Forgot to mention, pictures from our visit to the Castle Of Gruyères [a few weeks back] are online. The castle was quite amazing, one of the most majestic I’ve seen to far. But that was about all that we saw that day, due to the horrible weather!

Pictures here.

[Last one is a panorama]

One of most memorable events/places we visited this Christmas, was the Lenzerheide Magic Forest. We spent a few hours looking around the tiny town of Lenzerheide which was covered with snow, and then spent about an hour in the church as the snow was absolutely insane. Then we headed to the forest for the light shows and the market. The light shows were absolutely marvellous, and the market was quite authentic and beautiful. I’m actually looking forward to going there again next year!

Pictures here.

Last night [well, basically ’till morning] I finished reading Orson Scot Card’s “Ender’s Game“, the first book of the “Ender’s Saga”. The series have been on my reading list for basically ever now, but somehow I never got to it. Then the movie showed up which I don’t want to see before reading the books. [I’m a much bigger fan of books than movies and I don’t want watching the movie to spoil the books!] So a week ago I finally started reading the first book, and well, looks like I pretty much devoured it.

Once I started reading “Ender’s Game” I simply couldn’t put it down. The book definitely is one of the best sci-fi I’ve ever read, as was suggested to me by several of my friends. [You were all right! =) ] Now I’m going to start with the 2nd book… I’m of course very happy that there’s already 12 books in the series, and the author is writing some more…. I really do want more of this!

Honestly I wasn’t in such a hurry to see “Man of Steel”. Superman movies and comics have always been mere light entertainment to me, and even though I have occasionally enjoyed watching a movie or reading a comic, I’ve never been a fan. Through the years I’ve felt a chronic lack of plot and character development in all things Superman. [Which basically sums up my relationship with 99% of DC’s comics.]

So you can imagine my surprise, watching “Man of Steel” last night, and realizing in the middle of the movie that I was actually really enjoying it! Especially seeing the movie’s less than great ratings and the plenty of dissatisfied reviews! [Then again I often seem to like what everyone else hates and vice versa!]

Yes, I really really liked this movie! Many important details were changed, characters were much better developed, and most importantly so much nonsense and absurdity has been eliminated! I mean surprise surprise, for once in my life a Superman movie actually makes rational sense!!!!

For once we actually see a proper, well pictured, back story. Which actually explained why everything happened the way it all happened. I really enjoyed the beginning part of the movie where Krypton has been quite nicely illustrated, and we finally get a better idea of what “the parents” were like and what the circumstances were. Or for that matter why Zod acts the way he does. Also the earthly parents of Clark Kent have been much better developed. Supeman’s own character finally has some proper development with much less cheese involved. Oh, and for once, finally, someone has decided that Lois Lane should not be the idiotic, clueless, pointless, shame to all women, constantly in need of rescuing, aka the classical character. Thank you very much for that.

It’s been said the movie will have a next instalment in 2015. I do look forward to seeing that.

By the way, come to think of it, it’s interesting that the latest Batman movie was also the best I’ve ever seen, for pretty much all the same reasons! Looks like DC might have finally figured some things out… 😉  Maybe it’s time I go back and check the comic books……

Last week I finished reading [or more like devouring] Dan Brown’s latest book, “Inferno“. And well, wow! For me this book is now in a tie with “The Da Vinci Code” for Dan Brown’s best. As usual he has managed to put a lot of interesting ideas and generally “food for thought” in the book. But then the plot was also amazing this time, and felt like a bit of an evolution. So, I really enjoyed it. Totally recommended.

Last year I found out about this a tad too late, this year I managed to finally pay a visit to the Medieval Market in Montreux, at the Chillon castle. The market itself wasn’t much, it was just stalls here and there spread inside the castle. But the staff were dressed like elves, and the castle was beautiful.

Afterwards we walked from Chillon to Montreux, around lake Geneva…. this was simply lovely. After arriving to Montreux, we also paid a visit to the huge Christmas market in the centre of the city. Huge, and covered with chocolate and gingerbread for the most part. 😉

Pictures here.

On Sunday night we went to see the Hobbit [3D]. Yes, the opening week, in fact just after the opening day. =P I was in a pretty big hurry for this one… Couldn’t wait! And I’m so not disappointed!

The movie was simply great. As I wrote about the first part, in comparison the LOTR movies, the hobbit movies have the advantage of being truly faithful to the book, which naturally comes with making 3 movies out of the one book. Every important detail is there, with some cute additions, and altogether things just feel right. The visuals are quite stunning, and if you’re going to see the movie, make sure to see it in 3D.

I still have a problem with a blonde Orlando Bloom. That really doe NOT work. But I don’t think I had enough time to pay attention to that given Evangeline Lilly as Tauriel, and Benedict Cumberbatch’s voice on Smaug. =P

All in all it’s a lovely movie. The only “issue”, is the humongous cliff-hanger at the end. Of course when you divide one single book into 3 movies, every conclusion, every important event, everything that you are waiting for, will be at the end, waiting for the last movie. So now I have to wait a year for… well… everything. Meh. =P

Recently I attended the launch event for “3D Hubs” in Zurich. I really didn’t know anything about the service before that event, but I had in fact been wondering if such service exists. There are people with 3D printers, there are people who need something printed, it would be great if something connects them all to each other. And “3D Hubs” does exactly that. Check it out!

Also, there were some rather amazing printed items to see at the event. Here’s some examples:

This glove was entirely 3D printed, all the links together!

The brown one was printed out of PLA filament containing wood dust. It actually smells and feels like wood!

Transparent PLA!

Pretty stuff! =P

Inside looks a lot like a real analogue camera!

Of all the versions of Shakespeare’s “Much Ado About Nothing” that I have seen so far, old and new, classic and modern, my favourite has to be Joss Whedon’s! I watched it  some weeks ago for the first time, and a few nights ago again. I never thought I’d enjoy a version more than the digital theatre one with David Tennant and Catherine Tate, but I liked Joss Whedon’s even more than that! It’s just too cute! =D

Of course Joss Whedon and Jed Whedon also created their own version of “Sigh No More”, the famous soundtrack of Much Ado [with Shakespeare’s own lyrics!]. It’s quite nice, definitely the nicest version of it I’ve heard. =)

Last week we went to Basel to visit the two huge Christmas Markets. As usual though, we went early in the day to do some exploring first. We walked over the border to Saint-Louis [France], then to Huningue [France], then we crossed that amazing bridge in between the 3 countries and walked into Weil am Rhein [Germany]. Then we finally walked back to Basel and visited the markets!

As for the markets, they were amazing! These were probably the biggest, prettiest and highest quality [in terms of actual shopping items] Christmas markets I’ve ever seen anywhere! I even managed to find myself “Francesco Rubinato” glass pen… which was a real surprise! [More about that later…]

So… pictures are here.