taste, although not totally unrealistic. Catherine Zeta-Jones worked as a server in a restaurant for one evening as preparation for her role. Of course Catherine Zeta-Jones and Aaron Eckhart had to learn how to cut veggies “professionally” and how to turn barbecued food. In the “Making-Of” Aaron Eckhart says that the scenes in which they had to cook as well as speak dialogue, where especially difficult. On the one hand they had to look professional, which is difficult enough for someone not professional, as well as speaking lines, wasn't always as easy as it may look for the viewer.

Sometimes a somewhat sad, but often very funny movie about a bit of cooking and kitchen, but especially (sadly) not cookbook example of life and family. I'm sure we all sometimes wish, as Kate does, to have a cookbook for life, so we don't have to make up our own recipes for life situations.

Of course the movie has some bits of songs that “Nick” is playing. Otherwise Philip Glass is responsible for the actual film music. Although one theme can be repeatedly heard, which is actually from Mark Isham from the movie “Life As A House”, which is the melody of the song “Building A Family”. I like the melody a lot. It's one of my two favourite tracks from the soundtrack album. In “No Reservations” however the melody is played so often, that for me it feels like it's only that melody and the music “Nick” plays. With all due respect for Philip Glass, and I'm sure it's not his fault, but ultimately the director's decision, but I hardly consciously hear any of his melodies at all, when watching that movie.

Until next blog,
sarah

Monday 25 May 2015

The mysterious small package

Dear reader,

the other day I watched an episode of "Sherlock" again in which Sherlock Holmes gets a small envelope. "We've X-rayed it. It's not booby-trapped", explains Inspector Lestrade. "How reassuring", comments Sherlock Holmes dry and takes the envelope.

That reminded me again of an experience shortly before Christmas. I was at my dad's and had just brought him the post from the mail box up to the kitchen. Among them he had received a small package. I was curious and asked, if I should open it. "No, better let me do it", he said and suddenly seemed very insecure. He didn't have a clue who had sent him the package. He didn't know the sender at all and even more important than the sender: what was in the small package?

My dad went to the knifes and took one. That way I was standing across from him at the other end of the table and I gave the package to him. Carefully he opened it with the knife, took out mostly newspaper and finally then... a couple of small sort of sticks out of dark wood.

Now I was the one looking insecure and stupid. I had to ask him what those sticks were. Small spoons for jam for example, he explained to me. I asked him, what he had expected to find in that package really, because he had been so insecure. "A bomb?", I asked him. But apparently at that moment then, that had actually been on his mind. Whatever the reason for sending him a bomb might have been. I remember thinking: even if it had been a bomb, whether I had opened it or not, most likely I would have been hurt either way, since we had been standing together quite close, even with the table between us.

That was the mysterious small package before Christmas. Suffice to say that my dad is still not quite used to getting small or larger packages from strangers. Until recently my mom had done stuff like that and my dad usually only buys from amazon mainly, which is known to everyone.

Until next blog,
sarah

Friday 15 May 2015

And some more dandelions

Dear reader,

only a short entry today in addition to my previous dandelion jelly entries from last month. The season of dandelion flowers seems over for this year already. But the flowers are far from the only thing you can use. Also the roots can be used for dandelion coffee, which has been made a lot after the war. Since it's caffeine free, you can also drink it late at night.

Paul Tappenden has a video on making dandelion coffee. He seems like nice guy and also explains very well what to watch for and how to make it easy and fast.

Mother Earth News also has 9 things to do with dandelion. And if you're still not convinced that dandelions are healthy for you, check out this list of 11 health benefits of dandelion and dandelion roots.

And here's a Dandelion Greens Pesto for you to mention just some examples that might be unusual for you to get you started.

As promised, only a short post for you today. As you can see, dandelion is very versatile as well as healthy and there's no reason to just exterminate it. Might as well use it. It's far from just a wild weed. A while ago I read on a German forum that there's no such thing as a weed anyway. It was something like: "There are only wild herbs growing at the wrong place."

Certainly you can get creative with dandelions and other wild herbs, too. Tell me about your (taste) adventures in the comments.

Until next blog,
sarah

Thursday 30 April 2015

M&M: Nell

Dear reader,

in this movie from the year 1994, a young man provides a woman, living alone in the woods, with food, which he leaves for her in front of the cabin. But it isn't quite that easy. He hears wailing and as he carefully enters the cabin, he finds a woman, seemingly dead on the floor. Also there are flowers on the body and around. As if someone prepared the woman like this. Did the woman not live alone after all? The doctor of the town, Jerome “Jerry” Lovell (Liam Neeson) is called by the sheriff (Nick Searcy). They eventually find a young woman, by the name of Nell (Jodie Foster), who they find out is the unbeknownst daughter of the dead woman. Nell only speaks an unknown language of her own.

For Jerry Nell is fascinating. She grew up away from civilisation and yet she can seemingly live and organise her life completely inependantly. Paula Olsen (Natasha Richardson), a young psychologist student, sees more the scientific of it all. She would like Nell at the hospical for further investigation of her as well as her language. For the court however the most pressing question is whether Nell can live independantly or if she is depending on help and/or assistance.

Eventually it's decided that Nell can, for the time being, stay where she is and Jerry and Nell make themselves comfortable in the woods, too. At first they do it independently from each other, but by interacting and investigating Nell, they also get closer to each other.

It's getting obvious that Nell will not live undiscovered and isolated forever. So it's time to show Nell the civilisation, the town. An adventure for all people involved. Then the media notices Nell indeed and so a decision what to do next has to be made spontaneous and fast. Shortly after this radical experience for Nell, the second hearing at the court is set, which will decide how Nell is doing and how and where she'll live in the future.

Nell” isn't one of the best movies. The end is, although certainly desirable, over all a “Hollywood ending” and as cheesy as it is simply illogical an ending. Seeing how Nell behaved up to the court hearing, but especially how she reacted at the town visit and then the shock experience when the media finds her, then I just can't describe her behaviour at the court hearing with anything else but “illogical”. The movie borrows cliches from the “wild, beautiful” life outside of town, to the rather “movie-type” of psychologist up to the Hollywood-happy-ending. Why then do I enjoy watching this movie anyway and write it up here now? For one thing because I still do find it enjoyable to spend some time with Nell in the woods and to appreciate the images of the beautiful landscape and surroundings. Also I like watching Natasha Richardson and Liam Neeson and how they are so profoundly different at first and then get closer to one another. Some said that Jodie Foster's performance was too much acting and Nell seemed very forced. She seemed believable to me though, save the impossible court hearing at the end.

One reason why I didn't watch this movie over the last years, is the fact that Natasha Richardson, who by the way later in real life married Liam Neeson, had a skiing accident in March 2009. At first everything seemed ok, but in the end she died from inner head injuries on March, 18th. This is the only film I've got with her and I think this is also the only with with her and her (although not yet at that time) husband.

The book to the movie is, like almost always with books, a bit deeper with the background information on the individual characters. It's a nice read, if you like the movie. For the great images however, I'd still recommend the movie rather than the book.

For those of you, who like generally calm film scores, this soundtrack by Mark Isham might be for you. I know I enjoy it at least. I don't listen to it much anymore, because I don't think of it often, but I appreciate it every time I do listen to it.

Until next blog,
sarah