Oliver Thylmann’s Thoughts

Well my bank recently send me a mail saying that my brokerage service, Brokerage 24 from the Deutsche Bank 24 (somebody smoked something again there when they just started putting 24 at the end of everything), would be renamed to MaxBlue. Wow. What a name. It would actually be the same thing with added features. Cool enough. I already suspect that they are merging Brokerage 24 with their failed venture moneyshelf.de. Anyway.

So what do we have. I went to http://www.maxblue.de and this is a totally stupid looking web site. Like coming soon with a standard counter on it. I already wanted to scream that they do not have the domain to the name when I looked it up at geektools.com and hey, it belongs to them. I am _really_ not sure if that is better though.

MaxBlue.com was registered by the Deutsche Bank in London.

Well ok. I have to admit. It is better then anderesen consulting who renamed themselve accenture and did not even have all the domains while saying that they checked if they were free in their press release. YOU NEED TO REGISTER THEM NOT CHECK!!!

God.

That actually says it all. The bigger they get, the more pain they are. This counts for the company currently responsible for my internet connection which says that they have load problems … ok … BUT SINCE THURSDAY?!?!? They are also sending the bills to the wrong people, which is just as stupid.

Then there is a hosting company which is being an enormous pain to cancel an account with them and get the domain moved away from them. Of course reaching them to sign up is no problem but you have this very special non-free number where you hang in line for 30 minutes before somebody tells you that the person responsible for that is not there. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

I need to de-register a company in the US which has been an ongoing effort for some time and you would have thought that if you tell the people: “Send me everything I need and bill everything to this Visa card” that things would not take over a month. Well nothing yet. Another phone call.

Well back to business. Grr…

Hi Everyone,

I am back under the living with the bed full of candy. We just had Karneval in Aachen, which is somewhat similar to Karneval in Rio just a bit more foolish and less naked. The parade started at 1300 which was when we started drinking beer, screaming, shouting, having loads of fun. OCHER ALAAF is what you are shouting here in Aachen by the way. Ocher would be people from Aachen in the local dialect. Alaaf is just … emm… what you scream on Karneval.
The city was full full full with hundreds of people in front of our appartment on the main market (did I already tell you I live on the main square of Aachen?). The parade took about 3 hours. There is still a lot of screaming and musik outside of my window and it will probably continue throughout the night. I presonally slept for 2 hours after 2 liters of beer which is something that my body is not used to between 13:00 and 17:00 I would probably be at 4 liters now if we had not decided to stop the party for a bit and possible pick up at night again. I probably shouldn’t have allowed my body to relax
As another note I am working on my own style for my journal which is really an interesting thing to do. And I like some of the basics from which I started so much that I will probably use it for my own pages which I am just starting.

I have a new image up which is actually a clipping from my picture on inside.benews.com and rather old. But Scot convinced me that it would be a good idea if you _can_ see my face in the picture.

I need a new digital camera by the way. These things are addictive. A friend of mine has a Casio (yes they do not only make watches :)) which lets you use an IBM Microdrive. That rules. And they have a new one which is about the size of the Canon Ixus and also has place for the Microdrive. 1 Gig of high resolution images to carry around Wow! Drool.

I would like to thank the amazing Dr Z (sorry, that nick is too cool and fitting :)) for welcoming me to the collective in his latest post.

And everybody bow before the might Sean who is now no longer studying
And while we are at it and are spreading knowledge, I suggest you all head on over to Cal Evans site and read his Nerd Herding which is a very fun and insightful thing to read. At least from my perspective.

I have some others on my palm that I might share with you at a later date.

“When you lose, don’t lose the lesson.” From the Instructions for Life in the new millenium from the Dalai Lama

God that feels good. I just finished my first Tutor Marked Assignement (TMA) for my current MBA studies. Just to tell everybody a bit more about me, I am doing part time studies for an MBA at the Open University in England, which is a university that is targetted at people that are working and lets you work from home/work. Up till not, I started this month, it is a lot of fun and very insightful.

I mean I am running/started two companies and have some many ideas at 25 that I just know I need some basic theory to really be good at what I do. LOL
Well it is a wonderful day. If only I would not have so many things to do then I would be working on my personal home page again. Damn.

Ah well. The time will come.