Introducing my car

It took bloody ages to find it and get the finance sorted out but finally I got it... my car... and I love it!

Only 11 month old it is truly a baby but it comes with enough space for 4 grownups! It has even a bit of luxury with leather seats, CD changer and very slick interior.

But what it makes it to a full grownup is the engine... a 3.3L V6 with lots of horse power for the highway... I would love to bring it on the Autobahn though!

And its name is Hyundai Sonata.

So everybody is invited to a test drive!!!!

Root beer float

Root beer float... sounds strange but tastes great. What do you need for that? Let's ask the chef of the house himself... my house mate and adviser in all America related questions: Justin
You simply take root beer (which is not a beer, more a coffin lemonade like Coke with a different taste. Available at Subways across Europe), Vanilla ice and a Guinness glass. Put everything together... watch the foam rising and enjoy! Delicious man!

About winter and snow

The weekend I spent in the mountains between Vail and Aspen. It is a fantastic place even if you are not into winter sports... but see for yourself:


That was a quiet cold welcome... with 30 mph on the highway heading to Vail.

Keeping in mind another famous person who died here a good 100 years ago... Doc Holliday, the famous gunslinger and dentist. If you ask "who?" just watch the movie Tombstone or Young Guns.

But finally I made it... to a place called Aspen. The winter playground for all the rich and sexy people in America and beyond. Exactly the right place for me to be!

sony vending machine

I was stunned to find this machine in our local shopping mall: a Sony Vending Machine. Yes... a vending machine. But not with sweets and soda, instead filled with electronic goodies. Of course paying a headset, an MP3 player or a PSP with your change would take lots of coins, so you can pay with bank notes or even your credit card! Amazing isn't it? But you can pay with coins if you like... has anybody 1200 quarters change for me?

Happy Paddy's Day!

Paddy's Day in Denver? I admit that I had my suspicions but was surprised by the party we had downtown. But see for yourself:

Of course he had to be there, but the question was who is he? As one fellow American beside me said to his child: "Look, the elf with the big nose!"

Germans! Even here! This is a Club called

"Edelweiss" which also organize the

Denver Oktoberfest... lets see!

And I met some old friends of mine who where there too, dressed up for Paddy's day.

I wish all of you a happy St. Patrick's Day,

Ekki

Ekki about Spam

Nowadays everybody seems to have an opinion about Spam. My neighbors is getting annoyed about all the emails he has to read through every day, politicians are concerned about the impact on our society and our managers getting angry about lost productivity.

So about time that I go with my opinion about spam public:

Ekki says: delicious!!!

Germans! Germans everywhere!

Colorado is a quite multicultural place. Maybe not as much as California where an Austrian can become the Governator... but even in the Rocky Mountains I found two German restaurants:



This is not the "Schwartzwaldklinik", it is more a restaurant with food from this area. I didn't try it yet but I will! Funny enough is this restaurant in a village called "Nederland"... sounds a bit like our neighbors in Europe, isn't it?

The "Westfalen Hof" would make more the food I would be used from home. I tried it today and I have to say... great! Thumb up! And it is even closer to Westminster!

And finally... my favorite bread over here. Again from the Black Forest area!

As I said... Germans everywhere ;-)

It is just around the corner

So far all of you thought I moved very far away... this is not true! I just moved a bit closer to the Westbrook shopping center!

Most of you know that I was living in the Westbrook Glen estate in Dublin. And now I moved right beside the... yes... Westbrook Shopping Center. So just around the corner!

Brian, have a look out of the window! I am waving ;-)

It is a small world we are living in!

The second car

A new rental car... this time a better match for a single like me. Seven seats were far to much for me so I switched to a 4 seat car. And this time an American one: a Chevrolet Malibu. Not too bad but I prefer a European or Japanese car when I finally go for my own one.

I moved!

I finally left my nice Hotel to move to Westminster (not in England) but close to Denver. I am sharing a house with my friend Justin who was living in Ireland for two years.

As you can see in the picture it is a very nice house I am living in. We have a huge garage, two living rooms, three bathrooms, a kitchen, office and even a guest room.

I hope we will find an opportunity to fill the guest room soon!

Bible-belt or not?

Many of you asked me if Colorado is part of this infamous Bible-belt.

Hard to tell. The only thing I know is that I had two Holy Books in my Hotel... the Bible and the Book of Mormon. I didn't have time to read either of them. But from the first glance my favorite would be the last one... It had some colorful pictures which the Bible didn't have. That makes things much easier when you are tiered or in a hurry to read it ;-)

Snow, Ice and Xilinx

And it started to snow again and left me with the question... why? Not why is it snowing... but why does it have to snow when I am moving? Every time when I have to move all my stuff from A to B it seems like somebody up there switches the snow on. Ah well... I willl survive I guess. In the meantime I enjoyed the view!


That is our back entrance in Xilinx. The footpath is heated that why it doesn't look too bad with the snow.

This is in the park which is surrounding the building. Very nice too... specially with snow!

And this is our Xilinx goose. Don't ask me why a goose... I still try to figure out! Maybe I should ask Altera ;-)