take a pickchaah?

If you experience something exciting/thrilling/moving or whatever uncareless and the next thing on your mind is how to record it - either by taking a picture or "changing the status/blogging" then what's the sense of yourself in experiencing the process whatsoever?

Šaursliežu dzelzsceļš

a.k.a. Narrow gauge railroad is not only a common tongue twister (wanna give it a try?), but as well a reality at least in a stretch of 33km from Gulbene to Alūksne. The rest of the routes these days are either closed or adjusted to normal railways, but this one was revived as some sort of a cultural heritage and a tourist attraction.
You can compare here the gauges.

Some tourists :)

This train station boasts with an advanced infrastructure

The interior of our car

Endstation!

The rest of the stuff here

Shopping abuse

Today as I was about to go home, it suddenly came across to me that I've not been to the Rimi for a month or so and that I quite willingly want to go there. An awkward desire, gotta admit. So I went there, wandering a bit in a tourist mode, and realized that I don't need anything. I went to the shop to buy nothing. Instead I was looking, looking around and it felt like wherever I would look, my eyesight rushed into the looks of others that were seemingly staring at me right at the same time, which made me feel like an elephant in a glass store which needs to be monitored so that it doesn't break anything. Or maybe it was just an illusion :).

People who have a moral compass don't moralize.

Alleys in Vidzeme

Around Vidzeme there are many old alleys of oaks, birches and lindens many of which have been planted still in German baron times in 19th century (some oak alleys might be even older than that).



Surprisingly there was an Orthodox christian church in a region which doesn't have such a large number of Russian population.

Yet another breakfast song

And... it perfectly fits to all of those ontology profs who always make an example of human being being a subset of animal :).

One of those up against the mirror queries

How does your life relate to what you're doing?

a like

I'm like myself when I like myself

tin food: the good, the bad and the ugly

If you don't say it once you feel like saying it then thereafter it's just a piece of tin food.

TUW approach

Keep it simple - determine the complexity of everything you're about to do.

The gray dune in Pāvilosta

Gray dune in Pāvilosta is a prohibited area because of the unique biotope with many prohibited plant species that you wouldn't find elsewhere. For non-botanic an awkward thing that you can observe there is the grassland covered all over with lichens (that gray thing which the name of the dune arises from), great wild scenery and by turning around - a chance to observe quite a few windsurfers and kiteboarders.
Here's the weed teasing the clouds

The gray scene

A pic from another place nearby - I just liked how the butterflies have chosen the blossoms that contrast their own color.

Here are the rest of the scenes from thereabouts

you're just some racist who can't tie my laces

Sometimes you have to make two steps forward in order to understand what happened two steps back. But mostly it just gets you in woods :).

At the end of the day you're just another guy without a guitar

On integrity

After preparing a T-shirt present for my cousin (and her daughters (who should not know where the characters come from)) who has mathematical grade, I couldn't figure out whether it's nerdy-fun or nerdy-miserable - in either case it was the best I could come about :).

[19:13:57] Mārtiņš says: thesis is no vacation

North fort at Karosta

Karaosta (literally war-port) was a place you wouldn't find on the map during the Soviet times - a whole district of Liepāja was a military base and inhabited by Soviet fleet. After the Red army eventually withdrew in 1994 it has become a free-access place with many disturbing, but in many ways curious scenes - abandoned block houses, haunted Czar time houses, traces of military facilities etc. For me the most gripping site was the North fort - a defensive fortress of Russian empire which was blown up by retreating Russians in 1915 during WW1.
Here's a view from the mall

Baltic sea shows no mercy - those immobile concrete structures lay where they used to be in 1915. Now there's a nice bay :).

Nice...

On posts like that the cannons would be placed on. The name of the site could be concrete bay :).

A peek through the cells,

From the other side the cannons would get supplied.

The whole stuff here

no good

The time is ticking out, but seems like every sack I've every carried has been one-time-use only.

Hedgehog at my backyard

It's no rarity to run into a hedgehog if you hang around a bit in a country side or just in some park in Latvia - like spotting a possum in Australia, squirrel in Vienna or bats in Bolzano. Anyway at each time you get excited all over new, even though it's just a... just a hedgehog :).
Here it is at our garage's door.

Another angle :)

And us 2 :)

Even scarier than that shut-the-....-up thing

Whip your lip!

The Giant Pandas at Schonbrunn Tiergarten

Schonbrunn Tiergarten is one of the few Zoos in Europe where there are Giant Pandas, so paying 14 euros to see them seems quite a bearable price (or maybe pandable khem khem). Anyway you can't postpone checking them out forever so at one of my last days in Vienna I saw Giant Pandas for the first time in my life. Even though it wasn't as amusing as watching koalas in Sydney (those in Vienna were asleep :/), it's still arguably the main reason to visit the zoo at all, especially when you know that the zoo has to pay a loan of 1M dollars a year for each Panda to the Chinese government.
Willkommen!

A lazy panda

The only panda at TU Wien at last met another one of her kind

We got lucky enough to be on time when they get fed with bamboos

And here's a video ;)

And here's the whole stuff from the Zoo ;)

Belvedere under the weather

Here it is - one of the finest parks in Vienna. Well, at least imao. The day I visited it at last, I should have been under the weather - literally - but somehow it gave that awkward emptiness of all those tourists and a great, dense background.

And a semi-panoramic view from to the city

I found an appropriately-sized bush

jūra rūja

As I was standing there on my fingertips in the middle of the sea, with a light salty water swilling my chin and gazing at the coast line from one somewhat a horn to another one, it was about the moment to make some refinements to that shallow stuff we're milling on daily basis in order to convert it into some custom shallowness like - life's a beautiful bitch and then you die. And that's that - how else you could contrast your overall unwillingness to ease the overwhelming load of urgent issues versus a wild, sandy biatch at the coast of Baltic sea on a hot, sunny summer day with only some scattered patches of people as far as the eye can reach.

P.S. Just the first picture while googling for Jūrkalne ;)

we'll see

Heck, is it possible to dispatch me with the same trick on yearly basis? I've seen the ruins so I rather not attend the attempt.

Outta my garage

I got nothing left to be. Do you have some plans for me?

On goodbyes again

And then again - sometimes there's no good way to say goodbye, especially if it's a virtual halt button.

My long-live synthy love

If only our ideals could be our meals

Rooting back

Q: "Where do most of the geeks come from?"
A: "Geece!"

P.S. Crap, someone came about it before me, though no wonder.

kveščens end ānsās

They say that the answer doesn't change no matter how many times it's being asked, but life is no physics, you know...

green redding

I always say "green" instead of "red" and I don't know why. Maybe because "green" sounds very "red".

Again on bottomlessness

The depth isn't where you seek it, rather there where you fall.

A problem merger

Wanted!

And then suddenly you're on a rampage

Reluctance vs Next level

Covering the button with my hand and behaving like having pressed it.

The mixed message

Quite strange, that lately the songs that appear to have a special mood when there's only the sound, gets it all stirred up once I get to see the video. For instance, from this song you couldn't peel out some semi-Krishnaitic mood - the one that video suggests :). I guess it's similar when you read the book and then the movie spoils the story you had built up.

Hurray, Kylie!

In my imagination, there is no complication. No things that I wouldn't do.

On intangibles

"Ghosts in the air, unlike decisions, can't be second guessed."

cheer up for madness

When everybody's acting like sick puppies, you have an edge if you don't care. But only if you really don't care, otherwise your chillaxation will hit back on you in a long term.

A bottomless entry

I'm not interested in people. In general. To the depth, to the core. I'm not even interested in myself. Even though my conscience persistently claims the opposite. I'm just jerking from one curiosity to another. Like a grasshopper - taking off to the next blossom before the feet get too stuck on the current one.

Sharing is caring

Being carefree is about feeling free to care

The method in the madness

If someone robs you, you have to rob someone else. Otherwise you break the chain - you're the weakest link.

A perfect breakfast song

I looked at you and saw that you wanted to... jump in the poo, jump in the poo.

If it's still Q&A day...

Q: "What should you do if your nose just won't stop bleeding for half an hour?"
A: "Sing 'Bleeding in love'!"

P.S. No, seriously - I did that. Though that didn't help it much.

geo-apololitical

Q: "How can you tell an Australian band without any direct hints?"
A: "If the song starts with a line like 'We can remember swimming in December'"

rererevisting

Best things in life aren't the ones that happen to you, but rather the ones you build to happen.

too unstressed

If you can't impose on yourself some certain level of stress in order to do what you're supposed to do, then sooner or later you find yourself doing nothing but pleasing your ego.

Kelly, watch 'em!

If you can't get something that you want, but don't need - call it a star and just let it twinkle on.

Estonian puzzle

In principle - any unsolvable problem.

Tanel: "My Skype messages never reach my mate who's sitting next to me!"
Urmass: "Chill, it's an Estonian puzzle ;)."

Another french lesson?

Apparently Daft Punk, Air and Justice are just the visible part of the iceberg :).

Sorry, but pwnage :D

While seeing this stuff for the first time this evening on telly, it got me and and my room mate LOLing and almost ROFLing for a while - I guess that especially because of that initial sick-till-back-teeth women-screaming-scene-cliche caused annoyance which gets flipsided into a complete pwnage :). So I just couldn't resist to share... a bit.

Scientific laziness

Hey, you're more than 2 clicks away - scr3w you!

Kra kra Krakow

Last week, for 4 days I joined the trip to Krakow, didn't get impressed by city that much, though spent some quality time up there. It's a pity that the most of my course mates had went there once I was in Latvia for the Easter break, so the Thai supermodel Pung had to make up for the numbers :).
Dzen dobry, I got really polished :).

With the Thai supermodel outside the mine. If you look close enough you can see that I can't straighten my middle finger as the distal phalanx of it is quite loose - worth to mention, rrright?! :D

Dinner in the salt mine 130m underground. Chandeliers are from salt crystals, of course ;).

Check out that lone sneaker that's hanging down from that dirt

The mapping of our location (the red dot in the map) in Czech republic

The rest of the pics here.

the flow

kaksikaks ist vorbei und kaksikolm - schon dabei.

P.S. I think it's about the very moment to introduce you to amazing world of Estonian numbers, so that I don't have to explain myself each and every time :)

C'mon just admit it - we all love egoists. And moreover - the love in 98.4% of cases is an ultimate expression of egoism.

Nosprāga!

Tēti, tēti, kas notika ar kaiju?

Once you pick apart the fun part, the remainder isn't necessarily all true.

Minimalismi.com

As by this commercial entry Uroš grants me 10% shares of his franchise, I was too tempted not to refer to his amazing site about the minimalism design - chairs, sofas, chairs, lamps, chairs... curious stuff with sense - the minimalismi.com.

laik a zuppā-modell

Take away the personality and you're a perfect template

Being on time to skate

It didn't even take a year for Artjom to give me the skating pics... at last. So these are some hailaic.
It's not that my butt is so huge, I just move at a supersonic speed :). In any case nice shot by Artjom.

Teaching my asian coursemates the right moves is a tough task. Application for the next season's lessons has already started :).

Sveiki, te es ;) ^'

Pung, me, Nhung. And I'm standing on my knees, btw.

More panoramic views at my previous skating entry. And here are the rest of the pics.

' Use google translate in a case of a serious lack of basics in latvian :).

Unknocked, unkicked, unslammed

Only thereafter you learn that the most of all those doors you passed were open.

On optimism

I'm always fine unless otherwise

undelusionization

It's all about the corks, fillings and substitutions. I've no right to judge anyone for the means they weather a temporary loneliness, just gotta beware of not falling in any of those upper categories, unless you're in somewhat a masochistic mood.

...or stupid bastard lovers

we are all awkward attention loving bastards... or just stupid

No it's knot!

Latvians say that if you want to remember something, you should tie a knot*. So if you run into something that doesn't necessarily make any sense, it might as well be the case when it really doesn't - it might be a knot - smthn that has no meaning in shape, but rather in the knotter's memory tape's recorded content while tying it up.

*it has nothing to do here with marrying someone

On drinks

Once opened champaign needs a cork to keep the sparkles.
Sometimes it's whatever the cork.

Russedress. Che?!

Did you know what a russedress is? Well, neither did I. In any case it seems like some mania in Norway. Nevertheless I hope it won't get anywhere near Austria or Latvia, just to save my eyes from that kind of sight.
You know those Norwegian girls could have worn sacks and socks while still looking good. Though simple life in Norway doesn't sound bad at all :).

Russedress is a complete turn on...

Russedress - sounds like fun... in a booth? A booty-call?! :D

And when it's mania...

Whatever there was with their taste, Norway rocks... unconditionally... and here is me in the Norway :P

mhm

they say that you don't get accustomed to anything else faster than the comfort, but always feel every little bit when it's taken away. Regarding studies, I guess that the bug is the sloppiness - once you let yourself be sloppy about your work ethics, it's a pain till your back teeth to do it again in a somewhat conventional way.

livelearning

I guess that when meeting an American for the first time, you shouldn't make jokes about American little competence in Europe's geography, United States of Europe etc.

nests live

Ever watched bird's nest live instead of football or pressing F5 in your e-mail all the time? Well it's a great find, at least for me. There are like 5 estonian live stramings from the bird nests and one from Latvia. Latvian eagle's nest as much as I checked is empty, but maybe you get luckier.
Though the estonian owls are almost always there, especially the small owlings, who aren't about to get out of that trunk still for quite a while. And you can watch it 24-7 as it's infrared camera, comparing to the other cameras.

And then there is another estonian bird's nest (fixed link) - the one of The White-tailed Eagle. Ain't my screenshot just great? :)

The full list of the nests can be found here.

Latvian summer desert

Siekaliņa tek, ko?! Es zināju :P!

beating off the dribble

you know, life's like basketball - if you only take the sure shots, you have a higher percentage, but lower the score.

Kuldīga - jumping vimbas '09

Only the most athletic ones get to the breeding places...

Here's the live action jumping vid. Obviously these guys have grown up over the last year, when they looked like that.
The court house:

the rest of the stuff:

The full-sized gallery here.

P.S. Initially I got mislead that these are Salmons, but that doesn't take much off the spectacularity :).

It is what it is

Used often in the business world, this incredibly versatile phrase can be literally translated as "fuck it."
  The client changed the deadline to today? Well, it is what it is.

half in love with Elizabeth

Elizabeth means money, how come you didn't know?! how come you knew before i did? how come i didn't know? how come i tell you the things you know?

things change. you know... especially when you move your white ass. a bit...

It's such a delight to observe everybody else age, fatten and nerdify while, at times seemingly, heading the same direction.

leally

While teasing another, we actually tease ourselves with the notion that we actually intend what we pretend to intend.

flashy flasche

You know there's an issue about the bottles, the empty and the full ones. They're never nothing more than the bottles.

An ultimate teaser

Smthn that's chillin' on your palm, but you can't grasp it.

ever felt like being up for grabs?