Bryan Wears Dark Socks

Man, do I ever hate sorting socks.

Over the past couple of years, I seem to have overstocked myself on boxers and dark socks. I won't say that I stop in every H and M that I see, but every couple of months I do find myself buying a few pairs of boxers and inevitably, a six pack of black socks.

Once I get home to put the new articles away, I discover unopened packs of socks that I had previously purchased, lying happily (and forgotten) in the drawer. Ah well, I will certainly need them one day I always tell myself.

I seem to have the same habit with shaving cream, shower gel, and fabric softener, also, due primarily to the fact that I am an impulse buyer, but I will leave that story for another day.

Because I do not let the dirty laundry pile up, the clothes get washed frequently, folded, then placed in the bureau, only to be worn again pretty quickly. Thus, I tend to wear things over and over again; wear clothes for the week, wash them on Saturday, then wear the clean clothes again the next week. Jeans and shirts all seem to be the same (in kind of a Nancy and Sluggo sort of way), always dark (ok, black) and in the same style.

In reaction to some pressure from some of the more fashion conscious I know, I now wear white socks less and less. In Germany, dark socks are key. This is not a huge issue, but it has created a bit of an imbalance in my laundry sorting.

Usually, I have to let the whites kind of accumulate, since they are only white t-shirts now due to the absence of white socks. Not a problem.

However, what can be a bit challenging is the fact that I have multiple loads of dark that have to be done each week. One for the jeans and shirts, and one for the boxers and socks.

With the sudden shift from constantly being at home to being on the road several days each week, or perhaps even longer, I have had to change my laundry strategy, if only slightly. I decided to put together little travel packets: sorting 5 pairs of underwear and socks in preparation for the next trip. This resulted in a couple of things: I could better rotate my socks and boxers, and even allowed for me to find some of the cool boxers buried deep in my drawer.

When I got home Thursday afternoon from Budapest, I took a look at the laundry situation and decided that I would do the majority of the wash on Friday and Saturday; no nead to run a load on Thursday. Keep in mind that one has to plan a little with this domestic task. I do not have a clothes dryer, so am limited to the hanging rack in my bathroom for getting the clothes dry.

Friday morning I took a train a couple of hours north to attend new employee induction day. Not the way I really wanted to spend my work day, basically because I had, er, a fair amount of work to do and no time to sit in a video conference talking about company history and where to find the link to company news on the intranet.

Fortunately, the meeting wrapped up about an hour earlier than I expected, so I caught the next train back to Frankfurt, stopped off at a pizzeria, then went home to have a very quiet night after a rather busy week. Before I sat down for dinner and a movie, I threw a load of laundry in the wash. I managed to watch all of St. Elmo's Fire, then hung the wash on the drying rack (noticing that there were a lot of socks), then went to bed.

This morning, feeling refreshed, I enjoyed a couple of coffees, then started another laundry load (sheets and towels). Then I looked again at the rack, and realized I had a bit of folding to do. Sure, the boxers (5 to a kit, please!) are easy, but the pile of socks seemed a bit intimidating, so I had another coffee before I attacked the pile.

One would think that such a menial task would not be so annoying, but with black socks, it just takes a bit longer to sort. In all, it took me a good 15 minutes, and while I was glad to get things finished and the stuff shoved in the sock drawer, I noticed yesterday's socks lying on the floor of my bedroom. I had forgotten to put them in the wash, so they will now sit in the hamper for another week.

The cycle repeats itself.

This long-winded little tale about my domestic life is brought to you today by Lenor fabric softener (Energy - clear blue flavor!) and the Clean Clothes Brigade, all to the soundtrack of an interesting mix of The Police, Joe Jackson, and Blaggers ITA.

Keep 'em clean, and keep the faith.

bryan

Alone Again...or So Lonely?

A friend of mine contacted me last month right as I was starting the new job with the news that he was about to put up a blog on his website. In addition to putting up a daily post in real time, he also shares from his journal entry from the same day eleven years ago. I found that to be a very interesting concept, and have really enjoyed following the posts; every couple of days I go to his site to read a few entries.

Pause while I just remembered that he said he was going to be in Frankfurt for a couple of days this past week. Shit. Needed to have a pint with him. (said blogger is mentioned in one of my earliest German posts. Who said that an Arsenal fan can't be friends with a fan of Man U?)

Due to my action packed movie watching and novel reading experience last weekend in Glasgow, I found myself a little behind in blog reading. I travelled to Bolougne-sur-Mer on Monday via the Chunnel, which was quite cool. Two colleagues and I arrived at our hotel, checked in, found a local restaurant, then returned the hotel after dinner. I tried to connect up to the Wi-Fi in my room, but was totally unsuccessful.

I found that the local telly was showing L'auberge Espagnole, one of my favorite films, so decided to watch that instead of doing any work. A few minutes later, one of the colleagues sent me a quick text message with the news that the other colleague had to return home suddenly as his wife had just gone into labor. Thus, we would visit the repair site without him.

The next day at the supplier, I found I was still unable to connect to the wireless network. My colleague came around the table to check my laptop, and pointed out that my wireless was turned off. Damn.

As I turned red with embarrassment, I waited for him to zing me by stating the obvious. "So, you worked in laptop repair for the past 15 years, huh?"

Well, I deserved that.

The rest of the day was spent on the repair lines, and though I did connect up and pull down my work emails, I did not have a chance to look around on the internet until Wednesday morning. I found an interesting post that my friend had written the previous week on the subject of being alone or being lonely.

That afternoon, we drove back to England, and I was dropped off at a train station about an hour outside of London. I purchased my ticket and Underground transfer; I needed to get to City Airport for my return flight that evening to Frankfurt.

I contemplated the blog entry during my entire journey home, and have continued to reflect over the past several days that I have been back in Frankfurt, rereading the entry several more times. One sentence really grabbed me: "When we can be alone with ourselves and we do not need anyone else, then we can love like we have never loved before."

I have always thrived on my independence, and acknowledge that I tend to be on my own most of the time. I stop short of saying loner, because I do greatly enjoy other people's company. Furthermore, while I have certainly exhibited a tendency to be a nonconformist through the years (I recall a manager's parting comment as I resigned from a job I held at an insurance company, "Bryan, you did a lot of great things for us here, but you will go a lot further in your career when you stop going against the flow."), I have been able to develop both my professional and personal life by always reminding myself it was better to try and be myself as opposed to trying to stand out.

No sense in attempting to point out the obvious, right?

Since I have been in Germany, people have told me on more than one occasion that I really am no different than anybody else. Although I initally took offense at the comment, I quickly realized (and remembered) that it was the truth. I had confused the fact that I was alone, or feeling alone, when in reality, everyone else has those same feelings. OK, living abroad in a different culture brings about a feeling of isolation from time to time, but so be it.

So, while I continue to be aware that I am alone, it was not until the latter part of last year that I noticed more and more feelings of being lonely. It was rather a new experience for me, and has certainly created some anxious moments.

With the new job comes additional isolation. I am travelling a bit more (er, a bit????) and am conscious of the distance that has created. I was so glad to get home last Wednesday night and have the chance to see people that are close to me.
Sure, sometimes I wonder if I am missed, but then I read a blog post and the reassuring words.

I am comfortable with the fact that I can be alone. This ability to not feel dependent on someone enables me to concentrate more on the things that I know I carry with me: faith, hope, and love. Whether I am playing the song by the Damned on guitar, or dancing in a club to the cool track by the Police, reading a blog post, travelling to Budapest, or just living life, I keep the faith, have hope, and am able to love.

See you out there.
bryan

Voices, Sounds, and Images

„Grrrr,“ said my colleague in way of greeting on Friday morning outside our hotel.

“Morning,” I mumbled just as deeply, though it was more of a grunt.

Said colleague was with me on my very first day of work about five weeks ago, and we discovered almost immediately that neither one of us is particularly chatty in the morning, each requiring a bit of time (not to mention a coffee or two) before we are able to fully function.

I do have my moments, though, when I feel a bit inclined to make conversation, and because of my experiences just minutes before at the checkout desk, I did feel compelled to relate the story despite the early hour.

At the checkout desk, the service agent had greeted me cheerily, but was somewhat drowned out by the noisy alarm that was sounding from the mobile phone behind the counter. She was doing her best to ignore it, but I recognized the sound, because my mobile has the same alarm. In fact, I initially thought it was mine, so had quickly checked my pockets and confirmed that I was not the culprit.

As alarms go, it actually starts out kind of soothing, in a funky, synthesizer sort of way, then quickly, albeit gradually, launches into a noise not unlike the sound of the Jägermeister machine from my local pub, a pulsating, grinding machine sound that forces a quick reaction to switch the alarm off. It is one of the most annoying sounds I have heard.

There was someone being served ahead of me, and during the few minute wait this alarm went off multiple times, each time for about a minute, then a minute’s pause, then back to the, er, grind. I was sort of confused as to why the hotel agent hadn’t already simply reached over and switched the mobile off.

“Very sorry about the annoying noise coming from the phone, “ she said apologetically. “The phone was left somewhere in the lobby (presumably by a forgetful guest) and we do not know how to switch it off, as it is in German.”

I kind of smiled in response, as things became clear. “Perhaps I can assist,” I said, “my phone is also in German, I have the same device, and I might have a good idea as to who the phone belongs to.”

“That would be oh so lovely,” she breathed with relief. “This alarm has been going off for the past hour.”

An hour? (perhaps hotel protocol is such that one cannot simply eject the battery or, worse case scenario, throw the device onto the ground outside in the carpark so that a car can accidentally run over it)

With a quick press of the button, I disabled the alarm, and also pointed out that in future, should this happen again, just press the button on the screen that says, “beenden.”

I paid up, then headed outside, grunted my greeting to my colleague, then asked, “Wo ist dein Handy?”

He reached in his pocket, pulled out his phone, and I went on to say that one of our colleagues from Germany was probably looking for his device at that moment. As if on cue, I looked inside to the hotel restaurant and noticed another colleague going through his jacket pockets as if he were looking for something.

“Er, I think the mystery is already solved,” I laughed, but upon holding up my own phone and mouthing the question, “where is yours?” to the guy inside, he held up his own device.

My outside colleague quickly sent a text message to one of the other members of our group, and within a few minutes we had identified the co-worker who had been ransacking his own room in search of his device. We had a bit of a chuckle as the guy sheepishly collected his mobile, and that was pretty much the way we started our workday.

The fact that all of us were carrying identical German phones was not too surprising. Everyone from the German office of our department was in Glasgow for a meeting with our entire European team.

In all, there were to be about 40 people in attendance, including the higher level managers from the North American corporate offices, who were there to present to us the plans and strategies for the coming fiscal year. A bit of a rah rah team session, if you will. More on that in a minute.

Due to some local personal business that was pretty important for me, I had worked from home during the first part of the week, and, realized how necessary that had been as I made my way to the airport Wednesday morning, very much glad to have made that decision.

I flew from Frankfurt to Amsterdam, then hung out for a couple of hours as I waited for my (grunting) colleague to arrive. He and I then flew on to Glasgow and met up with our Scottish colleagues, as well as a few others from around Europe.

Thursday we worked out of our Glasgow office, and during the afternoon other colleagues from the team arrived from Germany, Spain, Italy, and England.

That evening, we all gathered at a Japanese restaurant, one of those where you sit around the cook top and watch the chef delight and amaze the diners. The dinner gathering itself was very new to me. Such things were very rare during my time in the states, partly because of my career position at the time, and partly because that just was not the work culture.

On the way to the restaurant, a couple of colleagues had described the last team gathering, the company Christmas party. Again, my stateside boss had just not ever done a Christmas party or dinner, and for the four Decembers that I worked in Germany up until this point, I had always been travelling, thus missing the team Christmas outing. (note – I am not trying to say woe as me, just simply stating the facts and setting the stage).

We walked into the restaurant, met several new colleagues, then grabbed a seat next to my Scottish colleague. (For the sake of clarification, I have several Scottish colleagues with whom I work very closely. Likewise, I have several German colleagues that I will be working closely with, assuming that I start spending some time in the German office at some point in the future)

This particular colleague is quite humorous, likes to laugh, and I am glad to be working with him. He gave me a bit of a run down on the new faces sitting around the table, as well as giving a bit of a description of the antics of the particular restaurant.

Drinks were ordered, as were our main dishes, then, the chefs came out and got to work. They started by frying up some potato discs, and I understood that the chef would soon be tossing bits to the guests, who would attempt to catch a piece in their mouth.

As we were on the end of the table, we got to start, and I willed myself to catch the piece thrown at me; perhaps a way of redeeming myself from the wine spilling incident that I had created a few weeks before in Hungary. Sure enough, I caught mine first try, and on around the table the game went until it reached a couple of the women who had arrived from North America. First, one declined with a shake of her head, then a second, and then the third woman sort of shook her head and gave a bit of an “Don’t even think about it,” kind of look.

I am sure that most of the chefs have had to put up with this sort of thing before, where someone refuses to participate in the fun, and while I can appreciate both sides, I do realize that sometimes you just have to join in, despite your character. (pardon the brief tangent: my father once related a story where he had done Karaoke in a Japanese bar simply because it was the expected thing to do while on a business trip with the Japanese hosts. I was horrified at the thought, as my father is completely tone deaf, but finally understood that singing ability was totally irrelevant to the situation. I put the lesson learned into practice soon after when I attended a wedding in Boston. I knew absolutely no one, save for the bride, who I had met a couple of times, as she was a friend of my sister’s. At the reception, we had to get up and dance around the dinner table and sing a song. Somehow, I rose to that occasion, and flamboyantly reenacted a David Lee Roth song with such enthusiasm that I amazed the other wedding guests, as well as myself. )
Anyway, the chef took this in stride and finished rounding the table. Fortunately, all the other guests did partake in the food throwing. The chef then went back to work preparing the entrees, slicing, dicing, adding oils and sauces. At one point, he grabbed a plastic ketchup bottle, turned to the grumpy woman who had glared so defiantly when refusing to catch a potato, pointed the bottle in her direction, and squeezed .

Well, the effect was astounding. Turns out that it was one of those fake ketchup things, where red string sort of shoots out, startling the unsuspecting person. The woman reacted as you might expect, shooting back from the table with a start, horrified that she might have just had tomato sauce spilled on her. She almost spilled her wine glass (been there, done that) and struggled for a few moments to regain her composure as we all laughed at the joke.

Because my colleague and I have already had a few moments where we have laughed so hard that one or the both of us have almost choked, we could not believe our luck; we were sitting directly across from the woman, and her facial expression before, during, and after were so extreme that we could not stop laughing. Her eyes bored into the prankster chef with such severity that I actually feared for his safety. She simply was a very serious person, who unfortunately does not like to joke about.

My buddy and I laughed about it for the remainder of the evening, and again the following morning as we arrived at work. Not only was the evening enjoyable and entertaining, I got a glimpse into the types of people I would be working with.

So, Friday morning, we gathered in the conference center, and various people, including the woman from the ketchup incident, presented the details of what we have to accomplish over the next year. I did learn a lot, and confirmed that I now work for a very large organization: lots of different departments, different people, and different locations. All of this adds to the challenge of the job.

As I listened to each person presenting, I noticed that all of them had the habit of ending each statement as if they were asking a question; the tone of their voice went up. It soon started to annoy me a little bit, because it was EVERY statement, but I made a mental note to discuss it later with a German colleague, and focused on the subject matter.

The experience was educational. Indeed, I have a better understanding about our direction, but also have a better understanding on how people from different regions work with one another. It is the human nature element that is of particular interest, especially since I am knee deep into a multi-national, multi-cultural professional and personal life, now.

The meeting wrapped up in the middle of Friday afternoon, and I said farewell to some colleagues rushing off to the airport to catch their flights home. Those of us not needing to get out of town went back to the office, where we proceeded to chat about the events of the day (and laugh about those events that were humorous) and do a bit of work.

My grunting colleague and I transferred to a hotel in downtown Glasgow, checked in, and then headed off in search of something to eat. He was due to fly back to Germany very early Saturday morning, while I would be staying through the weekend, before flying to London Monday afternoon, and on to a meeting in France during the first part of the week. (It did not make sense to fly back to Germany from the UK on Saturday, then turn around Monday and fly right back to the UK, where I can (ironically as it ma y seem) then get back to the continent. Travel logistics were way too complicated and time consuming.)

Well, the weather Friday morning in Glasgow was cold, rain/snow, and pretty much crap. The rain/snow mixture kept up throughout the day and into the evening, with a forecast of about 30 centimeters of snow due in the area by Saturday afternoon. Turns out that the snow never really accumulated, but the weather has remained quite crap.

Friday night, we walked 20 minutes or so to a part of the city with a variety of restaurants. As we walked through the cold, we joked about the fact that both of our voices are quite deep (particularly in the morning) and quite the contrast to the voices we had heard during the presentations. My colleague was equally aggravated by the way each statement sounded like a question. Though we had been trying to find an Indian restaurant, we came across a Brazilian tapas bar that looked interesting. My German colleague had done some work (and subsequent vacationing) in Brazil, and immediately steered us over for a closer look.

What was going to be a quick mojito became a 5 hour session. The tapas were great, the drinks tasty, and the scene pretty groovy. For those of you who have ever done the Gloria’s or Monica’s Aca y Alli salsa nights, you know what I am talking about.

Around 1am, we called it a night. I was tired from the week, as was my buddy, who also had the unpleasant task of getting up three hours later to go catch his flight. Then, he was faced with another couple hours drive home from Amsterdam.

Thus, Saturday morning I had a nice lie in. I looked outside, saw that it was still snowing and sleeting in a way that makes you kind of want to stay inside with a book and a cup of cocoa, and realized I had no book. I took advantage of the breakfast buffet, then braved the elements and walked to the high street, found a bookshop, and picked up a few things to tie me over for the weekend.

The weather has really been rotten, so I have taken advantage of the fact that I have no obligations and caught up on some reading and movie watching. True, may be a bit quiet for a weekend get away, but hey ho, I have enjoyed it.

It is hard to believe how quickly things are moving. I am about to begin my sixth week in this new job, which will soon enable me to simply say job. The experiences have all been interesting and very much worthwhile. I like having the multi-cultural professional relationships, as that adds greatly to the experience, the learning, and the humor.

Fake ketchup bottles and annoying mobile telephone alarms are optional, but they certainly help.

Keep the faith
bryan

Wonder Twin Power - Form of...a Slippery Slope

One of my fondest memories from childhood involved the Saturday morning ritual of watching cartoons and eating cereal with my sister. She and I got out the TV trays and ate Crunchberries, Fruity Pebbles, or something along those lines, on the floor and watched for a couple of hours. A favorite show happened to be the Superfriends, where all the super heroes worked together to make the world a better place.

Years later, I realized how much influence the show had had when I quipped, "Meanwhile, at the hall of justice," around some people, and just about everyone recognized the quote, and why I had used it in the particular situation. I know that my generation apparently has a tendency to use pop culture quotes in daily life, perhaps more than other generations, but sometimes, you just have to say, what the fuck! (first person who comes over here and tells me what film that comes from will gladly get taken for a schnitzel and a pils)

What took me a bit longer was to recognize that my sister had equally fond memories of those Saturday mornings, too. A particular team of the Superfriends was a duo called the Wonder Twins. Yes, I have referenced them in earlier stories, and might have even described Saturday morning cartoon watching once before. However, my sister and I, through the years, tend to use our secret identities (you see, we are the Wonder Twins, though she is a little older and I am a quite a bit bigger) as a way of helping each other through the rough spots.

I found myself in a bit of a rough spot this past Monday evening, after arriving in Glasgow. Workwise, everything seems to be going along just fine. On the personal front, though, I briefly lost the plot, and must have startled the other guests that were entering the hotel I was staying at as I wandered around the parking lot talking with my siter on the telephone. The details of the crisis aren't so relevant to this piece; I simply needed to reach out and get a bit of support to help me remember where I stand in my life and its rich pageant.

Without any regard to the roaming charges associated with using a German mobile to call a Spanish telephone number from a location in the UK (sometimes you have to say what the fuck), I phoned my sister, and was very glad she picked up.

We chatted (interpret that as some angstridden really tall little kid losing hair faster than you say, "Fruity Pebbles are really sugary," stomping around a parking lot with a beer in his hand and a handy in his other) for the next hour and a half, after which I felt a little better, though physically and emotionally drained.

The next morning at work, I glanced at my sisters slogan on her skype, and smiled when I read Wonder Twin Power!!! She had not done much more than listen and offer some encouragement the previous evening, but it had helped a lot, and this was her way of reminding me that things would be ok. Indeed she is right, even though I may need to remind myself regularly.

At any rate, I was able to concentrate better on work throughout the rest of the week, which was great. After a few weeks on the job, I am starting to feel like I am doing stuff each day, becoming more involved, making decisions, etc.

I met a couple of colleagues who are also working remotely in other parts of the world, and it was cool to compare notes and hear about their experiences in the African and Middle Eastern markets. During dinner one evening, they touched upon the fact that they had their work cut out for them, having to operate in tough markets, and somewhat limited chances to visit the office in Glasgow. Like myself, they are also a bit isolated, perhaps even more than me.

Midweek, I watched the Old Firm derby with some colleagues in the bar of a local restaurant, and recalled an old magazine article Pablo had given me some 20 years ago which discussed the rivalry, the hatred, the violence, and the, um, football. The match itself was almost insignificant, save for the fact that Rangers lost. Loads of reds and yellows, arrests, and commentary the following morning on how disgraceful the whole thing was to Scottish football. Thank goodness I didn't get beaten up, though.

I found myself watching an episode of Glee later on in the week (who said life on the road wasn't fun and eventful?), got involved in a a bit of banter involving the Old 97s (glad you enjoyed the show, Karen), ate a few more sandwiches at work (Ploughman's taste really good, especially with the sauce), but was really glad to head for the airport yesterday afternoon.

As I said a couple of weeks ago, it is only a matter of time before I flat out miss a connecting flight. Though we landed on time in Amsterdam, the line at passport control was longer than I had ever seen it. The problem was, EVERYONE was about to miss their flight, so it was not as if they could allow those of us with tight connections to butt in line.

The experience was absolutely surreal. More on that in a future post.

My gate was closing, and I sprinted through the lounge, shoes untied, belt in hand (I hadn't bothered to try and sort that after the security, as the time was too tight) up to the counter, quite a bit more huffy puffy than I care to admit. All I could say was, "Shit."

The girl at the gate sort of smiled when I said that, then pointed to the waiting bus outside; turns out I wouldn't miss the flight afterall. I thought that perhaps I would need to find a better connection in future, especially when the pilot announced midflight that the reason the plane was so empty is because some 20 other people had been held up at the same security log jam as me.

So once again, I am back at home, enjoying a sunny Saturday morning, alas, without cartoons. Yep, I am listening to Fight Songs, and realizing how similar my life is to Calvin and Hobbes (though I have a bear instead of a tiger). Imagination is a wonderful thing. It helps you appreciate reality.

And if it doesn't, well, you just might have to say, "what the fuck."

keep the faith
bryan