What a month! It was half very good and half very bad.
The good parts were meeting my friends, playing Pathfinder Rusthenge and visting a beautiful, small wedding of two friends. The best part was my visit to Manchester where I saw Liam Gallagher live. It was a special occasion because he played the whole Oasis album „Definetely Maybe“, plus some other songs from that era. I wanted to see the show in Manchester because that is were Oasis (and many other cool bands) are from. It was not my first time in Manchester, but my last visit was long ago. Still I had the same thought as at my last visit: „Woah, a lot of Cosplayers, Emos and Goths here“. Upon my arrival I went to the city, I got some jollof rice and fried plantain from an Afro-Carribean food stall, then I went to Afflecks which is a three-story house full with small vendors who sell „alternative“ stuff like dark batsy goth things, colorful lgtb stuff or shiny stones and jewellery. Then I went to a mall and had a very contrasting program there. I visited the Manchester City fan shop and got me a scarf. Not a real fan of that club but I like the colors and the logo. (Not my first time buying sports merch because of the colors). Afterwards I crashed in my hotel room and the went to the concert. It was so awesome, I cannot describe it in words. Probably the best concert I saw. I loved the crowd who went nuts when „A Town Called Malice“ by The Jam was played beforehand and then continued being crazy energetic throughout the whole concert. What a day.
The next day I had to leave the hotel at around 10 but my flight was in the late evening. Since it was raining, I did a little museum tour. There are two free buses in Manchester that stop at all the important sights, so I went by bus. The museums (Science/Industry Museum, Art Gallery) where so much better than I expected. The Science Museum made even looms sound interesting, and the Art Gallery had such interesting exhibitions. One was focused on art from the 18/19th century that appropriated other cultures like Iranian or Yoruba. Every piece of art had annotations by people of color. Then there was an exhibition relating art to the climate disaster. There were also annotations and personal views to the pieces of art. I really liked this mixture of old(er) art and new thoughts.
Well, afterwards I strolled around the city and then drove to the airport early. Way too early. My flight was delayed about an hour. I arrived so late at Düsseldorf Airport, at about 10pm and then had trouble getting a train to Cologne. I paid way to much money for an ICE because I didn’t want to wait any longer. What a horror trip back home.
Coming to the rest of the month: I got my second round of Corona. Well, it had to happend someday, some friends of mine also got it a couple of weeks before me. I think I had about 5 corona shots over the last years but still I got pretty ill, lots of headaches, very very tired and a stubborn cough. I wonder how bad it would have been without the vaccines (I am absolutely pro vaccine in any cases). In addition to Corona, my work was so stressful and annoying.
At least I could end the month with a good thing, having a snack and play with my friends. So, June has been a rollercoaster.

Gaming:
I can repeat what I wrote last month: „Still playing Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. I still like the storyline and the basic gameplay but oh boy, why are there so many repetitive sidequests and stupid mini games?“
I didn’t play that many boardgames but we finally tried Nemo’s War, it’s a solo game but of course you can play it as a coop. And I got Bonsai from the librabry, which is very nice and cute. I’m afraid I want to have that game.

Books:
I finished 8 books this month. Best one was Assassin’s Apprentice, a re-read. It was still as beautiful and lovely as I remembered it. But 20 years ago I thought of Burrich and Verity so very old and now my thoughts were how young they are just being in their 30s.
What I also enjoyed very much was I hope This FindsYou Well by Natalie Sue, a mix of drama and cozy novel in an office setting.

Films:
6 movies. I liked The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes but I think it would have been better as two or three movies. I also liked Gozilla Minus One, Sea Fog (Korean drama) and Babylon 5: The Road Home (so sad that many actors of the original series are dead already).

TV Shows:
I fininished You. Didn’t like the fourth season with the setting in England that much, but I liked the twist. Next I finished Fuller House. I don’t really like the humour of that show but it was nice seeing their faces again and having the storyline focues on the girls, now women. Then I had an intense binge on Hacks. I love the show about two women, one an old diva comedian, the other one a young gen z comedian, having to work for the older woman. We also finished Bridgerton. I think Penny is my fav character, I like her love for writing and gossip. I also watched the first season of The Alienist, it was okay but 19th century is not my fav time. Another binge on Beef, brilliant show with awesome actors. And as last show I started Kaulitz & Kaulitz. It’s a reality show about two twin brothers who are in a band called Tokio Hotel. I didn’t know that the band still existed, back when I was a teen they (who were also teens back then) were huge. I wasn’t a fan but it’s fun to revisit them and see how they changed.

My birthday month! It felt very celebretory, I got so many wonderful presents and saw my friends for brunch, gaming and BBQ. In addition, May was full of holidays which were very much needed. Work was still stressful but the exhausting part of transitioning to new structures is coming to an end. I also had some doctor’s appointments, one doctor was so nice and empathic I cried happy tears. So all in all May was a good month.

Gaming:
Still playing Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. I still like the storyline and the basic gameplay but oh boy, why are there so many repetitive sidequests and stupid mini games? Yes, the original Final Fantasy 7 had it’s share of mini games and goofing-around but with FF7 Rebirth I feel like half the game is filled with this kind of stuff.
Concerning boardgames May was pretty good. First time I playe Power Struggle, not my kind of game, I don’t like games with bribing other players. I played Wingspan Asia solo which was so much fun that I directly bought all the other expansions. I also enjoyed The Crew very much.

Books:
Ok, too many hyped books I didn’t like that much: Demon Copperhead, House of Flame and Shadow and The House in the Cerulean Sea.
YA books I enjoyed: Moxie, Five Feet Apart and Every Last Word.
The Book I absolutely adored and devoured: The Women by Kristin Hannah.
Oh and as a birthday gift my partner got me the new Tolino Shine Color. I love having an e-reader with color! It’s nice to see all the colorful book covers and the occasionally colored pages in Manga or books.

Films:
I saw the Macbeth theather play with Ralph Fiennes and Indira Varma in the cinema, it was very entertaining and Indira Varma the best Lady Macbeth I have ever seen. Then I saw some Batman Anime films which were all ok but sometimes hard to understand if you don’t know the world by heart. Another movie was Unfrosted which I thought would be the worst movie this month but it was topped by Oppenheimer. The acting was good but the storyline and script were, as we would say in German, „nichts halbes und nichts ganzes“. There were different themes and topics going through the story but not in a good way, it felt like 4 unfinished movies meshed into one. But well, the movie got me into nice Wikipedia sessions about the atomic bomb (I’m quite a „fan“ of Radiation and stuff)

TV Shows:
I watched and finished One Day, it was a very cute mini series but I hated the ending. Then I got into a serious obsession (pun intended) with the tv show You. It’s basically about a man who becomes obsessed with a woman and stalks her. But it’s not like a real life crime story (I personally am a bit tired of glorified male murderer stuff with female victims), but actually more of a twisted dark comedy making fun of the characters.

April’s weather in April, what a torture. There were days where we had all the seasons, changing every 10 minutes.
In April, there was a lot of work stuff going on, my colleague and I decided to change to a different department. Actually not much is going to change for us, same offices and stuff, only the people we work for may change. I still don’t know yet. I hate not knowing stuff. Otherwise not much going on, I had some boardgame- and lunchdates, but all in all it was a quiet month with not so much social stuff.

Gaming:
I finished Baldur’s Gate 3. Act 3 was boring and the ending not that satisfying. And I am still very very sad that I didn’t get to date Asterion. So I’m gonna have to play that game again. Then I started playing Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. It’s sooo good. They made some stuff easier (like not having to reload old saves when you want to start a fight over), the artwork is beautiful, Sephiroth still one of the best villains ever and there is so much that remindes me of the old FF7.
I played three new boardgames: Qwirkle: love it. Trade on Tigris: way better than I thought. Expiditions: Clumsy beginning, but then I liked it. I also played some other boardgames like Turing Machine and the Clevers.

Books:
I consumed 6 boooks. My fav was Yellowface by R.F. Kuang. I also liked her other book Babel. And Nettle & Bone by T. Kingfisher was suprisingly good, it was like an old fairy tale but with some nice twists.

Films:
April was a film month, I watched 12 movies, wow, that is a lot for me. I got many DVDs from the library and worked through my watchlist. What I liked: Saltburn, eXistenZ, Memoir of a Murderer and Mirage. Special note to the Finnish horror movie Hatching that got me nightmares.

TV Shows:
I also watched quite a lot of shows. 3 Body Problem was not as good as the books, there was essential stuff missing. Kevin Can F*** Himself was really good, a show that is half sitcom and half drama. I also watched all episodes of Undone which was a beautiful animated show about the butterfly effect. Then I continued with the third season of Upload. It’s an okayish show about a world where you can upload yourself after dying and then live in a simulated world. Next was Baby Reindeer, a miniseries about a female stalker. It was interesting and shocking because it is based on real events, but I thought both main characters were kind of annoying and horrible by different degrees.
And then we also watched what everybody seems to be talking about: Fallout. I didn’t like the first episodes, I don’t like the world-building so much because there is too much going on. But the last episodes were better and had some good plot twists.