Category: General

Wow, that went (un-)surprisingly bad. Of course I didn’t find the time to post any story at all about my trip to the far east, let alone the trips to Moscow, Dubai and the myriad of visits to the UK that followed after.

However I remembered today that I still have this blog here and that it might be worth to fill it with some content after all, for those of you who have not yet found my twitter or Facebook account, have not yet befriended me on 4², Gowalla or any of the other 2000+ social communites that are (contentwise) fed by my twitter account.

So, dear not-internet-citizens, here is a brief wrap-up on what happened in the last 6+ months:

– Mobile phones. Despite my rather longish quest for the “perfect” data plan I ended up paying a 700+ EUR bill for a week in Moscow. After that (and since o2 has released a 60 EUR EU wide data cap), I decided to go back to my 11 year old contract (well, I’ve changed plans quite often inbetween) and as of now I am an ordinary o2 Germany private customer again. On the other hand, I now constantly carry foreign prepaid SIMs around.

– Travel. I have quite well adjusted to travelling now; interestingly enough most of my birthday presens (oh yes, I turned 30 inbetween and celebrated – of course – at the Irish Rover) reflected pretty well on that. Thanks for all the thought you put into this! One outcome of me travelling so often is the fact that I now own a Priority Pass membership, partly due to the fact that I still didn’t manage to gain the FTL status with Lufthansa. And yes, a lounge is one of the most beautiful places you can find in an Airport (maybe besides the exit, if a well known taxi driver waits there to drive you home).

– Home. This will also change in the near future. I’ve lived in the Högerdamm now for roughly 5 years, half of the time sharing it with Inka. As the cats moved in and our offices changed into home-based ones, there is the need for a larger space. We’ve managed to find something decent and better-located to rent and will – at latest on 1st of October – move to the new place.

– Cats. If you don’t know by now: I don’t only live together with Inka, but also with our two great cats. If you need to see some cat content, let me know.

– New job: also something that I have not yet mentioned so explicitly here. After almost 5 years working for Computacenter, which was a great time, I left. I joined a privately-owned, 170+ employee strong German security vendor called Astaro, where I now work as a Pre-Sales Engineer responsible for the non-German speaking EMEA region; which means travelling a lot, but less than before. I also have an official home office and get even paid rent for that! And before you ask: I’ve not regretted this move a single day in my life up to now. The only sad thing is that I had to leave great colleagues and fun to work with customers behind.

– Summer: we really have something that can be compared to it at the moment here in Hamburg. Which hit us all by surprise.

– Fitness: As you might have whitnessed, I’ve cancelled my membership with Elixia way before they went bancrupt. Lucky me. However, it’s about time that I start again. But, I learned by observing myself that signing up for a fitness club that is across town doesn’t work at all. But, there are 3+ fittness clubs within a 10 minute walk from our new place, so chances are there that I’ll start again and hopefully keep on going there.

– The rest: There are probably plenty of other things to talk about, but I forgot about them. If you want to touch base again, just drop me a quick line via E-Mail and we can at least try to arrange a longer talk on the phone, over a drink in person or whatever is possible.