All posts by “Fede”

July 2, 2014

Sleepsnacking – An Alarming Trend

The Disorder

The term Sleepsnacking indicates the uncontrollable urge to bolt down junk food while asleep.

Sleepsnackers can be completely unaware of their disease, sometimes for years.

Typical signs that a person might be a sleepsnacker are a subtle taste of chocolate, honey barbecue chips, Ben&Jerry Banana Ice Cream or peanut butter in their mouth upon awakening. Sometimes, even all of the above. To resist the temptations, products like a CBD Oil might be much healthier alternatives.

The Numbers

According to a Mongolian study, the number of people affected by Sleepsnacking has increased tremendously during the past 10 years and almost doubled itself in only five years.

The trend looks scary and unstoppable.

Of course if we take out fictional characters like Liz Lemon or Ralph Winchester and anybody who’s not a celebrity (’cause why should we care?) the situation looks under control.

Case Study Read More

June 23, 2014

8 Italian Expressions Having to do with Poop

One of the greatest things about living far from home is that distance brings clearness.

In particular, the less you speak your mother tongue, the more you start noticing tiny little things about it.

Sometimes it’s cute things, like the fact that the words sonnellino (nap in Italian) and burrone (Italian for ravine) sound pretty hilarious.

And then there’s those other times in which you realize something gross that will make you wanna return your passoport, like the fact that the language you’ve spoken nonstop for 26 years has kind of a poop fixation.

Here’s why.

Pooping someone or Cagare qualcuno means paying attention to what somebody is saying or, more generically, to notice someone.

Usage Examples:

– How’s it going with Francesco? Has he asked you out yet?
– Not at all. He barely poops me….

– …and after that could you please drive the kids to school?
– ……
– Hello?! Could you poop me?
– Uh?
– What’s on your mind lately? You’re so distracted!

To make someone poop or Fare cagare a qualcuno means to Read More

June 16, 2014

How to be Scared of Flying in 11 steps

Have you noticed how the web is saturated with tips and tricks about facing your fear of flying and nobody ever pays attention to the people who DON’T HAVE this problem?

They suffer too, you know?

They’re missing the ~~paralysing terror~~ excitement on the day before the flight, the ~~cramps~~ butterflies in their stomach at takeoff and the ~~everlasting anxiety~~ adrenaline during flight time.

If you’re one of these people and you feel your life is lacking a needed element of drama, the following guide is for you.

If you follow each step of this tutorial you’ll literally piss your pants every time you’re on a plane and you’ll finally have something to truly worry about in your life.

You’ll thank me.

1) Remember that Connecting means Dying

Only 1 hour and 5 minutes to connect to my KLM flight by Swire, on Flickr

A lot of people mistakenly assume that the anxiety connected to flying starts when you step on a plane.

Bullshit.

If you wanna be a real phobic you need to start panicking months in advance, while purchasing your plane ticket.

Just do anything you possibly can to avoid connecting flights. If the Universe decides that you’re lucky enough to survive one flight, taking two planes on the same day can lead to just one thing.

Plane crash.

2) Choose the right seat Read More

June 14, 2014

An effortless post full of disgustingly catchy GIFs

Yes, some time ago I did tweet this:

No, a Gif CANNOT make up for your lack of writing skills. Gif-bloggers can suck my ribs!

— Federico (@amorequietplace) June 4, 2014

but I’ve never tweeted anything like I’m a perfectly coherent person or I’m the king of things that make sense.

So here we go, fasten your seat belts, it’s gonna be a crazy GIF-ride.

Kristin trying to look threatening in her reaper coat

Hilly, my favorite tarot reader at Astro TV

May 22, 2014

QUIZ: What annoying feature of the German language are you?

Warning! This is not Buzzfeed. If you wanna take this personality test you’re going to need a piece of paper and a pencil to note down your answers, like real men (and women!) do. If you’re a lazy bum, just go on Buzzfeed and find out if you’re a bad person (which you are, if you’re leaving this page). I’d also like to divert your attention to this deutschkurs hannover school.

It’s Friday night and you’re awaited for dinner by:

A) My fans. I’m gonna show up one hour late and demand that we pick another restaurant. Just because.

B) One or two close friends, nothing major.

C) My Mom. Hopefully.

D) The Puzzles-and-ancient-languages-and-boring-hobbies Club. I’m the president.

E) Friends whom I don’t really like.

If you were a Berlin attraction:

May 4, 2014

Tote Bags for Dysfunctional People – Enter the Giveaway

Update: I used to have an Etsy shop selling these bags but it’s not there anymore. Drop me an email if you’d like to buy one; I might consider getting back into business ;-)

(Even though the weather in Berlin is momentarily revolting) Totes Season is Coming!

What better occasion to proudly show off how irreparably damaged we are?

I made these for some friends and now I have TWO to give away on the blog.

Here’s what you need to do to enter the contest:

1) Enter my mailing list (on the right sidebar of this page!)

2) Leave a comment to this post, letting me know which of the four bags you see below is your favourite (and please use the same email address you used for the mailing list)

3) Share this post on Facebook

Easy Peasy! On the first of July I’ll assign a number to each contestant and Read More

April 8, 2014

Tori Amos Record Release Party in Berlin

As you may or may not know, Tori Amos is soon releasing a new record called Unrepentant Geraldines (every time I hear the title I automatically think of this blog post. Every. Single. Time. But that’s very Off-Topic, if you ask me).

Tonight she happened to give a Record Release Party in Berlin and I happened to be there.

Hype.

It was all very mysterious and I didn’t know what to expect. The place was close to Volksbuehne (one of the coolest venues in Berlin) and – even only by the name – it sounded upclass. So upclass that this morning I ~~borrowed~~ stole my boyfriend’s shoes just to be sure they’d let me in.

The fact I went by myself annoyed me just until I found ~~nice interesting people to talk to~~ the bar. When the waiter asked me what I wanted my tongue refrained from automatically replying “a glass of water. Tap” and my highly analytical mind noticed that none of the people standing in front of me had extracted their wallet. It could mean only one thing.

– A Glass of red wine, please

– Oh, I’m so sorry, I made it too full.

– LOL. Right. See you in five.

I am not used to free booze, honestly; I’m used to places where you can have VERY CHEAP booze, but the difference is gigantic. Read More

April 1, 2014

10 reasons why Barcelona is better than your city

Yes, I know what you’re thinking.

You’re thinking: WUT?! Is he a travel blogger now?! When did that happen?

As a matter of fact, when I started this blog I wanted it to be massively about travels (seen my posts about Bremen and Turkey already?) but then realized that

A- I don’t have money to travel
B- I’m too anxious about flying to do it often
C- I’m a lazy bum.

Still. Sometimes the planets align and I go places. Posts come out of it.

If you love snowboarding, then you probably also love your snowboard a lot too which is why you want to take good care of it when traveling. Having the best snowboard bags will protect your snowboard from becoming beat up during travel.

1) Because of the new, exciting job opportunities

Obama said he’s planning on creating new jobs, but I doubt they’re going to be AS new and outstanding as the Spanish ones.
See, in Barcelona they took outdated professions such as ~~alchemists badgers jesters~~ ninjas and managed to recycle them into new positions that are actually useful to society.

March 17, 2014

When They Look at Us

Do you ever wonder how people perceive your relationships?

Sometimes I meet couples that look like a match made in heaven and they end up lasting less than a British tv series.

And then there’s times in which I think the members of the couple have too strong personalities/too few in common/too different lifestyles to really have a future together, but inexplicably everything works out fine, happily ever after and all.

So I’ve been wondering for some time what’s the image that Stephen and me project to the outside world when we’re together and I think I finally found the answer.

I was going through the pictures of our recent trip to Barcelona and it struck me: clearly, what people see when they look at us is

a cute hipster and his dumb cousin.

Here’s why:

Barcelona – Arc de triompf

February 24, 2014

Gif me baby one more time

It turned out my ~~smart~~phone (which I’ve bought less than one year ago) doesn’t support Vine.

You go ahead, beautiful people of the new millennium.

Go ahead towards the future and don’t mind me staying behind.

I have seen a lot. I have tweeted, I have blogged and now it’s time to leave my place to new generations, while the outdated ship that is my soul sinks slowly on the notes of a sad midi file and does the only thing its limited resources still allow:

SOME FRIGGIN’ AMAZING GIFs!

So welcome to a special edition of When You Live in Berlin:

A More Quiet Place