End Of Year Post 2017

This year it's gone by really fast. It didn't really feel like there was a lot of 2017.

Let me sum up what happened this year:

• Made one trip to Ireland (first time ever) in May
• Another trip to Singapore, early July
• Amrum (North Sea) late July

Three major vacations in one year were great. It's something to keep up, especially with one country being a new one.

We also got a cat, Akasha, in November. She must have been born in early September, maybe even September first, we don't know for sure. This cat was very shy at first but turned out to be very social, loving and playful.

On a wider scale, 2017 was a very political year. Not only was it the year right after a big American election, which Trump won (we will remember how misleading the media reports were, considering it was not unlike the Brexit vote), there was also a German election. It is not the election itself that was really the milestone in a negative way, but in some way I feel that the election represented the changes that Germany has gone through. It all leads back to the "refugee" crisis of 2015. Most people in other countries won't understand what this means for Germany, because in other countries, laws are different. Here, whenever people come, they stay. It's that simple. And the people we got in 2015 were, even if they were real refugees, very different people who, let's say it mildly, are at odds with the German culture. To put it even more friendly, it's the German system who doesn't fit to them, if you won't put it the other way around.

To be more clear: I believe we will look back one day and say: 2015 was the year it was decided that Germany will be changed forever. It doesn't matter that it was changed genetically. What matters is that freedom of religion, safety and especially freedom of speech will be affected because of very conservative islamic communities building up in the future.

Back to 2017: Even though the elections politized a lot of people and had a shocking result to some, things stayed the same basically. The reason is that there has been a stalemate for some years. There were two big political parties, one of which has been suffering losses for over 10 years now. The other big party is also losing, but stays the strongest party, and that means that the chancellor who got us into all this trouble will stay in power for another 4 years.

Away from politics... what else happened? Not much, I think. I would mention terrorist attacks, but now is the time to acknowledge they have become a boring *yawn* part of our lives. But I do remember they were new and unheard of in the early 2000s. I will not forget that. And whenever a politician comes and tells me otherwise, I will slap them in the face (in my mind).

2017 was in some way a standstill. My other blog I use to generate income has been standing still. I only write when I have to and I don't put much effort into it any more. But in some way I feel that's okay because I'm looking at the stock market again, it has some potential perhaps.

What is there to expect in 2018? Let's see:

• Turning a childfree life into a permanent reality
• A trip to Tenerife (first time in Spain at the same time)
• small trip to Switzerland to visit a cousin
• Probably many retirements in my main job, which will bring changes
• Weight loss (there have been many ups and downs in 2017 and now I have to start at a very high weight)

So far, not that much is planned. I'll see how it goes. Bye!

Why Do Websites Change Design All The Time?

Before I start: Last month I forgot to post something. First time in the history of my blog that I don't have a post for one month of the year! This is not good for my obsessive compulsive disorder.


Why do websites constantly change their design? Here is an example:

Hey, are you still using the "classic" yahoo mail design? Do you want to change to the new design?

NO!

Why does everything have to change every year? And why does it have to change to the worse?

In the last 12 months or so, the amazon associate program, google adsense, xanox affiliate network, my online broker and yahoo mail have all changed their design. And I liked all of them the way they were (except for yahoo mail, because that's a piece of shit anyways).

Especially when money is concerned (affiliate programs), you just wanna create your monthly reports and print them out for tax reasons. You don't want to get involved in new fancy designs, find where the hid the buttons you used to find easily, or even rename things.

I don't mind if websites get better, but can we just decide to stick to one design for 5 years maybe? It's really mentally exhausting, and on top of that, I am in favor of a slick design that doesn't need a lot of text and many on-screen elements or scripts in the background. Can we just have a simple design and keep it? Please?


Here is how I like a design:

Everything that does not have a purpose: Keep it white (no racism here).
Buttons: One colour (corporate design stuff)
Tabs: The other corporate design colour
Number of tabs, buttons, menus: Start with a small number, then spread it out when you hover over some of the fewer options... then it can get a little more complex, because it's not all on one screen from the beginning and at all times.

Just like in all areas of life: If you want something to be done, you have to do it yourself. Well, I can't, and I won't. Just let me do my stuff, okay?

AFD: Useless political drama

There have been elections in Germany recently. And oh, my god, there was so much political drama because for the first time, a right wing party called AFD entered the parliament.

In Germany, this is seen as a big issue, because Germans can't distinguish between right wing parties and nazis. Basically, everyone who is "right" is automatically a nazi. And when you take Germany's history into consideration, everyone is afraid that history will repeat itself.

Now, to be fair, this party has some representatives who have uttered ambiguous (whatever the spelling is) messages. You could say that they are fishing for votes from nazis. Yes. But that doesn't mean that the whole party (or all the voters) are nazis.

Funny enough, most people who are against the AFD, bring up all kinds of reasons why it is stupid (yes, "stupid) to vote for them. They bring up all kinds of elaborate reasons. For example:

• The AFD does not even have a concept for pensions and retirement benefits
• The AFD has financial / tax plans that benefit rich people more than poor people (the supposed target group)
• The AFD can't provide solutions to the problems they complain about

All of this may sound like legitimate critisism, there is just one problem. Voters in favor of the AFD vote for the AFD for very, very simple and straight forward reasons:

• To veto Angela Merkel's 2015 decision to let 1 million immigrants (labelled as "refugees") enter the country on a permanent basis
• To protest against the rising influence of Islam in Germany
• Most AFD voters don't believe the AFD will solve problems, they simply mistrust ALL other parties

On top of that, you should note that there are virtually no other alternatives to vote for if that is your political position. Let me walk you through the options:

CDU: The party of chancellor Merkel. She decided to take in refugees. You vote for the CDU, you support Merkel's decisions
CSU: A party that has a strong position against the intake of refugees, asking for an upper limit of refugees per year. The only problem: They can only be voted for in one state (Bavaria) and are in a union with CDU, making them basically the same party in effect!
SPD: The social democrats. They were in a government coalition with the CDU, making them Angie's partners in crime (or in a brave act of humanitarian efforts, if that's your point of view). Voting for them basically means you still support the intake of refugees. It is a social party after all.
Green party: They are very much in favor of refugees
Left party: They are in favor of all poor people and therefore not opposed to taking in refugees
FDP: A liberal party. They are in favor of a Canadian model immigration program, meaning they want qualified immigrants who are given points depending on how qualifiied, suitable etc. they are. The only problem with them: They share similar views on other political topics with the CDU, making them a frequent coalition candidate in the past. In other words: Voting for the FDP will extend Angie's chances of being a chancellor in a CDU-FDP government.

When you go through all these options, you quickly realise that you can either vote for a party that wants to have many refugees from Africa, the Middle East and whereever, or you can vote for a party that technically is against taking in too many refugees, but then you directly support Angela Merkel who will then claim "the electorate is on our side".

So this is why 12.6 per cent of all people voted for the AFD, the only party that is clearly against Merkel and her choice to flood Germany with mostly uneducated and sometimes criminal nincompoops.

I should note at this point that Germany has a tendency to mix humanitarian acts with "we need highly qualified foreign workers". This argument does not work in reality, however, politicians use it to fool the public into thinking that bringing in ANY foreigners is better than not bringing in foreigners at all. The reality is that many poor foreigners would love to enter Germany to seek asylum and gain easy financial benefits, while few highly qualified Chinese, Indians and other specialized workers feel attracted to a country with a complicated language that is kind of isolated culturally.

It's as simple as that.

The next thing on the list is the alleged nazi problem with the AFD. I see two options here: Either, the AFD radicalize themselves further and further until they are basically unvoteable by the German public (12.6 per cent is not the amount of nazis in Germany... it's people giving them the benefit of the doubt) or they democratize (?) themselves to the point where they become a right wing, but not radical hater party. Then, they can continue to attract people who have conservative views within what's acceptable in a democracy.

And I think that's what we will see.... it's all not too dramatic.

Stuck in limbo

Man, life is really annoying right now.

I notice that something is wrong with my neurotransmitters. I'm constantly unhappy, easily angry, often stressed out and never satisfied. At the same time, I'm trying to lose weight, which seemed so much easier a couple of months ago.

When I go home from work everyday at 11:30 (I'm a part time worker), people say "man, wish I had your life". Then I wonder: why is it that everyone feels this way but I can't even be happy about it, even though I KNOW that I'm lucky?

I'm walking through a goal-less and meaningless life right now. I make video game achievements and saving money my priorities so that I have anything to live for. The bad thing is that the video game achievements are shallow and without long-term reward, and saving money doesn't work because life always takes money away anyway. Crazy dentist costs, unexpected bills, being screwed over financially, wasting money because you can't find time to look for cheaper contracts. Whatever I do, I've been stuck at my current balance for a year now.

I would like to be happier. I don't want to say "I'll be happy later" or "I'll be happy as soon as X happens". I know it doesn't work that way.

Other people seem to be happy. At least they have this ability of laughing when small things are good, pleasing or funny. It takes me more things to enjoy myself.

I still get thoughts like "I'm falling back into a depression" sometimes. I can't escape it completely, I guess.

Sometimes I keep a "to do" list, but I can't work all these things off because I'm suffocating with the daily tasks. Too much time is wasted doing housework or paperwork or paying off another bill and stuff.

I also waste too much time with the cheap thrills I need. I need youtube and video games. No longer do I have a hobby. I'm tired all the time and not interested in doing anything. My weekends are so boring that I do housework to keep myself busy and get the workload done for the week. I would rather do housework on weekends because I'm bored and I prefer having more time to myself when I get home from work.

What would have to change to make things better?

• I need to go to a doctor and get my amino acids checked. More money down the drain, but I'm tired of conventional "take this pill" medicine. It's on my list of things to do, but I lack courage to explain myself.
• I need to get some long-term "things to do" done so that I can return to a life where I don't stand in my own way.
• I need to lose weight to the point where I can finally focus on healthy nutrition without having to constantly anger myself over too little weight loss
• I need balance... just don't know how to feel more balanced. But I've been wanting to really be alone for a couple of weeks. When people speak of this "lonely island" and what to take there, it always sounds like an emergency situation. But I really want to go there.

The only good thing I take from my current situation is a very strong confirmation that having kids is not ever going to work for me. I'm too overwhelmed with life as it is. I'm not even that much attached to life. Even though I might be pessimistic about my parenting abilities, and can't speak of experience, I know in my heart that not ever having kids is the right thing, the "rightest" thing to do. It really, really wouldn't be a good idea otherwise. But it still makes me furious to imagine that I would have to justify myself in front of family members.

Unbelievable coincidences

I have a tendency to be paranoid. Sometimes I think that things that happen to me are so unlikely that, if I was insane, it would be understandable if I really believed that someone is setting me up.

I know that it's not real. There isn't REALLY someone trying to mess with me, like a Truman Show or something. But I keep making these sarcastic remarks about when weird stuff happens because it IS really weird.

In short, unlikely and unbelievable things happen that just seem as if they are there to annoy and outrage me.

For example: Today, I wanted to write in my other blog. For each blog post, I need a picture, and I already had a picture in my phone. The thing is: In order to move that picture from my phone to my PC, I have to do all sorts of things. I could either use a cable (but before that, I need to remove the outer casing etc.), or I could send the picture to myself from my email and then access the picture from my email again on the PC.

It sounds like a stone age way of accessing a picture, and that's because it is. My PC doesn't have blue tooth and all that shit. I think there should be an easy way nowadays, but apparantly, not yet.

Well, let's fast forward a little: Usually, sending myself a picture like that is possible, even though it's tedious and annoying. But today, it got worse. I sent myself the picture without a problem: I opened my yahoo mail app, sent the picture to the same yahoo mail account, then opened yahoo mail on my PC's internet. The email arrived with the attachment, but yahoo mail is so slow that it simply didn't open the mail.

I thought: "Hmmm... maybe the internet connection is weak". But no, the internet on other pages worked fine. I googled the problem and found out that many people have problems with yahoo mail because "yahoo mail has 1000 scripts running in the background". I agree with that assumption because I noticed this before. The problem is: I have many important things running on yahoo mail. Not only all of my private and professional contacts, also some of my accounts like Amazon run with this email. So in order to change my email address, not only would I have to let everyone know, I would have to make sure I also change my email account with all the logins I have for other websites!

Back to the main issue: I tried sending the picture to myself on ANOTHER email account I have, this time with Gmail. Gmail is totally different, loads quickly and doesn't take ages. The problem here was that when I tried to download the picture on my PC, the download only STARTED, but NEVER completed. It was at one point stuck at 1,7 MB out of 2,3 MB, another time at 2,0 MB out of 2,3 MB. Whenever I tried, the download always "got stuck" at some point and I had to cancel.

So, let's recap: 

• Because my technology is super old, I have to resort to ridiculous means of tranferring a picture from my phone to my PC, both of which are centimeters apart from each other
• Using a cable is too difficult because my phone has protective casing around it, I can't remove the card, I can promise you that I would scratch the phone screen to death
• Sending an email to myself is the only option, however...
• 2 SEPARATE email accounts fail to provide me with the file because either, the mails can't be opened or the download doesn't work in the most "almost there" way possible
• We are talking about 2,3 MB!!! In the year 2017!!! That is so embarrassing that I even blush and feel ashamed for my own PC.

This drives me insane, especially when you consider that getting that picture is just a very small part of writing that blog post. It's not even worth mentioning. It's as if I want to leave a house, drive a car to the petrol station and refuel it, but when I try to leave the house, I get stuck in the doorway because.... some technicality... Some urgent repair in the stairway or something. Then I try to jump out the window, but the window won't open, even though it used to open just fine. And the same with all the windows.

Yeah... that kind of analogy. Oh yeah, and one of the windows ALMOST opens, but just to the point where I can't squeeze through.

So... yeah, I get the idea, if I really believe that someone wants to annoy me, I can go straight to the mental hospital. But at the same time, I have to somehow be content with the fact that this is just a REALLLLLY strange way of life that I have with REALLLLLY strange and unusual things that keep on happening again and again. I could write a book with all the strange, unusual, unfair and unbelievable things that happen.

And I'm not talking about things that just happen without a reason and don't ask for suspicion. For example, on the way to Singapore, I missed the connecting flight and was stuck in Switzerland. The consequences were unpleasent. I lost the seat reservation for the next flight, was stuck in the middle seat, couldn't sit next to my wife, had to stay at a hotel, didn't sleep much. But here is the thing: I ACCEPT that this is a normal incident. It's not extremely unusual. Some things happen. Missing a flight, or missing the bus, or having ONE thing at a time go wrong, doesn't make me paranoid. What MAKES me paranoid is when several things happen at the same time that LOOK LIKE they are scripted reality. When things that go wrong look orchestrated... to the point where, even if I try different things, it's NOT SUPPOSED to work out for me.

Just to make it clear: I don't mind bad luck once in a while. But it should be realistic. Singular occurences, not chain reactions of things going as if to screw over my plans. It's really a bad sign when I think about my own life as "this is unrealistic".

Today, the message was: YOU DO NOT WRITE THAT BLOG ARTICLE. I got it... and gave up for today.

Escalator People

When you find yourself on the magically moving stairs of an escalator, you don't want the situation to escalate (get it? escalate? because it's an escalator? Lol... I'm so awesome).

However, here are some idiots you will encounter in real life who turn your relaxing times of effortless movement into some serious stair wars.

Escalator People

#1 The Sneeze Master


The bible said it best when it said "may he who is free of sneezing cast the first stone". People everywhere sneeze, especially in the western world where everyone has to be clean and germ-free, and as soon as germs appear, everyone's defense is totally down and unprepared.

The sneeze master is a person who will sneeze in all directions while standing on the escalator stairs. What is the worst scenario for you? Slowly drifting into the sneeze cloud a person in front of you created, or not knowing whether someone from behind sneezed onto you or held his hand in front of his face. Either way, you will spend the next hours of your life wondering if your head is full of crap (not from the inside, on the outside) - until you find a sink to wash your whole head.

#2 The complete moron

This is the kind of person who always stands on the wrong side of the escalator. In most civilized countries, there will be a side for people standing and a side for people walking along the escalator. If the escalator is crowded, no problem. If you can't move, you can't move. But some people seem to make it their hobby to just stand there, wrong side of the escalator, and chill.

These people are dreamers who are completely carefree of everything that happens around them. There is only one excuse, although this excuse applies only to some people...it's the...

#3 The Traveller

The traveller has an excuse for standing on the wrong side of the escalator stairs. He or she is used to standing on the other side. It's the same as with road traffic. Some cars drive on the right side, some on the left (also known as the wrong side, because it's the opposite of the right side).

Escalator people who would like to just stand are supposed to stand on the normal driving side. It's just the general side of all traffic, whether it's by car or by foot. If you drive on the left side of the road, you also walk or cycle on the left side, and if you're slow, you stay on that side and let others overtake on the other side.

Travellers are not complete morons (see item #2). The main difference between complete morons and travellers is that travellers cause stress to themselves more than anything else. They will often recognize their mistake, turn red and explode with embarrassment, while complete morons just don't care.

#4 The Safety Fanatic

Do you ever notice how some people get on the stairs of the escalator, but their movement is as clumsy and careful as you'd imagine an elephant getting on the escalator for the first time?

It looks like this: Foot reaches out for stairs, then pulls back, then goes back out again, then the rest of the body follows in a very hectic and unbalanced fashion.

The safety fanatic looks like a village person who has never been on a train, car or plane before. The worst part is that they disrupt the flow. And they confuse you. If you think the person in front of you is taking the usual step forward, you might even bump into them because they like to leave an EXTRA space in front of them free. Extra extra, not just one empty step in between them and the person in front of them. No. Two empty steps.

#5 The Creep

The creep is a person who doesn't leave ANY space free. He or she (no, actually mostly he) will enter the escalator so damn close to you that you can usually feel his facial textures on your butt. It also raises your pickpocket alarm because their body parts will be all over your belongings because they are just standing so close to you that everything you OWN is in some way being touched by this person.

On another note, you can sense their breath, smell, obesity, whatever else there is.

#6 The Inseparable Couple

When I talk about people in public, I often refer to some kind of "blood clot", and this one is certainly the one in terms of escalator people. An inseparable couple is when a man and woman (boy and girl, girl and girl, boy and boy, transgender and nongender, bla bla bla) are standing next to each other.

Standing next to each other on an escalator is not a bad thing as long as one of the following criteria are met:

• The escalator is crowded anyway
• The person standing on the "no standing" side is staying alert and moving out of the way if necessary
• The escalator is situated in a place that doesn't need people to be in a hurry

Usually, however, the typical scenario is that the couple doesn't care. The two people are either so much in love, or so involved in a conversation, or so self-centered that they just accept that blocking other people's way is part of life. And I hate them.


#7 The Awkward Companion


Sometimes, when the escalator is crowded, people stand next to each other. Usually, that's tolerable, but sometimes, the escalator isn't even fully crowded and still, strange people are standing next to you. A catholic nun might be standing next to a punk rocker, a pedophile priest might be standing next to a little child, a drunk football fan might be standing next to a millionaire golfer, and so on.

It's just awkward when people stop walking and decide to wait NEXT TO YOU on an otherwise relatively empty escalator. I guess some people just enjoy the awkward company.

#8 The Wrong-Way Walker

Believe it or not, there are people who decide to walk up a down-moving escalator. In about 90 per cent of the cases, it's children who think they're really smart.

Sometimes, it's grown adults. Once at an airport, where the escalators are flat, there was a grown woman coming towards me, and I was wondering why. I was really, really wondering why. It was so damn obvious that my feet were not moving, yet she was totally focussed on getting on the escalator line that I was moving on towards her. It was only when her feet already touched the line that she realised that this was a worse idea than moonwalking the floor next to the machinery. So she eventually got it and walked past on the normal floor.

#9 The Staircase Competitor

This one isn't especially annoying, but I'll include him anyway. Some people are so much in a hurry that they would rather take the stairs because it's quicker than taking the escalator next to it.

While this is often the case, it's also relatively funny to see someone struggle so hard to get up the stairs, yet when we both arrive on the next level, we're still next to each other and the other person is out of breath. Pretty, pointless, huh?

#10 The Irresponsible Acrobatic

One of my favorites. This person likes to use things that are forbidden on an elevator. Like bycicles, or especially lovely, a pram with a baby in it. Lovely. Then they have to keep the balance and perform all kinds of acrobatics. The great thing is that, while it goes well most of the time, there is probably a certain percentage of fatal freak accidents every year, but I don't really wanna know.


So...which idiotic escalator person are you?

Total Confusion

Currently my life is a mess. I have lost track of almost everything that is important. I have two bank accounts, one of which I need to close, and in order to do so, I need to move all the in and outs of the account into the other. I also need to change the PIN because I can't remember two PINs.

I have lots of documents lying around. I can't remember how to log into the online banking because of the two accounts. I'm so confused with passwords and PINs I think I might need a PIN for my passport.

Then there is shit I wanted to do a year ago, like open a message board for my commercial blog. Haven't done that and all the comments from half a year ago until now are unprocessed (not public, not denied, nothing) so people must be wondering what's wrong.

I've lost track of everything to the point where I might even forget very important things. Even to-do lists keep piling up.

The problem is: I can't breathe. I'm so stuck with everyday housework like ironing that I can't get the "one time tasks" done.

It's not that I don't have time. I have plenty of it. But I'm exhausted to the point where I don't WANT to do anything any more. When I get home (which is around 1pm already), I can be glad if I can get ONE small thing done, like taking out the trash.

I don't know what exactly the problem is. It started getting impossible about a year ago when we had a water leak in our house and we were moving from one place to another at the same time. It was just too much stress, and since then I've always been in the "just get me out of here" mode. Not referring to the place. I'm referring to the situation of wanting to be past something... getting it behind me without having to do anything anymore.

It's like I have a mountain to climb, but I don't even know where to start. I also notice a phenomenon called "vom Hundertsten ins Tausendste kommen", which roughly means that when you say or do something, you divert or digress into smaller and smaller things.

A fictional example to explain this: I want to take out the trash. A task so simple. But then, I notice that I'm out of bags. So I need to go to the grocery where they sell bags. But then it rains and I need to spend 10 minutes looking for an umbrella. Then I notice I'm out of money and need to withdraw cash. Then I notice the ATM broke down. Etc. etc.

This is what life feels like. It is especially terrible when I want to cook, because then I need to clean stuff, find stuff, sort stuff, and then I can basically tear my own stomach out before I can eat.

Going on vacation only temporarily helps... in fact, I think the whole planning makes things worse, because you find yourself doing more and more paperwork, tasks and chores.

Bye.

10 Reasons Why The Moon Religion Is Not Compatible With Western Societies

The following article is about a fictitious religion. Any similarities with real religions are purely coincidental. Don't come to my house to kill me.

The moon religion and its prophet Moe [insert redundant phrase of respect] are well known throughout the world. In recent years, moonists have been placed in a victim role after terrorist acts commited by moonists caused lots of resentments and hate of non-moonists towards moonists in general. This automatism has spread to the point that whenever a moonist terrorist attack occurs, the first thing politicians do is make sure that people "do not generalize/discriminate against moonists". It's not even about the dead people any more, it's first and foremost about the feelings and the peace of mind of members of the religion in whose name the attack is carried out.

But let's not talk about the bad T-word (terrorism). There are plenty of reasons apart from this very controversial subject why the moon religion is not compatible with western values. It is important to point out these problems because if we only think about terrorism, all moonists have to do is claim that "this has nothing to do with moonism" and quickly all critizism can be discarded. Which is what the media are trying to do!

Here are 10 reasons why we shouldn't let moonism off the hook:

Hate towards the Star Religion

Of the three major (fictitious!) religions we are often talking about, the star religion has a lot of problems with the moon religion, not so much with the cross religion.

Many moonists hate the starists. They say that the starists deserved to die in the holocube when the evil moustache man came and gassed them. They say they are greedy people who can't even share their home land with moonists who claim its their home land. The world is just too small for some people to live together.
It's a very complicated subject and it would be wrong to come to much too quick conclusions. But the main point is that in the name of religion, people will always kill each other, even over a piece of "sacred" land.

Anyway, even though this is a regional conflict, moonists all over the world like to show very openly that they are star haters. And in a western society, that's unacceptable. That's why we have laws against hate towards moonists, or any religion for that matter. However, it's hard for crossists to point out the hate that moonists have, especially when the crossists feel guilty about the holocube and think they shouldn't be the ones judging over right and wrong... because they did things so horrible they never deserve to speak up again. Ever!

Hate towards homosexuals

Religions are very clear on the topic of homosexuality. That's why none of the major religions welcome any homosexuals. And homosexuals who think they can live in accordance with religion are just delusional. But that doesn't mean that they don't have the right to live freely. It's up to them what they do in their free time, as long as they don't disturb other people.

At least that's what we believe in the West. The problem is, what do we do if, say, a million moonists enter the country within a couple of months and bring their values with them? What if they suddenly don't like to see same-sex people kissing in the streets? Well, one thing is for sure, there is a lot of potential for trouble there.

On a different note: Pity those poor people who happen to be born into the moon religion and turn out to be gay, only to be stuck between being gay and being an acceptable believer in the eyes of the family.

Hate towards people leaving the religion

Just like other items on this list, moonism technically has a death sentence for apostacy. The death penalty is only not carried out in some societies because of (secular) laws made by non-moonist governments. We can be happy for that. But it's not necessary to kill someone over leaving the religion anyway. Most people who have found out that moonism isn't for them aren't going to leave the religion with a bang anyway.

The consequences would be dire. Being disowned, never speaking to your family ever again, being outcast. There are enough ways to make people just...fit in and pretend.

However, if people ever make a big deal out of leaving the religion, it can cause severe problems. That's another reason why moonism is not compatible with western societies. Because western societies have freedom of religion and freedom of speech, and that implies that you are free to say what you believe in and what you no longer believe in.

No individualism

This one is a little more abstract, and not everyone notices it. But it's a major point and a big difference between crossism and moonism. The big prophet and saviour of the cross religion, his name is Jay Jay, said something along the lines of: "You can only go to heaven through me, and it's something between you and me only, yo!".

Crossists believe not only in a personal relationship between them and the supernatural, they also think it's a one-on-one thing. It's only each person indiviudally. In moonism, however, it's always a clan thing or a family thing. You are responsible for your children, for their deeds, their sins. Or if you see a brother, sister (member of your faith) do wrong, you must correct them or you are also sinful.

This clashes heavily with individualism in the west. We believe that everyone is responsible for their own actions, and we also accept that anyone could be right or wrong about their religion. But moonists constantly feel like they need to correct everyone's behaviour and put a stop to whatever is wrong. Constant nagging, constant facebook posts about who is more righteous, yada yada.

I know someone from another country who kissed a girl (girl-on-girl action) and a moonist came by and called the police over it. Luckily they lived in a free western country, but you see what these moonists are capable of when they believe they are right...even in a western country!

Just imagine what else they are capable of!

No marriage between moonists and non-believers

A marriage or even a relationship between a moonist and a non-moonist is forbidden. As we have seen before, it doesn't matter if the moonist is actually practising their religion, because leaving the religion is forbidden. So if you're born a moonist (especially a female one), you can neither leave the religion without punishment nor marry someone outside your religion.

If you still stay in a relationship, you face the same consequences as the apostates, the other option is for the non-believer to join the religion, even against his will. In any case, this clashes with freedom of religion, freedom of speech and other things.

But when people love each other, sometimes they have to pick their poison.

Missing sense of democracy

Another big flaw in the moon religion is the missing ability to have a democratic society or to join one. Moonists have a very theocratic understanding of the world. The reason behind that is that, because they are so restrictive towards people leaving the religion, marrying outside religion or generally accepting people of other religions, they have a strongly embedded idea that "Elly knows best". Elly is their god, by the way.

This way of thinking usually translates into "we don't need people's opinions, god has already decided what is right". This leads to everything being carried out in the name of their religion, while other opinions, especially the ones disagreeing, are neglected or punished.

If a democracy is infiltrated by people who believe their god knows everything and should decide on everything, chaos follows. Sadly, you can't just "explain" why democracy is so important, because moonists usually don't know what it's like to suffer from surpression. Here are some examples: They don't know what its' like for moonist to be forced to join a different religion to get married to someone they love, because only they force it on other people. They don't know what it's like to get killed because you are a starist (because they aren't), they don't get punished for leaving their religion because they wouldn't even dream of it, and so on.

Democracy is the certainty that your values will be respected individually. However, if a large portion of people believe that your values don't matter because of a diety, then you can just forget about yourself.

Exploiting the trust of gullible crossists

Especially in the wake of refugee / migrant crisis, there is a very nasty, ugly face showing up. It's the face of moonists simply abusing the help of crossists. Crossists, who suffer from a double guilt complex due to the death of Jay Jay and the events of the holocube, will try to help everyone in need. They are masochistic in a way, doing everything they can to help other people to feel good about it, even if the helpees will spit in their faces afterwards.

The thing about moonism is, it says somewhere in the holy scripture that you should lie to, abuse and eploit the non-believers (called Coffee-r) whenever you can. Non-believers, the text goes on to say, are worth less than pigs.

What the crossists usually don't know is that the text actually says these things, and that the moonists in fact don't have a very positive opinion about their hosts. They just laugh at them and reap the (unemployment) benefits.

The drive for the afterlife

Crossists think of themselves as people who should serve others in order to come closer to Jay Jay, the prime example of a loving hippie. Starists believe in financial and other business-related success and diligence in order to do well for their society and make their god proud. Moonists...well...just want to die basically. Okay, that's a little exaggerated maybe. But their only purpose in life, it seems, is to bring as many babies into the world as possible, and everything else is just in god's hands anyway.

Are you going to be a successful person? Don't know, god will handle it. Will you be rich? Who cares, it's not up to me anyway. Will I be a respectable person or a criminal? Well, only God knows.

There is a reason why many moonists have poor education where I live. And no, it has nothing to do with genetics, that would be racist to think. But the upbringing of those people, along with the Koffee-r exploitation, goes a long way.

In the end, this life isn't good enough. They only care about the next life, so they take the victim role and get comfortable with it.

The bad position of the woman

If you read up on the literal texts of the main religions, they all don't seem to get along with women. However, it's not all about the texts, it's about how much people follow these texts. Sadly, when it comes to moonism, believers are still caught in the dark ages.

Women are exactly worth half as much as men. When a woman is in court, her testimony is only with 50 per cent of that of a man. If a woman is raped, she needs several male witnesses to confirm that a rape took place, if that's not followed then she is a whore. Sorry, just telling what it says there.

Now, in real life, it's often a lot more subtle. A woman should always follow her man, obey her man, little things like that. What it boils down to is that the woman is always the #2 person in the relationship. In western societies, that's not acceptable, but as long as women are stupid enough to let this happen to themselves, and as long as men can cite religious texts to validate that their violence against women is justified, everything is cool for moonists... at least the men.

The bottom line: No acceptance of western values

The bottom line of all my points is: Moonists can't live in the west unless they totally adapt. Even if we cross out terrorism, there are more than enough problems. Moonists, true moonists, don't accept western values. Freedom of speech, equality of men and women, freedom of religion, freedom of sexuality, all these things don't matter.

Those moonists who are tolerating towards other people are only tolerant to the extent in which they are forced to tolerate. Did you ever ask yourself how tolerant your moonist mother/father/cousin would actually be if they were tested? If they had one of their children leave the religion of the moon, marry outside the religion, become openly gay etc.?

I believe that you are either a moonist deep down or you're actually not a moonist at all. You're either a hardcore follower or you actually don't really believe these things, you just follow a rough guideline of what you think gives your life some sort of structure, but in reality you have long discarded everything that doesn't work with your sense of morality , even though it is written in the text.

But hey... I'm only talking fiction here. It's all cool.

Underworld Football Manager: Bessere Spieler

Ein deutscher Guide für Underworld Football Manager (Stand: März 2017)

Vorwort

Diese Anleitung soll euch helfen, sehr starke Spieler zu kriegen. Ich bin ein erfahrener Manager bei Underworld Football Manager, und ich war auch schon mal 4. in Liga A, weiß also, wovon ich rede.

Der Trick, um starke Spieler zu bekommen, ist, sie jung und auf niedrigem Level zu bekommen und dann schnell und radikal hochzuleveln!

Warum das so wichtig ist und wie alles funktioniert, seht ihr jetzt:

Wie man sehr gute Spieler bekommt

Damit ihr richtig starke Spieler bekommt (nicht nur vom Level her, sondern von den tatsächlichen Werten, z.B. Schusstechnik), müsst ihr die Spieler von Grund auf hoch trainieren!

Es hat sich gezeigt, dass es besser ist, Spieler mit niedrigem Level hoch zu pushen, als Spieler zu nehmen, die schon von Anfang an Level 25-30 sind.

Gleichzeitig sollen die Spieler so jung wie möglich sein. Am besten 17 Jahre alt, aber auch 18 und 19 ist noch okay.

Es gibt zwei Wege, um an solche Spieler zu kommen: Auktionshaus (da gibt es welche ab Level 10 bis 14, die sich lohnen) und auf dem Bolzplatz (da schon ab Level 1). Egal, wofür ihr euch entscheidet: Nehmt nicht die Spieler mit sehr hohem Level. Spieler größer als ca. Level 18 lohnen sich kaum, weil sie nicht optimiert sind. Mit anderen Worten: Hättet ihr die Spieler schon auf Level 1, 5 oder 10 bekommen, hätte ihr sie viel besser (=viel spezialisierter) trainieren können.

Welche Faktoren sind wichtig?

Früher war es wichtig, Spieler zu bekommen, die silber oder sogar gold waren... jetzt nicht mehr.

Wichtig ist nicht, ob ein Spieler Bronze, Silber, Gold oder so ist... sogar ohne Färbung können sie gut sein. Ihr könnt auch "schwache Spieler" nehmen und ihnen Items geben, damit sie Talent, Spielverständnis etc. bekommen. Folgende Faktoren spielen beim Hochleveln eine Rolle:

• Talent: Sehr wichtiger Wert. Entscheidet darüber, wie lange es dauert, bis ein Spieler zur Aufwertung braucht. Ich habe schon Talent 100 gesehen, aber alles größer als 50 ist ein guter Start.
• Labor: Genau dasselbe wie Talent, nur eben als allgemeines Gebäude, welches für alle Spieler gilt. Gutes Talent eines Spielers und guter Level eines Labors bedeutet maximale Geschwindigkeit beim Hochleveln
• Die Fähigkeit "Einzeltrainer" (Universität): Ein sehr wichtiger Faktor. Benutzt eure Fähigkeitspunkte in der Uni hierfür! Dadurch werden Spieler beim Hochleveln noch stärker, und das werdet ihr bei Level 30-40 ganz besonders brauchen!
• Alter: Je jünger ein Spieler ist, desto häufiger könnt ihr ihn hochleveln, bevor er älter und schwächer wird, was ab dem Alter von 30 Jahren leider passiert. Bei manchen Spielern lohnt es sich nicht, sie auf Level 40 zu bringen, wenn sie vorher schon zu alt werden! Denkt auch daran: Es gibt jetzt das Item "künstliches Herz", was ihr benutzen solltet, um sehr starke Spieler bei unter 30 Jahren zu halten (kann man aber nur zwei Mal pro Spieler machen)
• Bolzplatz-Level: Je höher euer Gebäudelevel beim Bolzplatz, desto mehr Talent haben die Spieler im Durchschnitt.

Wie bekomme ich die Spieler?

Früher war der effektivste Weg eine gute Agentur beim Bolzplatz. Damals konnte man noch Einfluss darauf nehmen, welchen Level die Spieler haben. Das ist jetzt nicht mehr so. Zwar geben die teuren Agenturen dort mehr Spieler, die silber oder gold sind, aber diese Spieler haben leider oft einen zu hohen Start-Level, so dass ich diese Agenturen überhaupt nicht mehr benutze. Sonst bringt es nichts, weil die Werte sehr schlecht sind im Vergleich zu selbst trainierten Spielern.

Ich bin inzwischen so weit, dass ich nur die billigsten 4-5 Agenturen im Bolzplatz benutze. Die Spieler dort haben bei mir zwar nur manchmal ein Talent von 45-65, aber damit kann ich gut arbeiten, wenn ich z.B. das Item "Ideenhut" aus dem Pfandleihhaus benutze. Diese Spieler kann ich schon auf Level 1 bekommen! Wichtig: Wenn ihr solche Items benutzt, dann gleich am Anfang, denn Items wie "Ideenhut" steigern den Wert am Anfang mehr (wenn die Spieler "braun" sind. Bei Bronze, Silber und Gold ist die Steigerung nur minimal).

Das Auktionshaus ist auch eine Möglichkeit. Man kann zwar keine Spieler ab Level 1-9 bekommen, sondern nur ab Level 10, aber manche dieser Spieler haben dann auch ein Talent von über 70, was schon sehr gut ist. Auch dir übrigen mentalen Werte sind sehr solide und es gibt mindestens Silber-Spieler.

Wichtig ist, dass ihr immer junge Spieler nimmt, also am besten 17-19 Jahre alt. Und bei der Auktion müsst ihr viel Geduld haben! Bietet nur mit, wenn ihr euch sicher seid, dass ihr genug Marken und genug Geld habt und dass ihr den Spieler wirklich wollt!

Was mache ich ganz konkret mit den Spielern?

Jetzt kommt der wichtigste Teil. Ihr müsst die Spieler zunächst spielen lassen. Am Anfang dauert es bei manchen Spielern nur ein einziges Spiel, bis sie bereit sind zum Level Up (Aufwertung). Je höher der Level wird, umso mehr Spiele muss ein Spieler dann machen.

WICHTIG: Bei jedem Spieler müsst ihr euch für einen Zielwert entscheiden, also ein Wert, den ihr IMMER erhöhen werdet. In Liga A wird dies meistens so umgesetzt:

• Torhüter werden IMMER in "Torwart" gestärkt
• Verteidiger werden IMMER in "Zweikampf" gestärkt
• Mittelfeldspieler und Stürmer werden IMMER in "Schusstechnik" gestärkt

Natürlich kann man auch andere Werte wählen (aber dann bitte konsequent dabei bleiben). Interessant ist auch, dass ihr zum Beispiel "Passen" noch stärker verbessern könnt, wenn ihr "Verteidigung" + "Strategie" kombiniert.

Wenn ihr also beim Aufwerten eurer Spieler die Fähigkeiten wählt, dann wählt zuerst die, die ihr IMMER nehmen wollt, und dann noch restliche Fähigkeiten, am besten so, dass die mentalen Werte (Fitness, Loyalität etc.) gleichmäßig hinterherkommen.

Warum ist es so wichtig, sich auf einen Wert zu konzentrieren?

Dafür gibt es zwei Gründe: 

1. Exponentielle Steigerung der Fähigkeiten, wenn die Spieler höhere Level erreichen (der Wert wird jedes Mal deutlich stärker als beim Level davor)

2. Die Gegenstände, die die Spieler tragen, steigern einzelne Werte um beispielsweise 30%. Es ist besser, einen GIGANTISCHEN Wert zu haben, und den um 6x30% zu steigern, als mehrere Schrottwerte mittelmäßig zu steigern. Vertraut mir einfach!

Es ist wichtig, weil die Werte immer exponentieller steigen. Am Anfang habt ihr vielleicht nur "+400", aber später wird daraus mal "+100.000" oder mehr. Das klappt aber nur dann gut, wenn ihr bei JEDEM Level-Up auf EINEN Wert setzt, der IMMER erhöht wird. IMMER!

Dazu kommt, dass der Wert, den ihr wählt, auch das passende Item haben muss. Wenn ihr Schusstechnik erhöhen wollt, dann sollte euer Spieler sehr viele Raketenschuhe tragen. Denn diese Items bringen eine prozentuale Verstärkung auf euren Basiswert!

Wie klappt das Hochleveln am schnellsten?

Wie schon gesagt, sind ein einigermaßen hohes Talent und ein gutes Labor hilfreich. Geht auf den Testspielplatz und spielt viele Spiele, wenn es nötig ist. Schaut euch auch viele Videos an, wenn ihr das müsst. Und wenn ihr keine Videos mehr gucken könnt, könnt ihr Gold einsetzen, damit ihr wieder Spiele habt. Der Trick hier: Wenn ihr nur 5 Testspielpunkte braucht, um die Testspielpunkte voll zu kriegen, kostet das nur 1 Gold!

Was ebenfalls hilft: Ihr könnt eure Spieler selber verletzen (mit einer LEICHTEN Verletzung), damit sie sich nicht schwer verletzen können. Dann können sie in dieser Zeit nicht ausfallen.

Wenn die Entwicklung im Labor läuft, überlegt euch, ob ihr Gold verwenden wollt, um die Entwicklung zu beschleunigen. Das lohnt sich aber nur manchmal, also seid clever!

Beispiel: Ihr wollt bald ins Bett gehen, der Spieler wäre in zwei Stunden bereit, um wieder zu spielen. Das Beschleunigen der Aufwertung kostet 2 Gold. Wenn ihr jetzt Gold einsetzt, könnt ihr schnell noch ein Level-Up schaffen. Während ihr schlaft, kann der Spieler also wieder stundenlang hochleveln!

Wie viele Spiele dauert es?

Ihr wollt wissen, wie viele Spiele euer Spieler braucht, bis er endlich wieder aufgewertet werden kann? Schaut euch den Ergebnisbildschirm eines Spiels an. Wenn ihr nach rechts wischt, könnt ihr weitere Bildschirme sehen, darunter auch einen, wo steht, wie viel Prozent der Spieler an Erfahrung bekommen hat.

Wenn er 50% bekommen hat, dauert es zwei Spiele bis zum Level Up. Wenn er 10% bekommen hat, 10 Spiele, wenn er 2% bekommt, ca. 50 Spiele. Daran könnt ihr in etwa abschätzen, wie bald das Level Up kommt.

Die 2. Mannschaft (B-Team) einsetzen

Es gibt in Underworld Football Manager ein Gebäude namens "2. Mannschaft" (B-Team), welches ihr benutzen könnt, um Spieler 24 Stunden lang wegzuschicken. Sie spielen dann im Hintergrund eine bestimmte Menge an spielen und sammeln Erfahrung.

Dieses Gebäude lohnt sich für euch im späteren Verlauf, wenn ihr eure jungen Spieler noch weiter fördern wollt. Irgendwo ab Level 25 (kann bei euch früher sein) dauert es extrem lange, bis ein Spieler hochgelevelt werden kann.

Die Faustformel ist: Wenn es länger dauert, die Spiele selbst zu spielen, die ein Spieler braucht, dann lieber das B-Team einsetzen. Wenn ihr also meint, es dauert euch mehr als 24 Stunden, dann schickt den Spieler einfach ins B-Team. Ihr könnt diese Strategie auch benutzen, wenn ihr wenig Zeit zum Spielen habt (Schule, Termine, etc.).

In Kombination mit dem vorherigen Tipp (ausrechnen, wie viele Spiele man braucht) kann man gut abschätzen, ob man selber spielen will oder den Spieler im B-Team lässt.

Was kann ich erwarten?

Schaut euch mal die Leute aus Liga A an. Achtet auf ihre Werte. Da kann Schusstechnik schon mal 100 Millionen haben. Euer Zeil sollte es sein, Spieler zu schaffen, die im Alter von Mitte 20 schon sehr hohe Werte haben, die in die Millionen gehen. Wenn eure Spieler dann noch auf Level 40 kommen, falls ihr so viel Geld habt, um das zu leisten, dann habt ihr bald ein richtig gutes Team!

Verschwendet euer Geld nicht auf Spieler, die zu alt ihre Karriere beginnen oder die nicht mehr lange gut spielen werden.

Ihr müsst auf jeden Fall die Zeit gut nutzen. Hochleveln, hochleveln, hochleveln. Wenn es geht, mehrmals täglich, später einmal täglich, und wenn es mit dem Hochleveln sehr lange dauert, ist euer Spieler hoffentlich schon da angelangt, wo ihr ihn haben sollt... im Bereich von Level 30-40, bevor er alt wird. Macht dies mit mehreren Spielern gleichzeitig und synchronisiert deren Fortschritte, so dass sie alle die Spiele gemeinsam nutzen können.

Es gibt sicher noch viele Tricks, die man hier nennen könnte, aber wenn ihr diese Tips hier beherzigt, seid ihr bald besser als die meisten in euer Liga.

Ein weiterer Tipp: Schaut mal auf mein Gelände (Kaiser Hannover) und schaut euch meine Anzeigetafel an. Ich spiele meine Testspiele immer gegen F.C. UGAO. Das ist ein menschlicher Spieler auf Level 209, der nicht mehr mitspielt. Die Spieler bekommen etwas mehr Erfahrung, als wenn man gegen Computer vom gleichen Level spielt. Es ist ein kleiner Unterschied, der aber auf Dauer viel ausmachen kann. Also wenn ihr ihn besiegen könnt, dann spielt gegen ihn.

Everything is out of control (life at the train station / headless chicken syndrome)

Yesterday I learned that the folks at the train station have less order and organisation than a pile of headless chickens.

I was waiting for my train. Usually, I'm there very early because the train stops at my station for a long time (it's both the end and starting point of the train route). To my surprise, the train didn't show up. It was very cold and I was freezing. Then, after the train was already supposed to leave the station again, but had not shown up at all, there was an announcement that the train would be "45 minutes" late!

Do you notice what's wrong here?

Imagine you are waiting at a train station for a train that usually shows up 20 minutes before its scheduled departure time. Imagine that train doesn't show up until the point when it's supposed to leave for the next station. Now consider that it takes the personell of the train station until AFTER the train is supposed to go to informer customers that it will be 45 minutes late, and consider how much ahead of time they must have known this... I mean.... 45 minutes!

So I had wasted about 20 minutes of my life waiting for a train that, when I got to the station, was already hopelessly late. It was so late that it could have been brought to my attention the very second I set foot on the platform. But nope. Who cares about the fucking customer, right?

Then, all hell broke lose down at the main hall of the train station. The display boards were going crazy. Various trains had different delays, and my train had displays on that went from "30 minutes delay" to "70 minutes delay" to "45 minutes delay" to "train service ceased" in that order. Nobody knew what was happening, appearently. Everything is crazy.

At that point, I decided not to put any trust in trains on that day, because if the service people at the train station can't decide whether there will even be a train or not, I don't think they have the competence needed to bring me home.

So I went to the bus station and luckily found a bus that was going the right way. It only took me more than an hour extra to get home compared to what I had planned to take to get home. But hey, at least I didn't have to get a room in this crazy city to spend the night.

It is actually amazing to believe that people whose job it is to deal with delays are acting like headless chickens when things don't go as planned. I mean, all I need is a clear statement. Train is coming, yes or no, and if yes, when. If no, fine, I'll take the shitty bus home. Just don't make it a wheel of fortune kind of thing. It's not my job to find out IF I'm going to make it home, it's yours. You stupid massafassas....

Trump Is President And Everyone Loses Their Mind

Donald Trump is now officially president of the USA. And everyone here in Europe, especially in Germany, is losing their mind.

I can only laugh about it. When I compare Trump to the spineless politicians in Europe, people who can't even say a single sentence in proper English without embarrassing themselves to death, Trump looks way better because he knows he can speak with confidence and doesn't have to be afraid.

Politicians here come up with their conclusions of what "can't be done", and America isolating itself is one of the things that supposedly "can't be done". Well, first of all, why are you so sure it can't be done, and secondly, why do you keep insisting that it's bad for America, but you as Europeans are the ones that are shitting their pants?

Could it be that EUROPE is afraid of disadvantages, and that AMERICA might be the one to benefit from harsh trading laws?

See, I'm wondering who's in charge here. From what I hear, this whole "fear" is just an attempt to manipulate people's opinion. Because politicians here are scared that Europe will lose out on a lot of money, goods etc.

On another note, I would like to state clearly that Trump is not going to install death camps, create a nazi army or any bullshit like that. It's all hype. Even a considerable number of latinos voted for him, and why? Because they, of course, don't like to be associated with illegal immigrants.

This is the thing I keep thinking: Xenophobia only becomes a problem when immigrants as a whole are seen as a bad thing. This also happens in Germany. We have a lot of problems with so called refugees, but everyone who looks different has to suffer now. If you're a black university professor from Britain, people will look down on you because all they see is another guy who might rape a woman or scream "Allahu Fuck Y'all" and blow shit up.

I'm actually glad that Trump is president now. He may not be a good president, who knows, but at least he stands for a lot of values that are dying now. He is NOT politically correct, he does NOT want to shut his mouth about the dangers of religion X, and he does not want to tiptoe around topics of illegal immigration, terrorism etc.

In Germany, the taboo-isation is so complete that you're already a nazi if you talk about "terrorist X came as a refugee".

We can't have that any more. Germany is at the brink of disaster, and the reason is that they are so traumatised about their own history that they would rather run blindly into becoming an islamic state one day than to even slightly risk becoming a nazi empire (lol) again (despite being totally brainwashed into guilt in school). I'm not saying that either of these things is happening in the next couple of years, but the birth rates of immigrants of a certain religious background and all other people in Germany are speaking volumes... and birth rates go hand in hand with the education and indoctrination those kids get from their parents.

At least emigration is still an option 10 to 30 years down the road. But I don't expect to be welcomed with open arms like Germans welcomed those people.

Also: I remember being a child 20 years ago. And back then, it was all TOTALLY different. I know how fast society can change.