December 3rd, 2009 by Anitale
Ce sont des questions qu’on se pose tous les jours.
L’argent et les moyens, c’est un argument. Il faut réfléchir avant réagir.
Aujourd’hui, demain, un jour. La vie est rempli de devoir et loisir… attend non, pas trop de loisir… sinon je me sentirais coupable.
Je ne peux pas regarder ce SDF et en même temps tenir dans ma main un sac avec mes derniers achats. Trois boulotte de laine cachemire pour tricoter une écharpe qui coute probablement plus cher que d’offrir une nuit d’hôtel à ce Monsieur…. qui me regard, qui me rend coupable, je tourne mon regard, je consacre encore 15 mètres de pensée a son malheur et mes solutions. Des solutions que j’en ai pleines la tête mais j’en fais rien.
Ce n’est pas mon devoir, je ne peux pas donner à tout le monde… attend, je crois toutes mes pensées sont trop négatives… mais bon, je vais en réfléchir… et oublier.
Jusqu’à je croise le prochain SDF dans la rue, que je regarde, qui me rend coupable, je tourne mon regard, je consacre encore 15 mètres de pensée a son malheur et mes solutions. Des solutions que j’en ai pleines la tête mais j’en fais rien.
Et un jour on tombe sur un tweet qui me mène à lire un article sur un blog, qui me mène à réfléchir… et bien: c’est à moi de réagir.
Un sac de couchage pour ceux qui en rêvent
November 16th, 2009 by Anitale
Tradition is important. Tradition is what rules our lives. Tradition is global, local or just family and friends. Tradition is just something you do and mostly you don’t even perceive it as tradition.
It’s just something that melts into your habits of life. Year after year you repeat what your parents already did and before that your grandparents and your grand grandparents and so on.
Most of the time you don’t even know why you do it.
It might be, that you attach great value because of your sweet childhood memories, or because you love reuniting your beloved ones.
One of my favorite traditions is Christmas baking. I love baking, I love it even more with friends and if I would have the chance with family, I love baking German cookies and I love sharing them.
November 13th, 2009 by Anitale
which is totally fine… BUT (there is a but) on the other side that makes me sad.
I haven’t been to my mothers in 17 months. That is such a long time. That sounds like I would be a political refugee. Being banned for lifetime. It’s the 21st century. I can fly to Europe back and forth 15 times a month… if I could afford it.
I haven’t visited her in 17 months because it’s always the reason that wins when it comes to my professional life. Instead of enjoying the free time while looking for a job I stay immobile. I can’t do a step left or right, no, I am stuck on the “looking for a job” road.
The day I find a job I feel so relieved, happy to finally be able to do what I want… but wait, I am in the US! The French days of 36 holidays are gone.
FOREVER GONE!
Might sound as if I would complain - probably - but that’s just because I think it is insane to not having visited your family in 17 months.
October 13th, 2009 by Anitale
English: It’s raining cats and dogs.
French: Il pleut des cordes.
German: Es schüttet wie aus Eimern.
The French say: It is raining ropes/wires.
Wondering why it should rain ropes. But I kind of get it. That’s what you see when it’s really pouring and the raindrops seem to join together to long ropes.
The German say: It is pouring out of buckets.
I think this is kind of exaggerated but at least it does not make up some weird stuff falling from the sky.
Why would someone come up with this strange idea and let cats and dogs fall from the sky.
Although wikipedia explains why it rains animals from time to time, it couldn’t help much witch the cats and dogs.
Which leaves me with an open question: Where do the cats and dogs come from?
October 13th, 2009 by Anitale
I surprised myself this morning.
I considered working from home just because it’s raining. Something I would never ever have considered in my old days back in Paris.
I love rain. I am Miss Rain!
But somehow after 1 year of rainless living I kind of got used to dry shoes. So I took my green little umbrella and walked over to the office.
I had to battle 20 long minutes. The wind just comes from everywhere. My umbrella survived but many didn’t.
September 29th, 2009 by Anitale
Having friends having babies is a good reason to start quilting. And I enjoyed every step. Choosing fabrics, cutting it, sewing all together, sewing even more, sewing, sewing, sewing and at the end quilting.
It was my first time and I made a lot of mistakes but I don’t care. This quilt is right now traveling over the Atlantic and will very soon become little Sophie’s Baby Quilt.
September 25th, 2009 by Anitale
It’s like an idea born under a shower drain. To bring this idea on 3 pages of a Moleskine you have to take a huge step. It’s the first and most important one. And to tell your best friend about it is the next big step. Step by step it moves on. And one day this whole idea has so much grown that it needs space.
And here we are. UserVoice made it to the top floor of a nice little building in downtown San Francisco. I have not picked my desk yet but I can’t wait to do so.
May 24th, 2009 by Anitale
The best thing about arriving somewhere in the middle of the night is the wonderful surprise you have the next morning when you first open your eyes.
So, this is the view we have lying in our bed.
What a lovely place. Blue water, snow on the top of the mountains, blooming trees and some beautiful blue birds that I've never seen before.
I really love lake tahoe in winter and summer.
Posted via email from Anitale’s life in pictures
May 8th, 2009 by Anitale
Tea time for me means Mariage Freres.
And Mariage Freres means Paris and its beautiful Mariage Freres stores. Something that I definitely miss here in San Francisco.
Posted via email from Anitale’s life in pictures
May 1st, 2009 by Anitale
Here are some thoughts on customer care, triggered by a bad experience that happened to me.
Customer care includes technical support, several kind of inquiries, shipping statuses, billing, feedback and much more. Customer care can literally make or break your business. Of course, the type of customer care your Website offers depends on the product or service you sell. Satisfy and help the customer before and after the sale/service and you will attract new customers to your website, and keep them coming back for more.
So, that leads me to…
…that bad experience I had with Eurostar. Couldn’t buy my ticket online because one of the address lines didn’t accept my address or any other address. Without address no ticket. And you know, if you don’t buy your ticket way in advance you can pay 5 times the price.
So I decided to call the Customer Care: A robot told me, that the number is no longer valid and gave me another one. The other number does not work at all.
There is that option to send an email. But you know how that ends. You will get an answer when the cheapest ticket is no longer available.
Since I am a twitter user I twitted a big HELP! No reaction. I thought a big company like Eurostar would perhaps track their name. But it seems that I am wrong.
And I kind of understand why they don’t track their name.
There is only one train going from Paris to London. That means there is no competitor. Flying is not an option. It would take so much longer and is more expensive.
Lucky Eurostar!
But what if there would be a competitor?
What if my tweets would have an influence on my followers and their followers?
What if all these people would turn to the competitor?
Customer Care means they should care about what people say.
Every company holds a statistic about incoming complaints. But most of the time people do not complain that way.
They complain on their blog, twitter, in their online community. That’s how they spread their discontent.
And so many companies can’t afford to destroy their brand’s reputation.
To make it short, I would have liked to get feedback and help. Lucky Eurostar! No competitor and I have very few followers on twitter.
I had to buy my ticket on my old Eurostar account. That means my billing address (that I couldn’t change) is my old address in Paris and I had to pay the ticket in Euro. Which means I’ll have to pay a percentage on my Visa card purchase.
April 30th, 2009 by Anitale
What is a community?
Am I part of one community or am I part of several communities?
Is a network a community? Are my friends my community?
Is it important to be recognized as a member of a community? And why?
My first step in a social network was my subscription to orkut.com. That was so many years ago that I cannot remember when exactly that was.
My first blog I wrote in winter 2002/2003 to document my New Zealand trip.
Over the years I subscribed to hundreds of social platforms. Global, national and local, private, leisure, professional, photo, blog, discussion, video, forum and groups. Did I forget something?
Whatever is important (or even not important) to me I can share it online in my social network, in my community. Sharing is easy. Most of my networks are connected to each other. It must be easy and quick.
I know, I did not answer my questions above. I think I have no wise answer.
I think I am part of several online communities. Big ones and small ones and micro communities within a big community. Sometimes I am more active and sometimes less. I noticed that a community becomes my network when I stay active.
The word “friends” need to be redefined. Or we need a new word for “real-they-care-about-me-friends”.
So, are my friends my community? Probably.
And yes it is important to be recognized as a member of a community as long as I share and contribute, I need feedback. I need to know that people care about what I share. It can be positive or negative, but I wouldn’t share if I didn’t seek for recognition.
April 11th, 2009 by Anitale
…most of the time. And I love my Chemex coffeemaker.
Does coffee taste better in a design coffee maker? Yes, it does. Because the pleasure preparing the coffee already releases all the happy chemicals in my body and drinking this coffee makes the chemicals last.
April 8th, 2009 by Anitale
It’s been a while that we were looking for “the” coffee table.
We had several tables in mind. I really like the Gae Aulenti glass table. But very expensive and needs daily cleaning.
I also love the Eames Elliptical Table. It should be an authentic one. But we never really looked for one. I don’t know why. Perhaps it was just my fantasy but not his.
What we had in mind was a factory cart. We saw it first at Anthropologie. Yes, they do sell furniture. Really old furniture. But so expensive. Abusively expensive.
But there is Alameda Flee Market. A great flee market. Miles and miles of beautiful furniture and old stuff and ONE factory cart, less then half the price of what we’ve seen at Anthropologie.
And there it is; industrial and old and I love it.
Posted via email from Anitale’s life in pictures
April 3rd, 2009 by Anitale
After hours and hours painting tiny circles I eventually came to an end.
I could have bought a painting but at this size it’s difficult to find something affordable and I would have disrespected my motto: “Do it yourself.”
See and download the full gallery on posterous
Posted via email from Anitale’s life in pictures
April 2nd, 2009 by Anitale
No in fact it’s more an evening dolce.
Posted via email from Anitale’s life in pictures
March 28th, 2009 by Anitale
Diamond Heights in San Francisco somewhere on a stairway is this snake enjoying the sun… or just waiting for us. I don’t know. I have no idea if this snake is dangerous or not. I just thought let’s take a picture as close as possible. I’ve never seen a snake outside a zoo or animal store. Oh not true. I had this neighbor in Munich who actually walked his snake in our neighborhood. It was a boa. 2 or 3 meters long. He fed it with small rabbits. Wondering if his boa is still alive. And also wondering if it’s allowed to have a boa at home. 20 years ago nobody cared.
Posted via email from Anitale’s life in pictures
March 27th, 2009 by Anitale
I have no garden and no balcony but I have a lot of windows with windowsills. Wide enough to put plants on.
Last year I bought so many beautiful flowers but the joy did not last; they died within 3 days. Too much wind and sun and apparently the wrong flowers for this kind of condition.
This time I read carefully every single plant characteristics.
Hopefully they survive. I’m confident. But I must admit I already made a cactus die.
See and download the full gallery on posterous
Posted via email from Anitale’s life in pictures
March 23rd, 2009 by Anitale
I don’t see that many school buses. But when I saw this one this morning I had to take a picture.
No sleeping kids inside? I had to check it. Yes, bus is actually empty.
Wondering how many times that happened before they came up with this funny solution.
See and download the full gallery on posterous
Posted via email from Anitale’s life in pictures
March 16th, 2009 by Anitale
Taking the bus in San Francisco is easy. There is a bus stop at every intersection. All you need is 1.50$ and time.
Sometimes you can spend 20 minutes waiting at a bus stop. You check the http://www.nextbus.com page every minute, you move with the sun to the edge of the sidewalk, you think about hot coffee. You get cold, because there is always somehow an icy wind when you wait at a bus stop.
But when you finally made it onto the bus it’s pure pleasure.
Uphill, downhill and beautiful views of the city.
Posted via email from anitale’s posterous
March 15th, 2009 by Anitale
A few weeks ago I got my piano tuned.
After 8 long years without playing I got so obsessed. I played night and day… until my neighbors knocked on the door. Very nice neighbors.
But anyway, either I stop playing at inappropriate time ranges or I move my piano to the other end of the apartment where it would face a concrete wall and no longer these ridiculous thin plaster walls. I never understood why plaster walls are used to separate two apartments. The bathroom from the laundry room - okay, but not two rooms where intimacy is on the top of the list. I can hear my neighbor cough when I lay in my bed. Not cool.
I moved the piano.
I’m still obsessed and play night and day. BUT most of the time with the celeste pedal. I don’t want to bother my neighbors with practicing. And all I do is practicing. I’m getting better but it will take time.
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