... or is it? According to the people who got banned from Furbase the other day it is. But I think it's not. I admit that things could have been handled better from the Furbase administration's side, but still, the whole thing came to pass because a few people thought it would be a fun thing to push the admin's buttons. And they know exactly which buttons to push to make him mad. Needless to say that the outcome of this "prank" was completely predictable.

Guys, you could have posted the thread, get it closed and deleted by the staff and leave it at that, but reopening it over and over again was a sure bet to get the admin pissed off, you know it as well as I do. And now you're bragging about how cool it was to be banned for a "stupid little prank". And how cool it was to see the admin lose his temper and cause problems for other forum users. Yes, very mature, very considerate.

Tell you what: It's not cool, it's not funny and it's definitely not something you can be proud of, regardless how many of your followers post high fives in your LJ comments. It's just poor and sad.

Do you know what would be cool? An apology to the forum admin. Now *that* would be something you'd get *my* high fives for. But I assume you don't have the balls to do it. You rather bask in the praise and woo-hoo of the people who don't know better. Well ... you should.

A is for age: 36
B is for beer of choice: I don't drink beer
C is for career right now: Technical Support Engineer for Linux Business Customers
D is for your dog's name: I don't own or want a dog
E is for essential item you use everyday: Computer
F is for favorite TV show: No TV
G is for favorite game to watch: I don't watch games
H is for Home town: I moved too often to call any town my "home town"
I is for instruments you play: Keyboard / Piano, Guitar, Drums, Voice
J is for favorite juice: Apple
K is for whose butt you'd like to be kicking: Lazy musicians :P
L is for last place you ate at: My computer desk
M is for marriage: Not married
N is for your name: Look it up! It's somewhere here ... on this page
O is for overnight hospital stay: I was 5 years old, getting eye surgery
P is for people you were with today: My colleagues, my beloved angel Pan
Q is for what's your best quality: My sense of humor
R is for what are you currently reading: A strange Meme
S is for relationship status: Happily taken
T is for time you woke up today: 6:30 am
U is for the type of underwear you have on: Black briefs, I think ...
V is for vegetable you love: Turnip
W is for worst habits: Easily distracted, forgetful, lazy
X is for x-rays you've had recently: My feet when they were hurting like hell for no apparent reason
Y is for something candy: Licorice
Z is for zodiac sign: Gemini

Taken from ... uhm ... pretty much everyone else

• Take a picture of yourself right now.
• Don't change your clothes. Don't fix your hair.
• Post that picture with no editing.
• Post these instructions with your picture.

Found at kralle_lion and stolen:

I'm a Chevrolet Corvette!

You're a classic - powerful, athletic, and competitive. You're all about winning the race and getting the job done. While you have a practical everyday side, you get wild when anyone pushes your pedal. You hate to lose, but you hardly ever do.

Take the Which Sports Car Are You? quiz.

Well ... I know someone who probably is as surprised as I am myself now :P

In reply to lynard_:

Here's a little update for those of you who are waiting for the Fauna Project CD. Last weekend we met at our rehearsal room and did a lot of guiding track recordings as well as semi-final vocal recordings, so we're making good progress on that. Still, there is no telling how long the production will take, and we're still a little short on songs, but work is ongoing, and I will give an update on the status every now and then.

My company is giving our team the opportunity to learn and improve our English skills, and I'm quite thrilled about it! Today was the second lesson and the learning curve is already becoming steeper. I love the English language, and thus I hate every single mistake I make while using it. I ordered the guiding book we're using for the class on January 10th, but until now, the material has not been delivered. When I ordered the shop said "delivery time 3-5 business days". After placing my order, it said: "delivery estimated between January 15th and January 29th", which is grossly different from what had been claimed before. As of today, I'm still waiting for the class material to be delivered, but I have my doubts that it will ever reach me before the exam in July :P

Oh, the exam ... It's called "Cambridge First Certificate in English". We're expected to pass the exam in the end, so I'm trying to pay extra attention to the part that gives me the most headache: tenses. It's one thing I can't keep the right names for each tense in my head, but it's another to be unable to decide, which form of tense is the correct one to use in a given situation.

The teacher is great and uses a lot of useful examples to illustrate the rules by which the English grammar works. He tries to avoid the "grammar speech" and get us to understand the forms of the tenses more naturally instead.

So, if you talk about something that happened sometime in the past, use the simple past - I talked
Something in the past connecting to the present, use the present perfect - I have talked
When talking about something in the past, referring to something even further in the past, it's past perfect - I had talked

... and so on. I hope I can memorize those rules and absorb them into my understanding of the language. I really don't want to think about how to say something, I simply want to say it, and say it right.

During the lessons I realized that I have picked up a lot of false impressions on how tenses are to be used by reading publications on the internet. It seems that the native English speakers either don't use their tenses correctly themselves or that it's simply not common to bother with the right form, as long as you get the point across. I should make a point of trying to get this fixed in my head to be confident about using the language again.

Oh, and if anyone reading this finds an error in what I wrote, please comment. I really want to improve, so I need to see my mistakes.

For the German readers, I mean it literally :D

Tonight, my beloved angel pan_h_shiroi prepared dinner for us, and what a dinner it was! She went through a lot of effort to bring a first-class menu onto our humble kitchen table! Soup, Chinese roasted duck and au gratin potatoes ... wow! I was stunned and it tasted wonderfully!

Afterwards it was time for the gifts! I was told to close my eyes, and after some rustling and preparation she came back to me and led me into the bedroom, where I could open my eyes again. I already suspected something like this but I really didn't think she actually did it. But yes, she bought me...


It's a 12 string model and the sound is marvelous! Look at the red and black silhouettes of my character! She made them herself, giving the instrument a personal note :) And another gift I got from her was ...


Again, I was speechless before such nice presents. I have no idea how to pay her back for all she does for me!

I got her ...


When we went shopping a couple of weeks before she showed me the quill and told me, how beautiful it was. So I got her one for Christmas and luckily they still had one of the bordeaux colored feathers. Other colors included pink or green ... yuck! My other present sadly has not arrived yet, but I told her she would get the matching drawing table for her quill :)

I wish you all Merry Christmas and at least as much fun as I had tonight!

I was at the movies with pan_h_shiroi to see "The Golden Compass", and I must say, I was very impressed by the imagery and overall beauty of this movie. The storyline was a little predictable, and the dialog contained too much explanations, but all in all it was well worth the time and money spent. And, as you can imagine, the concept of having an animal daemon was quite exciting for me. So I took the test on http://goldencompassmovie.com/ to see, what daemon would match my personality.

Here is the result: http://goldencompassmovie.com/goldenCompass_blog.swf?id=744970

Please feel free to review my daemon :)

My beloved angel Pan (pan_h_shiroi) designed a new avatar for me! I love it, the lines are beautiful :) You can find the full-size version of this picture on her Deviant Art page:

http://panhesekielshiroi.deviantart.com/art/Eisfuchs-line-art-69739638

Thank you, love! It's fantastic!

Herbstcon was a blast, to say the least :) A lot of friends, my beloved angel and all the other nice furries to have around and great food. What more could you ask for? After the usual hugging and greeting procedure we settled in the main room to socialize and chat. Quickly there was a bunch of us forming an impromptu Worms Armageddon match, and we repeated this the better part of the next day, having six players and one spectator on the match at all times. The selfmade sound sets were hilarious and we made plans to create several more :) A lot of artwork was produced as well, and I was especially delighted to see a drawing done by my angel pan_h_shiroi for eosfoxx's sketchbook. During the con we had the Eurofurence e.V. meeting, discussing the past and future of Eurofurence as well as some side events happening.

I found the time to do a rough mixdown of one of the songs we played at the Fauna Project Concert on Eurofurence 13. Maybe I can get around doing some more, it's fun and keeps me in practice.

The next Herbstcon will be at a different Location, I'm curious how the new place will turn out.

Here we go again, another meme :) Brought to me by my beloved angel pan_h_shiroi!
Your Boy Side
[ ] You love hoodies.
[x] You love jeans.
[ ] Dogs are better than cats.
[ ] It's hilarious when people get hurt.
[x] You've played with/against boys on a team.
[x] Shopping is torture.
[ ] Sad movies suck.
[ ] You own an X-Box.
[x] Played with Hotwheels cars as a kid.
[ ] At some point in time you wanted to be a firefighter.
[ ] You own a DS, PS2 or Sega.
[ ] You used to be obsessed with Power Rangers.
[ ] You watch sports on TV.
[0.5] Gory movies are cool. (not all of them)
[ ] You go to your dad for advice.
[ ] You own like a trillion baseball caps.
[ ] You like going to football games.
[ ] You used to/do collect baseball cards.
[ ] Baggy pants are cool to wear.
[ ] It's kinda weird to have sleepovers with a bunch of people.
[x] Green, black, red, blue, or silver are one of your favorite colors.
[x] You love to go crazy and not care what people think.
[ ] Sports are fun.
[ ] Talk with food in your mouth.
[ ] Wear boxers.

Total = 6.5 points

Your Girl Side
[ ] You wear lip gloss.
[ ] You love to shop.
[ ] You wear eyeliner.
[ ] You have some of the same shirts in different colors.
[ ] You wear the color pink.
[x] Go to your mom for advice. (I used to before I moved)
[ ] You consider cheerleading a sport.
[ ] You hate wearing the color black.
[ ] You like hanging out at the mall.
[ ] You like getting manicures and/or pedicures.
[ ] You like wearing jewelry.
[ ] Skirts are a big part of your wardrobe.
[ ] Shopping is one of your favorite hobbies.
[ ] You don't like the movie Star Wars.
[ ] You are/were in cheerleading, gymnastics or dance.
[ ] It takes you around 1 hour to shower, get dressed, and put on make-up and accessories.
[ ] You smile a lot more than you should.
[ ] You have more than 10 pairs of shoes.
[ ] You care about what you look like.
[ ] You like wearing dresses when you can.
[ ] You like wearing body spray/perfume/cologne.
[ ] You wear girl underwear.
[ ] Used to play with dolls as little kid.
[ ] Like putting make-up on someone else for the joy of it.
[ ] Like taking pictures of yourself with your cell phone/camera when you're bored.

Total = 1 point

Well, all in all a clear victory for the "boy" part, but not as "boyish" either. I guess that's a good thing :)

Okay ... Found in tanidareals Journal, I couldn't resist to post my version of the meme :) I'm not sure why I'm going along with those, but they are kind of fun.

Read more in the cut.

Heh, I'm probably going to mix american and british english in this post, so please bear with me if I butcher your language a little ;)

Ah, anyway. I came home yesterday and noticed the right back tyre (see?) of my car was low on air pressure. I wasn't too concerned about it because that tyre always lost the air faster than the others, and usually a quick stop at the gas station fixed the problem for another two months or so. This morning, though, I found the tyre completely flat, so I decided to leave the car in the garage and go by bus. This left me half an hour late for work, but that's not really a problem. I can catch up on the lost time easily on my next home office day, which won't be too long, due to the strike at Deutsche Bahn.

I walked home from the train station, since the bus wasn't coming for another ten minutes and the connection at the next bus stop would be another fifteen minutes of waiting. It took me about thirty minutes to get home (the bus caught up with me five minutes before I reached home).

So when I came home today I went into the garage, got out the car-jack and the spare wheel and replaced the flat tyre. Tomorrow I will change for winter tyres anyway, so it's not really a problem having three summer sports tyres and one winter replacement tyre on the car :D

It was too late to go and buy some food, so we ordered pizza and salad for a change :) It was good, as always.

It seems, since I started this live journal I keep running into things I can write about ... I considered closing the journal to see, if those things were going away ;) Anyone else noticed that?

Today Pan and I went to a medieval market in Erlangen City. Pan dressed up in her best medieval costume while I just went with my black shirt and pants. I don't have a medieval outfit yet, but we're planning to change that. She's very fond of those markets, so I want to see if I can fit in there. During the train ride to Erlangen people of course regarded us with skeptical looks, but as a former fursuiter and role-player I was quite used to that and smiled at the on-lookers which mostly left them in bewilderment.

The market itself was pretty small, but they had some decent booths there to buy medieval stuff and live musicians with bagpipes and drums. Pan got herself a new belt and a drinking-horn, while I stayed with the food and hot mead. It was pretty chilly and several people were shivering even more when they saw me walking around with a short-sleeved shirt :) Later at night it became *really* cold so I put on a long-sleeve before we decided to take the train back home.

All in all it was nice, and we made plans on how my own medieval costume was supposed to look like. I wonder if I can build it the way we imagined it.

As usual, my girlfriend had parked my car next to the post office to pick me up from the train station. We hugged and got into the car to go to the grocery store for some dinner ingredients. I pulled out of the parking lot onto the street, constantly watching the traffic behind me and waiting for a free spot to use. That's when I saw a light in the corner of my eye and looked back to the parking lot, where a woman in a silver limousine was just about to back up. I tried to honk but it was too late. She turned and hit the front of my car with her driver's door with a sickening crunching sound.. I saw her shocked reaction through the windows and we drove back onto the parking lot to have a look at the damage done.
Fortunately there was next to no damage on my car at all, just a little dent at the rightmost headlight casing. On her car, she got some bad scratches and a deeper dent in the door. At first she thought I had been trying to come into the parking lot and hit her, but when I told her that she actually hit me while I was trying to pull into the running traffic, she was very confused and obviously angered by the situation. To make her insurance happy, we called the police to file a formal report and half an hour later we were on our respective ways again.

Tonight we had minced meat with leek and a cream cheese sauce. Tasty :)

I had a great time at my new job so far, and today I had a review with my Mentor and my Boss. It went pretty good, my evaluation period is not over until January, but my Boss suggested to start looking for a flat closer to the company. I guess this is a good sign :)

Here we go! The results of my part of the meme hype :)

- I once drove 500 km with 4 passengers (two of them well over 100 kg) plus luggage in a small car through a snow storm at 120 km/h

TRUE - I picked up 4 furries on my way to a small housecon including all their luggage in an old Volkswagen Golf II. But due to the enormous weight it was no problem on the street, even with all the snow going on.

- In elementary school I was moved up one grade because I disturbed the other children

TRUE - I learned to read and do the math at age 4, together with my sister who just started school.

- I once lived 6 months on white bread and cheap sausage in an empty flat with a computer, a mattress and one light bulb

TRUE - This was my first 6 months in Berlin after leaving home. I was broke but the pay on my new job was good enough to pay the rent and cover the expenses to pay off my loan. Later on the Berlin electricity company told me their electricity meter had been broken for nearly a year and they charged me based on the power I used *after* I bought a fridge, a stove and a washing machine. Bastards.

- I got out of a 5000 EUR debt because the person I was owing money died

TRUE - My mother helped me a lot while I was unemployed and I tried hard to pay back the money she loaned me. By the time I got to Berlin I was still in for 5000 EUR, but unfortunately, my Mother died about year later, which relieved me from the financial burden but left me without a truly loved person. :(

- I left home only when I was 28, after I had sex for the first time in my life

TRUE - I am a late bloomer in this regard ;)

- I once started a fight with a policeman just to find out how it feels to be handcuffed for real

FALSE - Sometimes I was desperate, but never *this* desperate! :D

- I go out with only a shirt and pants at 5 °C

TRUE - I don't feel the cold until it is way below 5 degrees :)

- Sometimes I go out into the forest at night, shed my clothes and sink out of sight in a mud bog

TRUE -I like being out in the forest at night, usually with as little clothing as possible :) And I found myself a nice bog to play and sink in :) For those, who don't understand, take a google tour about WAM and quicksand lovers :)

- I once crawled in 11 meters height on a 30 cm wide cable trussing with a roll of fiberglass cable on my back 15 m across a room

TRUE - I used to work for a network cabling company and at one time we needed to get this fiberglass cable across the room, with no way to get a ladder or a crane to this part of the building. I was the smallest and weighed less than all other workers, so I was sent out across the trussing, grasping the metal for dear life and keeping my eyes well focused on the wall ahead, because I was afraid to look down ...

- I have high anxiety

TRUE - Any height above three meters makes my head spin, unless I can hold on to something, no matter how fragile or solid it is.

Oh well :) Here I go giving in to the Livejournal craze! But I don't think I will use it much. This little game intrigued me, however, so I decided to create a journal to participate :D

Stolen from cheetah_spotty, unclekage, kralle_lion and bigbluefox:

One of the following statements is a lie. Please comment on this entry and tell me, which one you think it is. Comments will be hidden until tomorrow night, so everyone can take a shot in the dark :D

- I once drove 500 km with 4 passengers (two of them well over 100 kg) plus luggage in a small car through a snow storm at 120 km/h

- In elementary school I was moved up one grade because I disturbed the other children

- I once lived 6 months on white bread and cheap sausage in an empty flat with a computer, a mattress and one light bulb

- I got out of a 5000 EUR debt because the person I was owing money died

- I left home only when I was 28, after I had sex for the first time in my life

- I once started a fight with a policeman just to find out how it feels to be handcuffed for real

- I go out with only a shirt and pants at 5 °C

- Sometimes I go out into the forest at night, shed my clothes and sink out of sight in a mud bog

- I once crawled in 11 meters height on a 30 cm wide cable trussing with a roll of fiberglass cable on my back 15 m across a room

- I have high anxiety