With northern Germany now having to deal with an unseasonably warm spring, it’s time to take a last look back at the unseasonably snowy winter that it just endured. And when it comes to winter, a personal pet peeve of mine is people who don’t clear their cars of snow and ice properly. (Sounds unusuallyContinue reading “A lazy shade of winter”
Author Archives: fogBlogger
Say it ain’t snow
For most of January, Not-Bielefeld and the rest of northern Germany were laid to waste by an extreme and extremely rare weather anomaly known throughout the rest of the world as winter. It was chaos. Planes and trains strayed rarely from the plains. Road salt was as hard to get as the real stuff wasContinue reading “Say it ain’t snow”
Alphabet soup
In “researching” my last blog post, I came across two of the worst acronyms that I have perhaps ever seen. (And, remember, I’ve seen TdLL.) Unsurprisingly perhaps, they both derive from the same organization, namely the Netzwerk Nachhaltigkeit Niedersächsischer Hochschulen (Network Sustainability Lower-Saxony Universities; and, yes, the German name is similarly devoid of prepositions andContinue reading “Alphabet soup”
Disdainability
As I’ve mentioned more than too many times in this blog, the University of Not-Bielefeld has taken to increasingly bludgeoning us with its new-found environmental conscience. The latest foray here is in promoting the existence of numerous “sustainability markets” on campus. Now to those of us lacking spin doctorates, these markets are nothing more thanContinue reading “Disdainability”
Un-vital signs 09.01.2026
It’s finally happened! After literally years of being promised that the appropriate signs would be coming “very soon” or told that such signs were not necessary in the first place, the University of Not-Bielefeld finally put up signs on my campus late last year indicating that all dogs must be on a leash. Ok, signsContinue reading “Un-vital signs 09.01.2026”
The Emperor’s unused clothes
I did a bit of clothes shopping the other day and it was only after I got home that I discovered that one store had cynically charged me an extra 15 cents for the paper bag that they had put my clothes in. But wait. Why is the store the cynical one here? Shouldn’t IContinue reading “The Emperor’s unused clothes”
Un-vital signs 02.10.2025
A few weeks ago, the following sign popped up on the garbage bin on campus that I pop my dog’s poop down every morning forbidding this practice in the future. Someone in Not-Bielefeld must be very proud of themselves. They need to work on their punctuation a little but did manage to use the genitiveContinue reading “Un-vital signs 02.10.2025”
Orna-mental health
World Mental Health Day is on the horizon (October 10th), something that, quite frankly, is stressing me out a little. Not the day itself, of course, just the attempts of the University of Not-Bielefeld to capitalize on it. The background to this is a survey that the University recently conducted asking how its employees evaluatedContinue reading “Orna-mental health”
BCD 10.09.2025
As happens every couple of weeks or so, I got barked at again today for letting my dog walk off-leash at the University. The person complaining was new, but much of the conversation wasn’t. What was new, however, is that he volunteered the reason why all dogs on campus should be on a leash withoutContinue reading “BCD 10.09.2025”
Un-vital signs 05.09.2025
A hallmark of the University of Not-Bielefeld is how invested it is in teaching. Not in real teaching, of course, because that costs real money and if you want to build 1.4 million Euros worth of bike racks, something’s got to give, right? Instead, the University’s emphasis here lies much more on promoting its commitmentContinue reading “Un-vital signs 05.09.2025”
The Blog About Fog 