movies as a reference

To what extend (never know when it's a t or a d) can we use movies as a reference for our daily life? Was confronted with that question yesterday night when driving home from the airport. I had to find out, and it took me many years, that movies don't help when it comes to love. Although many romantic scenes seems to be inspirational for the personal love life of ordinary people like we are, it just doesn't work. You will find yourself in situations that have some similarity with the scene in the movie but then crucial aspects or moment are just not there. No lake with a full moon, no high speed car or plane falling down that you can just save her from by pulling her into your arms. And women don't say the right lines they are supposed to say to which you can respond in your clever, funny but oh how romantic way. It just doesn't happen! My favorit scene is from 'While you were sleeping' with Sandra Bullock. (if I could do my life again I would not change much except for moving to the States and find myself a job in film-industry to marry Sandra) In that scene she is with a guy in winter in New York where it's icy and slippery. Then of course she falls and he catches her and then they kiss. Perfect scene. But how to make that situation happen? How to find the slippery place? I managed ones to find the slippery place, she fell (well I pushed her a bit) and when trying to catch her she hit me with her elbow on my face and my lip was bleeding. No kissing.
Anyway...coming back to yesterday night. Which didn't have anything to do with love. As I said I was driving home from the airport. I could see in the mountains many fires burning which is quite normal for this time of the year because it's hot and dry. Calabria is burning! But then suddenly a fire appeared there right in front of me. Well...it was not the road itself that was burning but on both sides flames were dangerously reaching into the air. Instead of stepping on the break I took the other pedal and pushed the car to maximum speed through the flames. I managed. But immediately after I thought it was an absurd ridiculous thing to do. It could have been a big fire going on for kilometers. It wasn't but it could have been. I realised it was the movies. Because that is what they do in movies: full speed through the fire. Although never in a 10 year old Citroen Berlingo.... And it's true...I wasn't followed by police cars with sirens on... no helicopter above me... So maybe also when it comes to traffic and fire movies are not the right reference.
Well... I got home anyway...

no news

living in italy doesn't stop me from following the dutch news. there's one dutch channel on my television and i follow the newspapers. dutch journalism seems to develop more and more the competence to spend hours on no news. two weeks ago the television evenings were occupied and the papers were filled with interviews, expert opinions and historical overviews on the 11 city skating tour that then in the end didn't happen. not enough ice.
since yesterday journalists are spending an enormous amount of time on reporting about the condition of the second son of the dutch queen who ended up in a hospital in innsbruck after being caught by an avalanche while skiing in the austrian mountains. the news is that there is no news and there will be no news in the coming 2 days. reporters are standing in front of the hospital, in front of the palace where the royal family lives but where nobody is home because they are all in austria and in front of the parliament telling that there is no news. dutch viewers are presented with holiday movies of the last 50 years of the royal family skiing in austria but still also after watching this there is now news from innsbruck. and of course there are the experts! experts on avalanches, experts on skiing, experts on the royal family, experts on austria, experts on health conditions of people who end up in avalanches, experts on health conditions of royal families and experts on dramatical situations in which queens, kings, princes and princesses were involved. serious talk-shows and well respected journalists have stopped doing their normal work and make extra hours to report there is no news from innsbruck.
i spend the whole day next to my phone waiting for a call to be interviewed. i consider myself an expert. i know more than ten austrian people, i've been in austria many times, i have been skiing in france which is not austria but would be interesting to compare, i live in italy which would give a kind of mediterranean flavor to the interview and here we have earth quakes and volcanos which also can be very dramatic. probably tomorrow they will call...

passion and ambiguity

this day was all about ‘passion’ and ‘ambiguity’. to be more specific: the morning was about passion and the evening dealt with ambiguity. reason is the preparation work for training courses on these topics. well and in the afternoon i spend one and a half hour watching bloopers from seinfeld (seasons  6,7,8 and 9) played guitar for half an hour and made 2 pancakes for myself. not sure if this is really valuable information but the picture is anyway complete. not that I have an enormous amount of readers but you don’t want people later sending emails asking you about your afternoon activities.

anyway: passion and ambiguity!

i became more and more aware how closely these two issues are connected. passion is a very ambiguous thing and ambiguity is in many cases strongly related to your passion.

or: maybe the biggest ambiguity in our life is how to deal with our passions. if you just don’t pay attention to your passions life could be quite simple to live. you just do what everybody else does. you go with the flow, follow a decent education, get yourself a normal not to challenging job, find a partner, produce children, relax in the evening and the weekend and try to deal with the challenges that life will bring anyway. and of course sometimes there will be these moments that you want to jump out… to travel the world with a backpack… to quit your job and become a musician singing songs in pubs all over the world … to spend the rest of your life growing plants in an enormous garden… to climb a huge mountain… to start a new life with a new love… to start your own pub or restaurant… to move to iceland or brazil…

but then you think one more time and laugh about yourself: aaaah these silly passions.

what however when we do follow our passions? so many people are telling you these days to follow your passion! but what when we do?  immediately we will find ourselves in quite ambiguous situations. if you have only one big passion things could be a bit more easier, depending of course on the passion. when your big and one and only passion from being a child is to be for example a post(wo)man or a dancer you can work on that and you might have a big chance to get there. still… if you lack any sense of rhythm the royal ballet might not want you. but most of us don’t have one ever lasting passion. we have more… we change and get new ones. when is the moment something becomes really a passion? what are the quality criteria for a real passion? how many passions can you follow at the same time without running around like a complete idiot? will you still be loved if you run around climbing mountains, traveling to brazil, starting a new love, playing the guitar in a californian pub  and only talking to your plants?

it’s ambiguous. to be honest my preference goes to following your passions as much as possible. but how much do i do that? do i do that enough? how much change and ambiguity can i handle? should i sit here writing a blog now… or should i…. whatever!

this morning opened my 'to do list'. in the last days in a quite chaotic but still productive way i've been doing many things. small things, administrative things, cleaning things... so i thought it was time to tick them off. but to my unpleasant surprise all the tasks i did were not in my 'to do list'! i immediately started to put the things i finished in the list and ticking them off but that felt quite embarrassing.
so the big question which immediately appeared: do things you did still count if they are not in your 'to do list'?
in general my 'to do list' works. it's a mind-map, so there's no order. it's just not to forget what i have to do. no planning involved. every now and then i try to make an order... but it doesn't work. the only plan that really works is 'the evening before the deadline'. for the rest it's a lot about starting things... getting a mail...going on facebook...writing a tweet...listening to a song....watching a clip... having a skype-talk... doing a completely other task...making coffee...
the good thing is that we have a word for it these days: procrastination! when i was a teenager we didn't have that. i would have loved to use it with my parents and teachers: 'sorry...suffering from procrastination at the moment a lot...' they would have been impressed. but we didn't have it so they just told me to work harder and to put the right priorities in life. no excuses!
wiki-pedia says:'In psychology, procrastination refers to the act of replacing high-priority or important actions with tasks of lower priority, or doing something from which one brings enjoyment, and thus putting off important tasks to a later time.' 
when surfing around a bit to find out how to overcome this newest disease you will be told to work with a 'to do list' but with priorities, to prioritize, to schedule, to manage and to set yourself goals. which sounds, in other words, a lot like what my parents and teachers told me years ago...
probably there will be a pill soon to fight this terrible disfunction. as they can develop a pill to keep your penis focussed longer it should be a piece of cake to keep your brains focussed for many many hours.


but i would propose not to fight procrastination but to celebrate it...to embrace making your day a complete chaos...full of enjoyment... to accept that the first thing you do is probably the most important!
and if there are still these kind of tasks which seems to be important but you never do... make them unimportant... kick them out of your list... it's just not your thing! 
yeah!!!! let's get procrastinated!!! 

nonxmas

still... thanks for all the wishes!

earthquakes and ambiguity

quite an alarming and confusing article in our calabrian newspaper Calabria Ora today. the National Head of Civil Protection Franco Gabrielli  cannot sleep at night because his fears for an earthquake in calabria. he told this to Famiglia Cristiana, the newspaper for the christian italian family. reading the article brings me in quite an ambiguous situation raising a lot of questions. what is the real problem here, his sleeples nights or the upcoming earthquake? is the article part of a serie about sleeping problems or about earthquakes? what is the relation to the christian family? when you are the Head of Civil Protection shouldn't you do other things than giving interviews about your sleepless nights? a plan for calabria maybe? what about us people living in calabria? does the Head of Civil Protection has any tips for us when the earth starts moving? or should we also have sleepless nights? does it help to be a christian family when there is an earthquake?

then somewhere in my head there is this thought that it's all about something else. the man who had this job before Franco was Guido Bertolaso. he became a hero in this country after the earthquake 2 years ago in Aquila. he was leading the whole operation rebuilding the place and in the meantime organising the G8 meeting in Aquila. incredibile!! but then one year later he had to resign because strange things had been going on with the companies who were hired to rebuilt Aquila and the girls that were hired by these companies to give massages to Bertolaso and his friends... which were a kind of full massages...well...very complex...but still...end of the hero.
anyway the conclusion could be that in that job you can become big when there is an earthquake. so maybe that causes Franco's sleeping problems... this secret hope for earthquakes and fame...well and maybe also the massages....

google lips and world peace

googled myself today. it's always good to get to know yourself better. amazing what google knows and i already almost forgot. such a pity that google wasn't there yet during the first half of my life. now people in the future will think my life started only half way. 

annoying are people who have the same name. not so many but still. there is this dutch football player who is mentioned a lot in all kind of articles mostly because he is quite unpredictable... one week he plays great and next week like shit. then there is an austrian guy who does workshops on yoga, meditation and world peace. i think it's a bit strange that his name is written in the same way as me... as an austrian he only needs one o but then 2 n's. probably it's the thing in his life: shouting 2 o's and 1 n!! poor guy...and still going for world peace... respect!!

anyway happy to have myself archived!!

i want to make a strong statement here. we should make a deal on being honest to women who do their lips. in the last days i was confronted a few times with ladies who blew up their lips. it's terrible!!! the only thing you think is: 'oh god she has her lips done and its horrible'

the problem is that they have the idea that they look gorgeous... they even paid for it!  the good thing however is that after a while they shrink again. and that's when we should come in!! before they have them redone again. be friendly but clear! let's be honest to the big botox lips women!! 

probably also good for world peace!