Not sure if you figured it out, but finally I started my own photography blog. Ehmm … I mean media blog, since I already posted some music and videos. So what is the blog about? Wondering? Wondering, because I already have a blog and you don’t think I need a second one? All right, here is the answer.
Do you already have one of those days where it seems that everyone is snubbing you? Where you just feel like eating a duck? Where you really need to be cheered up? I am sure you had! Exactly about this is my new blog. It lists random stuff I found during my wanderings through the Internet. It is about cool things, motivating things, passionate things, wonderful things, beautiful things, things to help to calm down and about everything which is not considered as sorrowful, depressive or sad. It is an act of ignoring the daily global news!
A great help to continue my run when I have sore legs or to do my cycling training on a raining day. Also, it is a nice disruption …
Hope you will like it, and eventually, you also will start one. I am looking forward to read it, to watch it or to listen to it!
I did it again! Did a nice 12 km run outside! It was kind of cold, but I didn’t had the extra time needed to drive to the gym. So I decided to get some warm clothes and real experience the nature. At the beginning of my run I was kind of unmotivated, since I already did a 15 km run yesterday, but luckily my feeling of guilt was stronger as my lazy attitude.
While I was running, I was listening to my music, trying to relax to hopefully get a clear mind. Hey, but what was that? It was a little princess sitting on the right side of the muddy forest track. Lonely, freezing, wet and dirty. To be honest, at this point I completely ignored her and continued my run. I was thinking: “I am sure she will be gone when I reached the turning point and will be on the way back”.
And? No, she didn’t left. She still was sitting close to the forest track. Still alone! Still wet! Sill dirty! So I picked her and was holding her for the residual 7 km in my right hand. While I was finishing my run a group of US soldiers passed me (I have to say that Boeblingen has some US barracks).
I think the soldiers where thinking that I am kind of strange or maybe something else. At least they had a big grind on their faces. By the way, I was putting the dirty princess in my washing machine after I arrived at home. So that she will be clean again. ;-)
Today the weather was wonderful, so I decided to run outside instead of going to the gym. Also it was the first run in 2011, which I did in the nature and not on the treadmill. Because of this it was even more enjoyable! We had around 12 degrees Celsius, no snow, the sun was shining, the wind was blowing a gentle breeze, or in other words: “It was just perfect”.
I think this was the reason why I run 15 km instead of 12 km. While I was running I figured out how good it is that I don’t have a TV. Yeah, you understood it correctly. I DON’T HAVE TV and believe it or not, I am still alive. Furthermore, I even don’t understand people who have a TV in their bedroom. In my opinion this is the number one killer for a relationship.
So while I was running I thought about why I don’t have a TV.
Regular TV program is most of the time just garbage. Have you ever looked at a TV schedule? In the morning it starts with trash talk. You can see some uninteresting moderators talking about celebrities and other unimportant stuff. They talk about problems I even didn’t know before. Then they call it “breakfast television” so that you don’t feel so guilty when you add it to your daily wake-up ritual. In the afternoon you only can find soap operas, talk shows and court shows. Again, only problems I didn’t know before. Then, it ends in the evening with similar stuff. The main content of many TV stations is only about problems, dramas, tragedies, conflicts, etc. Where are the nice and wonderful things? Where is the passion? Where is the stuff we enjoy and brings us further? If you don’t believe me you can do the following game: Grab your TV schedule and black out everything which falls into these categories. It is amazing how many little is left.
TV distracts you from other more enjoyable things. While watching TV you can’t go outside, you can’t do sport or your exercises, you can’t write, you can’t do your work; you can’t do anything in an efficient way.
Most news broadcasts in TVs are bad. They are commented and full of emotions. Also, they have a lack of confidence, seriousness and it seems that investigative journalism is almost dead. Have you ever saw a news broadcast where a moderator asked a reporter something like “How do you feel?” or “Do you feel safe?” First, that is exactly these kinds of questions I don’t want to hear and get answered from reporter. Secondly, he or she should give an overview about the incident in a fast and neutral way. Who cares about the reporter itself? If I want to get the feelings or insights from the reporter I can read is autobiography afterwards. Third, I am not interested in these 24 hour news special broadcasts of incidents where they analyses what the bad person has eaten before he or she did the bad thing.
You cannot listen to music. Yeah, I am making this as an extra point, because most people listen to music, but they don’t concentrate on the music. They can’t listen to classical music or Jazz and tell you which instruments are currently playing or they can’t tell you what kind of dance it is and how the rhythm goes. That’s why it is good for you to go outside, go out for a run, go in the nature, breathe and concentrate on some of your favorite music.
I don’t know under which circumstances this photo was made, but I think it is a very powerful example how the media can manipulate us. What do you think? Do you have more examples you can share with us?
Do you know this situation? Something started in an awful way but ended perfectly? That’s what happened to me when I dove to the MS Zenobia, which is one of the best ship wrecks in the world.
The Zenobia arrived in Larnaca on 2 June 1980, were a problem with the ballast tanks re-occurred. After an analysis, engineers discovered that the computerised pumping system was pumping excess water into the side ballast tanks, making the list progressively worse. On 4 June, the Zenobia was towed out of Larnaca harbour to prevent her becoming an obstruction should the worst happen and was left at anchor roughly 1.5 – 2 km offshore. On 5 June, with the ship listing at around 45° the captain dismissed the engineers and maintenance crew and requests from the captain to return her to Larnaca harbour were denied. At around 2:30am 7 June 1980, the Zenobia capsized and sank in Larnaca Bay to a depth of roughly 42 metres (138 ft).
Our dive started very stressful since we were the last group that arrived at the diving boat. So we had only a couple of minutes to prepare our equipment. Then, after I connected my regulator to the scuba tank and opened it, I realized that it was licking. The problem was the converted from a DIN to a ISO scuba tank was screwed in the wrong direction. After I fixed it, our dive guide told us that all weight belts were missing. I asked him three times if he has all weight belts since I was not allowed to put it in my box. I hate stuff like that! Then, we got a very bad description about the diving spot. I had to ask him by myself about the current, the deep, the alarm signal, when we should end our dive, etc. Then, after we put our equipment on another guy realized that his scuba tank is half empty. He forgot to check it before. Then, the first person jumped into the water and lost his diving computer.
Belive me! At this point I discussed with my diving buddy if we should stop the dive or not. Luckily, we both were experiences and self-confident enough to do the dive on our own, which was necessary since our dive guide lost all of us down at 35 meters. What a … ;-(
As I said, it ended perfectly and both dives were amazing. One of the best dives I ever did. During the first dive we went down to 30 meter and entered ship via the cargo back from the back. We saw the huge marine propeller and a lot of damaged trucks. We went down to 40 meters to get a better view of the trucks. The whole scenery looked like an apocalyptically horror movie. The funny thing was that there is a little hole in in the cargo bay which was filed with air. The hole is big enough that it could fit your head. So I put my head in it and was hearing me breathing down at 35 meters deep. Amazing! I breathed like an old man.
The second dive was even better. Again, we went down to 30 meters and entered the restaurant from the side through a window. Unfortunately, nobody prepared lunch for us. The restaurant looked quite interesting since some of the wallpapers are still intact. We dove though the restaurant and left it via the same window we used before. Then we dove to the front of the ship and entered through another window the bridge of the ship. You still can see some cables and electrical equipment. Amazing!
In the following you can see some of the pictures we made and video films that give you an idea how cool this dive was. I hope you will enjoy it, too!
Christopher McDougall explores the mysteries of the human desire to run. How did running help early humans survive — and what urges from our ancient ancestors spur us on today? McDougall tells the story of the marathoner with a heart of gold, the unlikely ultra-runner, and the hidden tribe in Mexico that runs to live.
Ever considered to use your iPhone as 3D scanner? Trimensional is the first 3D scanner iPhone app on the world! It gives you the possibility to instantly capture3D models of yourself or other objects. To achieve this it uses both the screen and the front-facing camera on your iPhone, detecting patterns of light reflected and build a true 3D model. It is kind of a fun app, even the fact that the expert functionality needs more improvements. In the following you can find a video that describes how it works and my first results.
For me running is more as just doing sport! Beside the fact that it just feels good to be all in sweat and wear a wet t-shirt; it gives me the possibility to calm down, reflect and get equilibration. Because of this I got some of my best ideas during running (not mentioning that I got some of my dumbest ideas, too).
I know that there is already a lot of spam in the Internet, but there can’t be enough. So I decided to share it occasionally with you.
Do you know the people who step on a treadmill and start with stretching their entire body, starting with the legs, going over the arms and ending at the neck? Hey, it is about running, not about Chi Gong, Yoga or all the other new age stuff. It is about moving your legs, one by one, breathe and sweat. And why do you stretch your neck and your arms, you run with your legs! If you need more time for stretching as for the running itself something is just wrong. Because of this I vote that every treadmill needs a new functionality who detects automatically that a person jumped on it. Then, after 5 minutes of inactivity it starts for at least 30 minutes with a minimum pace of 7.5min/km, which is 8 km/h.
When John Wilkins described in 1668 a first version of its metric system to the Royal Society it had a reason. Why do you think he made it? Do you think he made it because he was bored? No, he made it because it is more practical, because the units were chosen to be of similar units as customary units. Believe me, physics are much smother in metrics as in imperial units or US customary units. Everything else is just dirty? Why? Do you know that sometimes cargo aircrafts are overloaded just because of the confusion between pounds and kilograms? Or do you know that the NASA lost in 1999 a $125 million Mars orbiter because two teams used different units? Or that the US has statistically more medial errors as other countries just because of the confusion between grains and grams? Eventually you would say that all the countries that use metrics should change, but seriously, would you prefer to drive a Tata or a Porsche? So let’s get rid of the inches, feet, yards, fathoms, rods, chains, furlongs, miles, etc.
During the Christmas season I was listening many times to Classical music, but now Jazz is back! Yesterday, I bought six wonderful Jazz CDs from several artists around the world. Their music is outstanding and keeps you …
Original and striking re-invention of favorites by well known composers. A wonderful variety of styles, languages and moods. Not a typical Jazz album, but still very nice.
There he goes. One of God's own prototypes. Some kind of high powered mutant never even considered for mass production. Too weird to live, and too rare to die.
