Victorious

Conchita Wurst from Austria kicked some bigots asses yesterday by winning the Eurovision Song Contest 2014 with by far the highest score.

Austria came in first with 290 points, followed by The Netherlands with 238 points and Sweden in third place with 218 points.

Conchita received the coveted "douze points" from no less than 13 countries and the second highest, ten points, from seven other countries. She received points from every country (with the exclusion of her own Austria) except Armenia, Poland and San Marino. Good going, gurl!

The scoreboard from The Official Eurovision Song Contest 2014 website

Dealing With Backlog

I am drowning in post-it stickers and paper stacks at work at the moment.

The situation has changed drastically over just a few months, due to two experienced lawyers leaving and being replaced by two less experienced lawyers. Simultaneously there has been an increase in the workload. My forced attendance at the Polish conference last week did not help either, although it was pleasant to get away and think of and worry about the work instead of doing it.

All we can do at the moment is prioritize and handle the emergency cases with deadlines, put in long hours at work and try to charm the disgruntled clients, who of course always believe that their problem (or sometimes even nonexistent problem) should be our top priority.

We support each other as well as we can in the workgroup and seem to make an impact on the piles by our joint efforts. Hopefully we will be getting to the lower prioritized stuff by the end of next week.

This means that I am almost braindead when I get home, so I am no good company. However, I am going to try and log in a little tonight and make good time for my friends in SecondLife during the weekend. I need the rest otherwise I will go crazy.

Back Again

Blogging is really strange, at least for me. When I am in the habit I keep on getting inspired to do new posts and can easily write 3-5 times a day, but if I have not posted in a couple of days I just get stressed out and go completely blank.

This is a pointless post with a beautiful picture just to get warmed up. The picture was posted on Facebook, at this time I cannot remember by whom.

My visit to Poland went well and I returned home late Sunday evening. Krakow is a beautiful old city with beautiful men but with horrendous, really awful, food. The traditional Roman Catholic homophobia and antisemitism still flourishes, but - as I was informed by a resident - the citizens of Krakow "are a bit more polite about it".

I am happy to be back home again, sleeping in my own bed and with complete access to both my lives again. I have missed you all, but some of you more than the others.

A Mission to Krakow

“Jeszcze Polska nie zginęła” are the first words is the national anthem of Poland. Translated to English they mean "Poland Is Not Yet Lost".

The words became relevant in a discussion yesterday at  a summit meeting at Southern Charm. The recent discovery of an age-old peace treaty in SecondLife from as far back as 1993 whereby the citizens of the Polish town of Krakow with SecondLife avatars swore eternal allegiance to the laird of Southern Charm (or his legitimate predecessor). Over time the treaty had been forgotten and no efforts had been made to develop or consolidate the alliance.

The discussion concerned whether or not it was meaningful for Southern Charm to try to revive or revitalize the treaty or if Krakow should be given up. At one point in the discussion HRH prince Wild Zepp, who always finds a way to show off his multilingual talents exclaimed, "Noch ist Polen nicht verloren", which is the German translation of the initial words in the Polish anthem. 

This enthusiastic outburst completely changed the mood of the meeting, and instead of asking whether or not a mission should be sent to Krakow to salvage what was possible the conversation switched to when and how the mission should be formed.

It was finally decided that the mission of "love, peace and cordiality" much include the laird himself accompanied by an unwedded prince and a an unwedded princess of his immediate family. The latter two would be married off with some Krakowians to further strengthen the bond. "With their beautiful faces, bodies and minds and their charming dispositions the residents of Krakow will not be able to resist us!", HRH princess Hedda Millar said.

The two unmarried royalty that were chosen from within the family were HRH princess Minerva Xenno and HRH prince Matt Gaboian, who were both able and willing albeit a bit concerned about how this would end.

It was determined that the mission would leave, with a rudimentary following of only fifty people to care for and serve the royal's immediate needs. as soon as possible, i.e. the next Tuesday and return back on Sunday.

"Krakow is still Ours", the Much Honored Bock McMillan, laird of Southern Charm, prince of Cascade Falls, Sovereign Ruler of the Commonwealth of Southern Enchantment Region and Outer Territories and finally also UN appointed Protector of the Solace Island and Mount Whitney sims in SecondLife, concluded with a happy smile.

IDAHO Day 2013 (Updated)

Today is the International Day Against Homophobia & Transphobia (url).

In almost 80 countries around the world, loving someone of the same sex is still considered illegal, at times involving lifetime imprisonment and, in nine countries, it is even punishable by death!

And in many more countries still, citizens are denied their right to live according to their preferred gender identity.

As well as legal discrimination's  social homophobia and transphobia serve to daily deny millions of people across the world their basic human dignity.

The International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia (IDAHO) was created in 2004 to draw the attention of policymakers, opinion leaders, social movements, the public and the media to this issue.

It is not one centralized campaign; rather it is a moment that everyone can take advantage of to take action.

The date of May 17th was specifically chosen to commemorate the World Health Organization’s decision in 1990 to declassify homosexuality as a mental disorder.

Today is the day to take action in your local area, talk about it or simply mention it, just spread the word!

Update 1
The European Union´s Agency for Fundamental Rights today presented a report of a survey among 93 000 gay inhabitants in the EU and Croatia (read the summary here)

The lowest rate of discrimination occurs in the Netherlands followed by Denmark and Luxembourg, while the highest rate of discrimination occurs is in Lithuania followed by Croatia and Poland.

Update 2
Read my friend Garth Raleigh's suggestion in the comments below about how to take part in the manifestation in SecondLife today!