Weekend's Here!

Another week of work's done. I'm exhausted.

Horrible

Three days ago Paraguay beat Brasil: 2-0.

So everyone's happy, of course. "Historic win", said the newspapers.

Today, Bolivia beat Paraguay: 4-2.

Horrible.

A New Job?

My boss Andreas today said that someone in the Supply Chain Management (SCM) department was impressed with my work and asked if I was available for permanent employment.

I agreed to an interview, but have yet to be officially asked by the SCM Manager.

How ironic. When I went looking for work, I couldn't find it. When I stopped looking, it found me. I think there's a sermon illustration here somewhere.

Visiting Parents

After my massage therapy today at noon, I went to see my parents.

I had lunch there: Spätzle and salmon, and for dessert, my favourite: Blitz Torte.

Usually I take very little food home with me after visiting parents, but today I took a lot. I'll take it for lunch at work next week.

After the meal and a nap, I hung around a bit and caught up with my parents before taking off to Melanie's place to pick up Ralph. He's going to California tomorrow morning and is staying the night at my place tonight.

In the evening Ralph and I went to see the new Indiana Jones movie. Waste of time.

Tomorrow morning I will go and watch the Spain - Sweden game (EURO Cup), and after that I'll drop Ralph off at the airport. In the afternoon I'm playing soccer, and in the evening I'm attending a Volunteer Appreciation Dinner for the OOC volunteers.

Damn I'm Sore

But oddly enough, it's not my back muscles: I'm tiger-balming the hell out of those....

It's my legs. Lifting with your legs sure helps protect your back, but it gives your legs a helluva workout.....

Tomorrow I'm going to see my massage therapist, who's been working on my back since January. He's done great work, and I'm glad I went to a "therapist" for it.

It's Parmesan Cheese!!!

A few days ago I was miffed because I'd tried to make alfredo sauce for the pasta I was cooking up, and the sauce I'd made just would not thicken!

Well yesterday I tried it again, and made one small change: I added parmesan cheese to the cream and butter as it was cooking up in the pot, not afterwards when serving the plate. And voila, the sauce thickened. It was an epiphanic moment.

So, there it is. Parmesan cheese is the thickening agent.

Aching Muscles

I've worked 3 days now, here.

I like my job, actually. It's physical work, which is something that I'm not used to, but which is something very good, especially for me, since my idea of physical work until this week was moving a pen from left to right on a sheet of paper.

My muscles are sore, especially my back muscles. Because my job entails a lot of lifting, I have to be very careful and make sure that I use my legs, and not my back, when I lift stuff.

My job is to detect defective solar panels, produced by the assembly line process. After I check for panel quality, I move it to a specific "pile", usually located in another part of the building. Each panel is 14kgs, and I estimate that so far I've lifted at least 500 of them. Marty, my working partner and fellow soccerino, has been very gracious and taken the brunt end of lifting duties. Thanks be to God for friends like him.

My boss is from Germany, Freiburg. Actually, there are many Germans at this company, maybe because the company has a subsidiary there.

Anyways, it's good to be working again. It's "brainless" work, so I'm not sure I could do this "long term", but for now, I'm very content to be working again.

Solar Panels

I got a job today. Starting tomorrow morning I will be working in the quality control department at a company that makes solar panels.

It's a factory job. Physical labour: inspecting flawed panels, determining the cause of defect. Not my dream job, for sure, but a necessary measure nonetheless. It's a 6 week job that will prevent my work-ethic from rotting while vocationally-undecided. There's only so much internet surfing I can handle.....

I have a very negative impression of factory jobs, because very often the dignity of people is taken away in these contexts for the sake of efficiency and profits, but anyways, that's not the topic I'm on about tonight. And even though I wont be working in an assembly line per se, it will be an industrial context, a world I'm very unfamiliar with. My point is that working in a factory context will be good for me, as it will either confirm my preconceived notions, or challenge them. My guess is the latter, because as is so often the case, our preconceived notions and ideas are simplistic.

In the meantime, I've emailed the bishop of Jerusalem to see if there's any work in the Anglican Church in North Africa or the Middle East. Let's see what he says....