Sylvester
2005 is over - looking back it was a wonderful year. The finish was just as I hoped it to be - being home again with my friends!!!
We started with some curling at my parents house - they prepared a nice ice ring and the weather was perfect for it. After that we went to Doris and Robert - having a Gloeck (swedisch punsch). The evening theme was "Mexico". Therefore we had some mexican food and drinks, e.g.: burritos, steak, chilli, tequilla, ...
The party ended at 4 AM but we continued it at 10AM with a nice breakfast. Check the pictures!

Doing some curling	Having the swedish punsch outside
Robert - our chef - prepared the first course	Anxiously waiting for the food
Some Tequilla	Klaus and Irene
The later the evening - the funnier the pictures got	Midnight Waltz
2 AM - A late midnight Gulasch	A rather strange but good breakfast - Salmon with Onions

Troubles with my cell phone
I think I spent about 3 hours finding and fixing a problem with my cell phone. The strange coincidence was that I bought a new cell phone that didnt work. Normally you wouldnt think that a new cell phone doesnt work - therefore I blamed it on the SIM card. But - replacing a SIM card from YESSS takes several days (sending it in per mail and waiting for the response). Therefore I bought a new TeleRing Twist PrePaid card as I thought a new SIM card with a new cell phone should work out of the box. But as I learned today: cell phones dont always work :-)
Anyway - 3 hours later - after spending about €60 - I am connected again to the mobile world :-)
Tonight is Walkers Time - hopefully not as intense as last week - cheers

Skiing in Gastein
Its been a wonderful time in Dorfgastein. Martin and I drove to Dorfgastein on Tuesday afternoon - arriving there just in time for dinner with Sandro and Claudia. After that - the boys went down to the KuhBar for some darts and nailing. On wednesday morning Juergen and Barbara joined us while Claudia had to ride home. After a nice skiing day we went to the Skiglo for some drinks :-). 4 Hours and 2 promille later we went home - going to bed really really early :-)
Today - thursday - Martin and I had a great day on the slopes. The sun came out and the snow was perfect. Here are some pictures.

Playing "Nageln" (=Nailing) at the Kuh Bar	The boys at the KuhBar
Sandro changing his glasses after I "powdered" him :-)	On the slope
On the lift	The schnaps we had in the Skiglo
The 3 girls from Linz - it took me 1 day to convince them to dance with me :-)	Martin a little bit exhausted
Nice slope - nice to carve	The view from sandros appartment
More skiing pictures	One more skiing picture

Salsa Concert in Remembar
Tonight we had a great Salsa Concert in Remembar. As you can see from the pictures - I wore my "Hands" TShirt. Thats the shirt that I got from my family before I moved to the states. Well - the shirt is amazing - everybody wanted to touch it - especially Joachim was very fond of it. But - at 2:30AM when the bar closed - a girl came to me - a bit drunken - and told me that the only thing that she doesnt like is the shirt - she told me it looks like I am leader of a boy scout team :-)
Anyway - the evening was amazing - as was the afternoon. It was my dads birthday and we did some more xmas celebrations with my sisters family.
I wont be able to update the site in the next 3 days - Martin (aka Resl) and myself visit Sandro in Dorfgastein for some days of skiing.

The band - really really good	People dancing on the dance floor
Birgit, Joachim and a sweaty Andi	Dani and Silke
Yeah - he liked my shirt	Yeah - they also liked my shirt
The bartender team of the Remembar	Birgit, Klaus and Nora

XMAS
Every year - XMAS is the day that brings our family back together for 3 days. Every day its pretty much the same ritual - and thats what I was looking forward. After a short night sleep from 23rd to 24th I packed my belongings and drove to my parents home in Gallneukirchen. The day was mostly spent with the decoration of the christmas tree. The XMAS celebration before opening the packages was pretty short as we have 3 kids at home who got more and more excited to later the evening became and therefore we had to switch to the "opening the packages" ceremony really quickly. After that we had our XMAS dinner (Raclett).
At night we usually go to XMAS mass. I usually go with my friends from town. So I set out to visit them at 10PM to wait for the others and then we were all supposed to go to church - but - starting with gluehwine and schnaps we soon decided to celebrate our own XMAS Mass at their place - till 3AM!!!
Mario and I were the last to leave Doris and Roberts home with the intention of going home - well - the intention was really good - but the force to do some more XMAS celebration was stronger. So we checked out the pub scene in Gallneukirchen till 5AM and finishing the evening at Marios house at around 6AM when I finally started walking home. 3 hours later the kids at home started playing with their new toys - ole ole - that ment - forget sleeping - rather get some coffee :-)
After having dinner with my parents - my dad and I checked out the new wellness area from my brother. They already had the whirlpool outside in the garden - but last week they added a Sauna. So - we started in the Pool - two rounds of Sauna and another Poolsession.
Tomorrow will be the last XMAS day - its also my fathers birthday - looking forward to that. cheers and happy christmas

Our xmas tree before we started decorating it	We changed the decoration from the traditional farmers style (lots of straw, apples, nuts, ...) to a more glittering style
The kids got big big eyes when they first saw the tree	Maximilian - our honey
Grandma with Maximilian	Grandpa with Maximilian
You cannot start early enough with showing the kids our good beer	Robert played on his styrian style akkordeon

One day to christmas eve and lots of cool things happened. First - we had a xmas soccer game - yeah. Second - I met Silke who spent the last 3 months in zambia doing social aid work. Then - we went out for a nice evening/night to different pubs in linz. Its been crazy - it seems that everybody in linz was out tonight. Walkers was packed full when we arrived around 11PM - so was Remembar at 2AM. No its time to go to bed. It will be a big day tomorrow - christmas eve. cheers

Martin and I in Walkers - in the back room	I didnt know what the word cunt means when I took the picture - but now I know - check it on LEO
Posing during the Baywatch song	Martin on his way home - cheers

Meeting with old friends from the HTL (school)
Not only did I meet some friends from the school - I also met Roman as you can see from the pictures. cheers

Winter Wonderland - picture taken from my appartment	Romand and I at the XMAS Market on the Hauptplatz - with a Gluehmost and Bratwuerstel
Friends from the HTL at the Klosterhof	And - going on to Walkers

Its been a very nice vacation day. Getting up early - finally getting a nice haircut - leaving the car at the repair shop for an oil change. Then Mole, two of his friends and myself went for a nice lunch meal to a very traditional austrian gasthaus. After that we went to a very traditional austrian cafe house.
Well - wednesday nights seem to become a good tip for salsa. Daniel teaches advanced salsa lessons in the Beluga - very well done!!

People dancing in the beluga bar	Birgit and Daniel doing a very fancy move

My first "official" day of vacation was really nice. After dancing till 2AM on monday I had a good night sleep till 9AM. Getting up -doing some errands - visiting my parents and some friends at home. And - tonight was the big night of tasting Julius Echter and of course checking out the 2 liter prinzregent luitpold glass. You may remember - udo and I had a bet going on during our last company wide bowling event. the one of use with the lowest score was going to provide the beer for his 2 liter glass - and it was me. check out the pictures.

The Landstrasse in Linz - taken from the Passage Shopping Center towards Hauptplatz	The XMas Market at the Hauptplatz where people do their XMAS shopping and drinking punsch and gluehwein
Another view of the XMAS Market	Udo tasting the delicious Julius Echter
Filling the 2 Liter glass of beer	Mission accomplished
No comment	No comment either

Salsa in the Remembar
Monday is Salsa time in the Remembar. It was wonderful being back and having fun - dancing all night long. Besides that it was my last day in the office this year as I took the rest of the year off (doesnt that sound cool?).
And - some update on my professional future. I've already told some of you that I figured out that austria is the place for me to be. What does that mean? Well - I've been offered to stay for an additional year in the USA - but in the last 3 months I realized that - although the states are a great place to life and work - austria is the place that i miss and that I want to be. So it seems that I will go back to the states in january to finish some business but I will not stay too long before I go back and stay in linz.
Well - thats the update - good night - bye

Sunday afternoon and I finally feel my jetlag and the lack of sleep. But - it was a fantastic weekend. Yesterday night we had the XMAS Party of our JVP group. We went out for a nice dinner and continued to Tanzcafe Hoppala. Today - breakfast with my brother + family and then lunch at my sisters house. Thats it - good night!

I helped didi making some cookies for xmas - the special flavor comes from the beer :-)	Bernie, Elke and Didi
Red Bull - brings austrians to smile	Andi dancing with Helene
Singing to "I want to break free"	Isnt that cool - a wheat beer candle - a gift from Juergen

Going out in Linz
Its been the first night going out in linz after I came home. Yesterday night - after driving home from Nuernberg - I went out to meet lots of friends including Alex, Mole, Max, Martin, Irene, Doris, ... - we started at the XMAS Market - going on to Lennox, Walker and finally Remembar. The funniest part was that Martin and I were refused to enter the Remembar at the first attempt. We just came from the Wuerstelstand and had a Kafka - and of course - smelled like hell (onions, garlic, ...). So - the security guy wouldnt let us in - we turned around - got out to franzesko and had a beer to wash away the smell in our mouths - then it was ok to enter the bar :-)
Another - maybe not so funny thing was that I realized that my alarm clock in the appartment was set to 6AM - and it is damn loud. So - this alarm went off for the past 3 months and I am sorry for my neighbours - because they definitly heard it for the time when I was not around.
Now its time to get my car from juergen - visit irene - visit didi and then head to the next xmas party in gallneukirchen. cheers

Greetings from Nuernberg!!
Yesterday afternoon we drove to Nuernberg as we have a customer meeting today. My lack of sleep and jetlag became quite obvious while we had dinner at night. I had to leave the dinner earlier as I started feeling bad and extremly tired. But - after 8 hours of sleep the world looks much better today. I hope the predicted snowfall wont be that hard today as we have to drive back to linz in late afternoon. I hope we will be home on-time so that I can check out the XMas markets in linz. So - I have to run now - cu.

X-MAS Party and the new office!!
Oh - what a day it was. A long one indeed. My one hour of sleep in the plane was not really much and - because of lots of coffee that I had I couldnt really sleep at my parents house before our company's X-MAS Party - which lastet till 5AM!!! It was great fun - starting with some curling (not really curling - more the austrian version of it) - 2 hours of relaxing in the sauna and then a delicous meal and of course some drinks. Check the pictures below - also - find some pictures from the new office. Clemens did a good job in decorating the walls of our room!

Curling - to warm our soul we had some punsch and gluehwein	First course - the appetizer
The entree	Reunited with the prinzregent himself
Desert	Jeid and Tom
Udo making a good choice of wine in the wine cellar	Maybe not the appropriate way to decant a bottle of wine
Hubbo - quite some alc that he had to work on :-)	Maybe gregor was thinking: I am drunk enough to taste a cigaret?
Mr. Techsupport - Lampy and Falco	Tom can smile again after days and weeks of strugling with the new reporting module
The new office room from clemens and me. Definitly better than a cube	And - the walls are full of motivating pictures :-)

Greetings from the Frankfurt Airport Lufthansa Business Lounge :-). Its 6 AM - just arrived from Boston and now I have two hours to spend till my flight home to Linz. Now - the thing that currently struggles me is whether I should drink a coffee as it is morning on european time or whether its still ok to drink a beer as it is midnight US time. Anyway - I had a good flight - prior to that Stephan and I had a nice dinner at the airport and two beers that at least allowed me to sleep for about an hour on the plane. I tried to get an upgrade to business class but it was fully booked - so - I enjoyed the flight in economy on an isle seat that resulted in a stiff neck :-). Well - thats the update.
In about 4 hours i will hopefully be picked up by my parents - and a bit later we have our company christmas party in kirchschlag - ole ole - cu

Getting closer to my journey towards home. Its been the last full day in the office - well - tomorrow will be another half day - but I expect that that will go by rather quickly as it is sticked with meetings, bug verifications and saying farewell. Sarah came down to Boston as she had to pickup somebody from the airport and she joined stephan and me for a dinner at christophers. We tried to get rid of their Julius Echter stock but we didnt really succeed. Its been a nice evening with those two persons that had the biggest influence in my life in boston - and I am thankful that I met them - without them it would have been a totally different story.
And - as X-MAS is on its doorsteps - they gave me presents that can be seen down in the pictures.
That will probably be the last entry before I am back home. The flight is at 4:45PM from Logan and I am supposesd to arrive in Linz on wednesday somewhen around 10AM - directly heading to the christmas party of my company - and the following day directly heading to the next customer presentation to germany. So - there wont be much update this week. bye bye

Oh yeah - here is a great link: The real brain behind George W.

Cognac to celebrate my last day	Me and my presents: padagonia sweater, bike helmet and a book full of quotes from george the 2nd - amazing what he has to say

Its been a nice sunday with a flavor of Star Wars. They have a Star Wars exibition at the Museum of Science where they show how ideas of Star Wars made it into our current life - and of course - some background on the movies - it was very interesting. After a 3+ hours tour through the museum Stephan and I decided its time for some food and beer. So we went to the Cambridge Brewing Company at Kendal Square. Now - sitting at home I am just updating my website and I am preparing to go to my last salsa night before I move home. Its no longer than 44 hours till my plane takes off - cheers

Darth Vaders costume	A Storm Trooper
Princess Leia and the two droids	Han Solos costume and Chewbacca
The Millenium Falcon	The Cambridge Brewing Company's version of Nachos - those at Christophers are just better

Stephan and I went for a late breakfast - or brunch - to the breakfast place next to our appartment. The first half of the afternoon was pretty relaxing - doing the laundry - some reeding - some naps and cleaning out stephans car from the snow. At around 5PM we decided to go into town and check out the malls. Walking all the way from park street to prudential center - checking dinner at a nice bar in south end - and walking all the way back to kendall square in cambridge (thats a long long walk). We finally ended at christophers where we had our good night julius echter and now we are sitting at home and enjoying our good night cognac.
Oh yeah - I nearly forgot. We actually wanted to get into Mojito as it would have been a nice lounge for some salsa - but we couldnt get in because of the dress code - we didnt really match their requirements.
thats it - here are some pictures

A winter wonderland - taking from our appartment out to massachusetts avenue	The X-MAS Tree in Boston Common Park
The ice ring at the Frog Pond in Boston Common Park	We got some coffee in a Starbucks on Newbury street - actually we got EggNog Latte - yummie
A nice night shot from the Longfellow Bridge towards Boston	Good Night Drink

The big snow is coming!! Its fun watching the news channels today - its all about the snow. I think americans are specialized in making stories out of something simple as snow falls. The channels have teams in different cities having live coverage of the amount of snow that was falling since the last live shot and how people think about the snow - well - its fun - but its just strange that they push it that far. however - i like the snow - i just dont hope that it will make my comute home tonight too long. We will see.
Back to yesterday - we went to christophers to check out the new julius echter - it was good. Cheers

Julius Dark and his Light brother :-)	The list of beers that christophers has on tap
Snow snow snow	More snow

First wednesday in the month is Segue User Group day. Therefore we had another SUG meeting where I could present our new upcoming product SCTM 8.1. Meeting lasted till about 8 - got home around 9 - just hopping in - saying hi to Stephan and going on to An Tua Nua where I came in just on time for the dancing lessons - at least the part of it that where interesting for me. Its been a long long night - got back at 1 AM and decided to take a later bus today in the morning - which - when I look back - was a bad bad idea. Because of accidents we had a very bad traffic situation in boston - so - the bus came later than expected and the ride took 50 minutes instead of 15 - well well - thats life. Tonight is christophers night - it seems that finally have the dark julius echter on their menu - yahooo!! cheers

Dancing people numbero uno	and number two
And three	The place from the outside

There is a swiss restaurant on Harvard Square that I checked out tonight. Well - there is not much swiss on their menu - except Roesti which are simply french fries and Bratwurst which is actually not swiss. But - they had a good chicken sandwich :-)
What else is going on? Well - I guess I am counting the days - 7 left to go then I am back in Austria - yahooo!! bye bye

This one will be short. I went out salsa dancing yesterday and therefore I got not enough sleep last night - hope I can catch up today. bye

Winter is here! When I woke up this morning - my neighborhood was covered in snow. So I went on for a long long walk - via Harvard Square - along the Charles - over Mass Ave Bridge - along Newbury Street towards Boston Common Park and back with the subway. Here are some impressions.

John Harvards statue and japanese tourists	Along the Charles river from the Cambridge Side
A Boston neighborhood	Copley Square
The ice ring in boston common - on the frog pond	Dogs dressed like reindeer

The Wizard of Oz - we are just watching it - its my first time (I mean - watching this movie :-) ). Today we've been out walking through the city - doing some more shopping and dining in a fancy restaurant.
The office in Linz is currently moved to a new location - Juergen took a picture and put it on his website - check it out: Juergen Richtsfeld.

Funny lighting of the archway on the harborside of Boston	View from Government Center down to Fanueil Hall

Yesterday I was adoring the fact that there are so many nice people out there. And today - this amazing obversation continued. I was waiting for my bus home in front of one of the office buildings in our office park. As I was standing there a woman came out of the building - looking at me and then asked me whether I was waiting for the bus - and if so - if she should give me a ride because it was the same way. So actually brought me home as it was on her way. She told me that - when she was younger and had no car - she always thought about giving people a ride when she has a car because she always wanted somebody to stop and give her a ride. Today I was the lucky guy.
As you can see from the pictures below - a little bit of christmas has already entered our appartment - its just 3 weeks to go. bye bye

Stephans funny note on the board	Our small xmas tree near the door