Graz–Feb. 17, 2025

I spent most of the day finishing up the computer program I had written, then out to find a gym bag at a sporting goods store near Puntigam. Unfortunately, they’re a branch of a company that is in Germany, so they don’t have all the inventory that the website would lead you to believe. So that was a bit of time wasted. Oh well.

The following are some pictures I had on my phone and had forgotten to upload earlier.

Not a “blue screen of death“, but pretty close. Every once in a while the monitors in the streetcars either don’t work or display things like this. Once I was on a streetcar where the display was showing the last stop on the route in the reverse direction and never changing.

If I were a real estate agent, I’d advertise this one as “A nice fixer-upper, with old-fashioned rustic charm.“

Today’s lesson that nothing on the Internet is permanent. Even though the URL is carved in stone, if you try to go to the web site, you get a 403-Access Forbidden error.

A Random Thought

On the streetcars, there’s an automated recording that announces the next stop. (This system works even when the display screens don’t.) The voice is neutral-to-slightly-happy. At some major stops, such as Jakominiplatz or Haupstadt/Congress, there’s also a message in English. The person who did the English recordings sounds like they are thinking, “Oh god, this is the most boring, depressing job ever.”