I completely forgot to tell you about my trip to Prague plans... Turns out that the bus was completely sold out except for two tickets. Since the people in question are Tini, her boyfriend and me, obviously I get the short shrift. Understandable, yet sad at the same time. But wait! The lady at the ticket thing said if we arrived early there might be a slight chance that somebody did not turn up and I could still get onto the bus. Ok. It's now 9 p.m. I am supposed to meet Tini and Marco at the train station at 10. Bus leaves at 11. If you don't hear from me until Saturday everything worked out. If not, I'll give you more birthday present stories. Do you really want that? Well, then wish me luck!!! (Marco and me put in a request for it at the Universe, but I've had mixed success with that so far...)

The only thing I can think of that I would want for my birthday is a peppermill. This needs to be co-ordinated, though, because if everybody gets me one, I can pave the roads in M with pepper. Peppermills are so damn expensive, though. But if you ask a salesperson they will tell you a lengthy story about the innards of said peppermills. These apparently crunch the peppercorns with blades sharpened by ancient wise monks in Tibet over thousands of years, a process that also involves secret rituals and blessings. While the monks come pretty cheap (thin little buggers, don't eat much) one has to take into account the price for the goats for the ritual. Plus, the little kids that carry the sharpened blades from the top of the world to the nether regions, clambering over the mountains, have recently formed an union and raised their asking price. So you see, actually, the price that YOU pay for the peppermill is just a fraction of what it's worth. You should be happy that the peppermill manufacturers out of the goodness of their hearts decided (at a great loss for themselves) to provide the market with an opportunity to sell these fine products. (Swiss people, mostly, those manufactureres, and whoever heard of the Swiss making a profit? Frolicking on the Alps, yodeling. That's what they do)

Can you tell that I don't really know what else to put on the list? I also have an amazon wishlist but don't go there, the evil amazonian website make you buy things that you don't really want to have. But books are always good. Oh, I've always wanted the second "Naked Chef" cookbook. And the "Naked Chef", but that's a different story.

I can't even really tell you what I don't want. I like presents. As long as you wrap it up nicely, I'll be totally happy with a rock. Maybe no puzzles. I still haven't done those I got for my last birthday.

I guess I'll have to think about it some more and I'll get back to you if anything else comes to mind.

Penguins.

SpontaneousMon is back! I am going to Prague tomorrow night with Tini & Marco to celebrate Tini's birthday! We will be going by bus, stay for Thursday and Friday and be back Saturday morning.. I've never been to Prague...I am quite excited! I am celebrating by changing my song for the day. Been singing it all morning now. I guess, I am feeling better after all.

Had a talk yesterday that cleared my head somewhat (thank you :) and got a phone call today (thank you, too :) and am once again open to the public. Don't want to go into details on the blog, so I'll just go about my business as usual.

Re: Winning a trip to Ireland. Apparantly, we've advanced to the Final Round of 30 Participants and they sent us a disposable camera to take pictures of us "in action". Yesterday Ulisch and me went around taking those pictures:

• Drinking coffee
  
• Playing Mensch Ärgere Dich Nicht (huge version)
  
• Sliding down a slide
  
• Lying between tulips
  
• Riding our bikes
  
• Buying books about Ireland
  
• Standing in front of the Frauenkirche
  
• Sitting at the Stachus Fountain
  
• Kissing the metal pig in front of the Hunt Museum
  
• Reading books about Ireland in front of the Monopteros
  
• Having beer at the Chinesischer Turm
  
• Dipping feet into the Eisbach
  
• Being interviewed by a camera team of Sat 1
  
• Having ice cream at a café
  
• Standing in front of the University
  
• Jogging
  
• Stretching
  
• Hanging from a pole
  
• Sitting on one of those kiddie bouncy animals
  
• Simulating football excitement
  
• Pretending to hitchhike to Ireland wearing one raincoat and holding an umbrella and a sign
  

It was quite a feat and took all day. The Sat 1 people said our pictures were boring, though. Hey, what do they know. Posted the camera right away, now we'll have to wait and see.

Tried to blog for an hour now. Couldn't wrap my mind around what I want to say. Am not sure I want people to see inside my head today anyway. Am not sure people will want to see inside my head either.

If you're interested in baby pictures: Olivia and Trixi plus Olivia.

If you've got something to cheer me up go ahead and share because I'm feeling like crap today.

I just returned from a party. It was kind of strange.. I'm never that good at making small talk. And my attention span and concentration were seriously lacking as I was still feeling somewhat out of sorts. So I started all sorts of conversations that kept getting interrupted by somebody barging in or me getting distracted and I felt a little like hanging in the air...drifting around...talking this and that...never making any sense (I hardly ever do even when I'm all there - senseless rambling is my speciality). I even think a guy was hitting on me shortly but then this, that or the other happened and our conversation got interrupted - well, maybe he wasn't hitting on me, I'm not even sure. At least he payed me a compliment. And I like compliments, even if I didn't really care for the guy. I never knew what to say to him and I hate rummaging around in my (already slowly functioning) brain for something to say.

That's also what I don't like about small talk, I guess. Most of the time it's just so - boring. Maybe it's my lack of interest in other people but I don't really care whether you were born in Bielefeld, shortly lived in Gütersloh, then moved to Munich and were supposed to meet your friends because you had arranged to meet two weeks ago in Freiburg which didn't work out so you decided to meet this weekend but then everybody cancelled and then you heard your best friend's cousin was having this party so you came here. Bored? You betcha. Maybe I just don't have a knack for it and if I just asked the right questions, an actual conversation would emerge from the mud pits of small talk (Dagobah, anyone? Use the force you must, Mon. Raise the conversation, you can). Maybe it works better when you're really drunk. But alas, I just sipped at a beer and didn't feel like indulging in heavy vodka drinking.

I guess I'll drag my tired body to bed now and see if I can be restored to former glory.