Dienstag, 19. August 2008

holla back ... blogger in draft

about time for an update ... but where to begin?

The beginning. Right. Well, I suppose it all started in the Holodeck. Doesn't it always?

while i was shooting pics on the way to brooklyn, my driver ... hehe ... missed our exit, so first thing we saw was a pretty much crazy area - as rich in colors as in its spectrum of different cultures - which we later realized to be williamsburg. unfortunately i didnt manage to get there after that, but i tried a couple of times and maybe i will give it another go after i finally get into that brooklyn museum the following days. ... by the way i should have read those wiki-pages more carefully in order to avoid closed doors as happened with the later but lets start from the beginning or shortly after we managed to find my place in bedford which is another neightboorhood of brooklyn city known for its many different ethnic districts. jewsish, black, hispanic, polish and probably many more ...

basically i was there only for the weekend but ended up to really like this place, not especially because of the two danish girls, but also because of all the other guys who stayed there. some of them like me only on a short trip, others had already over a year ... some frome france, canada or from LA together with folks from just around the corner ... all combined it had an charm of its own; too bad i was too busy all the time chillin in central park and so spent only the second evening really there ... warming up with the others and later going to the bembe for some saturday night dancehall action ... nice

having the place of another colleague from monday on i still was thinking about staying at bedford for the rest of my vacation. still finally an own restroom plus much more room for myself seemed to outweigh all concerns (even the danish) ... even if i ended up on the wrong side of the george washington bridge, which is fort lee

now i've been driving back to brooklyn for two days, firstly to miss - as already mentioned - the brooklyn museum's opening hours (not starting before wednesdays) and going instead again to the prospect park. this time i also came around it's zoo, the picnic house and later on south side and the big lake. the last part happened when i was already on my way to the next point of interest which was the sea and coney island with its amusement park, alongside brighton beach and the mostly russian community

the second time was only today after i woke up as preferable as always on holidays when the golden ball hit again at its highest - or maybe shortly after that - just to drive to jamaica bay for breakfast. being a bit chilled my first physical encounter with the sea water took only a couple of minutes. also after reading my book for an hour and finishing chapter 4 of the stranger i realized that i've forgotten my lighter and so had to go back to my car and maybe move on to rockaway bay with its wildlife reservoir. after checking in via signing my visitors passport i took some photographs of local birds (the real bird birds ;) while not being allowed to have a cigarette again

anyhow currently im back "home" and calling it a day... chilling out on the couch and watching voyager. my plans for tomorrow are still pretty drafty, maybe i go back to central park and finish my book before going to philly on thursday, lets see ...

... the wormhole is collapsing ...

Mittwoch, 13. August 2008

nom nom @ wasabi, nyack

since most of my colleagues are leaving the us and flying back to germany tomorrow my boss decided we should go out today to celebrate. the best restaurant around here is definitely the wasabi and i already booked our reservation ftw

looking forward to their green tea martinis and awesome sushi
... mmmmm ... niiice ...

........ i like .....

nom nom nom


check out their website for reservation info

http://www.wasabichi.com

Dienstag, 12. August 2008

sheep meadow in da zoom

moved for the weekend to mannhattan and stayed at the hilton (53rd n 6th) which is only a couple of blocks away from the central park and just across the street of the museum of modern arts (aka MoMA).

the central location of the hotel was the main reason for this booking, but unfortunatelly the high rates forced me and my colleague nikbin to share a double room. since even that didn't suffice for the costs to be covered by the company (it was still more than our two rooms at our hotel in WCL) we had to pay another 100$ by ourselfes, but this was definitifly worth it and so we got by pretty well.

after doing some sightseeing stuff (4th street -> downtown: china town, little italy, ground zero, battery park) on friday (nikbin was visiting the big apple for the first time and thus was very eager to see everything in detail) we decided to chill out at the central park saturdays.

having stocked up on breakfast supplies we headed straight for the biggest lawn in central park called the sheep meadow which is pretty much compareable to the Schönfeldwiese (lit. "Beautiful meadows") of the Englischer Garten in my beloved hometown.

just as it would have been the case in munich, because of the nice weather the place was full of stressed out new yorkers looking for some recreation from the otherwise noisy and fast-paced city; doing picnic with friends and family, playing frisbee, soccer or other fun games. the only difference was that obviously there was no beer garden around and people couldn't drink their beer from bottles but had to refill it to paper cups first.

i for one was still occupied with breakfast / my venti iced latte and sized the opportunity to get the spirit of the park and it's visitors into focus with my newly acquired zoom lens.

arrrrrrr

click the following link for my flickr set containing some more of my favorite sheep meadow pictures together with some images taken at the moma the next day when it wasnt that sunny anymore

flickr-set

Dienstag, 5. August 2008

eee ez

here we go ... my new eee pc has arrived at last :) isn't he a cutie? i didn't give him a name yet, but thinking about it maybe i should call him swift eee in remembrance of my first car (a suzuki swift). another idea would be to call him awesome eee... (like in that south park episode, right) but in the end both names are equally appropriate and i guess i will use them by turns ... see below for a pic of my new found pride and joy (together with another pair of new trainers which would deserve an appreciation post of their own, but thats a different topic so lets move on :)


besides of his goods looks and the unbeatable size this so called sub-notebook excels through it's easy set up and great performance. the internet access was working within minutes and the pre-installed package covers all basic needs. most astonishingly maybe is the resemblance of the linux OS to the windows operation system. even users with no previous experience are enabled to perform all needed settings just as with microsoft ... and what's best i got even a SAP GUI installed, how kewl is that hmmmm :D

to illustrate the user interface i post you some screenshots below


and here's some evidence of the sap gui for teh 1337 ;)

the only open issues are now concerning the keyboard usage and the change of the desktop theme, but im sure ill fix it soonish

finally some technical details from the asus web site:

Operating System
Genuine Windows XP® Home
GNU Linux
Display
8.9"
Intel CPU & Chipset
Intel Atom
Wireless Data Network
WLAN: 802.11 n
Bluetooth: YES
Memory
1GB (DDR2)
S.S.D. Storage (Solid-State Drive)
SSD 12GB (Genuine Windows® XP Home)
SSD 20GB (Linux)
Camera
1.3M Pixel
Audio
Dolby Sound Room Certified
Stereo speaker
Digital Array Mic
Battery
6 Cells, 4.2 ~ 8 hrs*(Genuine Windows® XP Home)
6 Cells, 4.5 ~6 hrs*(Linux)
Weight
1.1 kg
Infusion
Red, Green, Black, Peony White, Pearl White and Fine Ebony