Arigato gozaimasu!

well, i think its spelled like that.

In 1 week im off to japan. were going from zurich to vienna, and then vienna to tokyo, that last part is 13 hours!!!
Im afraid that i might loose my mind on that long flight. not because im afraid of flying, more of being closed in a tube for 13 hours. normally flying from iceland(3-4 hours) is driving my wife quite crazy. I get so restless!
But we will see how that all goes.

Other then that i got a whammy from my boss, need to deliver a watch before i go. i get the last parts on wednesday. that means making those parts work and then case the watch on thursday and friday(cause we all know that wednesday means wednesday night, if not early thursday morning.) Time will tell.

I will take a million and half photos. and post the naughty ones ;)

Photos part 1

 

these are just some random photos of the people that i work with. What all these photos have in common is they made watches that were displayed(in VIP rooms) in Basel and Geneve)

 

They might be expensive, but we are pro's we know what were doing!
 

Im sure we do! dont worry :)
 

a little shout out to my peeps!

Photos part 2

 
 
 
 

Some more photos, of more ppl, of more watches going big places!
This is really an inspiring place to work, where you see the Creme de la Creme every day! Its hard not to get spoiled by it. When i walked around on basel, looking at all the "normal" watches there, i got bored quite fast tbh.

Photos!

Im gonna add some photos to my blog the upcoming days!
First i gotta find a good system to do that. im sure Picasa and blogger have something worked out. dunno how to do it yet though <.<

But stay tuned for photos of watchmakers and theire watches!

Away she goes!

My first watch was accepted by the client company! And im very happy with it.

My parents are coming later today, they landed in germany and are driving here in a rental car, but they got the wrong rental :S, so were gonna see what we can do about that!

Alors, ill cya later all

Video games

I read a wikipedia page about Jack Thompson, and boy, that man is KAH-RAZY. Someone even likened him with Don Quixote, fighting his eternal battle against magical evils and dragons(aka games and game developers).

And i hereby declare that Video games is one of the BEST entertainment solutions since Orson wells "War of the worlds" on radio. TV is brain killing, we all know this, it doesnt ask you any questions, only talks and talks and talks. Infact, TV is like that 14 year old girl who just thinks her side of the story is soooo much more interesting then anything else, more interesting infact then any thing else.
Books are good, at least they call upon your imagination.
But, Games(tv ones or computer ones, same same) are atleast getting you engaged, thinking, and interacting. Ill go as far as saying that Violent computer games are good for moderately violent people to calm down a bit. Ofc, crazy ppl(like Jack thompson) have always existed, and murders and random violence has always existed, games or no games. This is just the latest scapegoat for the white middle aged(good chance of Christianity, not a defining factor, but these crack pots just always seem to be) to blame the state of the youth on. It even all started with the Space invaders game. When in fact, if you put the table for the amount of crime victims per 1000 citizens(i guess this is america) and put over the release dates for different violent games.
well, this is the effect!

[picture snagged from http://www.surprisinger.com/]


Kinda makes you chuckle huh.

Thats it.

At long last

I have finished my first watch!! *loud cheers*
Yes, thats right, My first 470 000 euro watch is ready. Its the Girard perregaux Jackpot. Im quite happy with it. Got very good marks on quality(aka how clean and well finished it was. also in regards to how it worked). And im very well pleased with that. Ofcourse.

My parents are coming for my fathers 60 year birthday. I just hope that we have good enough ativities laid up for them, the right food etc.

Ive decided to try and revive this blog a little, with smaller but more frequent posts >.<

So! hopefully see you soon :)

whats this?

Is this a blog?
Oh well, better blog then.

Started building my movement now, its going forward. It is kinda hard, because allot of the things im doing are new to me, but at the same time allot of the things are things ive done before. So those things i know are allot fun, because even if i know them, they take concentration and precision to become like it should be.

What am i doing now?
Im doing premontage(it seems ive said that allot on this blog). A whole deal of watchmaking on this level is premontage, getting the pieces ready, making sure they work in the watch(this can sometimes be very time consuming, for example, almost the whole day yesterday went into a big cross slide. Making sure it was completely free in its slide but not having a big shake in said slide). This is very cool and fun because when my boss is telling me what to do with X piece or Y piece, he explains a bit about what it does in the watch, what powers are working on it and what i need to be careful off and what to be extra perfect with. At the same time i get a bigger feel for the whole mechanism, which is of course totally awesome :P

Tomorrow me and my wife are going to see the alps. A colleage of mine and his girlfriend are going on a road trip to the alps, and they invited us with them. If the weather is anything like today it will be really nice and hopefully a relaxing but enjoyable ride.

Offbeat, I am finally getting a good hang of the french. Getting some of the jokes, even making some of my own now :P.
Relations at work are getting smoother and smoother. Even being able to drop into some workshops and just chat a bit. That feels very nice, to be able to participate in normal banter.

p.s. im gonna see what photos i can take of this movement, the platine(main plate) is very revealing so im not sure if thats allowed or not.

Happy New YEAR!!

2008 is here!

And im back in switzerland.

X-mas was great, see the family, go around town, meet friends and, EAT FOOOOOOOD!! omg, ive never managed to be full for 12 days straight before, like the WHOLE TIME. geez, need to find something to do to get rid of some excess fat.
And 2 weeks is almost too short when you need to meet all your family for the year. so when i came back to work i was tired as hell.

Im actually having huge problems with my last tourbillion, both me and my boss have looked at it a few times now and we just havent been able to find anything that should give this tourbillion so low amplitude :(

Until late today, my boss saw that the incablocs werent moving back into position like they should. so tomorrow im gonna change those and see what happens.


Just a short post today, gonna try and write more soon :)

p.s. and x-mas photos are to follow soon'ish

sorry.

Yes yes, i know, ive been lazy writing new posts on the blog.

And well, now i have a few reasons to write something again :)

First, my old teacher/headmaster was on a course for teachers at the WOSTEP foundation in neuchatel, so we took the chance and met up ofc.
We agreed over telephone that i should come to neuchatel by train and should arrive 3ish, and that i did. But, i hadnt eaten very much that morning, so i was hungry as hell already at 3. He had been busy doing something else so he hadnt eaten either.
So, Situation : we were both hungry
Solution : Eat!
Problem! In switzerland, restaurants dont start serving food untill after 6'o clock at the soonest. But, both me and him had eaten at this really good pizza restaurants in the past before 6'o clock. We walk to this restaurant *MEEEEP* half past six they start serving food.... ok, what else?
we walk around for 30 minutes maybe. At this point i was having trouble containing my hunger-irritation, i always get very irritated when i get too hungry. But i managed to contain myself :P
After those 30 minutes, we decide to eat kebab, because all the kebabs ive eaten in switzerland have only been snacks, littly tiny things to tease your appetite, i thought that would do us good for 2 hours and then we could have a pizza.

*kaaPLAMOOoo* the biggest fucking thing ive seen since Borensberg. this kebab was enough to feed a hungry family for 3 weeks if cut up right. So, that scratched the pizza plans. oh well.

We talked allot about the education i got and what he wants to change in the school, it was really nice to see such fire in him.
But what was really important was ofc that he brought me my Ring(linky)
Had a few beers and some glasses of wine, all in all it was a nice evening.

I Have also _almost_ completed my first tourbillion, Its all polished and ready for final fine-tuning. Today i also completed my first movement. Ok, its just a movement travaille(a movement to put the tourbillions in to test and regulate). It was great fun to recognize the parts from premontage and to get a sense of completion to what im doing. I also got told what im going to do after X-mas, but im not telling you :P


And Rebekka took some awesome pictures of when it snowed a few days back

Ill try and be more active in my posting :)

David out!

Around we go!

Tourbillion : means Whirlwind literally, is an escapement device in a watch, its very delicate and very brittle. so this takes specialized tools and VERY strict guidance if you want to do this. Last but not least, you need the talents.

Lucky for me, my boss thinks i have all of these now(the tools i made, linky at top), the guidance i get from my boss and the talent i got somewhere else(mom? dad?).

Anyway, i am now in the process of making my Very first Tourbine cage, you pronounce the french cage similar to cache, but with longer a, like caaache.(or tourbillion cage(this is the english cage, like bird-cage), the complete thing is called a cage, beats me why). ive taken as many pictures as ive remembered to take, be cause, to be perfectly honest, im quite swept up in this work and easily forget to stop and take pictures.

Its great fun, especially since i can for the first time sense that im getting close to my first "product". Its very challenging though. Small brittle stuff that easily break or if i take a 100th of a millimeter to much here or there, it simply wont work and *woosh* back where i started on last wednesday( wednesday-ish atleast).

Other news :

Were going to IKEA again now on saturday, it sucks to have ALL your clothes in one biggish closet with 3 shelfs, that makes all my pants in one big pile in left corner of shelf, all my t-shirts in a big pile in the middle, some t-shirts spill over to the pants, some wander off to the sweaters, which also have a specific corner to be in. Now, add some pull-overs and polo(?) shirts and its all a big mess. this needs fixing.

My French is coming along, im almost able to totaly understand my teacher soon. this will hugely boost my learning capabilities(sarcasm intended) No, but seriously, my french is picking up and coming along nicely. Last word i learned was "fois" (which means "time" as in "Due fois par semain" = "two times per week".) Rebekkas french is, ofc, brilliant, she just doesnt get as much practice as i do.

Working on workphotos

Now that im finaly done with most of the pre-montage for the other guys in the attelie, My boss asked me to do some possages(dunno how to spell that, but its to put parts on for pollish and/or work in the lathe.) for a tourbillion. so that probably means that i will start working on the Tourbillion soon.

Btw, before i can start working on the tourbillion, i have a 7 page how-to, just step by step, without any theory on how or why(thats a few books of material). and i needed to make 7 possages to hold different parts for specific steps(or what the hell you call it, things-to-do-before-its-finished).

Even if the tourbillion is really not many parts at all, it is the beating organ of any watch its put into. and being handmade. everything becomes very touchy-touchy. if i dont keep my tolerances while doing the pre-assembly on the tourbillion, the finished product will be a bitch to get right.

Im really looking forward to this. i havent been in a rush getting here though. ive been savoring the feeling of anticipation, and knowing there are more, better things to come then pre-montage. i think that every step of building my own watches(the ones i get assigned at work i mean) will be very fun and very interesting work for me.

Im growing quite confident in my skills now, at the same time i am starting to realize the amount of stuff i have yet to learn, and that amount gets bigger and bigger for the day. "Learn the answer to one question and have two more questions" kind of thing.

In closing, i need to talk to my boss before i add more pictures, i want to get a permanent deal so that i can just keep posting without being afraid of being sued or something for leaking industrial secrets >.<

And here is a slightly hazy picture of a Tourbillion in a watch for those who didnt know what that is.

Some work examples

I have really told all the story on the picasaweb website, so just check it out. there is a description on what i did today and monday. Its typical pre-assembly work, just finishing parts, making them straight etc. when i have some other nice piece to work on ill post more pictures :P (and according to what im allowed to show ofc ... )

new watch!

i couldnt resist, i had to have one of these

thats officialy my first compulsive buy ever i think(atleast in watches). so look and like it :P

Dutchies!

Me and Rebekka had three friends from holland here on visit the last weekend. It was _great_ fun, we went to Saut-de-daubs, Neuchatel and drove around some in the area. The area is really nice, i hadnt seen so much of it before and it is awesome.

We had lots of food, beer and fun, Theire son(Daniel, 2.5 years old) is such a sweetheart he kept asking me what i was doing and when i told him, he would always say "okey" in the cutest voice :)

I would love to go and visit them someday soon, probably will after X-mas :)

for pics check out jp's album


Work work work.
Almost a month done soon, and im getting more and more comfortable with the ppl at the company, even if my french is mostly still point and grunt(with nasal sound effects, it sounds french atleast).
This friday i started mirror polishing, it didnt work out at all, even the guy showing me wasnt able to get it right, we have to figure out what is wrong, if my tools are defect, my paste(the polishing paste) or if the piece itself is the base of the problems. well, i wasted a whole day on it anyway, so the things my boss gave me to do before he went on a small holliday will guaranteed last me now...
Oh well, c'est la vie.

I also found out that my employer will pay for my french lessons, so im starting those after x-mas i think. to avoid a 2-3 week break in the studies. Thats 600 francs i save, so awesome :P

p.s. Freddie! have fun with your boys!

/David out

Second week, starting badly

I caught a fever and went to work yesterday with it, i thought id better show up, feel how it is and go home if its bad. It turned out to be bad, but if i had gone home after showing up, i would have lost plus-hours. so i struggled through the day with fever and headache, something im not doing again, the whole day was error ridden and mistakes were being made a lot(at least according to me)

Riveting wheels with wrong punches, cleaning the same wheel twice and leaving others dirty etc etc, i just was not able to focus the whole day.

BUT

We are gonna pull our forces together and work like horses and finish the order we have before x-mas AND do more then that(for a nifty bonus). so that means the odd Saturday at work and a few more plus-hours.

I start most mornings at 7.30 and work till 1700, that gives me 1 plus-hour a day, thinking of trying to come at 7.00 and staying till 1700, thats 1.5 hours a day. but we'll see about that, maybe its easier to just go to work at noon on saturdays and work for a few hours. atleast that way i still get 2 sleepy mornings.

I would like to talk about what im doing at work, but im not sure what kind of secrecy i have on me, so ill ask my bosses how much i can talk about without getting in trouble :P

other then that, check my new pics for our appartment

thats it for now,

p.s. everyone can now leave comments, no need to register with anything or anyone, so please do :)

/Davíð

Watchmaking

I have now worked for a week, doing some pre-montage, its going decently i guess, too early to judge i think.

But phew, the depth of watchmaking im going into is immense! everything needs to be 100%, and not just any 100%, a watchmakers 100%, this is going to be a real challenge(like climbing a mountain, not like solving an impossible puzzle). Were also getting settled in our appartment, it will be really nice here i think.
We finally got our internet connection installed, im really glad that we got it before the weekend, not after :P

I had one of the best work-lunches today, my boss and i went downtown to get some tools, we then went for a pizza and some coffee afterwards, the lunch took 2 hours! usually we take 30 minute lunches, but its really nice to know that once in a while its okey to take a long lunch and chill.

the pre-montage, as i said is going quite well i think, we got to play around with the GP jackpot a little bit today and yesterday, it really is gonna be a cool watch when its finished(there are only 2 pieces completed, the one that went to Basel fair and the one we had. Its still just basic work, but its very good training and setup for when i start doing "real" work. And im starting to realize just how big this job is, i feel really lucky that everything just seems to fit, time, money(not much, but enough), wife, boss, work etc etc.

Im excited about the future me and Rebekka are going to have here in Switzerland, the next couple of years are going to be interesting!

/David

Switzerland and language

Here we are.
The appartment was a little strange. it isnt as big as i hoped, so any guests and visitors will have to sleep in our living room, which should be okey though. We will change appartments though when we can(next septembre), becouse even if this appartment has a balcony, a bathtub and decent planning, the house and general state of the appartment isnt the shizneck!

Le Locle, the town itself is very, very cute, quite lovely actually. with a million small restaurants, a few supermarkets, hardware stores etc etc. So living here the next year should be realy easy and nice -- EXCEPT -- the house we live in is at a top of a HUUUUGE hill, so we will get thighs of thunder and asses of steel!!
Im quite surprised at how well we are getting over the language barrier, been able to order food, postage stamps, internet(which should arrive in 2 weeks the dude said) prepaid SIM card for my mobile(which should work tomorow) and all sorts of things.

We went on a looong travel to IKEA just outside of Lausanne yesterday, and phew, it was a tough journey to make back with backpacks and bags full of lamps and stuff. but we had too, the appartment didnt have any lights installed, so we needed something atleast.

and now, the weekly "Whats differnt in Switzerland"
All electric plugs are different(atleast all the grounded ones), a problem you dont really see untill your there, trying to plug in your TV to watch a porno-reel...

All-in-all. i am really excited about our stay here in Le Locle.
I am really looking forward to my first working day on monday, ill tell you all about that when we get there :)

/David

Arrived!

Atlast i have arrived in Switzerland, feels good.
The trip showed that switzerland has the best railroad system that i have ever had the pleasure to use. fast, cheap(ish) and gets me to the place i want.

Will give a longer post when i have more time and better peace of mind.

/David

Bigger wedding post

Hi all again.

So this is the promised, longer wedding post.

It started out a little rocky. Since we didnt get married in a church, we got a civil marriage. That isnt why it was rocky though, it was when we got to the office of the syslumaður(the "judge" who performs the marriage). Me, my wife, my brothers and sister, theire kids, Rebekka's sister and brother, theire kids and our parents ... had to wait.

the person taking calls didnt see or realize that we were there for an marriage. so, 14 ppl had to wait while she was busy handling some one person doing some stupid stuff. we asked and asked "what are we waiting for??" and all she could say was "just a moment please", ppl started laughing at her for stalling, she was starting to sweat etc etc..

Buuuut, it all worked out lovely in the end, the ceremony took about 10 minutes at most, the judge asked if Rebekka wanted to take me as her husband, i asked the judge where she'd want to take me, she didnt like that joke and went on with the ceremony :P

After that we went to the Reykjavik Botanical garden, took some realy nice pictures . The weather was beautiful, we were really lucky, it was raining up untill the ceremony started, then it rained a little after we were done with the photoshoot.

The party it self with only 47 guests was held in my sisters HUGE house(thanks ALOT sis, it was perfect), she made a floral arch to stand in front of front door, custom made for me and Rebekka :)

We didnt want a sit-down-and-eat party, we wanted more mingling and NO ALCOHOL, when my sis got married there wasnt any alcohol either, and it showed just how good sober partys can be, so we wanted that too. and (who knew) it WORKED.
The food was 16 kinds of finger-foods, realy good and tasty. perfect for this party.

My lovely parents gave us the party as a wedding present(and boy, it wasnt cheap)


All-in-all, im ExTREMELY happy with both the party and ceremony and the lovely, lovely wife ofc, she is a perfect match for me, i am quite certain that i will be happy for many, many years to come with her :)

/David