http://www.hesspoint.com

Here the card from the hotel I stayed in during my last business trip. Hilarious mistake! I swear it is not photoshopped (except the smudging of the license plate number).

On the weekend I payed my visit to this year’s CeBIT in Hannover. Well, let me tell you it was not very different from all the other years before, except that the companies were even more close-fisted then before. While a few years back, you normally went home with a bag filled to bursting with cool giveaways, DVDs, Software etc., this year I did not even get a free copy of the "Connect". A thing that did not change is the knowledge, or should I better say not existant knowlege, of the nice looking girls at all the stands and booths. Here a typical example of a fair-talk with a hostess at the CeBit (This is not a real situation but fictional and purely satirical and not meant to insult anyone):

Me looking at a new cell-phone. A hostess is coming towards me.
Hostess: "Hi! Do you like it?" (of course she was referring at the cell phone at my hand ;-))
Me: "Yeah, it looks quite nice…"
Hostess: "Look it even has a touch screen and it comes in lots of differen colors"
Me thinking: "Yeah, great. I hope they have them also in pink…"
Me saying: "Can you tell me something about the features?"
Hostess thinking: "Oh shit, I hate when they ask me that…"
Hostess saying: "Suuure! As you see it has a touchscreen…"
Me thinking: "Yeah, we got that already, yeah and the different colors".
Me saying: Yeah, does it have WiFi?"
Hostess (looking puzzled): "No. Sorry, It can’t make coffee, the next model certainly can do that. We show that in 07"
Me thinking: "Arrrrgghhhhh!!!".
Me saying (surpressing to ROFL): "Ok what about the internal harddrive?"
Hostess thinking: "Ugh! What does he want from me? No I am not that kinda girl!"
Hostess saying: "Sorry I cannot say anything about that, you should go to the main information and ask them."
Me: "Welllll, thank you for your kind help".
Me thinking: "Oh my goooooddddd!!!"

Now you got some idea of the mental state I was in after a couple of talks like that. Something inside my head told me "KILL KILL KILL". Well I supressed that fortunately and rather took some photos to calm down. The results you can see in the photo section. But anyway it was a nice day. Here come my personal CeBIT 06 highlights:

• The UMPC
• Samsung SCH-B600 (cellphone with 10MP camera)
• Samsung YM-P1
• Nokia E61
• Garmin GPSMap 60CSx

So see ya at the CeBIT Asia in Shanghai in September.

I just got back from my latest trip to the Eternal City, where I enjoyed somewhat that felt like spring, some sun, good food and of course, the main reason to go to Rome, good Cappuccino, Espresso and other Italian cafe specialties as well as Italian Ice Cream. Yummy!

While sitting in a little restaurant in Trastevere I found something quite funny on the menu:
"Bruschetta with Oil and Pillow". Actually the bread was fine, but the pillow was a little stringy

One last oddity I found was a store, whos owner might have immigrated from "Down Under" . Or  to put it with Asterix and Obelix: "These Romans are crazy!"

Ok this one tops it all. The ultimate X-Mas madness ever: The Lights before Christmas Video. A guy from Ohio put up a complete lightshow on his house. If you drive by with your car, you can tune your radio to the according music. There were actually doubts if this video was a fake, but it is for real. This is so wack, it will drive tears in your eyes, but see for yourself.

• The video clip
• Report on Spiegel online (German)
• Link on the Urband Legend Reference Page

These days, the mailbox gets stuffed with catalogues and flyers of all kinds of stores that vie for the attention of potential Christmas shoppers. While browsing through some of  ‘em this morning I found two items I really need to share with you.
First is a pack of toilet paper sold by the discounter Plus. So far, so normal, but here it comes: It smells like almond christmas cookies (in German: Spekulatius). I mean hey, is that delicious! Now everytime I eat one of those cookies it reminds me of wiping my butt. Man, that really raises my Christmas spirit

Second is a Playmobil ship. I was a little bit confused about the name of the ship owning company "Conlines". Either they want the children to play with a boat that transports convicted criminals or someone doesn’t know any English here. Obviously the designers never watched the movie Conair. It reminds me a little of the Eastpak backpacks that where sold under the name "Bodybag", which was really hilarous.

Here are two links that brighten up your day. Not to say they are pretty damn funny:

• Computer Science Exam (German only)
• Smoking kills (not 100% political correct ;-))

Recently I was driving in my car and I saw two funny names of companies on two trucks (sorry is only funny if you can read German):

Does not need a comment.

This one is funny for all you Stromberg fans By the way: You can watch all episodes of Stromberg online.

Here is one for all who were not yet aware of the endless possibilites of application a laptop can have. Rich Anderson’s gallery that let’s you get an idea. So be creative!
I just wonder if you could loose your warranty doning any of that?

Didn’t you always want George W. to say what you want. Maybe like "I can’t say nuclear" or "Momy I want home…"? Here is your chance.

Go to http://george.says-it.com and type your text into the box. You can also let Arni or John say it.

Recently I came across an add for computer equipment. I thought I’d seen it all but this one hit my laughing muscles hard. A UBS light. OK generally nothing special and quite useful (I own one myself) but with a lampshade? A company called Boynq produces these amongst all kinds of other stylish computer equipment. Check it out.