To Keep the Skis Company...

I bought a new ski/winter sports jacket in the sale yesterday. It's by Finnish company Luhta of which I'd not heard before, but as my Mum put it, "The Fins, they know know how to deal with the cold" so my expectations are high.

I might not be home often but when I am, I certainly do my bit to boost the Carinthian economy.

Couch Potato

PS to Same Procedure as Every Year - that would be my typical Christmas holiday-pose: parked on the living-room sofa, reading and simultaneously chatting with Granny, who likes to regale me with stories ("Have I ever told you about...?") that I know at least as well as she does herself. That book, by the way was not among my personal top ten of 2007 - chapters narrated by a human being are interspersed with chapters from a pigeon's perspective, complete with A Clockwork Orange-esque pigeon-speak. Not really my kettle of fish.

Ready.Steady.Go!

Christmas is officially over even though the omnipresent blinking and winking Santas unfortunately haven't made their exits. Don't get me started.
After 2.5 days of cold turkey retail-deprivation I more than made up for it today. Apart from several gifts for January birthdays and FCN's newborn twins, I bought a new pair of skis and ski boots in the sale. I'm tired of ferrying my equipment back and forth between KLU and VIE and as at least 2 ski trips with the Firm beckon in 2008, it's a good investment. As I spent more than €300 at Sports Experts I got the annual motorway toll sticker for half the official price. Oh yes, marketing ploys do work well with me.

KLU - VIE: 1:0

Some time this summer I noticed red flags advertising next year's Big Event (unless you're blissfully uninterested in soccer like yours truly) all along Vienna's Ringstraße. "That's a bit early", I thought to myself. Come winter those flags are an unappealing rusty brown with the print hardly discernible, thanks to exhaust fumes. Unless they are going to be replaced visitors will be greeted by dirty rags. Not a pretty sight.

In Klagenfurt, another venue for the championships, green versions of the EURO 2008 flags are all over the city (photo above taken by the lakeside). They are a pretty recent addition and chances are pretty good that they will still be in good shape for the games. Sometimes provincial can be a good thing.

Same Procedure as Every Year

Undeniably, there's a certain element of predictability associated with Christmas with the Folks. The fondue, the endless stream of biscuits made by people (including myself) who apologise every year that "this year, I really didn't bake much"...

The many presents by people who vow every year that this year, they didn't have time for buying/making presents and all this retail terror is getting worse anyway and we've got to do our part to stop it...

The Beast fiercely guarding the unwrapped presents afterwards...
Lots of baubles and ornaments to hide the fact that the Christmas tree (a gift, so don't look the gift-tree in its branches...) is somewhat anorexic in apprearance, needles-wise...
When Dad lit the sparklers we were all poised for the annual story of how Mum was trying to catch sparklers in an apron when she was little, but somehow Granny forgot to tell it.

Happy Holidays

Wishing all of you a Merry Christmas & a Happy New Year.

I'm in a frenzy of packing for 10 days in KLU, which is no small feat in view of the fact that I only got 4 hours of sleep after the office Christmas "party" (read: gourmet dinner with ensuing cocktail, singular) last night and have once more realised that sleep-deprivation is not really my thing. More, when I'm feeling more coherent. Whenever that will be.

Friends with One-Track Minds...

Yesterday, I paid a quick visit to the flu-infested Amica-household, handing her my presents and grabbing hers in exchange. As with all pressies from my Vienna-based friends I opened it right away since my car will be full to the brim for the journey to KLU anyway. Not only did I get a cool multi-purpose piece of garment from Austrian label "Göttin des Glücks" (Goddess of Luck) that I intend to wear as a skirt , but also the stylish bag-shaped vase. My friends certainly know how to please the Patron Saint of Shopping!

Mind Reader

Yesterday the Pampered Princess and Frida plus their respective men and babies, the PP's sister and I met for the seasonal Pressie-Exchange-Extravaganza. Frida must have read my mind as on Saturday, I was about to buy the very thing she got me - a funky foldable shopping trolley on wheels:Until very recently, I'd made jokes about my urban friends embarking on an expedition to their local BILLA with one of those things (or rather the non-collapsible variety), adding for good measure that I wouldn't want to be seen dead with one of those style-cramping accessories, but as they started selling them in fancier fabrics and with strategically placed zips that allow you to store them away in laptop-sized portions, I thought again. On Saturday, I'd stumbled upon the specimen above and it was only the long queue that kept me from buying it.

By the way, in German those trolleys are dubbed Hackenporsche (literally "heels' Porsche"), which I quite like. Personally, I always call them Oma-Ferrari, Granny Ferrari.

Busy, busy...

Meetings, both business and private (pressies need to be swapped!) are keeping me from posting something remotely interesting here. Plus I'm fighting flu symptoms in order not to join the sneezing, coughing, feeverish masses all around me. In lieu of content, I can at least offer some pic of this year's rather original Christmas decorations on Rotenturmstraße in downtown Vienna - Chinatowns the world over, eat your heart out!

My colleagues went to Hamburg...

...and all I got was no, not *this lousy t-shirt*, but this super-cool chocolate:

How (not) to make friends

When our new foosball table arrived 2 weeks ago, the guys eagerly installed it, somewhat disgusted at the faces of the players, a curious blend of baroque putto and inflatable sex-aid, and the team duly tried it out with all possible team formations.

In the middle of a heated match with four of us on the new table and two on the old which still hasn't been dismantled, one of the receptionists barged in. None of us had heard her knock. She just wanted us to know that people from the office downstairs had complained about the noise, "it's just because their boss is visiting today and they have a lot of meetings." Sheepishly, we vowed to play in a more quiet fashion and restricted ourselves to the new foosball table. Eager to please their #1 demanding clients, reception promised to get quotes for foam and felt mats. They'd let us know.

The day afterwards, an afternoon match was rudely interrupted by thumps from downstairs. The type usually associated with brooms. We all had a bit of a student-party-déjà-vu.

Big Boss (one of our noisiest players, by the way) decided to embark on a goodwill-mission downstairs, armed with branded merchandise, prominently displaying the Firm's logo. This, together with his promise that we'd restrain ourselves and at least not jump and shout, seemed to appease them. My guess is that it was rather the fact that their lease ends next week anyway and they know that there's light at the end of the tunnel.

In any case, we're waiting for the foam stuff to arrive and meanwhile have our instrument of neighbourly torture propped up on styrofoam blocks and only whisper our cheer and jeer.

Naughty kids.

Antidote

Winter @ MQ - the annual antidote to the kitsch overdose of "traditional" Christmas markets.
Hip, but not really inviting for my taste. I like the light projected onto the "igloo" though.