Die Hard Three

The weather is getting cold and this means I’m going to have to start wearing socks and shoes again. You have no idea what a burden they are until you’re allowed to go four straight months without them. Allow me to explain.

Relatively speaking, socks and shoes are uncomfortable and unnatural. Our humanoid ancestors never had them. I bet you dollars to doughnuts that shoes have been around for less than 1000 years and socks considerably less. Have you heard about those ultra-long-distance runners from Mexico? The reason they can run so long is because they run barefoot (i.e. without shoes). Unfortunately the dangers of the urban environment require that most humans wear something to isolate their feet from the ground. And it goes without saying the negatives of wearing black socks and shoes in the Ottawa summer. I walk about a kilometre (plus the bus) to get to and from work on any given day.

I have one pair of flip flops that I have worn almost every day since June 3. I would normally not wear them to work but I was on French training from June 6 until September 15 and the dress code was pretty relaxed. The only time I wore shoes during that period was when I was helping people move – about 8 times (was a busy moving summer).

My Feet

There is a very low overhead with having flip-flops as your primary form of footgear. Socks and shoes are a whole different ballgame. There’s a lot more work involved. Let’s start with the laundry.

Say you do your laundry once a week and you have 10 pairs of socks to sort and fold. If you’re like me you have many similar kinds of socks that are from different generations (i.e. they were bought at different times). On laundry day I turn into an archeologist closely examining the degree of fading to try and properly match up the pairs. This takes me between 2-4 minutes. Now if one does laundry at a longer interval – say, once every two weeks – all of a sudden you have 20 pairs of socks to sort. This takes even longer and it’s not a liner extrapolation. Full disclosure: I pre-sort my laundry by type of clothing (socks/underwear, pants/towels, shirts) before the wash. It saves having to do it after.

By wearing flip-flops (or any footgear that does not require socks) your existing sock supply will last longer (through reduced usage they don’t wear out as fast) and in the long run you spend less money because you need less of them. And while we are on the subject of cost, a decent pair of flip-flops are about one third to one quarter the cost of an equivalent pair of shoes.

Now back to shoes. My footgear routine over the summer was this –

• On – 08:20 – leave the house
• Off – 08:30 – arrive at school (we had a nice carpeted classroom)
• On – 12:00 – go for lunch
• Off – 13:00 – back in class
• On – 16:30 – finish school
• Off – 17:30 – home to cook supper
• On – 19:00 – movie, friends, whatever
• Off – 23:00 – back home

This is a low estimate. There were two fifteen-minute breaks at school and some evenings I would be visiting friends’ houses, have a quick trip to the grocery store, stuff like that. And I think this is similar to the habits of most office workers. My colleague John in French class never had his shoes on. And why would he? If you know you’re going to be sitting in a chair for two hours I think most people would take theirs off. Do a quick check around your work, I think you will find the same thing.

Now let’s use the following metric for shoes vs flip-flops (note – this is for shoes requiring socks and these are averages)

• Shoes on = 40 seconds
• Shoes off = 20 seconds

• Flip-flops on = 5 seconds
• Flip-flops off = 5 seconds

I think these estimates are reasonable. With shoes, one has to sit down or bend over and either lace them up or pull them on with you hand. Plus if you are carrying something you need to put that down and pick it up again. There is also the putting on of socks (usually only once per day – I think?). All of this adds to the time cost.

So we have four “on” per day and four “off” (conservative estimate). That’s

• 240 seconds a day for shoes / socks
• 40 seconds a day for flip-flops

So between June 4 and today Oct 6 that’s a 124 days where I’ve saved about 200 seconds per day for a total of 413 minutes or almost 7 hours. If you add on 3 minutes a week for laundry we are up over 7.5 hours (the standard GoC workday).

And don’t forget the financial savings – with increased flip-flop use, socks and shoes last longer, flip-flops are cheaper, and the laundry costs are less.

Anyway, all this is trivial – if you really want to save time, go number two during working hours and not on your own time. 10 minutes a day over the whole year (230 workdays) is more than 38 hours – an extra week of vacation. Still, I hate shoes, I’m going to be in flip-flops until it starts snowing.

I think this is the first time in my life I don’t worry at all about what time it is. School starts at 13:15 on weekdays – pretty hard to sleep in for this one (no alarm clock – score!). In class I hardly check the time – it finished when it finishes. The few times I’ve had to meet up with people it’s been either right after school (my next thing to do) or it’s been the only thing I’ve had to do during the day. There are no early mornings for me – but I still wake up by about 09:00.

On my way home from school I stop by the grocery store to pick up some breakfast for tomorrow. There are two checkout lines and I chose the wrong one – the customer at the cash is experiencing a problem. The guy in front of me (he is the next customer to be served) and I are doing the same mental math – bail to the other cash and go from being first in line to fourth? I offer to hold his space and let him back in should the problem be resolved quickly. He makes the right choice and turns and smiles when he reaches the front of the other line.

It feels like ten minutes for the customer in front of me to complete her transaction, but to be honest I have no idea how long it is. Back home this would have annoyed the crap out of me but here I just stand there and listen to the customer, the cashier and the supervisor try to sort everything out. More exposure to spoken German is a good thing. Plus during the wait I notice that they have a robot that dispenses the cigarette packs.

So cool.

I think my unawareness of what time it is stems from the fact that here in Berlin there are very few things I *have* to do. When one is home there is a never-ending list of chores to do and people to visit. Work can go into overtime. I usually suffer from some measure of guilt if I ignore any of these things, but on this trip they’ve all been greatly reduced or eliminated. Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to go for a beer with my Ottawa crew, but the reality of the situation is that I’m here and they are six timezones away. Plus the items on the Ottawa list are very difficult to prioritize. in Berlin it’s one of seven things: surf, blog, write, study, pub, museum, visit – and the only person I can disappoint is myself.

There’s also the comforts of home that eat up time. I’ve never enjoyed movies and TV shows as much as I do with my new TV I bought last year. Here is Berlin I’m literally sleeping on a futon in the kitchen of a one-bedroom apartment with no TV and a bathroom that seems intent on killing me.

I’m under no illusion that I can stay in Berlin and my life would remain like this. After enough time has passed I would accumulate the things (friends, work, possessions) that define my life at home. And the cycle would start over. But I do have to report that I’m experiencing a minor Fight Club moment – by the end of the first month, I didn’t miss TV. I’m not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing – right now it’s just a thing.

I walk over to Hackeshermarkt to catch the tram. I manage to find the starting-station for the M4. Before today I’d been catching it three stops later at Alexanderplatz – it’s usually full and I would have to stand. Not today. I’m one of the first people on and I get a seat near the door. Fifteen minutes later we arrive at Antonplatz and on my way home I pop into my local to finish this post.

To the best of my knowledge the artist playing on the radio is not Canadian.

I like the names of the metro stations here in Berlin. Cottbusser Platz. Landsberger Allee. Kottbusser Tor. Mehrowerraoulwallenbergspringpfuhlbies Strasse. Qottbusser Dorf. The people who made the subway must have had a blast naming them. My favourite metro stations are of course in London. Wood Lane. Shepherd’s Bush. Cockfosters. St. John’s Wood. Some say the English are all dry wit. I say, take one look at a map of the London Underground to disprove that hypothesis.

I’ve always wanted to name something. A few years ago I really wanted to get some cats – mostly so I could choose what they would be called. Murtaugh and Riggs. Mayhem and Chaos. Castor and Pollux. I never could decide. The only living thing I can remember naming is a friend’s dog. I shouted out Franklin and she loved it.

I remember reading about a terrorist organization based in the Philippines and their name in English translates as the Moro Islamic Liberation Front. I can just see these guys when they were sitting around trying to decide what to call themselves. Maybe their leader already had a great name picked out or maybe they used some sort of multi-round balloting system where each round the least popular names were dropped except if one of the names had more than 75% of the votes then they would just skip the remaining rounds and declare that one the winner.

The one English-speaking guy there would have had his notebook out and he would have been writing down the names when he first saw it. Or maybe it happened later that night when he got home. He wanted to find out if the .org domain name was already registered (it was). Either way it doesn’t matter. What matters is that it’s hilarious and for that terrorist, getting up to go to work each day was that much easier because of how he could now answer the question, “What do you do for a living?”

More CanCon – I arrived at my local last night and the hit song Ironic (1996) by Alanis Morissette was playing on the radio. No surprise here – I think Jagged Little Pill sold over 30 million copies worldwide. Is it just me or is the only irony that none of what she sings about is ironic – except maybe the “no-smoking sign on your cigarette break”?

Eric Partridge, in Usage and Abusage, writes that “Irony consists in stating the contrary of what is meant.” And here is an example I found on Wikipedia “Sullivan, whose real interest was, ironically, serious music, which he composed with varying degrees of success, achieved fame for his comic opera scores rather than for his more earnest efforts.”

With this in mind, you can decide for yourself if the song is actually about irony. Here are all the the relevant parts.:

• An old man turned ninety-eight – He won the lottery and died the next day.
• It’s a black fly in your Chardonnay.
• It’s a death row pardon two minutes too late
• It’s like rain on your wedding day
• It’s a free ride when you’ve already paid
• It’s the good advice that you just didn’t take
• Mr. Play It Safe was afraid to fly – He packed his suitcase and kissed his kids goodbye – He waited his whole damn life to take that flight –  And as the plane crashed down he thought – “Well isn’t this nice…”
• A traffic jam when you’re already late
• A no-smoking sign on your cigarette break
• It’s like ten thousand spoons when all you need is a knife
• It’s meeting the man of my dreams –  And then meeting his beautiful wife

Personally, I think the song should be called “Unlucky”, do you not agree? Natasha, I’m turning to you for guidance here. Or should I stick to writing about sidewalks? Note: I’m preparing an epic post about sidewalks.

Am I the only person who finds smoking gross? I’m sitting in a non-smoking cafe, but all the windows are open and there are two customers and one of the staff sitting on the patio, chain-smoking cigarettes like they just got back from the war. Would they be so cavalier with their smoking if they knew how ill they were making the non-smoking customer (me)? It’s a nice day and I wouldn’t mind sitting outside, but now I’ve moved three quarters of the way inside the bar because it’s getting unbearable.

Actually he was smoking a cigar.

Last night I was one of three customers left in the pub before closing. The other two asked me if I minded if they smoked. Of course I said I didn’t mind – they were far enough away and I was leaving soon thereafter. I have to say their politeness was refreshing.

Every time the server lights one up I ask her to get me something. A beer, then a glass of water. Do you have a menu? I figure there’s less smoke being blasted into the cafe when her cancer stick is sitting in the ashtray and not sticking out of her mouth.

My previous seat by the window.

The smoking ban will eventually reach Berlin and I hear the winters here are pretty cold. I’m thinking all the windows will probably be closed for at least a few months of the year.

“What right has any man to become a perambulating nuisance—a moving smoke-house—a traveling volcano—leaving his trail of nauseous vapor on the air, which his neighbor cannot avoid, but must, perforce, respire?”

— From a 1853 NYT editorial

——

Update – the kid of the chain-smoking server is running around the bar screaming and yelling. He sits down at my table and starts up a conversation (he looks to be about three years old).

Who am I kidding here? I have no idea how old he is.

The kid’s father comes by an says, “I hope he’s not bothering you” to which I respond, “as long as he doesn’t light up a cigarette”. He laughs and goes back outside to join his friends.

Then the kid comes back and sees his picture on my screen. He starts pointing and yelling with excitement that he’s on the computer. It might be time to leave soon…

The weather has been spectacular for each of the past 18 days. There was one thunderstorm when I was in Rome that managed to shut down the subway, but that was at night. And last Tuesday it rained for about 30 minutes in the morning in Berlin. Other than that it’s been perfect.

Is it snowing in Ottawa yet?

On Thursday I was invited to a BBQ in the park. On Sunday at 13:00 I met up with Bénédicte and two of her friends, Janet and Cindy (Three’s Company just wasn’t the same after Suzanne Somers left) and we went to the Volkspark Friedrichshain (M5, M6, M8, or you can just walk). I had gone shopping the night before and purchased two sausages and two sausage buns to eat at the BBQ. We picked up some beer along the way.

What a nice display of beer.

So we get there and everything is awesome. The weather is great, there’s lots of people, and best of all one of the French guys has brought this game where you throw the big heavy silver balls and try to get them closest to the little yellow ball. It was sooo much fun.

You get two points if both your balls are closest to the little ball.

Anyway, so Leo is running the BBQ and I’ve got my sausages on the grill and it they’re all cooked up good.

BBQ! French-German style!

So I move one to the side (away from the heat) and take the other and go over to where everyone is eating. When I finish, I go back to the grill and low and behold my sausage is missing! I look over and there’s Leo. He’s just about to eat my sausage!

I stopped him just in time.

Other than the sausage mix-up it was a perfect day. Twenty-five degree weather on the second of October. BBQ and beer in the park. I even managed to get in a little nap. Does it get any better than this?

So I had to make a decision on how I want to get around Berlin. There were six main choices

1. Buy a bike and take the tram (pay as you go)
2. Tram (monthly pass 74 euro) plus walking
3. Walk everywhere
4. Remain immobile
5. Buy a car
6. Use a taxi service

The factors I had to consider were complicated and many. I will list them all for you now:

1. When hanging out with Berliners they all have bikes – my bikelessness might impact rendezvous times
2. The weather will not stay nice forever – walking and biking in the rain sucks
3. Sometimes I want to visit locations that are outside of biking / walking distance
4. The other people in my German school do not have bikes and are relying on pubic transportation
5. Berlin has an awesome streetcar / underground / train / bus system
6. In Berlin one can purchase a pass for 30 days (e.g. June 5 to July 4) or for the calendar month.
7. I’m going to be leaving Berlin for a few days next month (maybe two weeks)
8. If I get a bike I need to sell it before I return to Kanada
9. Walking is good exercise but it is very time consuming
10. The pay-as-you-go use of the tram / subway is about 6 euros for a day pass (or about 1.5 euros per trip within the AB Zone)
11. I can use time on the tram / subway to educate you with this blog or to read or to study the German
12. Sometimes I’m required to move large quantities of substances around the city
13. Right now I am of no fixed address
14. One usually sees the more interesting things on the trams / subways

So I’m in the pub around the corner from my house, typing away. I hit the loo and on the way back Diamond Sun by Glass Tiger is playing on the stereo. I can’t believe my freaking’ ears. Now, you have to understand that Black Velvet was a number one hit everywhere. It made Christopher Ward a mulit-bajillionaire. But Glass Tiger?

There is no real way to describe the experience (yet I’m going to try). It’s a combination of too many factors. The complete lack of English or French being spoken in the bar. Being so far from Canada. The fact that it was not that popular song to begin with. I only really started getting into music circa 1986 so Glass Tiger would have been on my first mix tape.

Diamond Sun was a good song – the first single off their second album. Glass Tiger faded into obscurity shortly thereafter. But the the previous song on the radio was also Canadian: Tal Bachman’s She’s so High. I’m not surprised to hear this one: it’s more recent and I understand it was pretty popular. But still, this begs the questions: is German radio required to adhere to CanCon? There’s only one way to find out.

On another note, in the year 2000 in Burlington Ontario, I saw Glass Tiger perform at a benefit concert where my cousin was the MC. My friend Nita and I were essentially hanging backstage with, Zappacosta, Glass Tiger, Platinum Blonde, and Randy Bachman (father of Tal from the previous paragraph – and also Taking Care of Business).

For some reason in my previous post I forgot to mention the best part of last night. On my way home from the bar I checked in on the doner shop we went to the night before and they were playing *another* Jean Claude Van Damme movie.

JCVD’s awesome mullet was a dead give-away for Hard Target but I had no idea which film this was as he was sporting his normal do. My only clue (and it was huge) was that Oscar-nominated Stephen Rae was the villain.

And that turned out to be enough for me to find the movie on IMDB.

What can I say about my first Saturday night in Berlin

On my way downtown I realized that one of the things I find unnerving about the drinking in public is that unlike in Kanada, the kids are not drinking your standard 341 ml bottles of beer. See, over here things are reversed – the majority of beers in Germany are 500 ml bottles and in Canada a person drinking from one of these larger bottles in public would be an indication of someone you might want to avoid.

I watched the Phillies win (they were up by 8 runs with three outs to go – I’m pretty sure they made it)

When I left the pub the neighbouring bar was playing Black Velvet. I don’t hear this song for ten years and then boom, twice in 23 hours. In Germany. Very strange.

And then there are these “alcohol cops” that go around giving breathalyzer tests to drunk people. I think it’s just a mechanism to reduce drunk driving but it looks like it could be effective.

Bonjour La Police!