No real news in summer

In German, this situation is called the "Sommerloch" (summer hole), when journalists make news out of everything that happens.
I've found some things today that make me worry about the future of journalism.
The head of the German liberal party, Guido Westerwelle, has introduced his boyfriend to the public. Now what a surprise. We've been knowing that he's gay for quite a while anyway, and who cares? The mayors of Berlin and of Hamburg, I think, are homosexual, too. Is that worthy of space in the newspaper? Can't they keep their private life private?
In Romania, a surgeon has cut off the penis of a patient. The first cut was an accident, but then he panicked and just hacked the organ into pieces, so it can't be put back on anymore. Yeah right. Bad for the patient and his family, I suppose. But does the rest of the world really care? I guess it makes you shudder and grin, so it does two things news apparently need to do: move you and make you laugh.
And lastely, it seems as if Germany finally found somebody who didn't hide fast enough when asked to become coach to the national soccer team. We're talking the men's team here, the women are world champions, because they know what they're doing and don't just get money for losing. So Jürgen Klinsmann, who was quite famous as a soccer player a few years ago, is about to do that job. In my humble opinion, they should change the team instead of the coach. Just hand out German passports to all the French, British, Spanish, Brasilian and whatever players in the German soccer teams.
Summer hole, there's no other way to describe that. And we don't even have a summer to go with it. It has been raining hard all morning, and it is supposed to be like that for the weekend. That means we won't be able to go and have a picnic in the park for my sister's wedding on Saturday, meaning we'll spend most of the time from 3 o'clock until late at night / Sunday morning in one room. Yuk.
The news links are in German only, so those of you who don't speak German just have to trust me.

I spent the night with David Bowie

Something I forgot because of the bad weather and everything bothering me:
I had a wonderful night last night.
My dear friend Michael had told me that Arte, a German-French TV station would show some pieces of the Hurricane festival, were David Bowie performed right before his surgery. So I kicked my parents out of the living room yesterday night and stayed up to watch it. The first great thing was to see Ray Cokes doing the presentation, well known back from the times MTV was only in English. He did i in French, though, which sounded really cool. There also was a stupid girl from German TV there, but clearly Ray was the person who knew what he was doing, and she was just there to look good.
Anyway, I had to wait through The Hives, Franz Ferdinand, The Prodigy and several other bands before they finally announced the highlight of the show. Clearly, just as myself they considered David Bowie as the most important, best and greatest act at the festival. They only had three songs they showed on TV, All the young dudes, I'm afraid of Americans and Heroes. It was great. It's a pity our TV screen is not very large. I'd prefer something like movie theater size. But he is so impressive, he doesn't need all kinds of funny things like other singers, he doesn't need to tell the audience to clap with the rhythm. He's just there and everybody listens.
At the festival, there are people with very different tastes in music. With all the other bands, some people just sat around waiting for tht particular show to be over. But not with David Bowie.
It is all the more impressive knowing that right afterwards he had to have surgery. He must have felt something was wrong while he was up on stage, but he didn't show it. On the contrary, it seemed as if he had a really good time. He doesn't need to prove anything anymore. So he can just enjoy himself up on stage and have fun. That got communicated to the audience, I think, and that is what made the show so cool.
There was a little bit of The Cure after David Bowie, which was nice, too. I haven't heard much of them lately and they are still pretty good.
So when I went to bed last night - early today, actually - I was in a really good mood. And remembering it now cheers me up, too.