about an Austrian living in NY City
Archive for November, 2008
Vacation
Nov 27th
Finally I’m on my first vacation this year and chose the holidays over Thanks Giving to go somewhere warm. I’ve always wanted to go somehwere in the Caribbean so I ended up booking a trip to the Bahamas. Since no one wanted to join me I’m here all by myself but I’m looking forward to having a couple of really really relaxed days here lying in the sun, reading my books, sleeping, eating, drinking, sleeping, eating….. 
Here’s a first picture to make you all jealous and keep alive the eagerness
Netgear ReadyNAS NV+
Nov 18th
This is my new Network Attached Storage that I’m now using as central data storage in my new apartment. I use it as a media server to stream videos to my PS3, watch pictures on my TV, store and backup all data and also as a bittorrent client. It comes with 4 bays for hard discs and RAID 0/1/5 to prevent from data loss in case of a hard disc crash. I’m satisfied so far but this is what I found: To stream videos of proper quality (uncompressed DVD) you can’t use a wireless connection as the movie would judder but with a wired connection it works fine. And you have to update to the latest firmware to have the UI working with the Firefox browser.
My new neighbourhood
Nov 18th
Since it has been a while that I moved to my new apartment here in Soho, it’s about time to post some pictures of my new neighbourhood. The most important things to mention are the Patisserie (oh my gosh, what a nice smell every morning when they start baking) in the ground floor and the Pinkberry in the next block
Wiener Schnitzel
Nov 18th
This is the nice surprise that was already waiting for me last Thursday night when I got back from a busy week in Toronto. One of my favorit dishes….delicious
Toronto
Nov 13th
Tomorrow is already my last day here in Toronto for a while but I might be back soon. Here are a couple of pictures. The “Royal Trust Tower” is the building where I used to work for the last 3 weeks. Nice thing about Toronto is that all the buildings in the downtown area are connected with each other with tunnels underground. In this “path” system they have also all kind of shops and restaurants (according to the Guinness Book the path is the largest underground shopping complex) which means I don’t even have to go outside for my way from the Hotel to the office and this can be an advantage when it’s getting cold outside
Lucky with phone numbers
Nov 13th
I seem to be lucky with getting the right phone numbers lately. The first cell phone I got from my company was apparently a phone that was owned by an ex-colleague before. So I received all these calls from guys that he owed money and also some weird calls from guys that wanted to meet up with me….
Now I got my own private cell phone and start receiving automated calls like: “This is the second notice that the warranty of your vehicle has expired….”. If I would only own an own vehicle…
Did you know that…
Nov 7th
…the Canadian quarter with the Remembrance Day theme which was released 2004, is the first colored general circulation coin in the world? (see left coin featuring the red poppy on the picture below). The one on the picture that I own is a new one of the year 2008 which is now more scratch resistant than they first versions appeared to be. Since then Canada released a second one in 2006 which is the Pink Ribbon one (see the left coin on the picture below)
The first coins caused actually some troubles in the U.S Defense Department since they thought these Canadians coins have some hidden radio frequency transmitters. Read the article here.
Leberkaspepi goes London
Nov 5th
As you’ve probably read already either in the Austrian media or on other blogs, Leberkaspepi the famous Austrian restaurant that offers a large variety of this very unhealthy but very tasty kind of meat loafs , has now a new location called “Imbiss” in London. And of course we had to try it out
All the stuff you get is imported from Austria and you get all kind of Leberkas, Austrian sausages like “Frankfurter”, “Debreziner” or “Kaesekrainer” and most important Austrian beer (Stiegl and Hirter). Unfortunately they don’t offer Hirter from draft as the owner told us that the brewery didn’t think they revenue is going to be enough to make it worth shipping the barrells up there. But as you all know it also tastes good from bottles
The food and beverages were delicious. Only thing they really have to improve is the pastries and bread they offer since they were kind of old and cold. I would have either expected fresh or at least warmed up bread.
The staff there is Austrian so you can go ahead and order your beer using your good old Austrian tounge saying: “Nu a hoibe, bitte”
probably the most ‘powerful’ man in the world
Nov 5th
All I can say is that the right person for the job has won
Battery in MacBook Pro
Nov 4th
As most of you know, I bought a 15″ MacBook Pro 1.5 years ago and I’m really happy with it so far. If there wouldn’t be that battery problem….The batterylife is now down to 1.5 hrs when fully charged which is not really overwhelming. IStatPro reports that my battery health is only 56 % after 264 cycles, which isn’t good either. I guess I should have followed the instruction in this knowledge base article that explains how the “cycle” the battery every week. Next time I know…