I'm still here!!

Hello you lovely people out there? How are you? I'm back from my holiday in aitaly, back from the few days I spent at home at my family and right now on the train back to my home from work! It's nearly 10 pm on a Wednesday! Today we hosted an award event at our library in my work. The best austrian crime fiction writer was awarded. It was my first event that I had to organise in my new work and luckily it all went well. Do you want to see the beautiful location that is situated jn the beautiful house in which I work? Yes? Well then have a look at those pictures:

These are just a few random shots that I took while we prepared everthing. The tables were gone in the evening but there were a few gatherings in the afternoon that we also had to take care of. I really like my new job, it was the right decision to take it! 

Other than that I actually have nothing really to talk about. So I give you random facts that come to my slightly drunken mind (after show party, wohoo) while I sit on that sloooow train that stops at EVERY.SINGLE.RAILWAY.STATION along the way! 

- we drove 13.5 (let me spell that out for you: THIRTEEN AND A HALF) hours on the motorcycle on our way to Italy! And this doesn't even include the breaks! We decided to avoid the highway to drive the (what we thought) more scenic route across Austria. Turns out that the off-highway-roads have NOTHING to offer and that we just waster our time. Suprisiny it was still fun, though. We would probably do it again! 

- I managed to fly one time around the whole world (really, I did! I started in Vienna, heading eastwards and came back from the west) but this was the fiest time I visited Italy! Probably won't happen again anytime soon. Italian people are arrogant snobs. Pretty landscape, though! 

- my mother saw the top that I crocheted and immediately requested the same one for her! You can't imagine how happy I was about that! I already started when I visited them: look: 

- when we visited Venice I bought myself a pair of "New balance" shoes. Apparently very trendy right now, but I didn't know that at the time. My (future) mother-in-law saw them and immediately requested to buy the same pair. Somehow this didn't made me as happy as when my mum asked me about the matching top. I would never admit that, though. 

- right now, we're having real autumnal (is this a word?) weather. This is my view on my way to the train station this week:

Normally you would see the lake (and SKY) from here. Rain and fog and then rain again! 

- I still have 30 minutes to drive and I'm slowly running out of uninteresting and totally incoherenr facts to tell you. 

- riding a train when you can't look outside the window because everyhing is black outside and the only thing you see is the reflection of your alarmingly tired looking face isn't fun at all! 

- my man and I discovered geocaching! Apparently this is as trendy as wearing new balance sneakers. Up-to-date people we are not. But we really like it! My man is currently trying to give up smoking (one week cigarette-free tomorrow, woohooo!!) and he needed something to get his mind off of thinking about cigarettes, so we walked around our small town last sunday and already made plans for the weekend. Did you know, that I love really close to a beautiful national park? It seems, that there are quite a few caches hidden and we're going to check them out on Saturday after a family dinner for my uncle's 60rh birthday. 

- I'm not nearly anywhere near home, but I'm typing all of this (hence the massive amount of typos. This train ride isn't smooth bit rather wobbly. It's the trains' fault. Not the fact that I didn't eat anything but drank three glasses of wine. That's not why it took me about ten attempts to write the word 'cigarettes', oh no! ) on my cell phone and the battery is slowly but surely dying on me, so I better publish this thing. 

- I've you've read all the way through the end I salute you! Send me an e-mail so I can thank you in person! You're probably equally bored as me. Cheers. 

P.s.: thank you so much for your nice comments on my last post. Your wishes really worked - we had beautiful weather on our holiday. Just one rainy day and thee solid days of lying on the beach and reading. Which reminds me that there will be a book recoomondation pretty soon! Stay tuned! 

beach books, anyone?

I love, love, love books. Books are my favourite thing to buy. I studied German language and literature to be able to work with books one day. One year and three months after my graduation I will finally start a job that has to do with books. Yay. For this job I will also commute by train instead of my car, so that will hopefully give me more time to read. My reading time is very limited right now. I get up. I drive to work. I drive back home. I make dinner for my man, as I am the first one at home. Twice a week I go running. And after dinner we make ourselves comfortable on the couch and watch one or two episodes of Dexter (I just bought the last three seasons, we can't stop watching. It's sooo addictive) and then go to bed. Sometimes I skip the TV, head straight to bed and manage to read a few pages. But I always get tired.

My treat on weekends is to stay in bed, after waking up, to spend an hour or more reading. But since I share my bed with my man - I don't do that either. We only get to have breakfast together on the weekends and so my books get left behind - again.

Long story short - when it comes to books, I am the person to ask for my friends and my family. My best friend is going on a great trip to the USA in two weeks and she asked me, if I could recommend holiday books to her. "Something light. But no chick-lit. Nothing tooo light. No romance novels. You get the idea." And before I was able to start my rambling (as you might have noticed by now - I'm not a friend of few words) she immediately added: "And don't give me a whole list. Two or three books are enough, I will then chose one of them."

So, here are the three books I recommended to her, and, to please her wishes, I will introduce them to you in a very short way.

Number Three:
T.C. Boyle - The women
This book is a biography of the architect Frank Lloyd Wright. It's divided into three parts, each one dedicated to one of his wives. Love, tragic, comedy, bizarre elements and one of the most amazing ends that I have ever read, which left me with tears in my eyes. And whoever knows me, knows, that it's very hard for a book (or a movie for that matter) to bring me to tears. I bought this book in Paris, read it at the côte d'azur and took it to every holiday ever since.

Number Two:
Harper Lee - To kill a Mockingbird
It's a classic of world literature for a reason. Written from the view of a littel girl and it's so authentic, that you really think that there's a little girl standing in front of you, telling you a wonderful story. A story that you get to see through the eyes of the child. A child who learns that not everyone in this world is nice. That people harm each other, hurt each other and talk bad about each other. It's one of the books that makes you read 'just a few more pages' even though you know you will be tired the next day.

Number one:
Jeffrey Eugenides - Middlesex
Probably the book that I have read the most frequent. Lots of pages, but the language is so beautiful, that it leaves you sad, once it's finished. A book that tells the story of three generations, that draws the bow from Greece to the USA, from poor people to the industrial revolution, from a girl to a boy, from love, to live, to happiness and sadness. My all time favourite book.

Now I know that these are rather short and cryptic book description. But I think it's enough to get your curiosity. I don't like long and detailed summaries. It kind of destroys the whole process of discovering a story, getting to know the characters and really evolve a feeling for the book, the writing, the author. So these are my top three holiday books for you. What are your favourite books? Which books do you love to read on your holidays, at the beach or in the evening in bed? I'm always open for new suggestions. Also let me know if you decided to read one of my three books. Did you like it? What's your opinion? I'm looking forward to your reading experiences!

Servus from Austria,
Emm