9th to the 15th of January

It’s been a long weekend of comedy. The second time I performed in German on a small stage and then the third time on a Saturday at a paid show. Making progress, making people laugh and enjoying life. And some time throughout I find some time and silence to write this down.

9th of January: “Writing about music is like dancing to architecture”

False. I have done that for the longest time. In fact, when I was studying or even before that I was heavily involved with Metal-/Hardcore-forums. It all started with my teenage self posting stuff about Slipknot in an extreme metal forum. The metal gatekeepers did not like it a bit. But look which band is still around inspiration for many different artists in Hardcore and Metal. Later on, I posted a review of an All That Remains album on a German forum called Partyausfall. I copied the look and writing style of posts about their album reviews. Weeks later I got an E-Mail being invited to write there and receive the CDs as payment. Great deal. I did that for years. I love music. From Lorna Shore to Justin Bieber. What I like most is the contrast you find in Extreme Metal from dissonance to clean parts from guitar solos to binary shredding. It’s like the clean parts shine more brightly being enveloped by hard, dark and semi-ugly parts. There is a place for everything and honestly the most variety you can find in metal. Give it a try or stay a Top-100 fan. This I say jokingly, my teenage self was much more narrow-minded, so open up and enjoy a world of new music for every situation. Don’t you wish you had a soundtrack to your life?

10th of January: “Set in as many ways as possible”

Nothing is set in stone I thought setting the timer on my phone for 7 minutes of comedy. My set is a best-of of true stories that happened over the course of my life. Setting it off with a story about a buddy of mine trying to get a glimpse of my man parts. There is a little room that allows me to set the record straight with proof of things really happening. Mindset is everything. I genuinely find these stories funny and just tune it up in the way of speaking to set everyone up for laughter. I’d settle and win every bet that dares me to jump on a stage and tell a story. Ready, set, go!

11th of January: “How would your friends describe you to a stranger”

This Björn guy is full of energy and can probably power a room with movements and his presence. He is an odd character that likes to lead conversations toward edgy stories about sex or other fun topics. If there is someone who wears his heart on his sleeve then this is Björn, even if it might be to his detriment. Some might describe Björn as someone who seemingly never has a bad day (I do, but a whole day is rare, it’s more like short bursts of bad). He had almost every hairstyle possible and even though he comes from a village he has seen a lot of the world. Being with Björn can be exhausting if you are not a little stingy too, don’t like to walk and can’t keep up with the walking or don’t enjoy beer walks. If you have planned something Björn is there on time, maybe a little early, but he is not so much the planning type. A great dude on the verge of toxic positivity, but also a deep well of stories that sound unbelievable but they happened.

12th of January: “Eminence as a character to shift a plot”

When all hell broke loose the knights of the queen gathered a last time at the table to discuss the final battle. “We have lost many a man.”, “We gotta win this or else…” and “I am not going without you” were lines that were shouted through the room and echoed from the halls. Some doubt, some feats of persistence and the sheer will to fight on became a hurricane that swept through the candle-lit room. A door on the south side of the hall opened with a stuttering creek and the light cast a shadow in front of the hooded figure in a wheelchair. Silence. The shadow moved towards and across the table. Slowly and with grace the head in the wheelchair lifted the head. The hood rose a tad bit and showed blond-silver hair that became translucent in the light from the back. “We will fight, unleash the spirit our castle is known for and show the hordes that we might be not in their numbers, but we are unbroken and fight for everyone in this world, everyone with a heart, everyone that is able to love.” All the men rose from their seats clanked their steel boots and stood straighter than they have ever stood in their life. This could have gone the complete opposite way as the empress has barely shown herself. There were rumours of her being fragile and maybe not even able to speak but the frail voice uttering the words send shivers down all their spines. It’s true her appearance screams fragile but her voice resonated deep within their hearts.

13th of January: “Readers make better writers”

I believe this to be true. I did read a lot. Currently, I am re-upping my game of reading. There are so many more distractions. A book that I have read at different stages in my life and always had a different view of the characters and the meaning itself is Hermann Hesse’s Siddharta. Translated into English I find the book loses a lot of depth. As a teen, I liked the character of Siddharta and his gradually being able to let go of everything that “binds” him. These days I find it’s a very dickish move to leave your friends and fellow humans behind for you to seek “enlightenment” and I feel more for his companions that are set up to be disappointed by a friend leaving their life forever. It’s super interesting to re-read something a couple of times and, to be honest, I probably re-read only 3 to 4 books ever. In school, my German teacher used to ask me in front of the whole class if there is such a thing as a bad book. I answered I don’t think there is one, the fact that we are reading, something, anything is an achievement and always helps to better oneself. Read and you can live as many a life as there are books you read. Doesn’t have to be Siddharta but try and find something that you find meaningful. Unless it is 50 Shades of Grey, but even if you are able to finish that crap, then you have successfully read a book. Good on you! Leave Siddharta alone and find his enlightenment. You do you! Even if he doesn’t need you, you surely don’t need him but you might still enjoy the memories you made together.

14th of January: “Describe a person through the cup they drink from.”

When the light hit just right, then you saw some cracks in the bamboo. One side of the cup right on the edge had worn out a bit more, it was the side that had less impurities. Now the bamboo cup was home to various pens, all black, all beautiful and they filled up the cup to two thirds. Right next to the formerly favourite cup was a notebook that neatly laid there at an angle. If you would know Chinese, then the notebook said: “Write, laugh, live.” nothing too original but it does the job. The tea cup has been replaced by the newer and shinier version of itself, maybe the younger sibling. The window fogged ever so slightly from the younger siblings exhausted grean tea. Green tea has been the drink of choice to fuel the creative spirits of this young Chinese writer. She often sat there on Sundays around 3 and enjoyed a cup with milk and looked down at the pedestrian street making up stories of the heavily dressed up wave of people and picked a person who’s life she colored in with black ink on bamboo paper in a little brown notebook.

15th of January: “Paranoia’s the garlic in life’s kitchen…”

I have no known paranoia, so I find this challenging to write about. I don’t particularly like rats or mice when they roam about in cities. Weirdly I find them okay in village settings and in nature. The displacement of tiny critters in cold urban settings makes me uncomfortable. Some people are paranoid about food. In Thailand I ate every insect I could find. Wolfing down grasshoppers and water bugs (they are not great) I squatted down nect to the little cart that sold the food. It was the monsoon season so the street still had little puddles and I finished my bug snack assortment. I lit a cigarette and below me a drainage came to life. Shiny little eyes scuffled around, little bodies of fur moved about and swapped places. I stood up as fast as I could and squatted further away to finish the cigarette and watch people. Speaking of garlic. In Germany pretty much all boomer Germans love garlic but hate to smell it somewhere. They dislike sitting nect to you if you had something with garlic yesterday. I don’t even notice it or care, pretty much every dish we cook in our family has garlic. It’s a great spice! Use it. Don’t overdo it though, I know of the father of a former boss of mine who ate pickled garlic by the glass. The people in the sauna in his gym didn’t like it as much and he actually got banned from the gym. Because of garlic. Now let that settle. Fucking paranoid!