Bonn
Bonn: Retro Views
One of the few things that helped keeping my spirits up while away was trying my hand at a sort of color-faux-iPhone version of “classic movie night time scenery” views (as in: set in Europe), courtesy of an endless series of night sessions in my cooperation partners’ new office, which is right on Bonn’s main […]
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Cherry Blossoms
One thing that made me grin when surfing social media during my recent hospital stay was this post: — both because of the “World’s Top Destinations” listing and for pitying the hordes of visitors flocking here these days to see the city’s famed cherry blossoms … because very recently it had looked more like they […]
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Holiday Spirituality
Festive Tasks Master Update Post HERE Task 1: Are there any places or events that are particularly spiritually meaningful to you this time of year? Share a picture or description with us. There are, and it’s put a damper on my Christmas not to be able to go there this and last year. Neither my […]
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Festive Tasks: Door 19 – City sidewalks, busy sidewalks, dressed in holiday style …
Festive Tasks Master Update Post HERE Task 2: How does your community celebrate the season – i.e., how do you know it’s Christmas in your community? Fetes? Fairs? Markets? Concerts? Bonfires? If there are many, tell us about your favorite. Pictures if you’ve got them. Light decorations and Christmas market from the first weekend of […]
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Festive Tasks: Door 3, Task 1 – Here Comes the Sun
Festive Tasks Master Update Post HERE Task 1: How long is the longest day of the year where you live? How long is the shortest? Does your home town/country celebrate the solstice? Bonn does not so much celebrate the solstice as enjoy the longer evenings in summer generally. According to TimeandDate.com and Climate-Data.org, the […]
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Festive Tasks: Door 3, Task 3 – Bonn leuchtet / Bonn Shines
Festive Tasks Master Update Post HERE Task 3: Is your community known for any light displays in particular? Are there any displays (anywhere in the world) that you would really like to see in person? Tell us about them. I’ve shared images of this before — one of my favorite local events recurring annually is “Bonn […]
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Festive Tasks: Door 1, Task 1 – Of Chocolate, Cathedral Architecture, and Veerry Old Bones
Festive Tasks Master Update Post HERE Task 1: In Australia, it’s common to brag about having the “biggest ‘X’ in the Southern Hemisphere!” Biggest mall, biggest prawn (don’t ask), biggest pineapple, biggest earthworm. What does your country / city / region brag about having the best or the biggest of …? I’ve never […]
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Festive Tasks: Door 1, Task 4 – Walled in by Books
Master Update Post HERE Task 4: Australia has the world’s longest fence, the dingo fence, which at 3,436 miles (5529.7 kilometres) beats the Great Wall of China. Using an average of 12 books / meter, or 4 books / foot as a guide, if you had to build a fence of your own to […]
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Winter Storm & Flood
Sooo, the better part of Germany — everything from our general area northward — was hit by a major winter storm over the weekend and has been looking like this ever since: (Image sources here, here, here and here) … as a result of which, trains, planes, and public transport aren’t operational, streets aren’t passable for […]
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An Alphabet of My Likes and Dislikes: “N”
This is a post belonging to a new blogging project — the title is pretty much self-explanatory, I think; the project’s introductory post can be found HERE. Credit for the idea: BeetleyPete. As always, the only thing linking the two items mentioned in this post in my mind is that they both start with the […]
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An Alphabet of My Likes and Dislikes: “L”
This is a post belonging to a new blogging project — the title is pretty much self-explanatory, I think; the project’s introductory post can be found HERE. Credit for the idea: BeetleyPete. As always, the only thing linking the two items mentioned in this post in my mind is that they both start with the […]
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An Alphabet of My Likes and Dislikes: “G”
This is a post belonging to a new blogging project — the title is pretty much self-explanatory, I think; the project’s introductory post can be found HERE. Credit for the idea: BeetleyPete. As always, the only thing linking the two items mentioned in this post in my mind is that they both start with the […]
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An Alphabet of My Likes and Dislikes: “C”
This is a post belonging to a new blogging project — the title is pretty much self-explanatory, I think; the project’s introductory post can be found HERE. Credit for the idea: BeetleyPete. As always, the only thing linking the two things mentioned in this post in my mind is that they both start with the […]
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St. Martin’s Day Procession: Germany’s November Bonfire Tradition
24 Festive Tasks: Door 2 – Guy Fawkes Night, Bonus Task #1: Post pictures of past or present bonfires, fireworks (IF THEY’RE LEGAL) or sparklers. As a kid, one of my favorite holiday traditions used to be the St. Martin’s Day processions: The holiday celebrates St. Martin of Tours (France), a 4th century Roman military […]
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An Untraditional Christmas Tradition: A Nighttime Stroll Through My Neighborhood
24 Festive Tasks: Door 21 – Christmas, Bonus Task #1: Christine PNW’s untraditional family tradition for Christmas dinner is to gather around the fondue pot with her husband and children after spending the entire day in her pajamas and watching movies, playing video games or reading. Do you have any “untraditional” traditions for the day? […]
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First Day of Carnival in the Rhine Valley: Dinner
24 Festive Tasks: Door 10 – First Day of Carnival, Task 1: Carnival – including its first day in the Rhine Valley (Nov. 11; officially beginning at 11:11 AM sharp) – is essentially one big party; fuelled, wherever in the world it is celebrated, by traditional local food / snacks and drinks. In the Rhineland, […]
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The View from My Kitchen Window
#StayatHome blossoms — this is the view from my balcony and kitchen window at the moment. And by way of a bonus image, a pair of ducks (visitors from the banks of the Rhine, which is just a few 100 metres from my home) that were making a ruckus round about the front hedge while […]
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An Easter Walk
… or Passover, or Spring Festival, or whatever else you are celebrating these days. Easter walks are very much a German tradition (Goethe even immemorialized them in his Faust), and it turns out not even the Corona pandemic can do away with this. Unlike last weekend, people were out only (or almost only) in family […]
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Neighborhood Christmas Decorations
24 Festive Tasks: Door 13 – Advent, Task 2: Tell us: What is your favorite holiday tradition? I don’t know if I have one particular favorite holiday tradition, but one of my favorite moments occurs on Christmas Eve, when we walk through the silent, festively-decorated night-time streets of our neighborhood on our way to church. […]
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