SMOONSTYLE : October 2012

Hi sweets,

It seems that something went wrong when I first posted this. Let's hope that the second try will be successful.

These pictures were taken during our two day stay in Philadelphia. It was the first time for me that I saw more of the city than just Chinatown. We had an awesome stay in Philly!

Enjoy the pictures!

Waterside.

Cool shop that sells unique bar stools.

This buddy is waiting for a new family at www.phillypaws.org.

PAWS Philadelphia Animal Welfare Society.

Chinatown.

Downtown Philly.

Exploring the city.

Rocky.

Love,

29.10.12 14 comments

Hi Sweets,

The winners of the American/Canadian version are finally revealed. My apologies for the delay. I had a show in Belgium and a flight to Washington to catch. Here are the winners:

Monica Winter.

Gretchen Piening.

Sara Wertanen.

Please send another email to contest@nuclearblastusa.com to let me know to which show you'd like to come. Congratulations girls! I'll be seeing you soon!

Love,

23.10.12 5 comments

Hi sweets,

This is the first time that I blog during a train ride on my iPhone. Some of my most common train rides are those from the Netherlands to Germany. These travels always last approximately 5 hours if I'm lucky.

In Germany the train system is quite different compared to the Dutch railway. Trains don't drive every half and hour and have all different connections. I find this a bit a con compared to my fatherland. The prices are much higher, but for your price you mostly get a comfortable seat.

When you travel via the ICE it is advised to reserve a seat for €4. That is what I did, but when I arrived in Aachen I saw that my train had a delay of 25 minutes. That already gave me the knowledge that I would miss all my connections.

I rushed my way to the counter to rebook my train and also make a new seat reservation. These train rides are so much more comfortable when you can sit in a chair and not on the ground in front of the toilets.

When my train arrived, and I after quite some hassle found my seat, I saw that it was taken. I always feel really bothered to tell these people that I reserved their seat. Those people were grandma and grandpa which probably never travel and look at the signs above the chairs. It was not a very nice 'Stoelendans' because grandpa changed seats to another reserved seat and had to move again a couple of minutes later.

Point of this message is that whenever you travel by train in Germany; always reserve a seat in the trains that have such a system. I still have some hours of rail road ahead of me. Please keep your fingers crossed for me that my travels won't get more delayed.

Love,

14.10.12 10 comments

Hey Sweets,

Our tour through Latin America was a huge success! So many fans came to visit us. It was unbelievable! I'm glad that we've made a picture at the end of each show. Like this I get to keep a wonderful souvenir.

Each and every show was amazing. We even conquered new land; Paraguay. We were only 8 hours in Paraguay and had to take off again unfortunately, but we did have a bloody good time there! We've received many gifts, artwork and had lots of meet and greets.

In these three and a half weeks I flew 19 times, had 14 shows and one free day.

It was a sensational tour filled with air-conditioned (fridge temperature) planes, immigration forms, churrascarias, co operative and less co operative hotels and last but not least, zillions of devoted fans.

Thank you for making us feel so welcome and remember that the greatest gift you can give us is by coming to our shows and letting us sign your Epica CD's and cassettes, I've seen one in Brazil!).