Vi har haft gäster från Frankrike senaste dagarna och de ville åka skridskor på en sjö här i Uppsalatrakterna. Det enda stället som verkar hyra ut utrustning är dock Fjällnora - och dit är det omöjligt att komma med buss. Nu har de åkt vidare till Stockholm och kommer nog försöka samma sak där, men efter internet-sökandet och elaka tanter i telefonen ser det ut som det blir inte lätt där heller. Har någon missat denna marknadslucka?

For the last three days, we had six French from Lyon as our guests - of course via the HospitalityClub. Since it would have been very tight with eight people in our flat, we billeted out two of them to a neighbouring friend. But we had two very nice dinners altogether around our not-so-big table and had great fun. You even can have a look at some photos.

Yesterday evening was the first clear night since weeks here in Uppsala. I took the opportunity to spend a few hours at my institute's old building where the old double refractor still resides. It is a beautiful instrument from 1892 and I although I have been here for more than three years, I had not made it to the old observatory until a few weks ago. There are regular shows for the public and since I am going to take over some of these from next week, yesterday was a good opportunity to practice the usage.

The point is that all modern professional telescopes that I have used so far (like the NOT or the VLT) let you concentrate on your science and of course they can find the objects for you. You simply put your coordinates into the computer and say "go there". As you can imagine, this is not the case with this old telescope, so you have to convert the general coordinates into your local coordinates that depend on your location and on the time and then move the telescope by hand until the scales show the right value.

That can easily be done if a clock that shows sidereal time is available, but I took the lazy way and brought my laptop with xephem on it, an astronomical software that can show you the sky and does the cordinate transformation for you.

Since it was near full moon yesterday, that was a prime target. Especially when looking at the border between light and shadow, one can impressively see the craters' three-dimensional structure. Second most prominent target right now is Mars, which was in opposition recently and is still very bright. In addition and before we froze too much, we looked at the Plejades and the Andromeda Galaxy. I am looking forward to having people and kids up there and show them things and explain what they see...

Gerade habe ich zusammen mit anderen einen neuen, deutschsprachigen Blog gegründet: www.blogressiv.de. Gemeinsam werden wir versuchen, die deutsche Blogosphäre mit Texten über "Wissenschaft, Kunst und Gesellschaft" zu bereichern. Ziemlich anspruchsvolles Motto, mal sehen ob wir es ausfüllen können... ;-)

I just created a new blog: www.blogressiv.de. It will be in German and together with some other people, I'll try to enrich the German blogosphere with texts about "Science, Art and Society". Quite an ambitious title isn't it? :-)

We went to the "LoveLite", a nice little club in an old garage in Berlin-Friedrichshein. We went there at midnight and came back at around 5 am. There were two atmospheric live-acts and the general mood of the place was a pleasant one. I am always impressed by the public transport here in Berlin: the underground and S-Bahn go in intervals of 10 minutes around the clock for the whole weekend, which is of course very nice because one never has to wonder about timetables and times.
Now, we're heading for one or two photo exhibitions in Berlin-Mitte and probably will walk by the new Holocaust Memorial.

Hier sind die gesammelten Bilder von Olga und Stefans Hochzeit:

• Der Junggesellenabend am 22. Juni: Es gibt Bilder von Erik, André und mir.
• Die Trauung auf dem Standesamt Würzburg am 24. Juni.
• Die kirchliche Hochzeit mit anschliessender Feier am 25. Juni: Bilder von André und mir.
• Die Hochzeitszeitung (PDF-Datei, 13 MB).

(Wer seine Bilder hier noch verlinkt sehen möchte oder auch, dass ich sie hier bereitstelle, kontaktiere mich bitte.)

it is nearly 8 years ago that i left school. of course, i still have contact to some people (to some even regularly), but in principle it went like it probably always does: the enthusiastic promises that we all keep contact and organise reunion meetings vanish into thin air, apart from some sudden outbreaks of sentimentality. this is fine, after all, since there simply is no good reason to meet the people that you did not have contact with otherwise (so there was no interest, right?), except maybe from laughing at old times if one likes that. i maintained a mailing-list for the last few years that even saw some activity in the beginning but has been dormant quite long now. someone made an effort recently to take over the list and include real-life addresses. according to him, the response was very little (5 people). our school turns 100 years this year and of course there will be a big fuss around it. if i happen to be in the country, i'll probably even step by... :-)
why this little text should be of any interest to someone? no idea.

Have you ever used the wrong word(s) while explaining something? I mean the type of situation where from your own point of view the word somehow describes what you want to express, but it can (and of course will) be utterly misunderstood, turning your argument against you or even insulting somebody. I give an example: It was last time I saw three former classmates back home in Germany, two of which have become policemen. I do not remember what exactly the topic was, but we came into talking about differences between us, that developped since we left the common framework, school, at the age of 19. What I was trying to say is that until then we had a common ground and each of us since then has gone his own way and developed into different directions. What I actually said was "Then we all were at the same level, but now..." I could not finish the sentence because they interrupted me. What happend? I used the word "niveau" in German for "level". The whole point is, that they understood me like I would think that I had reached a *higher* level than they by studying and now doing my PhD. That was not what I meant. I meant *different* levels, equally high, where no direction is preferred over the other. But it was too late to explain this and put it right - and every attempt to do so (even this text) can and will be interpreted as simply trying to save the situation. "Niveau" simply was the wrong word to use for what I was trying to say.

As a PhD student in Sweden, I have have to fulfill the so called "third duty" (tredje uppgiften). The first and second duties are research and teaching. The third one means spreading research from your area to the public. I have not done much for this yet and just got remined by overhearing parts of a conversation that another student had. So what shall I do? Initially I thought about some kind of website. But there are already loads of them out there. I have no overview about the Swedish ones so there may be place for one more. Or a discussion forum. To set up the web application is not the problem, the point is to have a good and working concept and to fill it with life. Any good ideas (also besides internet-based ones), links or references welcome...

i recieved a very unexpected e-mail a few hours ago. it felt like coming from the distant past and indeed, i had not heard from this person in many many years (i just realise that i must have become old for i can say such things). i lived at her and her husband's place for a few weeks at that time and worked at his factory (he did not actually own it) which produced (still does, i suppose) rooftiles in all variations that you can imagine. i must have driven up there (near the border to holland, that is) with my little scooter at that time. either i was under 18 years and had no car or i had just crashed my first one and did not have a car... ;)
in any case, it was fun to have this kind of an externally triggerd flashback. i answered the e-mail immediately.

Yesterday, I went to the monthly meeting of the "Uppsala Fotografiska Sällskap" (Uppsala Photographical Society) which simply is a overblown name for the local photo-club. It was a pleasant meeting with a guest that gave a talk and showed pictures from northern Norway during the 70s. Afterwards one looked at pictures that people brought and discussed them. I had a few of my Chile picures with me and people liked them. There will be some local competitions soon where I intend to submit some of mine. By the way, a 105mm f/2.8 macro lens is on its way to me. :-)

well, the "blogging scene" is in the news quite often, even inceasingly so in german news which i do still read. one of the traits (my "new word of the day") of blogging that often is mentioned is the interconnection between bloggers. indeed one can often find a list with "blogs i read" on a bloggers site. so i must be an exception then, right? i have neither had feedback from something called a "blogger scene" nor do i read other blogs regularly. now i go and play the song played at the end of each Lucky Luke episode: "lonesome cowboy". ;-)
Update: seriously, does anyone have this song as mp3/ogg? contact me

Yesterday, I watched all 3 LOTR movies in their extended version in a row. We started at 10 in the morning and were done by midnight (there was a lengthyish dinner break). What a great method to waste a whole day. :-)

My flatmate Sanna (not to be confused with my girlfriend Sanna) told me yesterday evening that she will move out at new year. I cannot say I am sad about this. We did not have a hard time living in the same flat but we did never have any contact besides the necessary. I had considered myself asking her to leave, but this was the more pleasant solution. Having the flat (58 square meters, layout here) for myself will be pure luxury. Hospitalityclub people will have a guest room again... :-)