In between lectures at University, doing homework (!) and finally reading the book I’ve been waiting for for 3 4 weeks, I just did not manage to write as much as I did before I started studying. The whole picture of students in Austria is wrong, I knew that before. If you really want to get something done during your time at University, if you really want to be done with your Bachelor’s degree within 3 years and a bit, there’s not much time for doing nothing or going somewhere, for spending a weekend off or something like that. Lectures alone are 25 hours per week, plus 6 hours of tutorial groups plus some more hours of learning and preparing exercises for the tutorial groups.

The time left by this schedule, I spend (I guess, for the next 3 days) by reading “A Dance with Dragons”. I only bought it last Thursday, but I already got to 80 % (kindle doesn’t show the amount of pages). The book is great, as I expected, and the stories go on – some as thought, some changing to a totally different direction.

Just wanted to let you know that everything’s okay – there is just not enough time to write 😉

This is one point where the english language is short a word compared to German. “Eierlegende Wollmilchsau” is fantasy animal that is able to produce eggs, wool, milk and ham. The english translation for it is “swiss army knife”. It’s a bit poor, in my opinion.

But that’s not what I wanted to say.

What I wanted to say is that there is a solution to my agonising problem that came up some time ago!

It is the Kindle 3G.

Able to read eBooks (newspapers, books), to download them directly from the store via WiFi or (free!) 3G, and even able to work with PDF files.

Wait a minute, you might say. PDF files?

Yes! Although they look horrible when used in original format, there is a way to convert them: simply email them to a certain amazon mail address, put “convert” in the subject, and then wait some minutes. And there it comes! Converted, so you can zoom in and out, make your notes, and so on and so on.

Great. I’ll get me one as soon as I get all the money from my old company. And I am SO looking forward to the first book to be downloaded and read in pretty much one go …

One might get the impression that there is some Couchsurfing Invasion every weekend.

And this is right!

Some Couchsurfers literally spend their summers traveling from one big meeting to the next. Some do work in between, some just take as much days off as possible and have one huge summer holiday surfin’ through the world.

As we met some of the organizers at the Sounds of Salzburg, Georg and I decided to give it a try and go for Augsburg. We already know some people who live there, but have never been to the city.

The event will take place from September 30 to October 2nd, so just before my life as a student really starts. Georg will hitch hike there, starting in the morning. As I will have to attend some information event at the University already, I will leave at 4 pm. Hopefully, I will arrive before midnight 😉

I just handed in my application forms for the Selbsterhalterstipendium (the grant I hope to receive as I have worked full-time during the last 4.5 years). The people at the agency are very nice and helped me complete the forms where I was not sure what to fill in. Also, I can ask to receive a subvention for the public transport annual ticket, they just need a copy of it. As I forgot to mentio that when I was there, I called to ask if they needed to see the original, but the lady on the phone said that a copy of the ticket with my name on it was enough. And as my parents are living in Tirol, I might even receive a subvention for visiting them – called “Heimfahrtkostenzuschuss”.

Austria’s just great 🙂

So let’s wait and see. Should not take too long, according to the clerk who took the forms over from me.

Some 2 weeks have already passed since I finished “A Feast for Crows”, part 4 of the “A Song of Ice and Fire” series. And ever since, I am waiting for the message from Amazon relieving me from not knowing how all the stories will go on, and how some of them might end.

Today, I – once more – took a look at the listings on amazon. And there, it is totally unbelievable, it said: planned for July 2nd, 2012!!

I’m afraid I’ll have to borrow a hardback.

The last days are the hardest.

Today I discovered a way to get through. It all started out with “Killer Queen” (by Queen) coming up in my head again and again. To be done with it, I searched for the video on youtube, and after watching saw that there was a live version, too. So I clicked that one, too. It’s better by far, in my opinion.

But after watching the Rock Montreal version, I saw there is the whole freaking concert to be watched on youtube. Well, of course I’m at work, so I’m only listening, but YES, it’s greatly motivational right now 🙂

Click and enjoy. 23 songs, recorded live at Montreal in 1981.

There was a time when I loved bags. Especially this kind of bags:

Now, somehow, I’ve come to the point where I want to get rid of them.

Please don’t ask what they look like. They all look the same – black canvas with red and white writing on it. Only the writing differs, as the bags are from different cities.

And this is the list of bags I’d like to give away:

• New York (reserved)
• Salamanca
• Innsbruck (gone after 1 day)
• Rome (saying “Roma” / gone after 30 minutes!)
• Paris (reserved)

Terms of giving-away and shipment: The bags are for free, and can be picked up at my place or somewhere around the 7th district of Vienna.

Anybody intersted? Then please leave a comment or send me an email – Thank you 🙂

I proudly present: my pictures of the road-trip to Slowakia with Klaus, Georg and Ksenia.

Enjoy!

2 weeks, 10 people coming to see the rooms (and us), some easy, some hard decisions.

In the end, we had 3 people we really would have wanted to be our new flatmate, and also had a ranking. According to this ranking, Werner made the phone calls. If number 1 would not take the room, he would call number 2, and if number 2 wouldn’t take it, number 3 would be lucky.

But – lucky for us – number 1 did agree, so our new flatmate is: Martin!

Let’s see what happens next 😉

Another update concerning who will be doing what I am doing now, when I am gone:

There was another job interview on Friday. Claudia thinks the girl fits the job, so she should start working on Thursday.

This is going to be fun 🙂