Who am I to question a long English television tradition? In Germany, I mean.
Do you know who Freddie Frinton was? Or May Warden? Nope. Don’t feel so bad. If English is your native language and you live in the US or the UK, then you’re not alone. But a German would likely know the names, or surely at least know their most famous characters.
Happy New Year!
Beautiful German weapon sale of the week (this time with extra added bribery).
Because somebody has to admire them.
Or at least the national deficit is all yours, my German friends (and mine – I live and pay taxes here, too).
But there’s good news, at least. Sort of. It’s only going to get worse!
It’s a paradoxical situation: The economy is braving the euro crisis, tax revenue is making the coffers ring and the German state still goes further into debt. The public sector deficit climbed to 30 billion euros during the first nine months this year. First and foremost the federal government, but also social security and other benefits have gone into the red.
And economists fear that this is just the beginning. Billions of new burdens have been tucked away in the coalition agreement just signed between the Union and the SPD. Tax, social insurance and other contribution increases are right around the corner.
Hey, you voted this coalition government into office, Germany. Oh, that’s right. You didn’t.
Trotz guter Konjunktur und steigender Steuereinnahmen macht Deutschland Milliarden neue Schulden. Jetzt befürchten Ökonomen: Das wird die Bürger teuer zu stehen kommen – und zwar schon bald.
There must be something about the Christmas season that makes Germans want to take their clothes off, I guess. This year’s lack of snow?
While German police are looking for a motorcyclist who went riding naked through Münster’s Christmas market, A FEMEN lady with “I AM GOD” painted on her body jumped up on the altar and started screaming in the middle of a Mass on Christmas at Cologne Cathedral.
This “social nudity” is social enough already, if you ask me. Do they really have to introduce anti-social nudity now, too?
„Es gibt kein Argument, das eine solche Aktion rechtfertigt.“
Now that Christmas is over… Greetings from the Furred Reich!
“She’s lovely. It’s unfortunate she looks like a dictator.”
Ever!
Merry Christmas to all, and to all a goodnight!
I think it’s more like Goldfinger.
Or maybe Live and Let Die?
Khodorkovsky will make a statement to the media from Berlin later on Sunday.
Chodorkowski verlässt Russland – wie viele Milliarden Dollar vor ihm (Khodorkovsky leaves Russia, like the many billions of dollars before him)
PS: I think it’s really Edward Snowden in one of those Mission Impossible mask thingies.
The power bill, I mean. The Power Bill Blues, actually. Just like everybody else here in Germany.
The electricity prices in Germany are the highest in the EU. A household here shells out 1000 euros annually (approx. $1,370). The French pay half. The EU average is around 700 euros.
Is this what they meant by the Energiewende (energy turnaround)? The power may be renewable here but I’m not sure how much longer the money is going to be.
Well, at least the electricity prices in Germany will be going up even higher again next year.
Bei den Strompreisen gehört Deutschland innerhalb der EU zu den Spitzenreitern. Ein Haushalt zahlt mehr als 1000 Euro, der EU-Schnitt liegt bei 700. Und im kommenden Jahr dürfte es noch teurer werden.
Or Cryin’-Time TV, if you prefer. Or how about it’s-time-for-those-particularly-crappy-end-of-the-year-flashback-shows TV? Anyways, I got really emotional watching this collection of “The 25 Most Emotional TV Moments of the Year” last night on RTL.
Then I got an upset stomach, a bad case of the hives and had to barf.
Natürlich durfte die Sequenz aus „Supertalent“ nicht fehlen, in der Dieter Bohlen überrascht seinen Entdecker Rainer Felsen als Kandidaten auf die Bühne gestellt bekommt.
According to Semiocast, an analyst, Germany ranks 31st worldwide in terms of public tweets, with 59m per year. Germany’s 82m people have just 4m Twitter accounts. That puts it 22nd in the world, behind not only European neighbours like Britain (population 63m, 45m accounts) or Spain (population 47m, 16m accounts) but also Turkey (population 75m, 11m accounts) and the Philippines (population 98m, 8.6m accounts).
But they do like to google, however. Although what they googled most in election year 2013 is another matter. The number one German search item was Wahl-O-Mat, an online election tool that tells you who to vote for.
And Amazon didn’t even make the short list. That’s because it’s “designed for world domination,” I assume.
“Innovation erfordert den Willen, über einen langen Zeitraum missverstanden zu werden.”
Observing Hermann 