Old Friends and weired weather!!!
In the past days the weather in Austria twisted from "I think winter is around the corner" to "I need an outside pool to cool down". Lets hope it will be summer like the next days as the Wein und Kunst Festival takes place in the Linzer Altstadt in these days. Yesterday we went out to find some good glasses of wine - which we also found. Besides that I also found an old friend that I havent seen in the past 6 years - was good chatting with him again - walking in past memories of the times when we both worked in the same company.
Thats it - here are some pics.

Borland people pretending to work :-)	Intersting beer experience - BIO-HEFEWEIZEN
Winter is around the corner	At the wine festival
Reunion of two old friends	Looks like it could become a nice day!

Weekend Activities
Saturday was pretty relaxing. Alex was hiking on a mountain with one of her friends - so I could do whatever I wanted - meaning - not much. Some shopping - some biking. At night I went to Steyr to watch my former working colleague - Alois - as he acts in a summer theatre show. MORE INFO HERE!!
On Sunday we had lunch with Irene and Martin (aka Mole) at the "Gruener Olivenbaum" in the Altstadt. In the afternoon we visited Didi (working colleague) and his family - the cool thing here was: 15 degrees outside temperate - 27 in the pool :-)
Here are some pics!!

The stage in Steyr were Alois performed	Alois and Me - after the play in a pub in Steyr
4 kids in the pool :-)	Linz in the rain - on our way home after our lunch

Going out with Marion and Roman
Its been a while since I've seen Marion and Roman and therefor I was quite happy that they had time for me. So - we went for dinner to Papa Joe's for a good Steak!! Then we headed to the Hauptplatz where we checked out a new place - the small Irish pub in one of the small back streets on hauptplatz - really nice - they have a pretty good selection of beer and whiskey - and - I've not been insulted for ordering a Black&Tan (like I have been by the bartender at the Irish Platz on Hessenplatz). After two Black&Tans we continued to Marcelli-Remembar.
Unfortunatelly I dont have any pics from that night but I do have some from the last days, e.g.: me and didi in our old favorite pub in gallneukirchen or udo - a registered citizen. cheers

Clemens' and my office	Tom's office with udo as a visitor
Udo - registered citizen	Didi and me in our old bar - after loosing 3 dart games in a row

New Tools for my WebSite
Finally a friend of mine (Juergen) told me how ugly my pictures look. Not that they are ugly in general - but the tool that I use to create the thumbnails doesnt do a good job. Well - the tool that I use is self-developed - and it seemst that I havent really done a good job. So - I finally switched to a "professional" tool. So below you see some pics that Martin (aka Mole) took last saturday while we were sitting in the HotTub.
Not much else is going on - yesterday night I had the next battle with Leos computer - making it burn audio cds in a quality that leo can accept - the next battle will be to figure out how to use his TV card.
Today in the morning I had my final post-beach-volleyball-errands to do - returning posters - returning beer benches - ...
Thats it - cheers

Oh how nice it is - beer in the hot tub	The bigger picture of it

2 Goals for a Beer!!
Thats what it was today. We had 3 beers while watching the 2 champions league qualification matches of the two austrian teams - in the end we saw 6 goals - all against our teams - meaning that none of our teams made the qualification.
The most impressive thing of the evening was something totally different. As you may know - at least you should know when you are an austrian citizen - we have elections coming up on the 1st of october. Today the so called Summer Talks started on our public television. It was the partie of Mr. Westenthaler who had the first chance to present his topics in a 45 minutes show. The most impressive thing for me was this lady from our television company - just amazing - the way she argued and took steam from his arguments - well - sorry Mr. Westenthaler - you didnt really make many points tonight.
Oh yeah - nearly forgot about that - the evening was spent at Didis place - thats kind of a tradition right now - every time our Salzburg Soccer Team plays internationally.
The sad thing about today is that Alex is in the hospital. Nothing to worry about - its a routine check of her "plumbing" - sorry to use that term - but I think its funny - and actually - thats what it is :-)
Good Night

Lentos Art Museum in Linz at Night	Mr. Westenthaler - next to my bottle of beer

New Camera!!
Bought a new camera so that I can continue with the "coverage" of my day-to-day life. There are already some pics from satursdays volleyball tournament - CLICK HERE!.
So - the weekend was not as busy as I thought. Friday night has been short - we were invited at Alex's parents for BBQ - but as I was too tired for a long night we went home at around 9PM. Saturday - starting at 6:30AM - getting everything going for the tournament. We finished at around 3:30PM - then the clean-up - which brought us home to my parents at 5PM. Did some BBQ - drinks - took a bath in the hot tub - ...
Either we are getting older or everybody was just too tired for a long night - but we finished at midnight - which was actually good as I got some sleep to compensate my sleep deficit from the last week.
Thats it - cheers!

3 Girls: Mama, Claudia and Schnurli	2 Girls: Alex and Schnurli
Thanks for too much ad-material - so we had something to heat the grill - VERY HOT!! :-)	Hungry mouths had to be fed
Didi the Grill-Chief	In the HOT-TUB
A small but nice group at night - the weather allowed us to stay outside till midnight	My toe: broken or not?

New Pictures
Thanks to Martin (aka Mole) - www.mole.at I have new pictures to present. In a much better quality than usual!! We checked out the beergarden at Klosterhof - had a few drinks - talked about God and the World. After that I went to the Remembar because I forgot my jacket there on monday - and - what a surprise - it was still there hanging on the same spot waiting for me.
Today in the morning was really busy - I had to drive to several companies that gave us some prices for tomorrow's tournament - now I am back in the office doing some necessary work - after that Didi and I have to the final tasks for the tournament. Anyway - one more thing today on my plate is to buy a new camera - otherwise I would have to rely on martin to take pictures for my website.
Thats it - cheers

Me in the beergarden - with a nearly empty Prinzregent Luitpold	Beergarden at night

US Taxes - my 10000th attempt!!
Oh what fun it is to work with those offical offices. As you may remember - I had to pay a great amount of dollars in taxes for 2005 and some estimates for 2006. I filed the papers for those two years and additionally a paper to request a so called Independant Tax Number (Steuernummer). The money was taken from my bank account in June. Then I received two letters telling me that they have the money but they dont know who I am (but at least they were thankful for the money). I called to ask what the problem was - it turned out that the documents I had to send (a copy of my passport) was not notarized and therefore not accepted to aquire the tax number. So - I went to local notar - got a notarized copy of my passport - sended it in and hoped that everything is ok. No Way!! Again I received two notices that they still dont know who I am. So - I called again yesterday - after 30 minutes on the line with this lady (it was a 0900 number in the US) we figured out the following:
a) documents need to be notarized by US registered notars (no austrian notar can do this) - or by the US Embassy in Vieanna
b) I only need the Tax Number if I ever want some money refunded from the US Tax Department

As I dont think I want any money back from them I just told the lady that I wont do any further steps and just leave it as it is. That means - all the stress and additional maoney that was spent on notars, phone calls and mail service was for nothing - yahooo!! But at least - another story in my life is over!!

What else? Well - yesterday I received a nice birthday package from Stephan - thanks again!!! Also - we had a practive game in Volleyball for our tournament on saturday - we started bad but in the end we had some good plays. Thats it - today should be another attempt for soccer on the pleschinger lake and after that I will hopefully meet with Martin (aka. Mole) in the Remembar - first of course for a drink and second because on monday I forgot my jacket - hope they didnt throw it away.
Cheers

A short report on Mallorca
Well - still no sign from my camera - seems that nobody found the camera on the plane - so there might be no pictures from our amazing trip - but - thats the way life goes. Anyway - it was a very nice week - full of rememberable events. We rented a car for two days to explore parts of the island. We've seen lots of the north - north west - east and south east. We also enjoyed the facilities of our HOTEL. Twice a day we played beach volley ball - we enjoyed the great breakfast buffet - the nice bistro between pool and beach - the spa - the fitness center - the hotel bar - ...
Mallorca has a bad reputation within europe because everybody believes its just about drunken germans on the beaches on the south shore - but - as we've experienced - Mallorca is a great vacation island - nice small towns - nice beaches - and nice people (residents and tourists). So - I still hope to be able to present some pictures in case we get our camera back - if not you just have to believe me that Mallorca is worth a trip.
cheers

Numbers!!!
+43662/8580259, +4930/34344646, +34901116402, +32902320737, +34917789258, +34971448644, ...
These are some of the numbers I called today in order to get some information about the camera we forgot on the plane yesterday. Nobody in Salzburg, Vienna, Mallorca, Madrid, Munich could tell me anything - they just refered me to somebody else - well - I still hope we get the camera back - not because of the camera - but because of so many cool pictures that we've taken from this great vacation. As I am a bit short of time right now I will only tell you that the vacation was for better than expected - lets hope we have a happy end and we get the camera back - cheers

Alex's 29th Birthday!!
Its her 29th birthday today - one more year and she is really getting old :-)
Yesterday night we already started the celebrations. It started at Judiths place - joined by Sandra - we had Bowle and some snacks. Then we moved on to Walker where we met Claudia (her sister), Irene and some other friends. After a couple of beers, caipirinhas, prosecco at midnight and of course a dance in the far too crowed pub we went home at aroun 1:30 AM. And - as it has nearly become tradition when going out at the Hauptplatz - we got a late night snack at the Wuerstelstand on Taubenmarkt.
Today we started with a breakfast at Cafe Opera - then visited Udo (aka Prinzregent). Now we are packing our stuff for the trip to Mallorca and later today we drive to her parents for birthday dinner.
And tomorrow - well - 5PM is take-off in Salzburg - heading south :-). So - no updates will happen in the next 8 days as I wont have the chance (nor do I want it) to get an internet connection - not even my cell phone will work there - yahooooo!!
Cheers

Pirates of the Caribean Sea
Thats the movie that I've just seen. Sandro, Juergen and I went out for the movie tonight. We watched it in the original version - which is what I preferred - because Johnny Depp is really giving a great performance and plays the character of Captain Jack Sparrow really good - although he is hard to understand. The movie was ok - it was not a movie that totally excited me - but it was definitly worth seeing it and I am looking forward to the last part of it - somewhen next year.
Thats it - time to go to bed - cheers

4 days to Mallorca!!
Only 4 more days - then we fly to Mallorca. But there is also a sad side about that. Actually we wanted to use the train to get down to Salzburg - as we fly out from there. The tickets are part of the travel package. The idea would be great - with the tram to Linz Hauptbahnhof - with the train to Salzburg Hauptbahnhof and then with the shuttle bus to the aiport. All that to save some fuel and do something good for the environment. But - as our return flight arrives in Salzburg shortly before midnight we would have to wait till about 3 AM to get a train back to Linz. Thats not really the way we planned it - therefore we skipped our good plans and we will take the car :-(
There are two more highlights today:
a) met carmen - she spent the last year in england and needed some advise from me (she is in a similar situation that I've been when I was in Boston)
b) I did some work on the web-site of my brothers company - so - if you need somebody to dig a hole or to cut some trees - check out Baggerungen Grabner
Thats it - cheers