As Roy said: "I feel delicate." I don't even know why, I could tear up at the next best occasion or curl into a ball and wrap myself in warm blankets. I actually want to do that most days, now that I think about it. Hmmm. Winter depression? I hardly think so. It's not your usual "All is dark and shitty, I want to die"-despair, more like a subliminal urge to hug and feel cozy and cared for?

Aside from that, I just noticed again how much I really really love the early medieval period and how badly I must go to Oslo for this really awesome master's program. Arghlaldhdbssfff. But where to take the money frommmmmmaaaaach ლ(ಠ益ಠლ)

Seriously though, why is it, that there is no one I can fangirl with over Vikings, Anglo-Saxons, Thor, Loki and all that kind of shit in a really super nerdy way? Where are all the history buffs hiding?? :T My fellow students aren't much of an option to turn to. It's like talking against a wall with them ;_;

What's worse though, is how bad I got with drawing. I really got rusty, but that's not the bad part. There is simply no need or desire to do it; of course, I doodle when talking on the phone or during our Werewolf-sessions, it helps me concentrate, but actually drawing? Not so much. I have ideas and images in my head, but lack everything else. The hell is happening?

So in conclusion: Fuck you life, why do you always keep the really good things just out of my reach? >:C

Met up with Dani, Christian and Nadia at 9pm to play pool in a billard bar near Weinmeisterstraße. Very enjoyable, though the spirits did a nose dive after a while. We ordered pizza which was kind of OK (had to fend off the bar's dog from our food, devious critter), and after two games we left to have a drink or two at Cafe Cinema. Just got home now.

What I actually wanted to say, is this:
Nadia had bought a pair of shoes quite a while ago from a second hand shop. Lovely, fancy things, white and delicate that do not fit her. So I was to have them to wear and flounce around in them. Gosh, they are beautiful.

Now, I finally seized the chance to wear them and... by the time I reached the bar, I was walking barefoot. Have been the whole night since then - never noticed before how clean Berlin's streets actually are. Hardly any glass shards or other kinds of litter. My feet were black by the time I came home, naturally, but not hurting from anything else but the shoes I had worn earlier. I know now why this gorgeous pair was resold. You cannot possibly wear them without abrasions and blisters on the heels and pressure marks along the toes. Satan must have fashioned them himself, no kidding.

I think we will sell them as well. Someone else be subjected to the pain, for despite all temptations, the ache cannot be possibly endured. Not on the long run, no matter how pretty they are.

A few happier notes: I bought Hitman- Blood Money for PS2 finally. Also started reading Going Postal by Pratchett, god, I love that man. And last but not least - I made fantastic Wok-food today: beef, spring onions, sesame oil, soy sauce, orange + orange juice, honey = YUMYUMYUM. Successful Saturday, Y/Y?

{Edit: In case this wasn't clear enough, this is me fangirling. About Hetalia. OBVIOUSLY.}

I started reading Tacitus' Germania, and figured that quite a lot of social structures have not changed that much (granted, Tacitus does not delve as deep as he could have - but the few limited views he grants us, I find quite telling). They coincide with Viking social structure quite nicely. Does not sound that amazing (yet), but if you consider most sources on Viking society were written during the high middle ages... that's a gap of about 1000 odd years. Has so little changed? Or rather, are the fundamental powers still intact because of the things which have NOT changed (landscape, climate, foes)? Plus, isn't the sheer preservation in the face of Christianity just astonishing! Regardless, using what we know of Viking homosexuality and its hazards to back us up, Tacitus' record on punishment suddenly gains another level of meaning - So lets recapture, and then assume...

[Licet apud concilium accusare quoque et discrimen capitis intendere. distinctio poenarum ex delicto: proditores et transfugas arboribus suspendunt, ignavos et imbelles et corpore infames caeno ac palude, iniecta insuper crate, mergunt. Diversitas supplicii illuc respicit, tamquam scelera ostendi oporteat, dum puniuntur, flagitia abscondi.] In their councils an accusation may be preferred or a capital crime prosecuted. Penalties are distinguished according to the offense. Traitors and deserters are hanged on trees; the coward, the unwarlike, the man stained with abominable vices, is plunged into the mire of the morass, with a hurdle put over him. This distinction in punishment means that crime, they think, ought, in being punished, to be exposed, while infamy ought to be buried out of sight.                                                                                                                      - Germania, Ch. XII

I am merely speculating, of course. Considering virðing/drengskapr (similar to lat. virtus) as the forever unachievable ideal/social system, its origin and power it undeniably had over Vikings, the punishment for cowards does not seem so out of place anymore. The opposite of honor is shame, and what shames a man more if not meeting the ideal - an ideal, that is the ultimate goal of each individual. If a man is less than what he is supposed to be - what is he, then? Something different, the opposite. He must, by default, thus be female (or an animal.) Now, I won't open that Pandora's box today of how women were viewed - mostly because Tacitus' record of that differs a little from later Viking society's standard - and skip right into the actual argument instead:

Perversity, "the man stained with abominable vices", is regarded as severe as cowardice. How do these two coincide? Taking into account that only the receiving partner in a homosexual encounter had to suffer the full penalty of his sordid (or should I say sorðinn? Hurhurhur) act while the active partner is undoubtedly the victor, homosexuality was first and foremost a demonstration of dominance.It was a practice used against enemies and competitors as means of establishing a position within society. There was nothing shameful in using a man like a woman, but certainly in being used, in submitting and becoming less than a man. Simply the accusation of being a coward and thus unmanly, was so utterly shameful, a discredit disrupting not only to the man's equilibrium (helgi), but his kin's, that the Icelandic and Norwegian laws demanded the death (or exile) of the accuser, if it was unfounded.

Due to Tacitus' accumulation, we can easily make the connection between the coward, the unmanly and the sexual deviant. They all denote the same kind of person. It is obvious, then, why they would all be doomed to the same fate as well. Unlike traitors and deserters, whose crime it were to nourish different morals and not a fundamental flaw in their nature. One could even assume, that hanging traitors up on trees for all to see, the meaning becomes "Don't do it", as opposed to the unmistakable message of "Don't be it" when it comes to the second group of offenders.

I am not sure whether anyone has compared Tacitus' account of Germanic life/costume etc with the much later age of the Vikings, but I am sure, I wasn't the first one to follow that train of thought.  Aaaaanyways. What's more important right now... OMG I CAN HAZ?

It's almost a week since my internship ended. I meant to write a mean spirited, judging post full of vitriol about the work and my so called colleagues at the end of January. To get even, in a way. But now that it's over and done, there's nothing left but relief and a tiny sense of sadness. :/ Strange, huh? I don't really feel like writing about the internship anymore, because the tight, hot knot in my stomach vanished the day it was over. And left a blank space instead. I guess it's what happens to most people who work 7 days a week and finally, unexpectedly, are confronted with so called free time. It takes the wind out of your sails.
I gotta admit, I feel a bit lost. I know I got to find some new means of income, and I'm working on it (the chance came flying in just one day after my internship). It's just still so strange not to have to get up at 3:20am, or watch the news, talk to people on the phone. I still got the professional autopilot going when I phone someone. That's nice, I guess, because it lends you confidence, a mask to hide behind. But I am not sure if I always want to introduce myself with my "internship-voice".
Despite the new freedom I still don't go out, still don't meet the friends I promised myself to meet. Because I never really find the opportunity (I know it's been only a few days, 3 to be exact, that I didn't have to work - where I chose to finally go to Ikea and buy the missing furniture for my room instead of... everything else). I hope it will change the next few weeks. :/ I really miss being socially available.
Aaah, but it's still nice not to have to leave the house for 4 days out of 7. All I need to do now is to change my working hours at the JMB from Fr/Sa/Su to something more humane. Oh, and hope for being accepted at the University, of course.
All in all, I feel much more relaxed while still being stressed out. FOR WHAT EVER REASON. There's still so much to do, I don't know where to start, aaaaaah.

I srsly need a paid account again. I miss my icons :C

the only thing i could think of when the clock chimed midnight, fireworks and crackers going off everywhere: thank god it's over. adios 2010! auf nimmer wiedersehen. what a shitty year. and it went down the drain with icy baileys, beer and clear tab water. the food kind of tasted like nothing, ashes, i don't know. i wasn't hungry, just exhausted.
2011 started great, i got a spark into my eye and the damn thing wouldn't stop hurting and tearing up for the rest of the night.
god, i hated 2010. while everyone was outside as i tried to cry out the pain in my eye on the couch, i kind of wanted to die for a second or two. not only because of the spark, but also because i realized i had developed a lot of resentment towards last year. it grew slolwy over months, i am sure, into some black, acid ball of loathing that sits there, somewhere between stomach and ribcage, like some kind of lich (...).
man, it was just full of failures
and regrets
and wrong decisions
too hastily formed opinions
laziness
guilty tears
hate and all kinds of rainbow coloured shame plus a disturbed, tilted world view that burned down bridges quicker than you can say "OBJECTION!"
the horoscope predicted a year full of changes. changes it were, but for the better? questionable. to me, it was a complete waste. i'd like to erase it from my memory to never have to relive that utter disappointment that i have become.
i am not proud of anything i did in 2010, tbh.
not a single thing.
i wished i had started with a different attitude, things would have turned out well. SO WELL.
:|
and the worst thing? 2011 will be the natural consequence of 2010. makes me want to scream. fear anger and despair~ oh yay. but that's self-contempt for you.

It's been so long, I cannot even remember how to start an lj entry. Lots of things happened, a lot of them didn't. But let us just talk about the happy things that DID happen. Funnily enough, happy isn't something I'd applied to the situations at hand right now. A few months ago, I would have been delighted by the prospect, but experiencing reality as a as-is state and not "what might be" tends to have that disillusioning effect.

Anyways.

I got my editorial internship at a local radio here in Berlin. With the end of this week, I'll have worked 3 weeks of the morning shift in one row starting at 4:30am each day, ending at 12:30 pm. I'll be so so glad to get the afternoon shift after that again, I am extremely exhausted. Always tired, always sleepy, never getting anything done. It frustrates me to an incredible extent, where I start to display a violent temper at the slightest occasion. It's ridiculous, really. Should I get counseling?

The internship is anything you can think of: Boring, frustrating, stressful, informative, educating, too early, too late, confusing, infuriating, long winded... I went through fundamental feelings towards my internship over the weeks, differing so profoundly each day it astounds even me. The beginning started off rather promising, but the excitement quickly waned, giving birth to bouts of frustration and readjustment of expectations. Working 8hrs a day without payment can get to you really quickly. Let me tell you this: One months done, two more to go. Thank goodness. I could need some serious sleep here. (The fault lies with me, however. I never manage to go to bed early enough.)

The work at the Jewish Museum is the complete opposite so far. Strangely enough. It's so relaxing and entertaining and fun, even if at parts it can get lonely and boring. Boring is good, I say. It's the kind of boring I can need right now (should it ever get too dull, I have a lot of Jewish history to catch up on). Besides, we get employee discount at the Liebermann's restaurant. Hummus with pita and olives, omnomnom. Cheap, delicious food is always a plus in my book. (There's a Channuka market at the Jewish Museum, too OoOOH) Earning your share of the rent is a great, wonderful feeling, and the last two months healed me from being a lazy bum, turning me into a wonderful busy butterfly. I don't want to sit around any longer, I refuse to remain useless, I refuse to be a parasite any longer. There is no time like now, and I am done wasting my life like this. I have not reached all my goals yet, which is good. Great, even. Without goals, there is no reason to carry on, now is there? Well, except to nourish one's hedonistic tendencies. Which I fully intend to do, when (if!) I find the time, ohoho.

And who knows, next year I might actually have saved enough money to travel to Israel and see the one true wonder of the medieval world, the place so many yearned to see, but never reached. Ah, I cannot wait. It's going to be amazing, exceptional, and touching to see Jerusalem for myself *_* Eeeh.
This aside, here's the good news: We moved. Oh yeaaah. We still need to furniture the flat, but most things are set, more or less. Looks still pretty chaotic, haha. As it wont to be. Unfortunately, my broken heater disrupts the joy of having my own place. I wished my landlady would fix it asap ;-; It's starting to get nasty outside and I'd hate to freeze to death.

So here are the things I want to get done the next year/in the near future:Baby steps, haha. I don't want to fall on my face too quickly. C: It's sort of true, then, isn't it? The more you mature, the more things you suddenly have to organize, manage super important issues like HEALTH INSURANCE WHAT, get the laundry done, earn the rent. Kind of scary, and I am keeping a To-Do list or else I'd forget at least half of it. The worst part, tho, is, that nobody got a bullet proof plan how to get shit done successfully (but then, isn't that part of the adventure?). I guess Peter Pan won't come to my window from now on :C

OMG. YOU GUYS. I DON'T EVEN.

Dragonlance Kink Meme


*A* I didn't know I needed it like burning but now that I do.... fresh and sparkling new Kinkmeme. I don't know the woman who came up with it, but let me just say: YES. BRILLIANT. \o/ Exactly what I needed today.

Edit:
Pyros came over and we put my new shiny DSA-character together for tomorrow (a Thorwaler Skald). I decided to try joining an RP-group again, asking him for his help. It's been quite a while since I tried my hand at traditional P&P roleplaying, the previous groups had all failed me in the past ;_; sadface. So I am really looking forward to this group. I know it won't be brilliant at the start because I am a new, strange face and I haven't played in so long, I am not even sure if I can still do it without blushing with embarrassment, but it's def. worth a try. Additionally, Pyros gave me the Exclusive Variant action figure of Rorschach. Aaaah, it's so pretteeee x3~! *looks at it adoringly*

Tomorrow we'll also go look for a new flat °_°;; interesting times, that's for sure.