Weiter, weiter ins Verderben...

I'll type the next sentence quickly so that it blurs and you won't be able to read it properly. I read the Cosmopolitan today.

That endless source of reliable information (according to which I am a man, at least judging by the fact that I suck at analyzing male behaviour which is an essential talent for a Cosmo-Girl, whatever that creature is, and in fact behave like a male should behave if one wants to use Cosmo as a reference material for studying behavioral differences between the sexes) had one interesting article. It was about how the impending doom of becoming thirty affects our lives, namely the lives of young women.

Now, I have about a year and a half to go before I hit the big three-O, and I do recognise all the classic signs of panic in me. It seems that we are supposed to make all the most important decisions of our lives before that. Like the article put it, you are supposed to graduate, get married or at least pick your prince charming from the vast selection, give birth to a bunch of kids and get a career, all that during the few precious years when you are officially young and supposed to enjoy your life, because after you go past the Forbidden Gates of Adulthood, there is no hope.

We are supposed to make our lives complete before we turn thirty, and after that just move along following the pre-carved groove in the highway of life, if such a lame metaphor is allowed. Well, I don't wanna!

People in their twenties are young, for crying out loud! How in the name of seven hells are we supposed to know what we want out of life? In detail? The life expectancy of an average Western human being is about 80, so there's plenty of time to make all the decisions necessary for a successful living, and please someone define me "successful living."

The important question is, however, where does the pressure come from? Why are we supposed to live like there's no tomorrow between the years 18 to 29, and then suddenly turn into responsible adults? Is being young so overly idolized that life is practically over when the teen years are gone? Like there would not be anything more to expect out of life but fighting against wrinkles and gravity.

I have a thousand questions but no answer.

I seriously doubt that being young is the best time of our lives. Being a teen was horrible. I've quite enjoyed the most parts of being in my twenties, but if we leave out the age crisis, my life has generally been getting better and more enjoyable over the years. If the trend continues, my retirement years will be one helluva rock show. And the drummer will have pyro drumsticks.

So there. I absolutely refuse to squeeze my life into the next 18 months and then pretend like it was over. No way. In your face, youth-idolizing, career-orientated, Radio Nova-listening mainstream society! I am a rebel, a dangerous element of separatist fraction refusing to accept your pre-set models of exemplary living! Our resistance will not be futile! We will overcome, and then you will see the burning fire of our souls, the truth that you have tried to hide and deny. Fear us, for we will conquer, and change your ideas. The future is ours. Embrace the light of our revolution or it will burn you.

All right, that was a bit out there, but you have to understand that I am panicking whether I want it or not. The crisis will come and it will also go away once my subconsciousness is convinced that in the end everything will be all right.

...wir müssen leben bis wir sterben.




No link today, couldn't think of anything matching the topic. I will go sooth my nerves with some German grammar and then go get my beauty sleep.

All the German bits were once again borrowed from Rammstein (is anyone surprised?), and the translation is, if you are wondering, Onwards, onwards into destruction, We must live until we die. Suitable, eh? ;) Translation comes from herzeleid.com.

Reise, Reise

Spring is coming. Wonderful, wonderful spring. I can't wait to see the first blades of grass and tiny beginnings of tree leaves. The strange light phenomenon known as the sun has been sighted a lot more recently and the days have been getting longer.

This has had a strong influence on my mood. No more Little Miss Cranky, sulking about everything and feeling slightly depressed all the time. It's time for Miss Almost Cheerful to make her entrance and pave the road for Miss Summertime. Only about a month of winter left, and I can't wait it to be over. I mean, winter is so last season.

Another good indication that the season is chancing is my ever-growing desire to travel. Prague, Paris, London, Berlin - I want to see them all. Now all I have to do to fulfill my need is to learn how to siphon nutrition out of air and convince my landlord that he really does not need my money. Simple, really.

This happens to me every year.

And every year I always wonder what makes us want to travel. Why do we want to leave the comfort of our home and the familiar ways of living and surroundings? To get new experiences, say some. But why do we need to get them? Do they make our life better in any way? Are we on our way to enlightenment when we travel to strange places and meet new, interesting people? Or do we just want to make our friends and family jealous with our exciting stories of parts unknown?

My theory is that humanity functions on hope. We have to go through the trouble of traveling into new places because, who knows, the grass just might be greener on the other side of the fence. The medieval pilgrims made their way through the Europe on horseback and foot because they had hope that all their sins would be forgiven. The explorers of this planet had hope of finding a paradise on earth, preferably via a shortcut. Hope has always been one of the biggest reasons for traveling, be that hope for easier living, for wealth and fame, or for absolution either from a heavenly or earthly authority.

We are a curious species. We need to find out what makes the world tick, what lies behind the horizon and how we could benefit from it. Like Terry Pratchett once wrote, the last words heard before the universe folds on itself are, "What happens if I press this?"

With my high school education on psychology I can easily draw parallels with curiosity and hope. The desire to find new thigs / experiences / whatever is fed by the equally great desire to make life worth the trouble. Without curiosity, what are we? Life becomes mere existence. Ich hab' keine Lust, like Rammstein so cleverly put it.

Oh well. I have no money to travel, so I have to at least think about it.


Time for the link.
http://www.theforce.net/

If I can't travel in real life, at least i have my imagination. So, go to the ForceNet for your daily dose of Star Wars!

@ those who have commented: Thank you. I blush...

(the headline is shamelessly ripped off of Rammsteins latest album)

Northern Exposure

I had a near-nature experience yesterday. I was on my weekly walk with S, a friend of mine, when we heard an eagle owl. An actual, genuine eagle owl right in the middle of Helsinki. Amazing! And slightly creepy, too, since it was about the only sound we heard and there was a full moon, too. Über-cool with creepy as a side order.

Apparently the creature lives in the neighborhood, according to the Helsingin Sanomat it has been sighted quite a many times in the Kamppi-Töölö area. It seems that Helsinki is every Finns dream town, after all. A big city in the wilderness :)

Speaking of nature, the two representatives of wildlife currently residing in my fish tank are positively starving to death within five seconds if I don't feed them immediately. I'll be right back...

I've had had a weird attack of maternal instincts this week. I've been assigned to the Helsinki University's physics dep. cafeteria for a few days, and some of our customers are so above and beyond in their nerdhood that one couldn't think it possible. They are shaped like a question mark, wear clothes that are neat and tidy, but not necessarily parts of the same outfit and get easily confused when talked to. I've been like, "Awww, is that one ham roll enough, you're awfully thin? That's your fourth cup of coffee, are you sure you will sleep tonight? Make sure you have warm clothes, it's cold outside." I'm afraid I might actually say something like that to one of them. Bless 'em, cute little things.

(There are also a couple of *ahem* good-looking young gentlemen there. I've had trouble controlling my grin every time they walk by. Jay-sus, I think, is the word I'm looking for. Go physics, chemistry and geology!).

On the whole it's been a slow week at work. Everybody's on holiday. There's little else to do except listen to the world ski championships on the radio. Now there's a childhood flashback like nothing else. Every ski holiday my parents shipped me and my little sister to our grandparents where we spent a carefree week skiing, eating well, building snow fortresses and watching the ski world championships on telly. I still associate that one particular sporting event with peaceful, stressfree and mellow living.


German wildlife live on line, a.k.a deer and/or wild boars:
http://www.wildtiere-live.de/
Birdies! Squirrels!
http://www.ponttokamera.net/

Ten Minutes to Midnight

This will be a short post since it's late at night and I really should be sleeping already. But because I just got out of shower (sorry, neighbors) and I need to wait till my hair dries and, let's face it, I'm still overly excited about my brand new blog I can't let this opportunity to post go away unused.

Writing here makes me feel just like Carrie Bradshaw.

I noticed a funny thing today. I posted my first entry in English without even thinking about it, as if it was written somewhere that if thou want to contribute something in the internet, thou shalt write it in English. I had a small conversation about it with my internet self, who was of the opinion that she speaks English, end of story. My real life self tried to argue that since the rest of me speaks Finnish, maybe the internet persona should do some soul-searching on the subject. The internet self gave the rest of me a look and said, "Oh? Deal."

Who am I to argue?

Besides, not using a language after you've spent years learning it might be called a gigantic waste of time and effort.

My internet happens in English.

And since we already are talking about funny things, a note about my hair. It seems that mere laws of physics are no concern to my hair at all. I mean, every morning I wake up with my hair pointing straight up. It's not that short, can't be. And yet there it goes, every single hair happily stretched towards the sun like a sapling in the springtime. It takes ten minutes just to get it lie down, and another ten minutes to get those bits I want to point in every direction to do so (they are, of course, lying perfectly still, blissful and relaxed, not wanting to move a nanometer).

I have an upside down-hair. The portion that should frame my face in feminine and alluring fashion is rebelling with all its might, and those bits that should reflect my rebellious, heavy metal-listening half are pretending to be hippies in bloody Woodstock.

A link for education and entertainment:

http://www.angryalien.com/

EDIT: Now that I actually took some time to read through the FAQ part, I changed the comment-thingy so that anyone should be able to leave a comment without registering.

Manuals. Who needs 'em?

Enter me

Whoah.

I've just spent half an hour creating this blog. Username, password, layout and the horror of all horrors - what to call this particular blog. Do I really have so big problems making decisions? It's never too late to learn new things about yourself.

Anyways, I thought to give this blog-thing a try. I've never been a big diary-enthusiast but people have pointed out many good aspects about them so what the hell. Let's give it a try and see what happens. Who knows. I may even learn to write some day ;)

But right now I hear people clamoring for Big News about my life. Calm down! Your wait is over. During the past week I have conquered flu, succeeded to score a bunny-themed stamp from my German quiz, bought no less than three albums of Good Music (tm), namely by a German industrial metal-band Oomph! and re-organized my books.

The flu was the root of all evil, let me tell you. Four days of fever, runny nose, and my throat wanted to give birth to a flaming sofa. I'm still going through about a dozen hankies a day, but the worst is thank goodness over. I can not recommend this disease to anyone. If I was a car magazine, the review for this test drive would score nothing but minuses.

On the music front I am doing well, however. It seems that in Finland the record stores are required to diss all German music with the exception of Rammstein (do not think for a minute that I'd complain about Rammstein being sold in copious numbers - Fan, thy name is Sanna!). So I have walked from a record store to record store come sleet or snow (they both did. It was wonderful) trying to find some Oomph! or Megaherz without much success until I found Oomph!-albums from a wonderful, wonderful record store Keltainen Jäänsärkijä. Still, Finland seems to be a Megaherz-free zone.

Oh well. One needs to have something to pursue. I could make my life easier and dig bands like HIM or Rasmus or Britney Spears, but no, I had to choose German industrial metal. Life has its funny ways.

A point to illustrate the last sentence of the previous paragraph is how last Sunday I actually spent a couple of hours trying to determine what kind of car was in Rammstein's Du Hast video (It was the word of the day on herzeleid.com forums). I mean, a car. A thing that's sole purpose is to transport people from point A to point B. That's all. And I spent a couple of hours I'll never get back surfing the net for car images. *Sigh*

It was a Volga.

Despite all my accomplishments I still have some minor things to do. Like deciding what the hell I am going to be when I grow up, where to apply for summer job, about what exactly am I going to write my thesis about, small things like that.

So who knows, maybe this blog might help me to organize my thoughts into something, well, organized thingy.


Link(s) of the moment:
http://herzeleid.com/
http://www.oomph.de/oomph_page/english/index.html
http://www.volga.nl/indexEN.htm