NATO’s Eastern European Members

Beautiful German weapon sales of the week.

NATO

Because somebody has to admire them.

Military action by Russian-backed groups against Ukrainian government forces has started to nudge policymakers back towards weaponry designed to resist a land assault.

German Sommerloch Update: Office Chairs Incorrectly Adjusted For Many Employees

Especially for the ones still on their Sommerloch summer vacations, I bet.

Sommerloch

Sitting for long periods strains the spine. Many desk workers therefore complain about backache. Correctly adjusting the office chair can prevent these complaints, however.

„In vielen Betrieben gibt es gute Stühle, aber die Beschäftigten haben sich damit noch nie befasst.“

German Of The Day: Umweltunfreundlich

That means eco-unfriendly. Or in the case of biodiesel, this means “being so eco-friendly that it is eco-unfriendly.”

Umwelt

More starry-eyed government interventionism in action. To save the world from destruction by using biodiesel they have to destroy the world first by producing it. This reminds me of those good old communist planned economy days. And we all know how that went with the best made plans of mice and communist men.

Dem Biokraftstoff gehört die Zukunft. An negative Begleiterscheinungen dachte keiner. Doch die Indizien, dass vermehrt für das Weltklima wichtige Wälder gerodet, Sümpfe entwässert und in Ackerflächen umgewandelt werden, mehren sich. Nach Informationen der Weltagrarorganisation FAO dienen nur noch 47 Prozent der Weltgetreideproduktion – Weizen, Reis, Mais – der Ernährung.

I Thought Germany Already Had All Driverless Cars

Just try crossing a busy street here and you’ll see what I mean.

Driverless

But word is that only one in five Germans would be happy to ride in an autonomous car, according to a survey by Germany automobile industry monitoring association KueS.

I guess Germans just can’t stand the idea of losing control. Over the car that’s already out of control, I mean.

If we took the lead in autonomous vehicles, we could over-take the Germans, the Spanish and the French in a huge new industry. We just need to keep our foot on that accelerator – while browsing some play-lists on Spotify and sending a few e-mails of course.

Speaking Of Construction Projects…

So just let me get this straight. After one year Egypt has opened a major expansion of the freakin’ Suez Canal, deepening the waterway and providing ships with a 22 mile channel parallel to it.

Suez

Meanwhile, in Berlin…

The non-working airport, Berlin Brandenburg International (some prefer to call it Klaus Wowereit International), should have started working three years ago. It may start working in two years’ time. No one knows.

The most important thing to remember is German efficiency – both the term and concept – exists in our English-speaking world but not in theirs. You never hear Germans talking about German efficiency. Anyone who lives in Berlin knows why… While Germany may have a system for everything, Berlin proves every day there’s no system for when the system fails.

Dumb Question

“What Would Have Happened if Germany Had Invaded the U.S. During World War II?”

Germans

That’s easy. They would have ended up like this little Canadian robot dude who, like, just tried invading our country or something.

Philadelphia is the city of brotherly love, OK? Nobody ever said anything about robots.

Let’s be honest, whether fair or not, Philadelphia has a certain reputation. It’s a city where football fans booed and threw snowballs at Santa Claus. Baseball fans once threw D cell batteries (the big ones) at visiting outfielder J.D. Drew. And now, it’s where an adorable robot who was only counting on the kindness of strangers to hitchhike across the country was vandalized, effectively ending his summer trip.

German Sommerloch Update: Two New Mysterious Extraterrestrial Phenomena Found Near Berlin

No, not in Friedrichshain. NEAR Berlin. In a place called Großziethen. The Germans in this area call these phenomena “Kornkreise” and they appear to be designs or patterns laid down gently in a growing crop, leaving the surrounding crop untouched. By aliens.

Here is a picture of a German Kornkreis taken earlier this year.

Kornkreis

Needless to say, German Kornkreise are not spread randomly across the countryside but always appear near roads, areas of medium to dense population and Ortschaften (places) like Großziethen where there is obviously very, very little to do.

Two new crop circles have recently appeared in a suburb of Berlin and Dave Keating reports

First Sommerloch Monster Sighting Already Over

They don’t usually catch them, this time of year. But they had this guy in the bag in no time.

Kangaroo

Kangaroos in Brandenburg? Why not, they’re in Sauerland and Rheinland these days, too.

I do wonder if Germany’s nature engineers have thought this through thoroughly, however. Didn’t they just reintroduce wolves here reently?

Polizisten, ein Tierarzt und Anwohner haben in Teltow-Fläming stundenlang ein Buschkänguru gejagt. Erst Betäubungspfeile konnten es stoppen.