Spirit of the River

What is SmartSell? Fishpond New Zealand offers customers the option to pack their books, DVDs and games into a parcel (or more) and get them picked up by a courier. Fishpond will then list your second hand items on their website. They will sell it for you, send it to the buyer and you will receive the money (minus 17% fee) on either your bank account or your Fishpond account (which can then be used for future purchases on the site). My experiences with SmartSell Why I use it I decided that I need to sell quite a few of my books, DVDs and computer games but the thought of listing everything myself either by using Fishpond's normal selling system or by using TradeMe (which is a bidding site similar to eBay for New Zealand) wasn't a nice one. I've done things like that before and right now I don't have the time and energy to do this. I simply wanted an option to get everything out of the house and then receive some money in return. Fishpond's SmartSell pro...

To Lucy Lawless:  Thank you for all the work you have done and everything you will still do in the future - on the screen and off the screen. Thank you for inspiring people all over the world and thank you for being a positive influence in my life. The background for this post: I was just reading a list about 100 things to do when you are sad and one of the points was to reach out to the people who inspire you but do not know that you exist. For me, blogging seems the only way to reach out in some way - in a way that the people who inspire me might not know about either even if I tried to get the link to my blog to them. If you aren't really lucky, it is hard to tell people how they inspire you in a way that they actually get to see. If I was a rich person, I could try to do some research about where my special people are at a certain time, hire a plane or a big advertisement space in a city and put a message on an "ad" or let a plane pull a message behind it. Bu...

My Hobbit holiday After following the progress of the making of the movie (by watching the production videos, reading interviews and articles), I was very eager to finally be able to watch the movie. I had planned a little holiday just for this purpose (and I needed time off anyway). I went to Auckland for three nights and had planned to watch the Hobbit at least twice: once in normal 3D and once in HFR 3D – to see the difference. A lot has been written about the content of the movies. Critics were quite critical and wrote lukewarm reviews. Of which I didn't really read any, because what do I care? I wanted to see Ian McKellen as Gandalf again and nothing a critic would write would have been able to stop me. I was looking forward to the experience and I have to say that I was not disappointed. I ended up watching the movie three times, twice in HFR and once in normal 3D on an IMAX screen. Normal 3D vs. HFR 3D So, did I notice a difference between the two for...

The one at the bottom is Seagull, the one who went missing. What would you prefer? A world full of birds or a world full of people?  Sometimes I feel like animals have a better understanding of the world than people - and they are more connected to the universe. They simply live their live - and birds are most likely very close to the spiritual realm. People, however, are just people. We worry about so many things, mess up so many things, destroy so much, hate so much - so if I had to choose, I'd rather live in a world with animals only! Seagull, one of my favourite pigeons, has not returned. I hope that he is still alive because I don't want to believe that he is dead and maybe even had to suffer.

Some of my readers might know that I have been in love with Japan since I was a child - of course, this love also includes Japanese music, however, not the kind of Japanese music most people might have in mind. Today, I would like to share some of my favourite Japanese music videos with you. Hikaru Utada - Sakura Drops Hikaru is one of the best Japanese singers out there, I'd have to say. Her videos are also always very interesting and nice to watch. My favourite video of her:  Colours.  She is gorgeous in this video and the lyrics are just great! " The mirror reflects the illusion of a spirit. Unnoticed, it picks up speed. It is said that it's okay to go anywhere. A broken wish makes everything all grey. Tonight, a flame flickers and you draw your dream. Isn't the tip of your brush thirsty? If there's no blue sky unfold your blue umbrella. Isn't that good? The canvas is all yours. That time I that I gave up, I only hel...

Xena : See how calm the surface of the water is. That was me once. And then  [ she throws a stone in the water ]  the water ripples and churns. That's what I became.  Gabrielle : But if we sit here long enough it will go back to being still again; go back to being calm.  Xena : But the stone is still under there. It's now part of the lake. It might look as it did before, but it's forever changed. (Warning: If you aren't good when it comes to understanding figurative speech, this is not a good blog entry for you to read) This quote from Xena made me think about how much we actually know about other people when we talk to them - even if we have known them for many years. If we would see every person as a lake, a river or maybe even as an ocean, we would always only be able to see the surface. Unless we get to know someone very well, we will not have any idea how many stones are underneath the surface (which may be calm or churning). If you meet someone who is v...

Wanted - ALIVE Unfortunately, one of my favourite pigeons has not come back from the race last week - remember Seagull, one of the most beautiful pigeons in the photos I recently uploaded to the blog? It's him who's missing. To me, this is more than just bad luck, more than just a coincidence - you might remember that there seems to be a curse on my favourite birds... so I better not choose any favourites anymore.