So, tonight’s my first night at the new flat. Because the kitchen appliances will be delivered any time after 7am tomorrow morning, and I don’t want to get up even earlier and drive all across town to get here.
Den bereits gekauften Wasserhahn können wir nun nicht in unserer Küche anschließen. Wir brauchen eine Niederdruckarmatur. Sachen gibt’s.
This morning our neighbour knocked on our door and told us she just noticed that all the house’s cellars rooms were broken into. All locks were cut and the rooms have been rummaged through a bit.
From our room, not much was stolen – of all things, my used photo chemicals are no longer there (wtf?) – and that luckily seems to have been the case for all the other rooms, too.
Police was there to record the case and to see if they can find any identifiable traces.
We just hope whoever did this does not return.
Today, Zoe and I made a bike ride to a more far away playground. She likes playgrounds. And bike rides. Whenever she sees my bike, she wants to climb into her seat and put her little helmet on.
We had an enjoyable afternoon together.
Einfach mal auf’m Sofa eingepennt. Noch gerade rechtzeitig aufgewacht um ein paar Zeilen zu schreiben bevor der Tag zu Ende ist. Ziehe jetzt um ins Bett. Gute Nacht!
I’m going to do my last film development in the current flat to wrap up this day. Four rolls of APX 400 @1600 in XTOL.
There’s a bottle of Flens in the fridge and Matt Day has a new video up. That’ll keep me entertained while in the bathroom.
Singing
The amount of singing we do at home has increased a lot since we got Zoe. We sing along to all sorts of German and English kids-tunes. Nicole sings way more than me, but I learned to enjoy it, too. I was – and still am – not good at all, but I think I occasionally hit some notes. I certainly don’t get that cringe-y look as often any more.
Here’s Zoe’s current favourite (German) song:
A new Mac
I recently wrote about why I don’t want to upgrade my Mac right now. But last Saturday, it stopped working again due to that graphics card issue and is in for repair once more. So, I had to buy a new one, because I couldn’t afford to go without my computer for close to two weeks. And I also wanted something reliable again.
I decided on a current 13-inch MacBook Pro, with a 2.3 GHz Quad-Core i5, 16 GB of RAM, an 1 TB SSD, the Touch Bar and a keyboard with German layout.
I bought it refurbished, because that was the only option to get something fitting within two days. Plus, the price was nice. Which luckily means, concern No.2 from my previous post is lessened. But the other points are still a concern for me.
Anyhow, here are some initial observations:
- The new high-resolution display is absolutely gorgeous (and True-Tone seems nice as well)!
- The trackpad is super nice. Annoyingly, though, I can’t trigger drag-and-drop reliably.
- The Touch Bar is not bad. I actually like some features. But while the software Esc-key somewhat works so far, it’s not ideal, as I sometimes either don’t hit it, or hit it accidentally. But maybe I simply need to get used to it more.
- Touch ID is neat.
- The whole computer looks and feels great.
- Only 1.37 kilograms for such a powerful machine is absolutely fantastic.
- The keyboard is very nice to type on. But I really hope it’ll keep working.
- The German keyboard layout is driving me nuts! I’m slowly re-adjusting, but it’s still pretty frustrating to use.
On the one hand, upgrading to a model that’s more than seven years younger feels amazing. On the other hand, it’s simply another computer I can do my work with again. But no matter how I look at it, I’m very happy so far with this new machine.
Kitchen update
Today, the kitchen-building started. Bernd and I put up all the cupboards, checked the worktops and planned how we’re going to connect them. We also made a list of things to consider and buy for the final – or near-final – assembly.
I’m happy with the progress we made. We’ll continue early next week.
You know you go out less when the 🍺 🍻 emojis are no longer in your “Frequently Used” section.
Der Sandmann hat mich heute Abend unterhaltsam in Bett gebracht.
Been always blogging in the last few minutes of the day recently. It shouldn’t be that hard to pre-write a few posts and publish one of them each day, right? But I write just in time. And then it needs to be something I can write down rather quickly, instead of picking a topic from my to-write-about list. Makes me being annoyed with myself. But I’m sure I’ll get back on track eventually. 🤞😬
Missed the Düsseldorf Photo Weekend
This year, I missed out on the Düsseldorf Photo weekend. Usually I go, but this time I simply couldn’t find the time. The good things is, though, that most of the exhibitions run for longer. So, maybe I manage to visit one or two in the next couple of weeks – especially those that are at a venue I come by more or less frequently. Here are some that interest me:
The whole family went to the swimming pool this morning. After being cold initially, Zoe warmed up quickly and visibly enjoyed playing in and around the pool.
In the afternoon, I went over to the new apartment and assembled most of the kitchen cupboards. I think I’m now able to assemble a METOD cupboard completely without instruction manual. Anyhow, this took me a while, and I only returned home in the evening.
Assembling a kitchen is quite the task. And the hard bits are yet to come.
March is strange. Everything is going right and wrong at the same time.