Videos

My wife asked me last week if I could make a video of the garden for the Face-book.
In the past I had messed around a bit with videos for the Internet but I was actually never satisfied with the out come. I have down loaded Virtual Dub so that I could compress the data to a reasonable size, for instance from over 500 MB down to 130 MB in an AVI file, naturally the quality of the video suffered tremendously. I am at the moment experimenting and hope in the near future to put a video into my Blog.
I have tried Window Move Maker, which is a simple way to make a short video but on my laptop (I have Vista) it always shuts down on me. Anything to do with Windows Media Centre just does not function, its very frustrating and no one seems to be able to help me! I have looked the problem up on Internet, found lots of forums were people are having the same problems and there are hundreds of so-called remedies, have tried one or two with out any results.
I have a program called Pinnacle Studio 11; it’s a very good creative video-editing program with lots of good features in it and for my photos I have a program called Magix for making slides shows.
I have been doing some reading up on the Canon 450D and the 50D also went into a photo shop and got some first hand information on both the models. I have decided that I will save for the 50D instead of the first intended 450D; it means I will have to wait awhile longer before I can buy it but I think the wait is worthwhile. If I recall the Blotter has the 50D and from what I can gather he is very satisfied with it.
The weather is playing havoc at the moment, last week it was lovely and warm and everybody thought that at long last the winter was gone and that at long last spring was here.
This week it’s the other way around. Yesterday for instance I was at work and on my way there I left a rainy countryside to arrive in a snow covered one (the distance is 100 KM). All the morning it snowed heavily and in the afternoon it turned into rain. The temperature is no more then six degrees and slowly but surely we have had enough of this cold and dismal weather.
I was pleased to hear that my brother (No.1Broadstreet) had a very relaxing weekend with is wife, getting away from everything once in a while is a good thing.
My wife and I went on a three weeks holiday in the mountains of Switzerland years ago, in these three weeks we never saw a news paper heard the radio or watched TV, there were no mobiles, no laptops with Internet connection. We did long hikes every day, cooked our food mainly every evening on a grill and washed it down with good Swiss beer. The three weeks did us the world of good.
Take care out there were ever you are. Tshüss
The photo, well there is no explaination needed. Taken 26 years ago.

Little to write about

I seem to have got off to a slow start this year with my Blog, it’s not that my interest is lacking the problem is there is not all that much happing just at the moment worth writing about. I hope when spring comes (if it ever comes) that there will be more to write about.
Last week in a small town called Winnenden in the Bundesland Baden-Württemberg (you will have seen or heard about it in the median) a young man of 17 ran amok and killed 15 people most of them scholars in the school were he used to attended himself. A most appalling and tragic catastrophe, which catapulted the people living in this town out of the normal daily life and brought pain and grief to 16 families. When something like this happens I ask myself a lot of questions has it something to do with our form of society we are living in? Or has it to do with Internet? Video war games? I don’t know and I have the feeling the experts don’t know either.
On Friday evening we had a Skype link with my brother we wanted to congratulate him on his birthday (in New Zealand it was Saturday morning) There we sat my wife and I each with a glass of sparkling wine in our hands and when the link opened we sang happy birthday. Sadly to say the voice link was there but not the video link because I had downloaded an update of Skype and I forgot to change the setting for the video link. We enjoyed our chat, which lasted about one hour, had a few laughs and caught up on the family news. We were sorry to hear that thing weren’t going too well at the moment with my brother, hope our chat cheered him up a bit.
Last week I cut back a lot of bushes and some of them had long thorns. After I was finished my hands and arms also parts of my legs looked like I had fought a Porcupine. Three of the thorns went deep into the flesh and broke off and no matter how I tried with a needle and a pair of tweezers I couldn’t get them out. The one in my arm turned septic after a few days, so I had an other attempt at getting it out. I had the feeling that the beast was so long it was nearly showing through on the other side of my arm. With a needle (poking) and squeezing hard it suddenly popped out (thank goodness) it was five millimetres long. The one in the leg and in the finger I have managed to remove as well.
On Saturday afternoon we drove to a Garden centre just to have a look round and came out 36 Euros less then we went in with. The place was so full, hardly a space to park, you would have thought they were giving the plants away for free. Now me and my wife can go any day in the week to the garden centre but no we have to go when the rest of the world is not working. Daft I call it.
Take care out there were ever you are. Tshüss
The photo was taken 26 years ago on a walk in Northcote New Zealand.

No story today about the army.

Rain, rain and nothing but rain.

After two consecutive days of rain without a let up one starts to think it might be practical to start thinking about building a Ark (or something similar) just in case. After such a long and cold winter and now this cold and very wet period it’s time we saw some sun. Every one you meet is kind of dismal and definitely depressed with the weather situation, according to the weather forecast there is no change in sight, not in the forth coming week anyway.
On Tuesday we drove into Düsseldorf to do a bit of shopping, for instance a new kitchen-slicing machine was on the shopping list and one or two other small articles. We had lunch first, pepper steaks with French fry’s and carrots and peas and to wash it down a bottle of Alt beer. Afterwards we did our shopping, it’s always a mix of actually shopping and window-shopping when we are in Düsseldorf.
During a phase of window-shopping my wife saw a pair of earrings that she liked and I picked up the hint straight away that they would make a perfect birthday present, (My wife’s birthday is in the middle of May) I said to my wife “ If we wait till May they won’t be they’re any more” and really, I would rather buy something that my wife has picked out herself then me buying something that she doesn’t like, (I’m good at that)
A few weeks back I had reserved a table at the local Stadthalle (Town hall) for a jumble sale. Last year in September I did the same and I quite enjoyed myself also I made some good money out of things that we didn’t need anymore. This time I was there at half past six and the doors opened at twenty to seven. Seeing that the sale is over at one, being there early is important. Things went well for me in the first three hours, I managed to sell my old analogue video camera and one or two other pieces which brought me a total of 112 Euros, this will go towards buying the Canon 450D which I’m saving for.
In the afternoon we drove to the cemetery to tidy up and plant some spring flowers on the grave of my wife’s parents. We hadn’t been there for nearly three months due to the weather but were surprised to see that the grave didn’t look to bad.
Tomorrow I will be going to work instead of Tuesday because I have an appointment on Tuesday at the dentist, (just a check up)
On Friday I donated blood and was told that they had increased the donating age from 68 to 69, which by my reckoning gives me another ten years to go. (Laugh)
With this I will just say “I hope spring finds it’s way to Germany very soon because we have had enough of winter.
Take care out there were ever you are. Tshüss
The photo was taken in 1982 I think from Devonport? New Zealand.

Short story’s of past incidents in my army life (funny and sometimes sad)

After 12 weeks of intensive training the finial day came for our passing out parade. Parents, wives and lovers were invited to see us pass out. Parades in the army are equivalent to a theatre play, you rehearse and rehearse till it’s perfect then you have a complete dress rehearsal, then the rest of the time till the actual day is spent bulling you best boots and getting your uniform ready for the day. A daily nuisance is the frequent inspections of your kit to see if it is up to the required standards.
On the day, my parents came and I think my brother was with them but actually I can’t remember. After we had passed out we were given a few days leave. On reporting back to the barracks we packed out kitbags and then was taken by lorries to Preston railway station, there we boarded a train for Portsmouth. On arriving in Portsmouth we boarded a boat, which took us to the Isle of Wight were the Regiment after returning from a three year tour of Hong Kong was stationed . We were picked up by lorries in Cowes and driven to the barracks just outside Ryde.
To be continued.