Today I remembered an incident at university where we had some kind of argument in a folklore studies seminar. It’s not even important what it was about, basically I said that you can get an idea of a nation’s view on itself by taking into account its TV programs and this stupid guy argued that TV wasn’t „real“, so you wouldn’t see what people „really“ did or said, to which I responded that this wasn’t the point, because the point was that TV shows you, among other things, what a nation would like to be like and therefore is totally helpful in learning about a nation’s self-perception.

Back then I knew that I was right and that he was just too stupid to get my point, but it was my first year at university and sitting in class with thirty other students, none of which I do remember said anything to strengthen my point of view, I let it go pretty quickly.

Now, if I were back at school, I’d just take him down. I totally have to get back to university and scare the hell out of freshmen. Fun, fun, fun.

He: „What time is it?“

Me: „12:16. So it’s really 12:06. So, actually, it’s 12:04.“

I wonder if it’s a waste of brain space that could be used for more important stuff that I know exactly how much each of our clocks and time displays on various electronical gadgets goes wrong.

Einer hält den Spaten
Und zwei schau’n ihm beim Halten zu.

Sorry – untranslatable.

Finger weg von meiner Paranoia – Element of Crime

My mother is the only person I know who will make more gifts on her birthday than she received.
She’s saccharine sweet.

And birthday girl.

Les voilà – mes livres préférés de l’année 2005… (don’t ask, I had a French minute)

10) Barbara Kingsolver: The Poisonwood Bible
I didn’t expect to like that book as much as I did. The story of a missionary’s wife and daughters lost in a strange place called Africa. The different voices and views of the five women were captured brilliantly.

9) Dave Eggers: You Shall Know Our Velocity
I tried to describe this book to others and failed. Can you just trust me when I tell you this is a great book and should be read? Because it is.

8) William Goldman: The Princess Bride
Caitlin insisted that I haven’t seen it all until I have seen The Princess Bride. So I watched the movie. Then I read the book. Now I want to see the movie again. (So what I have a thing for Mandy Patinkin? Who wouldn’t?)

7) Margaret Atwood: Oryx and Crake
A strangely disturbing science fiction story and my first Atwood (yes, I am a bit ashamed). I enjoyed that a lot.

6) Michael Chabon: The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay
The touching story about Sam Clay and Joseph Kavalier, the passion for comic books, undying love and irreplaceable loss, New York and strange places. At the end I cried.

5) Neil Gaiman: Coraline
The creepiest book I read and my first Neil Gaiman that left me wanting more.

4) Gregory Maguire: Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West
Wicked was funny, tragical, weird, strange, wild and wicked. And now I even like the musical.

3) Joanne K. Rowling: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
I still like the fifth Harry Potter the most, but HPatHBP was great, too. The finale had my world shatter into pieces. Whoa!

And finally there they are. My favorite books of 2005. I need a drum roll or something.

1) Jasper Fforde: The Eyre Affair & Neil Gaiman: Neverwhere
I tried very hard, but I couldn’t decide. Both The Eyre Affair and Neverwhere were books I just loved, ‚one of a kind’-books full of wild imagination, fun to read and addictive as hell.

Here they come… the rest of my TV highlights of the last year. Enjoy.

5. How I Met Your Mother: A Belly Full of Turkey (1×09)
Representing several episodes of the surprisingly wonderful new sitcom â??A Belly Full of Turkeyâ? was my personal highlight of the episodes shown so far, followed by â??Okay, Awesomeâ? and â??The Limoâ?. A set of unexceptionally likable characters, refreshingly witty and funny dialogues and full of creativity that brought us the Thankstini, the Lemon Law of Dating, a Cock-a-Mouse, Bask-Ice-Ball, a sword fight in a living room and a frightening Seven-Layer-Salad in only 11 episodes.
â??And we grew up just fine And we grew to the proper size and then we stopped.â?
In this spirit: Get Psyched.

4. Arrested Development: Righteous Brothers (2×18)
Oh come on, how should I know which was my favorite episode of Arrested Development this year. Though I admit, I really donâ??t care. Following an amazingly good first season came the second one and how. One running gag after the other, a continuity that has yet to find a match in this genre and a bunch auf characters you can only love, despite (or because) their obvious and many flaws.

3. Lost: The Other 48 Days (2×07)
Personally I blame the success of Lost for all the mystery-drama-shows that had their season premiere last fall. Because, honestly: Lost has flaws. I donâ??t really think that the powers that be will ever manage to bring all the mysterious plots and story-arcs to a convincing end.
The brilliance of Lost however is the unique way in which it established a set of characters, so well done that I wouldnâ??t want to live without a single one of them anymore. I anticipated the â??Someone-Will-Dieâ?-episode with great fear, since there was no-one left I really wanted to leave the show.
â??The Other 48 Daysâ? maybe was the bravest episode of Lost. The only real flashback episode did completely without flashbacks, focusing solely on the freshly introduced characters, until finally the stories of both groups meet in the end.

2. House: Three Stories (1×21)
Surely, Iâ??d watch House only because of Hugh Laurie. Add a little bit of Lisa Edelstein and Robert Sean Leonard and Iâ??m in TV show heaven. At the beginning of the season, House ran the risk of becoming too schematic. Patient comes to hospital showing strange symptoms, all treatment fails and just at the end of the show someone says something and suddenly House knows whatâ??s wrong. The introduction of Vogler marked a change though and step by step the main characters came into focus as well. â??Three Storiesâ? is the highlight of the first season, extremely creative, uncommonly told, funny and tragical at the same time. Point is: you donâ??t get much better TV that this.

1. Veronica Mars: Leave it to Beaver (1×22)
What would our life be without Veronica Mars? With the show in its second season, Rob Thomas surprises and delights me week after week and is going straight to earning his rightful place next to Joss Whedonâ??s throne (of course ever since Firefly, Joss Whedon is untouchable anyway). The finale of the first season had me staring at the screen with sweaty hands and my mouth wide open (probably drooling). I want more! I can only hope that the rumours about a third season are true.

What made you cry or laugh or just marvel in awe?

I hate it when big stores make those special deal days and everyone just runs off to it and it just gets crazy in there. Usually I try to keep my pride and stay out of these things. Today, I couldn’t.

They had advertised special duty-free days (meaning no VAT) at one of our electronic/media stores and I wanted to check it out so I had the husband pick me up from work and we drove there. It wasn’t as crowded as I thought, so we sampled some and got out. Oh, we payed first, of course.

We both said that it was actually a good thing that our local store doesn’t have a very good selection when it comes to music and DVD. If we had gone to the huge store in Cologne we surely would have gone wild and bought more CDs that we could have afforded even without additional taxes.
Today I just couldn’t resist finally getting Alias‘ season 3 for 8 Euro less. It’s a damn bargain.

We stood on the balcony, watching the fireworks, holding hands and I wanted to cry because it was so beautiful.
Here’s to hope.

Why are they firing off fireworks more than two hours before midnight?
Patience is much, much underappreciated these days.

As part of the whole reviewing the last year here are my musical highlights:

6. My amazement when I found out that I don’t hate most of German music anymore. Mostly because suddenly there were a lot of good German singers and bands. Where the hell did they come from? Why weren’t they there before? It’s a complete mystery to me, but in the end I don’t care so much. The important thing is that they are here now and hopefully here to stay.

5. The discovery of Azure Ray. How could I have missed out? This is exactly the music I need and want and can dream to. Thanks to a podcast I occasionally listen to I finally have learned of their existence, and though so far I only have listened to „Hold on Love“ and the November EP I can tell you right now that I won’t leave it at that.

4. The Benjamin Biolay universe that it took me until this year to discover. The universe Рat least for me Рincludes Coralie Cl̩ment, Home, the wonderful Keren Ann and the very Monsieur Biolay himself and therefore a lot of money was spent on my part to bring all the music home.

3. 2005 also was the year I got into CD swaps. By now I must have more than ten mixes sent to me from music-lovers from far away and there’s plenty of great songs and musicians that I probably wouldn’t know if it weren’t for these nice people putting them on their mixes. Thanks to Caitlin, Srah, Kira, Ms. Pants and Mike for letting me have a glimpse at their music collection.

2. My album highlight of the year arrived here on December, 24th and therefore I consider it an additional Christmas present – although I had to pay for it nonetheless. Annika Norlin alias Hello Saferide recorded one of the sweetest albums ever and I can only thank my lucky stars and the fact that Robbie from Womenfolk put up a link to her CD on his blog that I found out about it.

1. Any of you who already guessed what will come next? It’s actually really easy. My biggest musical highlight of the year was – of course – the purchase of the iPod. There’s nothing better than riding on the bus to work and have it shuffle through the more than 3,000 songs that I packed on it so far. And with the loudspeakers I got for Christmas bliss is complete.

What can I say, musically 2005 was a success all the way. Once again I want to thank all the people – artists, singers, bands, fellow bloggers and friends – who contributed and made it so good for me. Here’s to 2005 and hoping that 2006 will be just as good – if not better.