Reviews, opinions, random chatter
Aug 05
Today’s Thursday 13 shows you 13 sights in town that are worth seeing… The Imperial castle Albrecht Dürer’s birthplace The Nazi party rally grounds Schwurgerichtssaal 600, where the Nuremberg trials took place Executioner’s bridge Beautiful fountain St. Elisabeth St. Johannis cemetery, a medieval cemetery, containing many old graves (Albrecht Dürer, Willibald Pirckheimer, and others). Way [...]
Jul 29
I’m not a big Douglas Adams fan, in fact, I am probably one of the handful of people on this planet who didn’t like The Hitchhiker’s Guide. However, “The Deeper Meaning of Liff” is one of the cleverest books ever. It is “a dictionary of things that there aren’t any words for yet” and it [...]
Jul 22
Image by firexbrat on flickr Today I’ll show you some lovely book items I found on Etsy and other similar shops… Sony Reader cover. I bought one of those in February last year and still love mine. Those make your Reader look so much nicer. Library button or magnet Cute “I love books” zipper pouch [...]
Jul 08
It is almost 1.000 years old. Around 1515 Albrecht Dürer published the "Stabiussche Weltkarte", the first perspective drawing of the terrestrial globe. Together with Prague and Cologne it was one of the biggest cities of the Holy Roman Empire. The main part of Nicolaus Copernicus’ work was published in Nuremberg in 1543. In 1632 Wallenstein [...]
Jun 25
Origami (from ori meaning "folding", and kami meaning "paper") is the traditional Japanese folk art of paper folding, which started in the 17th century AD and was popularized in the mid-1900s. It has since then evolved into a modern art form. The goal of this art is to transform a flat sheet of material into [...]
Jun 17
Lost in Translation is a book about “Misadventures in English Abroad”, the “very best and worst instances of genuine grammar-gargling from around the world”. Since I am working in the hotel business I was most interested in the hotel section of the book, but there are many more. Here is a selection of the hotel [...]
Jun 10
Today I’m talking about films made from books. The kind that works. At least they work for me. The Lord of the Rings trilogy I don’t know how often I have seen it, I’ve seen it in the movie theatre and at home, the regular version, the director’s cut, with background comments of about every [...]
Jun 03
I haven’t done a Thursday 13 for a long time. So this week I thought it’s time to join once more. Here are the best (in my opinion) 13 author vs. author put downs found at examiner.com. Image by dropowtt at sxc.hu 1. How to read ‘Harry Potter and the Sorceror’s Stone’? Why, very quickly, [...]
Jun 11
Today’s Thursday 13 is about extraordinary words in various languages. “yuputka” (Ulwa, Nicaragua) means “having the sensation of something crawling on one’s skin” “nggregeli” (Indonesian) means “to drop something due to nerves” “’alo’alo kiki” (Hawaiian) is “to dodge the rain by moving quickly” “ngetem” (Indonesian) means “to stop (a bus) longer than necessary at [...]
May 28
After the list of palindromes some weeks ago I decided to tackle pangrams next. Usually the shorter the better, but for my purpose it was nicer to choose pangrams that made some sort of sense. A 26 letter pangram for example would be “Glum Schwartzkopf vex’d by NJ IQ.” But does that sound like fun? [...]
