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We’ll be off to the sea side for a week’s cycling on Jersey soon, so this new little painting comes just at the right time.
Oil on Bamboo floorboard,
3.5×36″,
August 2007
Water always makes me struggle, but I hope that I managed to get some of the blue-ish/green-ish colors across amidst all the foam from this gentle surf.
Hope you like it. Click here, or the thumbnail, for the complete picture.
Funny how the UK is about to lift some restrictions on the pub hours, while others introduce them: In San Jose, California, the town decided to introduce a “soft closing experiment” (to be reviewed after 90 days).
The essence is that pubs, bars and clubs are allowed to stay open one more hour, but not allowed to serve alcoholic beverages during that time.
So, it’s Last Orders for night dwellers in San Jose, although their bell rings at 1.30AM.
According to this article by the San Jose Mercury News, however, it’s not drinking-up time for the people of San Jose: It’s sobering-up time: Officials hope the extended hours will allow people to sober up before getting in their cars.
Amazing what an hour can do if you are a politician.
I am pretty sure that the Greeks would have their Haddock like this. Being in Greece, you might prefer a grouper or some other fresh white fish. at any rate, this is extra-simple and extra-nice. Here goes:
Get some suitable white fish, approximately 250g per person. Fillets or “steaks” will work.
Heat a very generous amount of good olive oil in a large pot, casserole, or in a flat pan for which you have a lid. Add 6 cloves of garlic, sliced pretty thinly. Spread out the garlic, and add a heaped teaspoon of freshly ground black pepper, and a sliced fresh red chilly. Don’t let any of this burn. Put the fish evenly on top, add half a glass of white wine, close the lid, and let steam for 12 minutes give or take a few, depending on the thickness and type of your fish. Try not to open it too often, as this will let the delicious flavour and steam escape.
Sprinkle the fish lightly with fresh coriander for serving.
Serve with a spicy herb salad and steamed potatoes.
Enjoy!
After years of sporadically following the rumors and occasional queries, I can now confirm that Germany does indeed support dual citizenship. This could enable us to seek British citizenship while maintaining our German citizenship, thus accessing our few assets in Germany and remaining fully enabled to return to Germany if we ever wished to, while being able to vote and participate in the political life where we spend our money.
Whether we go for it is an other question. Must think about it. Doesn’t seem like we’d risk losing much more than a few fees.
The official word from the Embassy (which, it must be said, was very helpful and forthcoming with my recent email inquiry), is that dual citizenship is in fact not possible according to ยง25 StaG, but one may apply for leave to continue maintaining the German citizenship in case another citizenship.
To me, this translates into de-facto dual citizenship, subject to certain conditions, and subject to grant of permission with the wonderful name Beibehaltungsgenehmigung.
You know you are in California when you find the local town hosting a (free) Jazz concert in the local centre town plaza on Wednesday nights.
What, I hear you ask, makes that indicative of California?
Simple. The event finishes by 8:30pm, and no alcoholic beverages were on sale.
The Conservative Party was close to winning the campaign. In a last-minute effort, they stage the two town drunks and make them give speeches.
This was too embarrassing. I broke away and went to the nearby church hall to collect my things. A woman followed me, cornered me inside the hall, hugged and explained:
You owe me a kiss.
Before I could figure an elegant way of inquiring the kind lady’s name, she proceeded to take what she thought was hers.
I have a faint recollection that there might be some truth in her claim, but struggle with the details, as this would go over 25 years back.
At the same time that I am both unable to speak and think of her name, my wife enters the room. We break apart in time, and she says cheerfully
Your wife? Come on, won’t you introduce me?
How very embarrassing. Thankfully, the alarm rung and got me out of this tight spot in the last moment.
I am now reading Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince once more, an it only takes until page eight until you realise that she has seen it coming all along.
Let me quote:
"A grim mood has gripped the country," the opponent had concluded, barely concealing his own bread grin.
And unfortunately, this was true. The Prime Minister felt it himself; people really seemed more miserable than usual. Even the weather was dismal; all this chilly mist in the middle of July… it wasn’t right, it wasn’t normal.
We only have to turn to page 19 for the cause of the problem:
"And as if that wasn’t enough," said Fudge, barely listening to the Prime Minister, "we’ve got Dementors swarming all over the place, attacking people left right and centre…
[...]
And they’re breeding. That’s what’s causing all this mist."
Wands out, I say, and think of something happy! Suggested thoughts include a balmy summer evening, or a really hot August day.
In need of sending a packet to the US, I had a look at the services available through Royal Mail, their cost and features in terms of delivery time, tracking, etc.
Funny that they still quote Surface Mail to the US, with delivery times from 56 days:
This service is ideal for sending personal correspondence, business letters and documents, when economy is more important than speed. We aim to deliver within two weeks in Western Europe, four in Eastern Europe, and eight outside Europe.
Two weeks within Western Europe? Are they walking my letters to Paris?
Eight weeks to the US, possible traveling via Greenland and Canada on dogsled?
The wife and I sleep in a 2 by 2 meter double-bed, which I proudly made myself from bricks and timber. There’s nothing special about our way of sleeping, except maybe the unusual fact that we refuse to tuck our heads into the corner between mattress and the wall. Instead, the feet point to the south-facing wall. Head and arms point north and are not constrained by adjacent walls.
We are not into Feng-shui. The orientation or our bodies within the earth’s magnetic field is coincidental, and just because the bedroom wall and windows happen to be facing south, causing our heads to point north unless we are sleeping in a strangely bended way. Which we are not. Not normally at least. Or not while asleep. Anyway…
During my recent stay in my favourite Californian hotel, I woke up several times finding myself rotated in the bed, sleeping diagonally and almost crosswise instead of length-wise (yes, it’s a king-sized bed).
Obviously, my body prefers to align with earth’s magnetic field, although I am not sure at this stage whether my body points to the magnetic or the geographic pole.
Yeah. You know immediately the country you’re in when the sky looks like this.
Always nice to be back home. After the going away part and the being away part, coming home again is the third nicest part of being away, really.
Worn out from birthday celebrations and other things, it turns out that I am in need of a blogging break this week. This will be followed by a two week absence while I work from California and, as usual, suspend blogging while being there.
So, you should hear back from me mid August, full of enthusiasm and irrelevant comments.
P.S. Talking of birthday celebrations, you realize the blog had its second birthday a week ago?