Category Archives: From another Blog

Weltenwanderer – Reading Night (Lesenacht) #2

Thanks to all the renovation troubles I’m not really able to read properly, so I decided it was time to do so again and what better way to use another Reading Night by Weltenwanderer?

What is a Reading Night and how does it work?

It’s basically different people picking up a book to read during a set amount time.
If the invitation is sent from a Blog that usually involves answering question throughout the session.
In this case Aleshanee invited us to join in a reading from 7pm to 1pm on the 12th August 2016.
I answered the question that night on my Facebook (and subsequently Twitter) Page until 11 am and now you can find the collection of those answers and the missing ones here (All questions are obviously translated from their German version on Weltenwander).
Note: Everything in []-brackets is added/changed after the original posts.

Question 1: As you are participating in the ‪ReadingNight‬ today, I assume you’re not on vacation 😉 Where you away already or is it still planned for this year?
And which book accompanies you through the evening? Are you starting it or are you already in the middle of it and want to finish it?

I had my large vacation in March where [Janzy] and I visited and explored London for nearly two weeks. The other trip that was planned for September surrounding the Connichi was unfortunately postponed, so I don’t have any plans for further travelling (the exploring kind anyway) this year. (Non exploring travellings: Conventions and family trip)
I’m continuing with ‪NeilGaiman‬’s ‪‎The Sandman‬, so I’m not reading a book, but a comic – or rather comics[ as the Volume I chose consist of several chapters that were published separately].
I’m currently at Chapter 41, which is the beginning of Volume 7 (of 10) of the original run, so I want to finish this series, I guess.

Question 2: In which country or region does your ‪book‬ take place? Would you like to take a ‪vacation‬ there or would like to live there? Where would you most like to have your next vacation?

This ‪Sandman‬ story so far takes place in the different realms of the Endless, right now I’m in the Dreaming and I’m not entirely sure if I wanted to stay there for a prolonged period of time…

I mean what is shown of it is fascinating and there are quite a bunch of interesting people around, but suffering through Dreams mood swings? I’m not so sure that’d make it a good place for vacation…
In the real world there are a lot of places I’d like to visit. Currently I’d like to return to Ireland – especially for Halloween – , but that probably wont work, as I would[n’t] have anyone to take with me and travelling alone isn’t really my thing…

Question 3: By now you’ve gotten to know the characters in your ‪‎book‬ a little bit: Could you imagine to go on vacation with them? Are they likeable, like a buddy to through thick and thin with or would you not get along that well?

As I said before does Dream have a lot of mood swings. He’s fascinating, but he can also be extremely annoying, stubborn and even cruel. His little sister Delirium would probably drive me nuts with her babbling, it’s hard enough to follow her within the story.

So in both cases: Nope. I don’t think I’d like to go on a vacation with either of them – and I pity the poor driver Ruby, who currently is travelling with them, not only because I think she’ll die on one of the next pages (as I think I spoilered myself earlier…)…

Question 4: Where was your best vacation so far? Are there any funny anecdotes you could tell us about it?
If you spontaneously could go on a vacation tomorrow: Which three books would you definitely take to read?

All of my vacations had something special, so I can’t really decide which one of them was the best, but I can give you a look at some funny things that happened during some of my travels: Of Angel Chicken Wings and other oddities

I don’t know which books I’d pick, it usually depends on the vacation and my mood, but I mostly only take short ones with me as I rarely read while I’m travelling anyway.
The last time I went away I took „Am Anfang war die Kuh“ (In the Beginning was the Cow) by Fritz Steinbock – an anthology of short stories and poems about North Mythology – and a book with Russian folk tales in both Russian and German with me, but I didn’t read either.

Question 5: Do you like the ‪‎book‬ so far? Is it exciting, romantic, funny? Is it like you expected it to be?
Describe it with 5 nouns or a great quote, that you found!

I enjoy the tale that is told in the ‪‎Sandman‬ volume „Brief Lives“. It twists and it turns and the journey is interesting to follow. It’s kind of the way I expected, as this is already the seventh volume of the series and I kind of have a feeling of what it might be like to read it, but it’s still different every time around.

There were a few interesting things said by Dream or one of his siblings, but I couldn’t pick one in particular, so I’ll have to figure out five nouns…
Dream, Delirium, Destruction, Search, Siblings would probably be the easiest choices and as my mind is slowly drifting off into sleep-mode I’ll keep it at that. 😀
[Shortly before Question 6 was asked I finished the volume and decided to call it a day, with getting up at around 6am it had been a long one. So everything after this is answered retroactively.]

Question 6: Do you like the cover of your current book? Is the cover important to you or do you not care about it when buying a book?

I’m not quite sure I like any of the covers (chapter covers included) of the Sandman-series. They are strange and weird and I don’t know, chaotic and definitely different to what is usually used. They just don’t go for appealing the audience. At the same time are they fascinating and filled with all the things happening within the Chapter(s).
I don’t think I would have even picked them up if I hadn’t known the series to be by Gaiman and said to be one of his best works.
As for the other part of the question: I’d like to just forward you to my answer from last time with this quote:

It depends.
If I look for a certain book then it doesn’t matter.
If I’m just browsing through the book store my attention occasionally gets caught by a cover. If the blurb then fits what I like to read, it is highly likely that I will take the book with me. If not it’s just put back where I found it.

Finale: Sooo, some of you made it this far, but now I’m quite tired I have to admit… The conclusion of the evening: Did you enjoy the Reading Night, where the questions all right, did you manage to read even a little? Did you reach your goal and would you recommend your book?

As I’ve said, did I not manage to get this far, but I did manage to reach my goal in finishing the Volume.
I’d recommend the whole Sandman series, it might sound like a broken record as everyone is saying this, but it certainly is one of the must reads.
It has some very fascinating and interesting story lines, characters and worlds. The drawings might not be what is generally depicted as beautiful, but they’re certainly unique. The way the characters are shown feels almost like reading a story board that only waits for some director to pick it up and turn it into something amazing. 😉
The questions were interesting and even if the cover-question was a repetition do I think it’s a nice addition on such a night.
A great thank  you to Aleshanee for hosting this one again!

Additional Notes

I’m not sure when I’ll continue with the series – or reading in general, but I certainly will.
As I noticed yesterday did Feuerflügel participate as well, so feel free to check out her post about reading Stephen King’s The Dark Tower (that I still have to get too…  >_<)
Have you ever participated in a Reading Night?
Would you like to?
Let me know, maybe one day I’ll host one myself. 🙂
PoiSonPaiNter
© For the cover belongs to its rightful owner.

Blog-Parade ferngeweht – City, Country, River: P for Peene

Some time ago ferngeweht made a Blog-Parade about the old children’s game „City, Country, River“ or „Stadt, Land, Fluss“ as it’s called in German and asked for 26 Bloggers to write articles about a city, country or river for a respective letter. This time around Sabine wants 78 Bloggers (3 for each letter) to do the same.

I already participated in a previous Blog-Parade of hers (Fernweh) where my post got added to the e-book version containing nearly all entries and also two others about travelling (Strangest Travelling experiences and Travelling Glitches). When I saw the first Parade I wanted to participate, but my chosen letter was already taken and my time/motivation back then wasn’t that good to begin with.

Not that this is any better this time around (*click*), but I decided to apply for the river version of the letter P.

And as you’ve already figured out: I managed to get it. 🙂

Additionally, this post also qualifies as first „Travelling T-Day„, a category I introduced when I talked about the schedule (I just don’t have a picture for it yet >_<).

So without further ado, let me tell you a bit about

The Peene

The Peene is a river in North-East Germany; in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern (Mecklenburg-Western-Pomerania) to be more precise and if there weren’t those huge corn silos I’d be able to see it from our bath-/bedroom windows. So it’s obvious why I chose it, right? 😉

Anyway, as the Peene is a German river the pronunciation has nothing to do with the English „pee“ – even if the Slavic origin of the word (Pěna) – meaning „foam“ or „foaming river“ – could be associated with the word. If you go for a similar sounding word I’d recommend a look at „penny“. Here you simply stretch the sound of the e for the „ee“ and add the short one at the end. Easy, right? 😉

River basics

Geografische Karte des Peeneverlaufs
(c) Ulamm

The Peene is a river system consisting of the Peene and other rivers that have Peene in their names (see picture) and several side-arms running towards or away from it. The Peene – that is actually only called Peene – I’m going to talk about origins near Gnoien and runs past Demmin, Jarmen (my home town that I’ll be using as an example throughout the post), Anklam and reaches the Baltic Sea as Peenestrom (strom = stream/river) in Peenemünde (münde being an abbreviation of Mündung, meaning „water mouth“) – at least that’s what I get from local knowledge and the quite confusing Wikipedia article.

This part of the Peene is about 126 km long, it’s longest distance is 185 km in total. The river is sometimes referred to as the Amazon of the North (Amazonas des Nordens) due to the curvy course of the river and its natural habitats of many different (sometimes endangered) species.

Wildlife sanctuaries and shipping

The mill & the filling construction
The mill & the filling construction

These natural habitats are often even sanctuaries, where beavers, (sea) eagles, otters and all kinds of little critters can live and re-populate. Some towns – like Demmin and Jarmen – even use the beavers for touristic advertisement (Jarmen recently got a wooden beaver statue at the town entrance). The habitats range from normal river valley (Peenetal 😉 ) to moors, with the moor even being the largest low-level moor (fen) (Niedermoor) in Middle Europe and other parts run through an Urstromtal.

Some parts of the Peene can be passed through on special river tours, where you can see these habitats. As the river(s) runs through a couple of lakes – like the Kummerower See – these tours are sometimes combined with tours there. Other parts are still used for shipping freight or (hobby) sailing, but pretty much every part can be accessed via canoe, with several stations along the way.
There are a few harbours along the Peene; in Jarmen there is the mill directly beside it and sometimes you can see the transport ships being filled from the mill and/or the tall silos that are blocking my/our view. ;)Obviously there are also a couple of bridges that are either high enough for boats to pass below or able to be drawn up.
Jarmen has two bridges: One for the (former Federal Road/Bundestraße B96) Country Road (Landstraße) L35 and one for the motorway (A20) directly alongside it. With an motorway entrance just outside of town it’s quite easy to cross the river here. The next proper bridges are, I believe, in Loitz and Anklam.

Foto der Landstraßen-Brücke über der Peene
The feet below the bridge (by the yellow sign) belong to the motorway-bridge 😉

But that’s not all there is to it

The Peene also has a history of being a natural border within the state that is nowadays called Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, but used to be at least two different parts.
During the Swedish occupation of the North, for example, the Peene was basically the border in most parts between Swedish-Pomerania and New-Western-Pomerania. During that time a lot of towns alongside the Peene – like Jarmen – were under Swedish occupation. Later it cut off the Prussian region of Stralsund. Today the Peene is usually part of a county on both sides, but before we had the „Kreisgebietsreform“ (county area reform) where Jarmen became part of the new county called „Vorpommern-Greifswald“ the Peene used to be the border between the counties „Ostvorpommern“ and „Demmin„, if I remember correctly.

An especially interesting tale concerns the part of the Peene along the town of Anklam. Where the Brandenburger (or -ian?) and Swedish armies fought over the town and its access to the river.
In a bit more fictional way this plundering and destruction is composed as a theatre play called „Die Peene brennt“ (The Peene burns) and is performed every year around September and shows how the Anklamer drove off the occupiers. Unfortunately I never managed to attend one of the shows, but some day I certainly will. 😉

My Peene

As I mentioned a couple of times now, do I live relatively close to the Peene. Growing up we met down there to just sit around and chat, to explore or to relax in the sun – if it wasn’t that time of the year where all the dead fish lay in the river after repopulating (Nearby we also used to have a large playground with a wooden ship where you could climb and play, but only the giant sand box it stood in now remains of it).

I made a few tours on the river – and I really like being on a river boat or ferry. One was in elementary school, that I mentioned briefly before, where a classmate described the animals we could possibly see as „Bibers“, „Adlers“ and „Otters“ (horrible plurals of Beaver, Eagle and Otter) and the other a trip as part of a birthday party from a friend of the family. Both were great and I don’t mind going on another trip.
If you live here it’s easy to come across different parts of the river, so it’s not surprising that I’ve seen it in at least Demmin and Anklam as well.

Flussverlauf weiter an der Mühle entlang

As I now mostly stay in Neubrandenburg I don’t have time that I could spent down at the river – and it would be weird because off all the anglers standing down there. Still I enjoyed going down there again to take the pictures for this post.

I hope you enjoyed this little introduction to the Amazon of the North and maybe you find yourself thinking about visiting it one day. 😉

PoiSonPaiNter

On the Road: Giving a Lift

I’ve been meaning to write this post since 2012, but as I think it would fit the Blogparade „Travelling Glitches around the World“ (Reisepannen rund um den Globus) by Gecko Footsteps I decided to finally finish it – even though it happened in good ol‘ Germany. 😉
For quite some time now I’ve been taking passengers along for the longer distances between the parts of my Journeys and one encounter does definitely count as a Travelling Glitch in my book.
But before I get to that, let’s have a look at

How I get my passengers:

There are different platforms (everyone who ever looked for stuff like that knows which ones I mean, so I’m not going to advertise them) out there that give drivers the possibility to put up their route ad and offer a ride/lift for everyone that wants to travel the same direction in exchange for a little money.
Those interested can then contact the driver and arrange everything, like where to pick them up/drop them off; how to find each other, etc..
Usually this is easily done and most of the time the people I end up with are nice and interesting, but there are a few exceptions to that and one of which is what I want to talk about today.

A ridiculous idea

For some reason did I decide it would be a good idea to travel from Berlin to Hamburg and back to Greifswald/Neubrandenburg on the same day. Little did I know that this would turn out to be one of my worst decisions.
But why did I do that?
Well, as far as I remember was the whole ordeal on a Sunday.
The Saturday before that I was at a Powerwolf concert in Berlin and on Sunday we had a meeting from the Eventteam – the student group I was the head of at the time – in Hamburg that could not be postponed due to scheduling issues.
So basically: I didn’t have much choice, as I already had the tickets and the other thing couldn’t be changed either.
To at least get something out of this I then decided to pick up passengers from Berlin to Hamburg and from Hamburg to Greifswald on my way back.
So far so good, but then stuff happened.

Where are you now?

When I arrived in Hamburg I soon noticed that the original meeting point (Dammtor) was under construction, so I had no chance to park, let alone pick someone up there and decided to look for a different place.
After quite some time I found a parking deck a bit further away and told my would-be passengers that I parked in THAT parking deck (giving them the exact name that I can’t recall any more) and that they should try to get there instead (as new meeting point). I got a message from one of them saying that they found the train station nearby and I believe I forwarded that as well.
With the thought that everything was settled I then went to the meeting.
Unfortunately it dragged on a bit longer than I expected so even though I hurried I got to the meeting point later than I had said, but when I arrived no one was there. So I went to pick up the first person at the train station she had mentioned earlier.
At the same time I got a call from one of the others that wanted to know where I was and I told her that I was picking up the other passenger and that they should wait at the park-house.
As it turned out they thought I was in the parking deck near Dammtor (a parking deck near the original meeting point by a totally different name).
I told her that I didn’t park there and that I was on my way to pick them up, anyway.
If I remember correctly I got at least five more calls until I finally made it there and somehow found my way to them through the construction stuff.
This whole driving around (me missing a few turns along the way due to rising anxiety of what might happen when I arrive included) made us actually start an hour after the original plan.
The mood in the car was accordingly sour and down.

Are we there yet?

Time and again I tried to initiate a conversation, but I felt too… bad (for a lack of a better word) for making them wait so long(, even though it was only partly my fault) that I stopped trying at some point and just silently drove.
As it had been a long day and I usually made a stop there I took a break at a Fast Food restaurant along the way. Too anxious to say more I simply stopped and asked if anyone wanted to get something, because I was hungry and needed something to eat.
No one wanted anything, everyone stayed in the car and I had to fast eat my burger sitting behind the wheel and continue driving as soon as I was finished, abiding to the dark mood in the car.
A little while earlier – before the stop – one of the waiters asked me when we would arrive and I told her a certain time, which I later realized was a complete miscalculation on my part as the sat nav was set on my home and I didn’t include the dinner-stop.
Needless to say we arrived way later than I told them.
When we finally made it to Greifswald they all got out and I told them that they still owed me the 10(?) Euro for the ride, to which one of the waiters subsequently replied that due to the delayed start and the misinformation I gave them, she’d only give me five Euro and the others followed suit, intimidated by her.
At that point I was far too tired and exhausted to complain or tell them that most of it was their own fault, so I simply accepted it and just drove home – I didn’t feel like driving to Neubrandenburg, so I made a stop there and ranted at my Mum in the middle of the night about it.
With some distance to the whole thing I later pondered if it would be a good idea to create a dictionary Me-German/German-Me as I really did not understand how they could have misread my initial notification SMS…

The Morale of the Story

It’s been nearly four years and I still remember the dread and anxiety I felt during that ride and afterwards. It simply was the worst ride I had so far.
There was another one that turned ugly afterwards, when I got a bad rating by the girlfriend of a passenger for changing the destination after a discussion with BOTH passengers about what would suit them best and driving carefully (~100km/h on the motorway at times) after a Festival-weekend, but it wasn’t as bad as this one. At least the ride itself was great thanks to the other passenger that I’m still in contact with.
Long story short: You can have a lot of luck with the passengers you’re taking with you and it also can turn out badly (last minute drop out, language barriers, tense atmosphere,… ).
I certainly will keep posting my route ads if I drive alone, but after this and some other incidences I decided for myself that each of my route ads will include the following information:

  • The time is only an approximate value and can change due to different circumstances. In case of serious changes you’ll be notified.
  • If your English is better than your German: Please use it!

Better save than sorry, I guess?
PoiSonPaiNter

On the Road: Of Angel Chicken Wings and other oddities

Or (some of) my strangest travelling experiences

Those of you who follow my Blog for a while now, have probably read some of the tales falling into this category, but when I saw the Blogparade by Mit Kind im Rucksack (With Child in the Backpack) on ferngeweht, I simply couldn’t resist to participate and give you a little overview about mine and add a few I haven’t managed to write about yet.

I don’t know why, but it seems like on every journey I take – be it short ones or longer ones – something strange – or rather, ridiculous – is bound to happen, so this will only scratch the surface and I’ll mostly focus on the stuff that happened recently that I haven’t written about yet.

Sometimes these things happen, simply because the whole situation is strange to begin with.
Like when Breagit and I spontaneously decided to take a two hours train ride to Berlin, just to get some bread. Other times they happen because of the people involved, like that time I had a midnight chat in the back of my car at a Festival. Or when Black Kat and I went to a The Other (Horror Punk) concert at the Weekend of Horrors only to exit the hall into bright sunlight.

Sometimes there are other reasons…

Lost Direction

Whenever I drive somewhere for the first time and take someone with me, I always assure them:

„There is a high chance that I will take a wrong turn at some point.“

And I’m usually right.
It takes me a few times to remember a route, but when I do it’s not hard for me to follow it (or recognize it even years later), but when I use the sat nav I don’t always realize if the turn I’m taking is the right one.

But I’m good at that without proper navigation, too.
Two years ago Janzy and I went to Ireland for Halloween (I know, still lacking a travel log, I’m working on it) and for our first day we rented a car to get to our B&B in Navan and continue from there. Unfortunately my sat nav did not have maps for Ireland so we had to focus on manual maps, which wasn’t easy as the highways were a bit confusing, it was dark and we really had no idea where we were.

At some point we simply drove into the town/village Sword – and yes, that is really its name – and looked for someone who could help us. On our way we saw a few children dressed up for Trick or Treating and finally found an electronic market that was still open.

So we went inside and asked for directions to Navan.
The shop assistant was quite confused about our request and right away asked us: „What do you want in Navan?“
Well, we had our B&B there, so there was that…
Luckily he could give us easy to follow directions as it was somewhere close to his own home and after way more hours than we had planned we finally made it there.

Navigating during the day then worked way better and we didn’t have any troubles finding Newgrange and Tara, but back in Dublin something else was lost to us.

I don’t know how many times we walked up and down the O’Connell Street looking for the Hard Rock Café in the alleys on either side of the road, but for some reason we couldn’t find it.
Towards the evening, we’d partly given up the search, but still occasionally glanced into an alley, we went down the street again and lo and behold, there it was, mocking us with it’s bright name-sign as we approached.
It’s probably one of those buildings that you can only find when you’re not looking for it…

Strange Stops

With travelling comes taking breaks and some of them are more intentional than others.
Besides having a whole Youth Hostel nearly to myself (report follows) or staying at a Hotel that turned out to be Motel (same here) there were a few other accommodation surprises over the years.

Like that time Feuerflügel made arrangements with a friend of hers so I could stay there and totally forgot to tell me the guys name. Or the first time I decided to sleep in my car, because rain had soaked my tent and pretty much everything in it (see midnight talk-link). Or that time when I barely slept at all because of the location of the Youth Hostel (soon).

But accommodations aren’t the only stops.
Festivals are a great source for unintentional breaks, especially if you wait about five and more hours to enter a Festival ground that’s only a few kilometres away and people start running into the fields beside the road to relieve themselves (report later).
Or when you have to take a stop to wait for a Ferry because your sat nav decided it would be more fun to take that route instead of the bridge beforehand … (happened to me twice, guy-name link + Metalfest 2012).
Or you take a break on your way back from a Convention at a resting place called „Brocken View“ (The Brocken is a mountain in middle Germany), but it’s nowhere to be seen.

Sprachfasching (Word-messes)

Those who know me personally, know that sometimes the things I say don’t really make sense, but I’m not the only one suffering from that syndrome. Quite a bunch of strange words or discussions were created during my travels.

I told you about the Pony with Horn and the Spaghetti Fish and other things said during that particular Wacken, but I have yet to tell you about the (titular) Angel Chicken Wings.

During InGenius‘ and my visit to Stockholm we discussed a lot of things. Plans, stories, ideas, writing in general and how many wings Archangels in general and in particular in Supernatural have.
While we were in the greatest Book Store I’ve been in so far, I incidentally picked up a book about Angels that said that the Archangel Gabriel has in some sources 152 (or 146 or something like that) wings.
When I mentioned it in a later discussion, we imagined how so many wings would fit on a body and got to the conclusion that they had to sit on things like hands and feet as well.

At some point InGenius commented:

„You could make a lot of of … Angel Chicken Wings from that“

We laughed about this and discussed it a bit further (how would one make Angel Chicken Wings in a SPN setting?). Incidentally SPN itself made a joke about frying an Archangel in the episode Changing Channels, well and there is always Grace‚ Celestial Poultry, so it’s not surprising something like that comes up at some point …

Anyway, somehow we then got to the discussion about strange signs.
In my early days of travelling, when we explored nearby towns back in my school days, I once came across two arrow-signs, hanging directly below each other, reading:

„Lunch Specials: 5.XX DM“
„Funeral Services“

And yes, they pointed in the same direction …

When InGenius then told me about a sign that offered you:

„Second-hand Coffee to go“

when you read it the wrong way, I totally lost it and had to sit down for a moment, in combination with the Angel Chicken Wings this was just too much for me …

It’s in the genes…

Now, you’ve read a few strange stories, but long before I paid much attention to anything – or existed – there already were a few things that I’m told on occasion.
Contrary to what I grew up with, my parents travelled quite a bit before I was born and have many stories of getting lost while picking mushrooms, visiting bone houses and what not, to tell.

But there is one thing, I’d like to use as the final story of this post:

One time my parents and grandparents were driving with my grandpas Trabi (Trabant) and my grandma yelled at them from the back-seat:

„You guys keep looking straight ahead now.“

And proceeded to change the elastic band of her underwear right then and there. >_<
Doing weird stuff while travelling seems to run in the family …

For more stories about my travelling check out the On the Road-Category. 😉

Hope you had fun reading this

PoiSonPaiNter

Weltenwanderer – Reading Night (Lesenacht)

Tuesday is usually the day for the Reading Together, but as I haven’t participated in that for quite some time, I thought I’d simply post this collection from the Reading Night over at Weltenwanderer from the last Christmas night instead.

What is a Reading Night and how does it work?

It’s basically different people picking up a book to read in a set amount time.
If the invitation is sent from a Blog that usually involves answering question throughout the session.
In this case Aleshanee invited us to join in a reading from 8pm to 1am on the 26th December 2015 „To let Christmas wind down with a good book…“.
I answered the question that night on my Facebook (and subsequently Twitter) Account and now you can find them collected here as well (All questions are obviously translated from their German version on Weltenwander).
Note: Everything in []-brackets is added/changed after the original posts.

Question 1:
What are you reading today? Was the book a Christmas Present or did you have any books under the tree? If so, which ones? How many pages do you plan on reading?

Tonight I’m reading „The Ultimate Hitchhiker’s Guide“ (to the Galaxy) [by Douglas Adams] that collects all five novels and an additional one. It wasn’t a Christmas present, it isn’t even my own copy…I borrowed it from [Nazgul] back in 2014 and wanted to finish it back then for [BiblioSmiles‘ Summer Book Challenge – that I haven’t finished yet], but so far didn’t get around to do it.
So here I am trying to read as much as possible! 😀
[As I somehow didn’t answer that: I didn’t get any books for Christmas]

Question 2:
Which protagonists from your book would you have liked to invite for your Christmas celebrations? Or would they have demolished the whole feast? In which place or land are you right now in your book?

 I’m not that far into the book, but from what I remember from the movie would I probably not want any of them [participating in] our Christmas celebrations. They’re either too pessimistic [and that says something, as I am quite the pessimist myself] or too weird… >_<
Demolishing would also be a good point, as they’re currently trying to get rid of planet Earth – which is where I am currently. Somewhere close to London on Earth. 😀

Question 3:
Do you like your book up to now? Describe it with 5 adjectives 😀

Yes, I like the book so far, though in my head I keep comparing it to the movie-version (the one with Martin Freeman as Arthur Dent)… But I guess that can’t be helped if you watch the movie before you read the book >_<
extraterrestrial, confusing, detailed, footnote-y, bureaucratic

Question 4:
Do you like the cover of your current book? Is the cover important to you or do you not care about it at all?

As this book is a special edition the cover is rather simple, but nice, though it does remind me of a bible. Which it probably is to some people, I suppose. >_<
I discussed this before in a Reading Together, so I’ll simply quote the short version and you can read the long answer in the link:

It depends.
If I look for a certain book then it doesn’t matter.
If I’m just browsing through the book store my attention occasionally gets caught by a cover. If the blurb then fits what I like to read, it is highly likely that I will take the book with me. If not it’s just put back where I found it.

Question 5:
You’ve certainly looked through the other Blogs a bit… was there a book for you amongst them? Or do you know one of them that you can recommend? Would you recommend your current book?
And…are you already sleepy? 😀

 To be honest: I haven’t managed to read much at the other Blogs…I’m glad when I [manage to read] a few pages in my own book, as it feels like I simply don’t move forward. Though I’m not sure why that is (distractions, font, language?)
Well, I feel like not recommending the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy would be blasphemy, soo…
And yes: The eyes are practising for sleep-mode…

Finale:
How far did you get with your book? Have you managed to read „enough“ for today? Will you continue to read or are your eyes already closing themselves?

With a little cheating of adding 14 minutes to the 1 o’clock end I managed to at least get to page 100. For five hours of reading this seems like no pages at all – that’s usually my page count or one[-one 1/2] hour – , but I guess as in a different font and format this might be page 150-200, [plus] the fact that I got side tracked a lot and the book being in English I let it slide and simply accept it as such. At least I started at all.
I read enough in a way that I now go to sleep and rest my mind and eyes and finish the last pages of the first part afterwards.

Additional Notes

Regardless of the earlier statement have I not picked up the book again so far, but I will continue and the plan is to finally finish the whole thing before Towel Day, so, maybe that’ll help. I also wouldn’t mind to participate in another of this nights, even though it is exhausting, but at least I got something done. 😉
Have you ever participated in a Reading Night?
Would you like to?
Let me know, maybe one day I’ll host one myself. 🙂
PoiSonPaiNter

Into the Autumn

During the last few months I received several tags by both DarkFairy and Fissel and I’ll try to get them done one after the other without boring you too much with them. As the days are getting darker and colder I decided to start with this one that was forwarded to me by Fairy.
The Tag – originally called Ab in den Herbst* – was created by Corly and like all Tags brings Rules with them:

  • Link your post below Corly’s Original-Tag
  • Say thank you for the nomination: Thanks Fairy!
  • Answer the questions
  • Tag more Bloggers and tell them

The Questions

Which books remind you of autumn? (Be it due to the cover or because they take place in autumn)

Honestly? I have no idea. I barely remember any covers – even though they might influence my decision to buy the book – or take notice of the Season’s within a book – as they barely play a role.
Corly included the German version of Suzanne Collins Mockingjay in her list and I have to admit, that I am not sure if the thingies are supposed to be flames (German subtitle: Flaming Wrath) or autumn leaves…
Thinking a bit more on it, I guess Der Königsschlüssel (The King’s Key) by Boris Koch reminds me a bit of autumn, too, due to the colour of the cover, but I don’t think it was hinted at in the story…
Story-wise I’d say Terry Pratchett’s Reaper Man reminds me of autumn, simply because DEATH is bringing in the corn…

What do you associate with autumn?

Colourful leaves/trees, rain and wind are the major associations I have with autumn, but there are also a couple of other things. The days are getting darker, all the stuff from the garden is harvested and there are a few things that are celebrated in this Season – and I don’t mean Halloween – St. Martin’s Day was a huge thing when I was a kid – especially the lantern procession. By now the focus of the 11th November is more on the beginning of the carnival Season where we get the traditional Pfannkuchen from our bosses. Also in autumn are the change of the daylight saving time and the Eternity Sunday or Sunday of the Dead (Ewigkeitssonntag or Totensonntag) that I talked about back in 2013 over at the Fairytale Traveler. This year that day will be quite difficult….

What do you especially like about autumn?

I’m not really sure, but I guess I like that the weather now allows me to not feel guilty about staying in all day. 😉 And I really love passing by or driving through alleys full of colourful trees…oh and tramping through the fallen leaves and kicking them into the air is also great. 😀

What is your favourite Halloween-movie?

This thing is filed with difficult questions…
I guess my favourite Halloween-movie is Halloweentown and its sequels. They’re just so much fun… and of course Nightmare before Christmas, but you can never be sure if this movie fits into the category Halloween- or Christmas-movie 😉
[Author’s Note: I just re-read Fairy’s post after completing mine: I did not mean to copy these from you, but it’s not surprising to me that we picked the same movies. >_<]

Are you an autumn-child (meaning: Were you born in autumn)?

Nope, Winter is my Season. 😀

What do you say about the season autumn in general? Do you like autumn?

It depends, some days, especially when the sun shines and illuminates all those colourful leaves, autumn is awesome. On others when the fog is hanging low or it is raining, you just want to wrap a blanket around yourself and shut out the world, which isn’t an entirely bad thing, but sometimes it can drag you down and that’s not so great. But I generally like autumn as a season.

What kind of holiday destinations do you like most in autumn?

The majority of my travellings take place in summer, so the only times I am actually on tour in autumn is for concerts, maybe an MPS or things like last years trip on Halloween or this year the TimeLash. This also means that I barely use any vacation days in autumn anyway and therefore don’t have a destination – other than getting home, I guess. Though I do still want to actually participate in an American Halloween celebration or actually be able to follow some Irish traditions…

Are there animals that you associate with autumn?

Deer, I guess? And crows and brants and cranes probably, as those are the ones you mostly see either standing on the (empty) fields or noisily flying above you to their wintering grounds.

Your most beautiful autumn-picture? (Can be a private one)

Tough one again… I think most pictures that include colourful leaves are beautiful, so… (yes, I’m a big fan of colourful leaves…). I’m most fascinated by pictures that depict trees or forests throughout the Seasons, where they have like one picture for each Season. Those are great….

Do you have a special autumn experience?

Hmm…I guess you can count all those Halloween experiences I had so far into this, other than that…no idea…

Last thoughts

Okay, so this probably weren’t the most interesting answers to these question, but I still wanted to do it. I think it helps one to learn a bit more about oneself if you try thinking about certain things, you haven’t thought about before and tags like this one help with that.
As I don’t know whom to tag, I will skip that part of the rules. If you want to answer the questions anyway, because you think autumn is awesome or otherwise then go ahead and feel tagged! 😀
You can obviously use my translated questions or Corly’s original (German) ones.
Don’t slip on any fallen leaves. 😉
PoiSonPaiNter
* I obviously translated the rules and questions.

Supernatural Summary – Season 3

Welcome back to the overview of Eric Kripke’s Supernatural; the monster-of-the-week mystery drama series about the Winchester brothers Sam and Dean.

We last saw them closing a Hell Gate and killing their longtime foe in Season Two; now let’s take a look at what’s in store for them in:

Season Three

Storyline

With thousands of Demons up and about on Earth and their only weapon being a Colt with no bullets left, the Winchesters and their friends/colleagues/surrogate family Bobby, Ellen and Jo don’t really stand a chance against them. This is until the Demon Ruby decides to switch sides and help them by not just using a Demon killing Knife, but also by helping Bobby to make more bullets. However, the Colt gets stolen by con-artist Bela Talbot, who is more then a thorn in the eyes of the brothers. They soon discover  she has a similar problem as Dean: A Hellhound is on her heels to collect her debt for a deal she made. Resentful of her actions they, however, refuse to help her, even though she reveals to them who holds Hell’s contracts. Finally able to track down that Demon, Lilith, Dean’s time runs out and he meets his demise at the claws and fangs of the invisible beast, while she tries and fails to kill Sam.

The Monsters

For a Season after the release of thousands of Demons one would think the brothers’ cases this Season would mostly deal with them, but far from it. Right in the first episode they jump into a case where we meet seven Demons representing the Seven Deadly Sins and learn about the Knife. Other than that are they mostly figuring out and looking for demonic signs (cattle death, freak weather), but are faced with lots of other stuff instead, as this Season has a variety of foes.

They reprise the appearance of vampires with a turned Hunter set on killing Sam, that uses his new abilities to attack them. Needless to say he fails.

But there are also some new additions.

We have energy sucking Changelings, name calling Crocotta and the first appearance of – easy to kill – Pagan Gods, though they don’t say which ones. Even Spirits get a twist, as the spirit of a dying girl causes Fairy Tales to come true.
There also is a Witch coven out for blood and the Trickster from last Season returns for a time-loop episode and of course the return of the (to humans invisible) Hellhounds.

Plot Points

From this Season forward the Colt is more or less shelved and the Winchesters use the Demon killing Knife instead, after they take it from Ruby that is. Relevant for the following Seasons is the introduction of Lilith, whose powers do not work against Sam and it is a bit foreshadowing of what is to come of his abilities.

One of the themes of this Season was: What should one do with the knowledge of the supernatural? So besides monsters we can also see the results of using mythical artifacts. With Bela we have someone selling those to the highest bidder. Twice the Winchersters thwart her plans, once with a Lucky Rabbits Foot, that is not so lucky once you lose it – and you will lose it – and the other a Hand of Glory, where you drown after seeing its original owners’ ship. It shows that these things are not to be messed with.

Not addressed for the first time, is the fact that one brother cannot be without the other.

“Mystery Spot” plays with the thought: What if Dean died before his time is up and Sam cannot do a thing to stop it.  It gives us a look at how Sam would cope and it shows that he has the same narrow-minded tendency as his father, when it comes to tracking down the one that killed a family member. It is discussed more than once this Season that the brothers are each other’s weakness and this theme will continue to be explored throughout the series.

Minor plot points are the introduction of the Ghostfacers and the re-appearance of the Trickster. One is a parody of the Ghost hunting part of the Winchester’s life, where they bring back two guys that created a creature called a Tulpa through the common belief of their website followers last Season and now attempt to turn their Ghost hunts into a reality TV show – all with hand camera filming. The other likes fooling the brothers and teaching them lessons. In Season Two the Trickster showed them how easy it is to pit them against each other. This time around his illusion lays out another theme – and problem: You can’t escape fate.  The Trickster traps Sam in a time loop and makes him witness Deans’ death over and over again to get his point across. Though seemingly his work and all their struggling is in vein as the Winchesters do everything to escape their destiny either way. Though in this Season this is shown as a failure, as Dean does indeed die in the finale and Sam is left on his own.

Pro’s and Con’s

Season Three was a better one in regards to the variety of topics covered. While there was only a small continuation of the Demon story line, the things that were explored were quite interesting.

The episodes never drifted into repetition and some new and funny concepts were added. I cannot say if this was thanks to the briefness of the Season (only 16 episodes, due to the strikes of the Writers Guild of America back then), but I clearly enjoy the result.

As for the funny concepts: I like it when a show doesn’t take itself too seriously and with the episodes “Bad Day at Black Rock” and “Ghostfacers” we get some comedic relief from the seriousness of the overall Season. I believe the Christmas special (“A very Supernatural Christmas”) can be included in this count as well, as some things were rather ridiculous.
It is also nice to see some repercussions again, as one of the Hunters they had worked with and got into jail last Season is now on their heels to kill Sam, as he considers him an abomination due to his powers.

In contrast to this did we also get some questionable choices. With Bela an interesting and different character is introduced. She uses her knowledge of the supernatural for profit instead of becoming a hunter herself. But instead of expanding on her characterization, of her crossing paths with the Winchesters more often, she is reduced to just another deal victim with barely any background info and killed off within the Season.

An entirely different thing is the introduction of the Pagan Gods. This Season it is shown that they can be killed quite easily by using – in their case – an evergreen branch as stake. It is said that they lost the majority of their powers when people stopped worshipping them, but I still think this is way too easy.

Another thing that isn’t understandable is the introduction of Dean’s ex-girlfriend Lisa and her son Ben(,who is implied but denied to be Dean’s). It’s nice in a what-he-could-have-had-perspective, but in regards to the story line this Season it makes little sense.

In conclusion: Thanks/Due to its briefness this Season didn’t have much time to toy around, so it focused on the important things. Some of those turned out to be fun diversions (Ghostfacers), some disappointing (Pagan Gods) and others not quite clear (Ben).

All in all is this an enjoyable Season.

Rating: 4 out of 5

Until next time

PoiSonPaiNter

Originally Posted on The EXTREMIS REVIEWS: Carry on our Wayward Sons: Supernatural Season 3 – Poison Breaks Down The One Where Dean Gets Bitten

[The] Raven's Omen

When I checked out the Blog that had first created the Blogger Recognition Award, I noticed that Eve was currently holding a writing contest with the following premise:

The theme of this contest is called Raven’s Omen. You’ll be given a prompt, consisting of both words and an image, and your goal is to create a memorable piece based upon that prompt in the form of either a poem or a short story.

It sounded interesting, so I let my mind wander and came up with the story that you can read below.

The Prompt

„Dunkelheit“ by Vickie666 on DeviantArt

The raven lifts his head, sensing impending trouble. He takes off from his post above the dark, abandoned tower; a message of warning upon his wings.

The Guidelines

  • Create a story based upon the prompt.
  • Decide which category you want to enter into: Poem or short story.
  • Short stories should be between 100 and 1000 words in length. Poems should be between 5 and 15 lines long.
  • You must enter by August 23rd, 2015. No entries will be accepted after this date.

The Story*

High on top of the broken and charred remains of a tower, a flock of ravens had found its home. On each side of the tower one or two birds sat on the outer walls, watching over the field that lay beneath them. The tower used to be a watchtower for a once mighty castle and guards stood sentinel over the lands in every point of the compass. Now it was abandoned and the unspoken duty had fallen to the birds. The day had started like any other; a calm morning had turned into a warm and sunlit afternoon. Suddenly a shiver ran through the black birds as a dreadful feeling fell upon them. They sensed that something was not right. Something wicked was on its way. Wings fluttering and cawing loudly, the flock dissipated in every direction to spread a warning to everyone that crossed their path.
Down below the tower a field of grain stood proudly, its stalks swaying slightly in the wind. Men and women stood amongst them, shielding their eyes to follow the black birds. One man looked behind the tower and noticed an especially large shape.
„The ravens get bigger and bigger each summer.“, he commented.
„That’s not a raven…“ mumbled another one that had seen it as well.
„DRAGON!“ now ran the call throughout the field.
Every last one of them dropped what they had in hand and laid down flat on the ground.
Everyone except one boy that still clutched his fork in his hands, staring at the fast approaching dragon like prey looked at its predator.
The others yelled and called out to the boy, but they were ignored.
The beast flew lower and lower, his large wings spread widely he used them to glide over the field. Soon he was low above the field, his feet touched the grain and the wind below his wings, with every graceful flap he made, pushed it aside and sent clouds of dust and dirt into the air.
Now close enough the dragon stretched out its claws to simply snatch the boy away.
Another farmer boy gathered up all his courage and jumped up to tackled his friend down. Just in time they landed in the dusty field when the creature flew right above them, darkening their view; the sharp claws slicing the empty air it hit. They could hear its wings flapping strongly as it tried to assent again and regain its momentum.
„That was stupid!“, the boy reprimanded his friend, one hand still on the others chest, his ear touching the earth.
He could feel the others racing heart and ragged breathing. His own heart was bumping in his chest as if he had just ran many miles. Patiently the boys and the other field hands waited for the dragon to either return or disappear.
After a few moments had past someone finally yelled: „SAVE“ and they knew they could get back to their work now.
He helped his friend up and continued his scolding: „Everyone knows you have to lie down flat when a dragon attacks! They can’t reach that low mid-flight!“
His friend was still pale, but nodding in understanding. One of the older men came to give him a sip of his water skin and an encouraging pat on the back.
„Why didn’t it burn our crops to get to us more easily?“, one of the younger men asked after they had stood a while, watching the direction the dragon had taken.
„Because it knew we wouldn’t be worth it.“, an old man simply stated, leaning heavily on his hoe.
His remark was followed by several questioning stares.
„Don’t give me those looks. Dragons aren’t as stupid as you think. They know good prey from bad and in our case, we looked far too skinny for its taste to bother hunting us down and waste energy it could use to get better prey.“, he explained.
„Scaly bastards.“, another man commented.
The rest of them took this as a sign that the conversation was over and without further ado they went back to their work.
High above the field the flock of ravens one by one returned to their posts on the old sentinel tower, resuming their watch over the fields.

~ old: 485 new: 710 words

Afterword

I hope you enjoyed this little thing.
The word count for this was a nice alternative to our usual 800-1700 words and was therefore easily filled. I don’t know if I even can write a complete story under a hundred words any more… Notes and rough versions, yes, but not stuff that actually makes sense…
Anyway, I ended up not using the raven itself that much and also only noticed the eye it is holding in the picture when I had already written my first draft and did no longer fit into the storyline at that point, but well, inspiration sometimes strikes in the most unusual ways…
PoiSonPaiNter
© Rights for the story lie by me, those for the picture by Vickie666, as named in the description. Do not use or repost without my permission.
* Edited version 23.08. 13:20 UTC+1: Added and changed some things and included a last nod to the ravens for Breagit ( 😉 ).  If someone is interested in the original version, feel free to let me know and I’ll add it.

Blogger Recognition Award

I should write sooo many different things and my fingers are itching to type my latest chapter for my newest addition on Fanfiction.net/Animexx – that I have yet to put on here. Alas, I want to be patient and instead write about this instead.
Yesterday I checked my Reader for new posts from the Blogs I’m following and discovered that wrencollins nominated my for the Blogger Recognition Award.

I’m really flattered for receiving this. It feels like I’m doing something right, if people I don’t know personally are willing to nominate me for such things. 🙂

The Award

Unlike the Liebster Award this one is not bound by the number of followers or anything. It simply is there to show the Bloggers you nominate that you appreciate what they are doing. Or to put it in the words of the awards‘ creator Eve from Edge of Night:

When you say, „Hey! I’ve nominated you for so-and-so award! Congrats!“ and give one of these simple little pictures to a fellow blogger, you’ve probably just made that person’s day. You’ve inspired them to keep writing posts. You’ve given their confidence a little boost, and helped to make them feel that they are a part of this community. You’ve made them happy by being generous and showing your appreciation. There’s nothing better than that.

So, let’s see what this award brings with it:
Rules:

  • Select 15 other blogs you want to give the award to. Do some digging if you must! Find those blogs. You cannot nominate yourself or the person who has nominated you.
  • Write a post to show off your award! Give a brief story of how your blog got started, and give a piece or two of advice to new bloggers. Thank whoever nominated you, and provide a link to their blog. List who you’ve nominated in the post. Make sure to also attach the award itself! (You can do this by right-clicking, saving, and uploading the image above).
  • Comment on each blog and let them know you’ve nominated them. Provide a link to the award post you created.
  • Provide a link to the original post on Edge of Night. That way, anyone can find the original guidelines and post if needed, and we can keep it from mutating and becoming confusing.

In the Beginnings…

I had many thoughts and contemplated for quite some time if I should actually create a Blog for myself. When I learned how to do it I tried my luck with a homepage for different topics, but it just wasn’t what I wanted to do, so I scrapped it and went on. Then in 2007 I found The Forum and enjoyed sharing my thoughts in the discussions there. It was a lot of fun until it closed thanks to the then weird admin. Early 2008 I re-discovered its new version, now run by a different admin, and the discussion began anew. I met new people, even made some good friends – Fairy, Nazgul, Liathano, I’m looking at you 😉 – and a lot of interesting acquaintances. Then I started studying and the thoughts of a Blog came back slowly but surely. In 2011 I released my first story on Fanfiction.net, but that wasn’t my first story written by far. I already had some original short stories published in The Forum and I wanted to have a place where I could collect them all. So when I started discussing a project with my then beta reader I decided to create this Blog back in 2012.
And here I am now three years later and non the wiser. 😀

Advice?

Puh…I think I’m not that good at giving advice and usually people look for advice that tells them how to do things to be successful and with not even 200 followers (on WP alone) after three years, I wouldn’t consider myself to be a successful Blogger…
But what I can tell you is this:

  • Try not to be bothered by others being better than you. There will always be someone who has more followers, has the better design and the more read posts. Be happy for them instead, they worked hard for it and deserve it.
  • Try not to push yourself to write THE successful story. Write what YOU want to write about, not what everyone else deems popular!
  • Try not to feel bad if you don’t have a regular schedule. It helps a lot to get a reader base if you regularly post something, but things happen and you can’t always write something in time.
  • Most importantly: HAVE FUN! Don’t push yourself to do things you don’t feel like doing and take time off to try something different if you’re stuck. Half-assed posts aren’t fun for everyone involved.

And the Award goes tooo….

Obviously I have to nominate people myself and whoops I can’t count apparently, as I only nominated those that I haven’t nominated before – I think…

Have fun my dears and thanks for being part of the Blogosphere!
PoiSonPaiNter