Archive for category Sunday Column

Sunday Column (54)

Posted by Volker in Sunday Column, personal on 07/03/2010

This week was nothing but SICK. I went to work on Monday, went to a (honestly) small birthday party on Monday night and was home and in bed by 11 pm. From Tuesday I was off work for two days with a stomach bug. Thursday and Friday I forced myself to work, as my boss has been in the UK. It was worth it but I needed this weekend to recover and trying to get back to normal.

I have been sick for three weeks, and it really annoys me. I know there is little I can do but I really get sick of it! And, it is not one illness. Starting with a virus, then a cold, now a stomach bug.

Colin: he is continue to strive. I love his cute little actions and interactions. It is so hard to describe. He is so curious about anything and everything. He cuddles you one minute, then cries because he cannot play with your Blackberry cover, and then he grabs Jen’s glasses. If I put on her glasses, then he almost doesn’t recognize me. His age is fantastic. You can play around with him and teach him so many things.

The picture above is such a typical one of him. I believe it is hard to describe, but anyone who has children knows what they are like. I think that I still have to find the right work-Colin balance, as most days my days go way beyond 6 pm, so that I don’t really see Colin at all during the week. Whilst I am trying to make an effort to come home earlier two days a week, this might look less likely in the future. We shall see.

That is about all I can speak about this week, unless you want me to go on about sickness and work. No, not a pleasant week, but next week can only get better :-)

Have a great week and stay healthy. Look after yourself.
Volker

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Sunday Column (53)

Posted by Volker in Sunday Column on 28/02/2010

Another week being ill. It was a struggle this week as my cold (man-flu) seemed to get worse rather than better. Of course I survived but had some very tough days. Also seemed to have another stomach bug over the weekend, nothing serious but just not feeling right. Will that EVER stop :-(

I stop moaning now, but cannot help it, can I? I haven’t been to they gym at all but was surprised to only have 100 kg on the scales. Maybe not eating all these greasy meat really made me loose some weight? Hopefully I can be back to the gym sometime next week.

Work wise this week flew past. Although a few meetings got postponed, we made huge progress and I am very pleased with it. Fingers crossed, I really enjoy it.

There is not much else to report from the week. I didn’t do much else outside work. However, Volvo Doves Croydon, our car dealer where we bought the car, pissed me off by not offering me the warranty they said they would. I escalated things and now got a 12 months warranty as promised. Still to hear about my promised 12 months RAC membership :-) I decided to wait until Monday lunchtime for them to call me back. However, I will have a nice blog post ready by then, and of course will make sure their parent company and Volvo will get a copy. I don’t like to be lied to. And, I expect better customer standard than that from an authorized dealer. Maybe my expectations are just too high.

Maybe some words about my wee man: Colin. He has been loosing weight, or really, he has been growing a lot. He is robbing around on the floor, still backwards. He is so much fun to play with, to look at or just to watch. He manages to move from one end of the room to another without any trouble but still needs to figure out how to crawl forward. He got stuck under the table today. The only drawbacks at the moment is him trying to wiggle himself out of getting dressed, changed and washed. He can be a real pain – but a lovely one of course. We really adore our wee man!

Then it was Jen’s birthday this weekend. We managed to get a friend to babysit so that we went to our most favourite Thai place in Beckenham. Jen also went for a head massage and pedicure and got a surprise present. I am getting better at this whole birthday things, I think anyway :-) We had a really good weekend, and enjoyed time together, although she didn’t feel too good either.

Off to another week. It is raining a lot and with the earthquakes and all you sometimes wonder about global warming. Or we don’t really, do we?

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Sunday Column (52)

Posted by Volker in Sunday Column, personal on 21/02/2010

Now, this is the year’s anniversary of my Sunday Column. Times have changed in my blog and currently I only manage this weekly post to keep you up to date with what I am doing, nor not doing.

Like this week, I was ill. Saturday night’s food poisoning turned out to be a virus infection I didn’t get rid of until Thursday. So no gym! And, once it was gone, I got a cold or man-flu. So I am glad the week went quickly.

The days I went to work were fully packed with good and exciting meetings, SES London where our CEO spoke about mexad’s view on search and display media, and a full day home office packed with many calls. I think I almost managed to catch up on most things on Friday – so I finished the week on a high.

There wasn’t much private life this week. We got (or I got) more accessories for the car, like a car boot liner, floor mats, paint, leather cleaner, a cloth and an air freshener. Not overly exciting but I am. I have to say that for the first time ever, I really like the car we are driving.

Saturday I had a fantastic massage. The first in over 2 months as I had been too busy the last few weekends. So that was good, just to lay down, relax and not worry about anything. I think it helped my cold too.

A year of Sunday Columns makes you reflect a bit. 2009 was a very bumpy year and whilst I had lots of time to write on my blog, I now have less time and another focus on life in general. Colin wasn’t here last year either.

He is now over 8 months and explores new things every day. I hope to have some time to write yet another review of being a dad. It is fantastic to see him grow, minute by minute almost! He is so curious, interested and likes the engagement with his parents, a whole lot of fun being around him.

The weekend passed quickly with a new business opportunity, a nice French wine from the Lirac region, a trip to Faversham, an average fuel consumption of approximately 16 l/100 km (18 mpg) for the last tank, a wife that loved parking the car and we also visited an old neighbour. Guess that is enough for a weekend.

We now have some clearing up to do, some food to eat, more wine to drink and…you know, the usual :-)

Have a good week.

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Sunday Column (51)

Posted by Volker in Sunday Column on 14/02/2010

What a week. I know I keep saying that but it seems like one week tops another :-(

A virus infection of some sort slowed me down Monday and Tuesday, and Thursday and Friday I had the man-flu. So I only went to the gym, or better say a swim, once this week. That disappoints me a bit but I shouldn’t exaggerate things.

However, on the business side of things, it was a successful week with lots of meetings, positive noises and lots of interest. The next two weeks are already fully booked with conferences, meetings and work related stuff. But I enjoy it. Truly do (Sacha, I mean it!)

My dad turned 67 this week (sorry for revealing your age), and we picked up a Volvo XC90 this week, guess that makes me almost as old as him – but not as wise of course :-)

The car is great. My mother in law, my wife and boy went down to Rye on Saturday, and it was like driving a proper car. You can see the road, enjoy the heated seats, and it is just a comfortable trip. The 19.4 mpg are a bit too much, but we don’t drive too often, do we?

On Sunday, Valentines day, I got my wife these two ducks I was writing about the other day. And, of course, some roses. Some roses that could swim in the bath and double up as candles.

Sunday we planned to have a really relaxed day. However, I got food poising from the crab roll or prawn Jalfrezi. I was still sick in the afternoon, and didn’t feel well all day, so think that I will not be back in the gym as of tomorrow.

Have a great week.

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Sunday Column (50)

Posted by Volker in Sunday Column on 07/02/2010

Ok folks, first things first. The big question this week was whether, and if so, which car to get. And the winner is:

I feel like I am getting all family. Married, house, child, now a VOLVO :-) Neither my dad nor me, and he is the biggest Volvo fan in the world, would have ever thought I ever drove one. But here we go, family does change you….for the better of course.

What else happened this week (as if the above wasn’t enough)?

Monday I went back to the gym. I continued to do that every day, but Wednesday I was too knackered from the day before, and Friday my knee hurt too much. I overdid it on the cycling machine ;-( I know, laugh at me, but any circular movement to my knee seems to hurt the ligaments. I need to check with my physio massage therapist next week.

Tuesday and Wednesday just passed by. I didn’t do much this week after work, just had good meetings, one of which lasted 10 minutes, and I believe that we are making progress. Slower than expected but quicker than anticipated – if that makes any sense.

Thursday I started the day with a fab meeting and ended the day with drinks and networking. However, although (and I promise) I only had 3 pints, two ales and one stout, I felt like I had about 10 lager the next day. You know that I cannot drink lager to some intolerance, and I thought it might be down to whether the beer was over or under fermented. Stout, Ale and dark beers should be ok, but maybe the one beer I had, a very dark one, was a “Schwarzbier” and not a Stout. Never mind, I don’t in particular like beer anyway.

Friday we finished the day with some nice finger food (and it still smells of home made garlic mayonnaise) where we shared a nice bottle of Californian Zinfandel I bought in Harrods a few years back. Money well spend on this one ;-) I don’t believe how much of a connoisseur I have become on one hand, then still going on about intolerance to beer on the other. Guess life is for sharing ;-)

Last but not least I bought an audio book of the book I read a few years back: “Eckhart Tolle, The power of now” – I will write an exclusive post on that but thought I mention that this book is both fascinating and helpful. Sometime I do worry what we are all worrying about….

Enough said, have a great week ahead, mine looks fairly busy!

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Sunday Column (49)

Posted by Volker in Sunday Column on 31/01/2010

What a busy week lays behind me. After a weekend, which wasn’t a relaxing weekend, I found myself being off sick on Monday. Some virus got me down and I worked from home with more breaks and naps than I would normally have. I wasn’t well.

I felt better over the next few days, partly because I had to. I had a lot of social engagements and meetings at work. Networking parties, a trip to Leeds and Manchester and more meetings, emails etc. You know the drill. So work is very busy at the moment and things are going well. I cannot believe it is February already and I have been in my new job for a month. Time flies.

Colin, who I saw little of this week, is growing up. I believe he develops his own character, slowly but surely. He is playing by himself whilst I watch him. However, we believe it is due to his teething, he seems to have a bit of diarrhoea. Shall see and hope it is nothing serious.

Tai chi this week was good, and it will be one year next week. I believe that this is the first activity in a long time I have stuck to for as long as a year. Still I enjoy it and it is good to have a day a week to complete relax and wind down.

Saturday night we took our wee man to friends’ house for supper: Burns Supper. I had my first vegetarian Haggis which gave me heartburn but tasted really nice. It was a great night but unfortunately our baby wouldn’t settle at all. Too much noise, different smells etc. So we had to call it a night at 10 pm and he fell asleep not even seconds after we put him in his own bed. Bless him!

On Saturday we looked for car seats and came to terms that our car just cannot fit the car seat we think is appropriate for Colin. So it is either a compromise on safety, no car or a new car. We spent most of Sunday looking at cars and the results are quite simple:
- Jen and I are both tall and need a car which fits potentially 2 car seats and us plus a pram.
- We don’t want to spend too much money but need to go through a car dealer for our conscious of buying quality and because they offer finance deals.
- Whilst I don’t care less about status, brand or looks, my wife is thinking more about the latter.

The choice will come down to either a big 4×4 (and by big I mean Shogun or Land Cruiser, potentially XC90, Sorento or Outlander), or a people carrier – here it comes down to price….

Anyway, enough thoughts about cars. The more I look at it the less I am interested. I would like to spend little, get much, have enough space, enough security and still have a reliable car. No need for design and looks, just pure functionality – to be continued.

Enjoy your week, enjoy February!

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Sunday Column (48)

Posted by Volker in Sunday Column on 24/01/2010

Sunday. Hurray.
What a week, I don’t really know where to start.

I am very excited about a few things. One is my job which I really enjoy. And, I am not only saying that. I am convinced we currently have one of the best display media optimisation offerings out there to utilise ad exchanges. People are responding very well to it, so I am very happy with my choice of job.

Anyhow, besides that I am very excited about my son Colin who started saying DADA and I am now sure he means me :-) However, he was quite sick this week, including a big accident on Friday night after which we had to dispose some cushions :-( The joy of having a baby I suppose. My wife didn’t feel well either but so far I have been ok.

Then I am excited about my new regime – I have been up every morning at 5:45 am to go swimming and to go to the gym. Hopefully I keep doing that for the next while. My knee still hurts but with Ibuprofen and hopefully slow progression I am confident it will only be temporary. Fingers crossed.

And then I am excited about Schimanski :-) Not only did I order his jacket, the M65 Jacket I had for years in his stone/beige colour, but I also got the first four DVDs that were available of Tatort with Schimanski. It is great!

So this week has been very exciting. And, re-reading my post I didn’t necessarily put work before my son but I still spend more time at work than at home, that is why.

What else? I met with a good friend of mine on Monday night which was great. Haven’t had a chance to catch up with him for a while. Then I had a workshop about taxes and how to do my tax return which was quite helpful. I managed to have two early nights too to be able to help my wife with our son. I enjoy having less of a commute in order to be home a bit earlier. Of course if often happens that I have to go back to my emails afterwards, but it works well for us.

Next week I am looking forward to download the new Peter Maffay CD. Hopefully it will be a good one. Old songs newly recorded…. – I am touching base with my German roots quite a bit lately and I really enjoy it. It is as if I find myself and my history and slowly but surely know where I stand. Surely, I will write more about that shortly, but I can now let go of it. It took 9 years!

That’s all for today. I am tired. Taking care of the boy all weekend, long afternoon walks, not 100% myself, laundry….I have a lot of respect for my wife who does that every day. She enjoys it, as I enjoy what I do. That is fair I guess ;-)

You have a good week. Mine looks very busy and exciting, so fingers crossed.

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Sunday Column (47)

Posted by Volker in Sunday Column on 17/01/2010

Hello together,

You might have noticed that I haven’t written a blog post this week. The reason is fairly simple. It was my first week in my new job, and there is lots and lots of work todo. But I am loving it, and guess that is the main thing :-)

But of course there is more to life than work. Colin started turning himself back on his back after being on his front. He hasn’t quite mastered it yet but he is improving. Also, he started grabbing everything and gets more and more curious. He is sitting up now too and only sometimes falls over. I cannot believe he is over 7 months already!

Hansel, our lovely ginger cat, cut his foot and had to get stitches. Hence we had to keep both cats inside and they figured out how to open the living room door to get upstairs. So every night we got two visitors that (sometimes) quietly just sneak in and sleep on our bed. How sweet :-) As a result we put a proper door handle and lock on the door so that the cats cannot sneak upstairs anymore. DIY skills par excellence :-)

So a real family life is going on. I worked from home on Wednesday because of the snow. SouthEastern cancelled most trains to London and it was a nightmare. A friend got stuck for 2 hours on the train, so I am glad I stayed home. I still don’t believe that in the year of 2010 5 inches of snow (or less in this case) bring a country to a standstill.

It is melting now. I wouldn’t go as far that spring is coming but we had a few days above zero, with today even being around 10 degrees. I don’t mind the cold if I could do what I normally do, e.g. go to work or go shopping. Shopping delivery slots have been booked out all week :-(

The weekend was great. I had to catch up on some work related stuff but managed to get Hansel to the vet. We also had our neighbours around for coffee and biscuits. We managed to replace a few glasses we broke (I broke ;-) ), and I fixed the above mentioned door handle to the living room door.

Just a normal week with the family and work.

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Sunday Column (46)

Posted by Volker in Sunday Column on 10/01/2010

England got me back!

Yes, I was in Germany for a week and if you followed me on Twitter or Facebook, you already know what happened.

I started my new job with the media optimization company mexad on Monday. On Monday night I was supposed to fly out to Germany with Easyjet from Gatwick Airport at 18.40. They announced the flight at 6 pm as “please wait”, and kept us in the unknown until about 19.40 and announced a gate. To summarize things: more waiting, a bus tour to the plane, waiting next to the plane, a bus tour back, more waiting at the gate, and a cancelled flight. Wow! Not a good start for a new job. Reason for the cancellation was that the pilots were refusing to fly as they were out of hours.

Luckily my new colleague could book me a flight with Easyjet for 7.05 on Tuesday. It costs a few pounds more but secured me a seat. Some people were waiting for several days trying to get home to Germany, and the que in front of me was horrendous. I got a taxi back home, spend a few hours sleeping and headed to Cologne on Tuesday, thinking it will be all good….

Cologne was freezing. Very cold winds, a bit of snow – just like a real winter. I managed to catch up with some of my study friends and overall had a really good time. By the way, the picture is from circa 1950 ;-)

The job started out well. For me it is a new area within a familiar field, e.g. display advertising and media optimization on ad exchanges. It is very exciting and I am very much looking forward to starting the UK representation for this exciting technology and company.

Now, to summarize the flight back: lucky and stressful! I was booked on the Easyjet flight leaving Cologne at 21.30. However, Easyjet cancelled a few flights from Gatwick on Friday and when I arrived at the airport, their representatives suggested that if I could get another flight, this would surely be better. They haven’t seen any evening flights since last week! We took the decision to book Germanwings last minute to Stansted, leaving at half seven. And, it was the right decision. I rushed to the train from Stansted to Tottenham Hale, then onwards to Victoria, and I caught the last train at 21.22 towards Faversham which stopped at Bromley. Due to the adverse weather conditions, they were operating an emergency time table, so if I had been at Victoria 2 minutes later, I had to walk or get a taxi. How ridiculous is that? No snow, some ice I admit and freezing temperatures. This country is just not prepared to cope with any winter conditions whatsoever!!!!

However, I made it home at last, got a cab from Bromley and arrived just after 22.00. The Easyjet flight, according to their website, left Cologne after all around 23.30, arriving in Gatwick around midnight UK time. With a taxi from Gatwick I could have made it for 1 am, however I don’t believe if I had waited, that things would have gone right. So definitely a wise decision that teaches me that Germanwings will be the airline to fly with in the future despite the Stansted travel annoyance!

Maybe I was panicking that I didn’t make it out of Germany – maybe not. Some flights were still going on Saturday from German airports, but some weren’t. The BBC reported on suggestions from the German government to embrace for a blizzard and to have food for at least four days at home – pictures can be found at Welt.de

Overall an exciting week. I am glad to be back at work, in London, and excited to see what 2010 will bring. I learned a lot about airlines, priorities and weather conditions. And, coming home was nice. Seeing the boy and changing his diapers, feeding him breakfast…what else to wish for.

Have a good week,
Volker

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Sunday Column (44)

Posted by Volker in Sunday Column, personal on 27/12/2009

This week’s review will be short :-)

We spent Sunday/Monday down in Winchester with friends and had a great time catching up with them, and with other friends who live close by. Despite my worries about driving down from London due to the weather, it was ok and we got there and back again.

Monday afternoon I had a massage. However, just before I arrived about 3 inch of snow fell and my Blackberry got wet in it, giving up on me. It failed to initialise. A night in Tupperware covered in rice did the trick and the machine is now back to normal. I got lucky, as insurance would have taken too long for me to have it back before the start of my new job on the 4th of January.

Tuesday I spent most day cleaning as on Wednesday my Mother in Law arrived who I picked up at Kings Cross. It was very busy in town but we made it home and in time to just catch another big rain shower.

Wednesday I caught up with some friends for lunch and beers and got some last minute shopping for Christmas done. A great cheese fondue at night started the festive celebrations for us, followed by a turkey on Christmas Day. I want to be honest, I don’t think I will have too much meat in 2010, as I noticed how long meat is sitting in my digestive system and how much my body actually disapproves of it.

Overall, we had a great Christmas, spending a lot of time with the family. It was just fantastic. The weather was not too bad with quite a bit of rain. No white Christmas for us. There had been some UFO sightings in Beckenham but nothing we saw. Who knows what is happening next year :-)

We put my mother in law back on the train today and enjoy being back to our own world. As nice as it is to spend time with family and friends and have them staying with you, it is good to have your home back to yourself ;-) The next three days I am planning a detox, mainly drinking water and juice, probably eat a little bit of detoxing food to cleanse my body before the new year.

Have a good week. Speak to you in the new year at the latest ;-)

Volker

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