May you all enjoy the celebrations of new life and liberation!

 

Speaking of enjoyment: don't miss the yet unreleased Cohen song on youtube "Lullaby," which was recorded in great quality at the concert in Texas :) Thank you musicloveraustria2!

And besides, some great excerpts from the lost Bird on a Wire documentary have been uploaded at youtube by messalina79. Leonard at his best (or worst if you will). Some moving insights, anyway.

You Are An INFJ

The Protector You live your life with integrity, originality, vision, and creativity. Independent and stubborn, you rarely stray from your vision - no matter what it is. You are an excellent listener with almost infinite patience. You have complex feelings, and you take great care to express them. In love, you see relationships as an opportunity to connect and grow. You enjoy relationships when they are improving and changing. You can't stand stagnation. At work, you stay motivated and happy... as long as you are working toward a dream you support. You would make a great photographer, alternative medicine guru, or teacher. How you see yourself: Hardworking, ethical, and helpful When other people don't get you, they see you as: Manipulative, weak, and unstable

In contrast to me_pirateship 's result, mine seems to have got me - although I wouldn't see myself as too hardworking ;) Sorry guys that I can be so manipulative and unpredictable at times. I'm working on it.

Hahahahaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!  (can you guess the parents?)

I think that impossible child turned out rather cute ;) (compared to what happened when I tried other parents...)

Have a fun weekend!

(posting inspired by 1heckofaguy.com)

... for those hungry for the unusual but not yet  lucky enough in finding it.

Most of you will know the humourous and informative site 1heckofaguy.com. (Thanks, thanks!!!) Here interesting tidbits are posted frequently. Quite enlightening.
This site again leads you to leonardcohensearch.com/ , an engine that seems to be able to find anything you desire *lol* At least I found an excellent link there www.twoshakesofalambstail.com/storeroom/index.html
That may not look very appealing but look twice: you can quickly download Leonard Cohen songs that are not available anywhere else, that are extremely rare and hard to come by because most of them were only performed at live concerts and thus are practically non-existent. Of course, most are low quality but still worth the fuss: You get very funny/confusing interaction with the audience, Cohen singing not only English but German and Yiddish too and also improvising silly lyrics at random and obviously having a blast. Continous incoherent giggling by the audience and the background singers (!) included. Go ahead and join in the fun!
It sure helped me get over the fact that me_pirateship</lj> had returned home and left me and the cat of cats behind in our secret life ;) Thanks again for a fun visit, friend :x

And thank you to all the Cohen fans out there who are ready to share their treasures so generously.

My gentle and ever sinful flock! In spite of your refusal to send me any money for those in need *cough*, I will nonetheless wish you a very peaceful and happy christmas. May the New Year be filled with love, friendship and laughter. And may your jobs not be too stressful but rather satisfying - as is mine as your parish banker ... erm... priest.

Strongly recommended as uplifting holiday read:



Enjoy yourselves, everyone! And be kind to each other!

Remember? I gave you the first stanza of a poem and asked you to find a title and compose a second stanza.
Well, all right, I was not very lucky in finding participants here ;) but I will still keep my word and post the original poem along with the results. They are surely worth it! Thanks, elle_icit</lj> !!! Your throne still has not been broken *g*

( Pure genius behind the cut... :) )


You guys can still participate, you know :) I will add your poems in no time for sure. Pleeeeeeeease! :) This is so very interesting...

UPDATE: Thanks for your version me_pirateship !!

Here are videos of the autograph giving (First We Take Manhattan) and the "Volkswagen" joke (Whither thou goest):







Two dimensional proof *lol*

Right, so yesterday was my second LC concert and although there cannot much else be said after Lörrach, I still want to write a short review in order to remember.
The concert was just as brilliant as last time. Lenny's voice hasn't suffered from the many concerts in between at all - it was amazing!!! He even seemed younger than in Lörrach, jumping and skipping even more and seeming more at ease with what he did. Maybe the World Tour is indeed doing him good with all the love he must receive.
Yet, during the first part of the concert, LC seemed less chatty than in Lörrach - but then, so was the audience. This time he did not introduce the band members after each solo performance - maybe he has taken the criticism to heart by now. He was smiling but did not seem as happy as in Lörrach. (Of course, that performance will always remain extra special - also because of the famous sound check for sure.)
Anyway, after the break, Lenny seemed to have decided to have fun again. He joked and interacted with the audience more. Everything back to: "Laughing Lenny and  his admirers." Well, even critics write that Lenny and the audience were reserved in the beginning.
The Webb sisters did their acrobatics this time (which they hadn't done in Lörrach) and which was received by applause. We didn't get the meaning of life from the Master this time though (dadoodumdum) - instead he expressed his admiration for the singing ladies. Well, good he changes his words from time to time. However, we got he Prozac speech *lol*  And in the end he didn't only warn us not to catch a cold but also to be "as lucky as Volkswagen" ;) *cough*
No roses for Len here but some mistery envelope and he gave an autograph during a musical interlude - a friendliness which forced him to crawl along the edge of the stage. You had to love him for it. Henning at leonardcohenfiles.com got a better view and reports it like this: "Leonard got a big extra applause when a blind man with his stick moved towards the tight standing crowd at the end and handed Leonard a CD Cover to sign. First we take Manhatten had already started, Leonard took the sleeve from the man, layed it down to his feet, sang the first lines of the song and when the ladies sang their part, he kneeled down, signed the cover and handed it back to the man, who was waiting patiently." Couldn't see the man butI think it was rather a ticket than a sleeve - not that this would be of any importance *lol*.
Anyway, even though the audience was relatively silent (even during "So Long Marianne" it seemed to me), they still showed their affection, sighing and applauding in the right places ;) Some ladies behind us even discussed the beauty of his hair *rofl*
All in all, it was grand again and my spriritual batteries have been recharged. *dorky smile*



Leonard Cohen in Frankfurt (source: Frankfurter Neue Presse)

P.S.: LC didn't sing "Chelsea Hotel No. 2" or "Avalanche" that night.

Here's a good one from the latest BL album. They decided to make one with children's songs - kind of unusual most of them of course.
Hope you enjoy this cute one as much as I do :)

By the way, tomorrow I will attend my second Leonard Cohen concert. You can imagine I am looking forward to that.

Ah, and I am still hopeful that some more participants for the poetry challenge will turn up (see previous entry). This is why I haven't posted the results yet. Come on, everybody, get kissed by your muses! ;)

You guys are so very creative. Fact.
I would love to experience more of that instead of flooding you with my half-hearted compositions.
Therefore, I come up with this challenge *drumroll*
I will present you with the first stanza of a poem that some of you will probably know - but don't cheat! It is absolutely illegal to even glance at the original! ;)
I challenge you to find a good title for the poem, whose topic will surely inspire you *cough*, and  to write a second stanza. Of course you can write a third, a fourth or even more if you feel like it, but that is up to you and your muse ;) Surely you will come up with something that is at least as good as the original, which will be presented to you another day.

( Click for first stanza... )

Now I can only hope that SOMEONE will take the challenge. The more the merrier. Pleeeeeeeeeease ;)May my amused smile and admiration be your reward.

My last post made it clear to me that there are quite some misconceptions about my faith and what it means for my way of life or opinions. I know that Roman Catholicism has an aura of the strict, unrelenting control mechanism around it. The "unannointed" ;) may even think we run around scourging ourselves for every sinful thought. Or at least that we should do so as to avoid eternal purgatory. Well, you're wrong! In fact we're quite a happy lot ;)

( Some common errors about Catholicism )

Snatched from uhsir 

[01] Do you have the guts to answer these questions and re-post as The Controversial Survey?
Yup. Doesn’t seem too revealing to me ;)

( Presumably thought provoking survey... )

I only just realized that there are several videos that were taken during the soundcheck and the concert at Lörrach up on youtube by now. Thus my brain thinks I am back on that market place, i.e. fan heaven. So, I am ridiculously happy in spite of the undeniable fact that I will be back at work tomorrow (where our unorganized bosses will make my job almost impossible). Who cares? Oh happy day! *babbles incoherently*

The person who filmed this must have stood very close to me:



If you are really interested, check out the videos of the soundcheck (the first four videos daddo2008 posted), because that was something different from the norm. :) 

First conference today - back in the hell house. No timetables - we had to work something out for next week ourselves again. After that I went to my classroom, carrying and pushing tables and chairs to make it presentable. Man, that furniture was dirty - but I absolutely refused to clean it. They actually expected us to bring a bucket and cloth from home as I was told later. HA! Not my job! Bad enough I played the muscle like that in the heat. Well, on Monday I will hopefully be able to do something that resembles teaching a little more ;)





When, oh when will I finally find the time to start my career in Hollywood? ;)

I have only just returned from my trip to Austria, followed by two days in Lörrach where I had the great privilige of seeing Leonard Cohen on stage. I was very, very lucky in everything that day and now that I have seen the living legend live I wish to thank ispellitfor reintroducing me to him simply through being his fan. Thank you! I had the most intense and fascinating concert ever. So, this is going to be a long and very personal relation of the event.

 

(Picture taken from www.stimmen.com)

Thank you for bearing with the great big pudding's holiday chatter for so long! Here it comes: The final installment of my pictures from Russia. Enjoy!

Oh, yes. That was it. Russia is a beautiful country with very helpful and friendly people all around. I wish I could have stayed longer and seen more of it, especially of the countryside. Thus, I can but highly recommend a visit to all of you. :) Unfortunately, there are no cyrillic letters available here, so I'll do it the clumsy way: Doswidanja i spaziba!