August 2001 Archives

What the heck... I'm off to the movies in an hour or so.. gonna watch Final Fantasy

No, it's not an adult movie, you perverted bunch! I know the plot kinda sucks, but I wanna see the digital effects, I wanna see how "real" they could make human movement already. I will probably be disappointed, and on the other hand impressed, but really, think about it : what happens when they can make digital people, and one could no longer tell the difference? Would it stop mattering wether you are dealing with a 'non human' human after a while, or would we still want the real thing? I'm not gonna think about it, but maybe you can... Lemme know what you think your reaction would be : fear? curiosity?

I just came home a few seconds ago and hereby decelare holiday season officially opened! Yeah, I know I still have to do things before I actually leave, but the strain of the daily job is away now. I don't have to do anything right now. If I don't wash and iron and pack, I'll leave for the UK naked, but I don't have to do all that stuff.

Ofcourse I realize that I probably won't even make it to the UK since someone will stop me right here in Belgium, but hey... it might be a good thing to try. Anyone wanna test how far exactly you can get when walking, driving or so naked? Is it for instance possible to enter a bank, and withdraw money from your account? Can you go to the butcher and buy 10 pounds of roastbeef? Can you drive your car thru the carwash while being naked? Well, I actually think you might be able to pull that one of, just tell the operators that you'll keep the windows down and get washed as well :)

It's just incredible : I'm only 10 minutes far in my vacatation and already the witz are flowing out of my mouth, or rather fingers. Prepare for more to come!

Just read the note from Joco stating that he's prepping a trip-to-london blog for next week, but I'll just post the same stuff I post here on that blog as well. Unless ofcourse if it's his blog and he wants to keep it personal. I'll add a link on top of the page to where you can see the adventures as we experience them. I think we both will be taking about 2100 pictures or so, what would be about 300 every 24 hours, and thus only 12.5 photograph an hour... that ain't much! Besides, I plan on partying a lot in london, so there should be quite some nightlife pictures as well. I realize that we arrive on monday evening, and that during the week all those british foxes have to work, but we'll find a way to party anyway. And during the weekend, during the weekend baby... oooooowwwww yeah!

Yes, that is correct : today is my last day before I'm off from work for 2 weeks. Usually that could/should mean that there is a lot to finish before you can go, but not really now. It's friday, I'm in love... hmmm.. It's a title of a song, but apart from that, there is no reason why that sentence is here. Maybe I should mention Karen one last time, just to have a laugh? You'll get the Karen story some day, but it's kinda long to tell you right now. Wich reminds me : I've noticed Kristel of K3 (you know, that famous girl band from Belgium with hits like "Oma's aan de top" and "TeleRomeo") a few times in TV shows now, and she is pretty cute, intelligent as well, and she can actually sing. When you hear the songs K3 brings, it might not really show, but I've heard her sing in "De Notenclub" last week and she's really good.

Yikes! This late already? I've managed to be on time for the last 3 weeks in a row, succesfully beat traffic jams, road construction works, incorrect addresses and it would be a shame to turn up too late today... better leave right now.

ffwd. done.

When you read the last few entries in the blog, you could think that I'm a nagging old grumpy person.... and I'm really not. I'm just nearing the end of a very long and stressed period at work, and mentally (and physically too maybe since the back keeps on hurting) I'm just done. I'm sure I'll feel a whole lot better on friday evening when all is done, and my holiday officially starts. During the weekend I think I'll either pack some stuff so that everything is ready to go on monday, or I'll dump everything and hit the bed for 72 hours to fully recover from the past week(s).

After all, there is no point in leaving on a holiday in a stressed mood, is there? Holidays are supposed to be fun, and not a source of more stress. It should be possible to pack everything on monday, bring the ferrets to their hotel, clean the house and even have some time left to update the blog... But then I have to do some laundry in the weekend, I can't keep on buying new clothes, instead of washing and ironing the old ones :)

Got the monthly Visa bill in yesterday, and for the first time I was pleasantly surprised by it! It was only around $25, and even that small amount can/will be charged to someone else... That means I didn't use it this month.. hehhee... then why the hell do I have it? ;)

Just woke up, back still hurts. But at least it's a constant pain now, not in short stings. I can breathe in deeply now without collapsing in pain, so that is better. I already feel that even with those 10 minutes that I'm up now, that I'll be all cramped up by this evening because I automatically change the way I walk, and move around to avoid the pain. This will just overload my shoulders and other muscles, and effectively mess up the rest. Why can't this just go away? Applied more FlexFree, but only rest can aid I fear... and rest is something I can't take right now.

But we didn't go :) When I arrived there I told em right away that my back was hurting as hell and that I would wanna come along, but not play myself. I think that when I would have to reach down for the golfball one time I'd never get up again. Then it turned out Eef also had a sore back so we cancelled the minigolf and played some family game, that Joco won, Eef ended second and I grabbed the bronze medal by ending third. The fact that there was only the three of us, making the third place last place as well doesn't really matter. It certainly sounds better to have won the bronze medal, as to have ended last... the power of words... it's just incredible!

I'm gonna put some FlexFree on my back now, I normally never take any medication, but even taking a deep breath hurts so I think I might have sprained a muscle. Too bad that whatever you do, you somehow use your back :(

If the pain ain't better tomorrow I dunno yet what I'm gonna do since I don't wanna skip work for those last 4 days, and on the other hand, I don't wanna see my vacation go to waste because of a stupid sprained muscle that I didn't treat correctly (it probably just needs a few days of rest). The fact that I'm driving long distances each day won't help however... Hey, I'll survive!

Tonight it looked like it was gonna rain and cool down finally, but apart from some lightning and a very small amount of rain nothing much happened. It did cool down a bit however, but not enough if you ask me. I don't know what I did while sleeping, but my back hurts badly... not all of it, just a small part near the right side of my spine. I already tried stretching this morning, I picked up a blanket around 04h00 to see if it was related to draft but nothing helped. It seems I'm just stuck with it, and when your back hurts, everything else becomes painful as well. I don't think that I hit something or so, but rather slept in a bad position in some way. I hope that it wears of fast coz this ain't no fun!

7 more days before I'm of on holiday... may those next days be short :)

Although it might seem to have been a very busy day so far when you read the blog, it has actually not been. Slept till 12h00, changed the ferrets litter, food, water. Replaced the cooling elements, played a game, chatted with some people, checked some of the account info I got during the week and then went off to buy a new pair of shoes. I actually wanted to put a picture of them up here, but it seems the manufacturer doesn't show all their models on the site and even after some searches not one good or correct picture turned up. So much for shoes on the web :)

I actually liked another pair of shoes better, as they had a better color scheme and smaller tip, but when I tried 'em on, this didn't fit round the heel as I wanted them to fit. When I tried the pair that I liked best next, they fitted perfectly so... it only took me around 30 minutes to decide... hehehe... I saw some pretty nice designs in the ladies departement as well, but it seems they don't carry those in the mens departement... too bad. These boots are made for walking!

Wallets become part of your life, don't they?

I dunno if any of you feel the same, but for me, a wallet becomes a part of life. You know that whenever you pick it up, you are fully prepared to do things. It carries your ID card, drivers license, money, namecards (not that I have any... but it contains lots of cards from other people) and all the rest. When you forget it, or lose it, you're lost. I've been walking around with the same old wallet for the last, I dunno, 7 years, maybe even 10 years and although I've been told that it should be replaced I always refused to do so.

It went from brand new, strong nylon to a worn wallet, then a disgrace and finally a hole connected by tiny strings of nylon. There were actually ways to take things out of it without opening it! That is the best description I think. But... I've bought a new wallet yesterday and I'm done switching everything from the old wallet to the new one. Have you ever realized that new wallets never seem to be able to carry as much as the old one? Or maybe its just that you've abused the old one in so many ways it ended up with pockets where no pockets should have been?!

I know for sure that in the coming days I'll be looking for creditcards, ID card and social security card in the wrong places... probably cause big queues behind me when shopping, but I'll get used to it. Good thing about this new wallet, wich is leather by the way, is that it's euro compatible. Ofcourse I didn't think of that when buying it, but when I opened the wallet it said : "Ready for the new Euro Currency". I'm all prepared... give me the money! (not trademarked by joco, hehehhe )

Back home...

I've just come home after I've been to a little 'party', or maybe a gathering would be more correct. I think that next year it'll be fun for people aged 86 and those for are in a wheelchair... It really wasn't much of a party, so we (my sister and I) chatted to some people, then left after about 1.5 hours or so... We picked up Johan, went for 1 drink (sangria) and then for a bite (pitta)... but we all felt kinda tired because of the weather. It was a bit cooler however, but in order to really lower temperatures inside, it should drop at least 5 more degrees and stay like that for the next 24 hours...

Message to Joco : sorry, only got the sms just a few seconds ago, I didn't check earlier. If anything is wrong or you someone to need to talk too, call me anytime, you know that! Same goes for Eef ofcourse, but I think she knows that as well.

Off to bed now, gonna take a look at all the advertising that was dropped in my box in the last 2 days, then it's lights out and dreams on.

Message to Jess : leave Johan alone... I know you wanna get bootylicious, but he's tired.. don't force him ;)

Out shopping... and looking for ways to cool down

crap... second time I need to write this piece since blogger ate my first post :(

It's well over 31�C outside today (87�F for the americans) and it's pretty much impossible to cool the ferret cage enough for them to be really comfortable. They have a fan, wet towels over the cage, frozen bottles of water under it to cool the bottom, and still... it's hard to cool it down. I hope that temperatures drop tonite so they can come out and play. I'm not letting them out to play right now because they'd get too excited and could suffer a heat stroke. Ferrets can deal with cold temperatures much better as they can with heat. Heat strokes are very dangerous and unless treated immediately by yourself and a vet that knows ferrets, deadly in most of the cases. I'm not taking any chances. By keeping them in their cage, they sleep most of the time, and thus their body temperature remains lower as if they were playing. Not much else I can do :(

I'm out to do some shopping, buy some new clothes, maybe shoes and food.. I'll be back later!

Good morning everyone!

While some of you are still sound asleep, or taking a look at the clock, smile and turn around and doze back into sleep, there are others that are awake, ready to save the country, save the economy and make a few bucks. On wich they pay way too much taxes, but don't let that spoil the fun.

I've seen a chart a few weeks back and I think it stated something like this : When you put the income and tax load for an average belgian on a timescale of 1 year, all the money that is earned before may 10th actually is used for taxes. After that day, the money is his to keep. OK, it sounds a bit weird, but rephrased it comes to this : work one year, and 5 months out of 12 you don't make a dime, coz it's all used for taxes.

Now get to work! ;)

11h to go till the weekend starts.... and counting.

the the 'hot' level today... and tomorrow it's expected to be 'extremely hot'

Yes... it's been way too hot to handle today... I've spend too much time in the car getting cooked, boiled and fried, but I made it out in one piece. And tomorrow temperatures of +32�C are expected... it's friggin' insane! BTW : Joco & Eef : the ferrets say thank you for the fan... now they'll get some cooling in addition to the icecube cooling. I'll get a new fan on saturday, so you can have yours back.

Traffic Jams can mess up your day bigtime ;(

Yepz... left at 07h16 this morning, reached the highway to Brussels (E19) around 7h45 and reached the highway around Brussels (R0) around 8h07. At that point things went terribly wrong. Seems a truck had crashed itself into the midsection of the highway around 06h00 and it created a small traffic jam of 14 km's. I needed 2h to drive (or actually not drive) 7 km's... yikes. Arrived at the client around 10h35 when I was expected at 09h00. Shit happens :)

damn... now it seems like I missed a day in the friedkitten.com saga

I only missed the deadline by 4 minutes :((( - If I'd have left 5 minutes earlier, this post would have been on the 22nd, and there is no way to kinda post in the past... that's a functionality that could come in handy, but it wouldn't be the same then I suppose.

Went of to the home town, actually it's more like the countryside, for the annual fair. My sister asked to come along coz she would be kinda lonely otherwise. It's nice to have family, hehehe... anyways, walked the fair looked at the nice girls and had some fun. Hey sis, I don't know if you noticed that girl with the short(ish) lightbrown hair that was on our left side... she was nice ;) In case you didn't notice... hmmm... how should I describe her? About 170 tall, nicely build, good looking, lovely eyes (the eyes are the most important in case you didn't know yet)... "hmmm... just a bit more bite!"

Jurassic Park III - Featuring the Nokiasaurus!

Beat this for utterly stupidity : Jurassic Park III has a dino in it that uses a cellphone. It must be a Nokiasaurus! We also had flyandcrashosaurusses, littlecuteosaurusses and even dumpofshitosaurusses... the plot stinks, the action stinks and the comedy factor remains at 10% all time. Actually I went to see it with my sister and her boyfriend and a another friend, and while it wasn't my first choice, it sure was an entertaining evening. Thanks everyone for inviting me! I've had quite a lot of fun...

The job in brussels seems to be extended for another week coz there are already planned installations for coming monday, so that will also mean that I'll have to take care of everything on monday the 3rd coz we leave at 19h00 for the UK. Pisses me off majorly, but if that's the way it's gonna be, that's how it's gonna be. Right now I don't give a shite... must be the 75% wodka and 25% grapefruitjuice mix Eef fixed me, kicking in finally... whahahha... that stuff is good! But to be honest... it's more enjoyable to mix it 25% wodka and 75% juice... the juice diminishes the taste of the wodka and the wodka takes away the bitterness of the juice. Result : you don't taste that you're drinking alcohol. Final Outcome : you get wasted before you know it! Just remember : don't drink and drive!

but I can still smile...

It's been sort of a weird day... lotsa things happening around me, but not really to me. And they all were touchy for me somehow. This morning I've spend 45 minutes in a traffic jam, and that was just in addition to the regular traffic jams. I'm used to living a part of my life on the road, but it's really getting on my nerves the last few days. I really look forward to staying in for some desk jobs next week, unless ofcourse when I get called out for yet another week. At the clients place everything went as it was supposed to go, but it just took ages to get it all processed... I've spend about 2h30 minutes waiting I think. This also caused the install that was planned for the afternoon to be cancelled, and while I really didn't mind it that much, it took another 30 minutes to reach the people to make new arrangements.... It's really not stress, but just irritating that things can never go smooth, that you have to wait and wait and call again and again before you can actually get things moving.

Joco & Eef were off to the doctors this morning to get a checkup and hopefully know what the soon to be born baby would be, a boy or a girl... around 11h15 or I received a message that they don't know it yet, but to be honest... I don't believe it :) Really... I'm popping in one of the next days to take a look at that echo myself, better not kid me around like you did last time.

Around 11h00 I got a mail from my ex girlfriend stating that she's back at work, and that she wanted to call me around noon. No problem ofcourse since we broke up as friends. I called her while driving from one place to another and it turns out she's gonna get married next year! She hoped I was gonna be happy for her and ofcourse I am... What's the point in being sad or mad about it? We broke up, simple as that... and I have to live with it. I'm glad she found someone she likes better and that she feels like marrying, I'm living my life and she's living hers. My life can only be better knowing that she's happy. I was disappointed however that when I asked her if I would be invited at the wedding the anwser was "probably not". Which is her subtle way of saying no. Hey, I understand that we are not an item no more... I even understand that she's got a new life and I do respect that completely, but I kinda hoped the 5 years we've spend together meant something. It seems for it does, for her it doesn't that much. But, let's not go there as neither of us was 'wrong', or the cause of splitting up - at least, that's how I see it. I was very happy however that she wanted to tell me herself, that I didn't have to hear it from somebody else. Maybe that counts for something after all :)

Around 11h45 I got a mail from the office stating that one of the technicians dropped in with a complaint that his floppy disk in his laptop was broke and wich laptop he should take then? Erm.. excuse me... I'm currently doing long days for the Big Bopper in Brussels and I haven't been in the office for the last three weeks (apart from a very very short pop in of 15 minutes in wich I started a backup of the server, read mails, dispatched mails and updated the virusscanner over the network) so how the f*ck should I know? Ok, maybe that's a bit harsh, coz I actually do know, so I also solved that later on while driving around. Mobile phones and carkits are such a kewl invention... it guarantees you can't even have dinner during transfers. Technology!

Next on the list (it's around 16h45 now, and I'm once again stuck in a traffic jam) is a call from one of the account managers who states he's gonna clean up the server... I think my heart skipped a few beats there. Luckily he meant that he was gonna clean up the user drives and reorganize things a bit. He also checked in advance to see when I last made a backup... nice manager, really :) Still, I really dunno what to expect when I come back to the office. Funny thing is that he couldn't remember the admin password, but that is kinda normal since he doesn't have it in the first place... hehehe. Not that I don't trust him with it, but I really wanna keep an eye on what's put where on those server disks. Before you know it you can start enforcing diskquota and things like that. Helped him out too. I guess it's my fate to help people out... I'm too good for this world. Why can't I be a Bastard Operator From Hell?

Damn, I'll be really really glad when I'm off for a holiday, you can't imagine! On the other hand... hey Antwerp Branch Office people, I MISS YA ALL! (and some more than others... hihi, you know who you are!)

Busy busy busy... but it's fun!

I'm about to start working on a pair of t-shirts for our little trip to the UK... Nothing really fancy, but fun nevertheless. When I'm done designing them, I'll pop in a link to them ofcourse. Damn, I wish it was September already, I'm really looking forward to this trip. You can expect to see lotsa photographs too, as I'll be getting myself a Canon Digital Ixus 300 in one of them tax free shops... Things are much cheaper then :) And I really need that kind of equipment coz it'll come in very very handy for some web projects that are boiling in my brain.. hehehe... always creative!

I've been doing some homework today... and I'm not really surprised. But maybe you are?

I don't know exactly how I came to it, but I did... Maybe it was that pile of account info that triggered it, but I did another income balance review. Yeah, I do these at least once a year, and while they are not really in depth, they do help me keep everything nice and tidy. Have you ever wondered how much you spend exactly last month? Do you ever wonder how much spend each year? I know that some of us may not need to do so, but I do... and I've found some nice ways to keep everything in control.

1. Create a spreadsheet that alows you to fill things in fast and easy. if it's gonna take too much of your time, you won't be doing it! It doesn't have to be very detailed, but you can go as far as you want. Some of the things I've included is Food, Animals (I got 4 ferrets, and they too need to be taken care of), Leisure and Fixed Costs. There are more ofcourse, but I think you get the idea.

2. Spend something? Book it! Find the most appropriate section to book it and do it right away. Don't throw that bill away before you booked it... At the end of the month you'll know what you've spend on what or where.

3. Make averagers... and that's easy in a spreadsheet... no difficult calculations to make, but you'll know what you'll need every month to make it. In the beginning the averages will suck bigtime, but if you're 6 months further, you'll see that the tops and bottoms are flattened out and project a more realistic cost per month.

OK, now all of this is nice... but does it help you to keep things under control? Yes it does... just the fact that you spend some time each day or each week will encourage you to be responsible with money. Let me ask you a question : How much money do you have in your pocket right now? No cheating! Write it down on a paper and check the wallet. You should be able to at least come within a 10% margin. I think I've got $20.10 in my pockets while writing this.... I've just checked and it's $20.74, and I haven't paid anything today, so it's not like I checked my wallet a few hours ago. How did you do?

Such a balance statement will also give you a chance to spot costs that are really huge... is there a way to lower them? Just a tip, but check the insurance you've been paying for the last 5 years! I'm not saying you gotta cancel it, not at all! Review it... ain't there a better deal by now? Are there better tariffs and propositions at other companies? You don't have to change it all at once, but you might be surprised what you can gain by reviewing all those things once a year. Last year I cut my internet connection costs by 50%, while I can stay online for a fixed fee now, and it's faster as well.

* Note * I know there is nice software to do all of this like Quicken etc... but it's better if you develop a spreadsheet yourself coz that way you won't let the time you spend on developing it go to waste. You'll actually use it :)

Some not really to the point stats :

So far I have received 4.308 e-mails this year, and the end-of-year projection is 7.926. I've send 597 mails out, and probably end the year at 1.089 pieces. Of all those messages, 745 contained an attachment (thanks to sircam etc) and 1.361 attachments will have passed by the end of the year. Wow... ain't that impressive? I'm just a simple user... not a company or so!

No sleep for the tired ones...

I dunno what's coming to this world, but it seems just pretty impossible to get some much needed sleep every once in a while. Today everyone in Belgium has had a holiday, so you'd reckon that no one would start calling you very early in the morning.... But in the UK, they don't have a holiday... as I found out at 08h15 this morning ;)

Pascale, what the hell are you doing at work at 7h15 in the morning??? That's no time to start working! Anyway, I'm glad you called me, and no I don't mind at all... It's just that I still was asleep and even couldn't get the departure and arrival dates and times correctly :) But I think you certainly noticed that during our little morning phoneconversation, didn't you? It was fun talking to you (as it always is) and we're looking forward to fly over and kick some ass and party bigtime in London in september. It'll be the first real holiday I'm taking this year, and I think I've earned it so far... London, here we come! Everyone : you can expect some nice photo updates from the trip to the UK and Northren Ireland to appear on these pages as well (or at least a link to it).

I really don't recall what else I was gonna write here, and a few hours ago, my head was filled with idea's and things I wanted to let you all know... it's bizarre how the human brain works! Or, in my case... how it fails to remember things it should have remembered. I always thought that altough the brain is also in a state of rest during sleep, it's still pretty active. But OK, I wasn't really sleeping no more after that call, but I did get back to bed and suddenly it was 15h00 or so... I wonder where that time went if I wasn't asleep.

Weird... the text above doesn't make much sense to me when I read it again, so I really don't know if it'll make sense to anyone else... hehehehe... See you all in a day or so for the next update!

Yikes!

Damn.. how hot can it be??? It's been very very hot today, and I've been spending way too much time in the car and at work, and I don't feel like spending more time inside tonite when it's this awsome outside... I called my sister and asked her if she and her boyfriend felt like driving to the Ardennen (it's only a few hours away) but the friend had to get some teeth pulled today... come on, what's that? Are you a baby or so... Ok, I admit... it'll bleed for a few hours, and you won't be able to say much for the first 2 hours, but that's it. That shouldn't keep you from coming along! Anyway, they'd call back, but I really don't expect them to call back... wussies!

Next on the list was my best mate and his girly... answering machine. This is almost what I said to it :

Hey answering boxie... it's seems the mommy and daddy ain't home, but tell them to call me back if they decide to check back in later.

Erm... ok, it might not have been my exact words, but the idea is reflected above. No call back yet... Guess they already have other plans for tonite... good for them, bad for me :)

So... anyone feels like going somewhere? Preferably outside, on or around water... Distance doesn't really matter... You can travel pretty far in a few hours. This is what I'm looking for : SWF (single white female) that's up for some fun... nothing serious, just a trip to wherever we feel like going. Preferably aged 20-30 and non smoker (this last thing is a must!)... I don't ask much, heehhehe... Interested and about as curious as I am? Send me a mail within the next 2 hours and we can decide on a spot to meet. You can also leave a comment, but that's less secure since everyone can read those :)

Don't think, get creative! You never know... this could be the best thing that ever is gonna happen to you (or the worst, but I'm the optimistic kind of guy...)

How stupid can someone be?!

I've just arrived home a few seconds ago, and here I am, updating this page... I've been laughing for the past 15 minutes, thanks to a very very stupid french driver. Lemme explain : I'm taking the highway home, and the maximum speed is 120 km/h (75 mph for all you non-metric people). When I get up on the highway, I see a jeep of the belgian federal police in front of me, about 1.5 kilometers away. They obviously drive around 120, coz I'm slowly closing in at 130. This is already above the speedlimit and I'm fully aware of it. When I'm about 100m behind them, a car starts to pass them on the left side at 125 km/h. The cops don't react and let the driver do his maneouvre...

Then suddenly, I didn't actually spot him either, a Mercedes with french license plate comes flying out from somewhere behind me, on the left lane (me and the federal police are both in the middle lane) at a speed of, pure guess 160, maybe 165 km/h. The mercedes has to slow down for the car that's passing the federal police, and he stays behind it. Then the passing car sees he won't be able to pass the cops without going over the speedlimit too far, so he actually slows back down and stays behind them. The cops move to the left, in front of the mercedes... and they continue to drive left, passing other cars at around 125. I'd say that would be a very very fair warning of those cops, towards the mercedes. I'm still following both of them at a distance of about 50m.

I'm laughing my ass off already when I see both of them speed away. Reaching speeds way over the limit, I'm not capable of keeping up, but I can still see them in the distance. About 5 minutes later I see the mercedes on the side of the road, the federal police jeep in front of him and two agents that don't look too happy. I just couldn't stop laughing all the way home... Come'on! How stupid can you get??? Did that French Fry really think passing a police car at speeds way over the speedlimit, would be able without a reaction? Whhhahahahahhaa... Never mess with the Belgian Federal Police my man! They gave a very clear warning the way I saw it... pulling in front of him, slowing him down and staying there... they played it very fair coz they could even have stopped him right at that point as well. Thumbs up for the two officers in that jeep, and to the french driver : you really made my day man! It's been a long time since I laughed that hard!

Goooooood Mooooooorning

I certainly hope the morning will be better as the night since I couldn't sleep at all... Read a few more pages in the book, then finally hit the lights (bang!) and lay awake for three more hours, turning over and over, not falling asleep. I dunno what the problem was, but the result is you can hardly call me awake right now...

Final Post for today

My mate has returned from a short holiday in Holland with his girlfriend, so we can start tripping our plan, hm... planning our trip, to the UK in september. In fact.. he'll have to plan most stuff since I'll be busy all day in brussels, but he's got lotsa time if he manages to leave that damn PS2 alone for a while. I'm already looking forward to it!
Apart from the trip to the UK we'll also be taking a trip up and down... we're going skydiving! That's another thing that's for certain, and on september 29th I'll be at a festival in Aalst (Belgium) where Front 242 will be headlining. 'Nuff said. My short holiday will be stuffed with things to do...

Star of the Day : GLBT Weblogs

Oops... it seems I ain't done anything yet of what I said I was gonna do in the last post. In fact... I kinda got sucked into some other blogs and started reading and clicking... At one point in time I arrived at a weblog portal for GLBT. Not having any clue what GLBT stands for I found out that it's a log reserved for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgendered people.
I was, to say the least pleasantly surprised by it, and on the other hand somehow disappointed. I don't see why a persons sexuality should influence his or her style of blogging. On the other hand, I do understand ;) - Yeah, I know... it's a bit of a contradictio in terminis here, but I'm not yet thru deciding what to do with it. I agree that sexuality will influence people, and partially cause a certain reactions, but on the other hand : hasn't got everyone got sexual feelings and isn't it therefore equal for all?

Should I make that site Shite of the Day, for not allowing hetero people to be listed on their site (although it doesn't say so anywhere? Maybe this is just a presumption I'm making!) or should I make it Star of the Day for being a meeting place for GLBT?

Ok, this is what I'll be doing... I'll be making it Star of the Day... just because I think no one should be jugged just because they happen not to be "mainstream", although this is not really a truth anymore these days. I have got no clue how many hetero's there are in the world, nor do I know how many GLBT's there are. I actually don't care either! If I like someone, it's because what they are and how they communicate with me, not for what they do or don't do in bed...

I'm pretty sure some people will want to react to this... coz there are still people out there that think that GLBT's are the devil, they are perverts and insane maniacs, and others might feel that it's just plain normal and totally sane. Hey people... don't let anyone hold you back and send in those comments!

Quick Note

Wow.... it's sunday and I have absolutely done nothing so far. Ain't this what sundays are all about? Just doing what you want to do, including doing nothing.... Actually I've done stuff ofcourse : I slept till 11h30, woke up, grabbed a book I'm still reading and stayed in bed till 15h00. Then prepped a nice hot bath and soaked in it, still reading my book till just a few minutes ago. I'm a new man!

Too bad that even on sundays you gotta do things you don't wanna do : The time has come to start doing some laundry, ironing, and get some food in my stomach. Ofcourse the last thing is not something I don't wanna do... I like to eat... I'm Belgian, we love great food in large quanities hehhee... I might be back with some more updates later tonite. For now I leave you all with this little tip : Don't drop things that ain't made to be dropped.

Star of the Day : Josie and the PussyCats

Yeah, it seems it's movie day tonite! Last week I saw Josie and the PussyCats and while this can hardly be called a movie with a 'real' plot, it was quite entertaining somehow. I saw the first three or four minutes just to do a quality check and somehow got sucked into the movie. I actually think it was the music that did it... a good soundtrack can get people to really dig a movie. Anyone remembers Me, Myself and Irene with Jim Carey? Ok, I might be biased since I love to see Jim play, but the same happened there... I did a quality check, saw the first minutes (where you see him ride his highwaypatrol motorcycle) and was totally into it just b'coz of the music. It set a certain sphere that made the movie a must see for me. Friends of mine hated it, but hey... it's a free country, and I can't help it they ain't got no taste (grin). Josie and the PussyCats did just the same... it is brainless pulp, but all in all a very entertaining movie, and forget about the 'plot'... Everyone already knows that 'we' are marketed into doing certain things, buy stuff... How do you think a hype gets created? It's pure marketing.

Shite of the Day : Pimps Up, Ho's Down

Yepz... this movie totally sucks... It's supposed to be a real life documentary of the pimping world, but all I saw was a bunch of blown up hey-I'm-mister-important men bragging about how they pimp. Showing off their gold and cars, and their women. They even had an interview with a female pimp, and she actually made the most sense I think. At least she was the only one that could finish 5 sentences with saying "you know what I mean" every other word. Really... this was a huge disappointement. What was I expecting? I dunno... less show and more real life experience. Let the Ho's talk for themselves, not just some men doing all the bragging, and the showbizz stuff.

Weekend has arrived... finally!

Phew... I survived this last week. I'm however not really looking forward to next week, or the week after that.... When I woke up this morning, totally unvoluntary 'coz someone called me on the phone, I didn't bother getting back into bed. Instead I decided to give you, all those die hard fans out there (?!), some new toys to play around with. I've installed the reblogger comment script so you can feedback on my blogs, and I've changed some cosmetic details on the site. To be honest, I think the reblogger tools is fine, but not awsome. I however don't have the time nor tools to write something myself, just because I'd like to see it be more customizable.

Enough tech stuff now! I don't know what I'll be doing today, it's pretty sunny outside right now so I think I'll be off for a while, and later on I can check and react to 27 more e-mails I've got waiting in my box. Well, it's only 27 now, by the time I come back, it'll be much more ofcourse... hehehe... it's the dark side of being popular :)

Star of the Day : That sexy babe a few boxes away from me

Hell yeah... that is some sight I got here... lemme describe this beauty... she's long, slim and great looking. She's got some pretty hot hooters and a fab ass. Ow baby... and that smile... it's just to die for. I would like to put a picture of here up here, but I don't even know her name yet. Apart from that superb body and that gorgeous smile, I'm totally sold for the look in her eyes... It always tells me more about a person as clothes or language. It's like they say : eyes reflect the soul. And woohee, she's got lotsa soul!

Piss on the world...

Yepz.... this is it. I'm pissed at everyone and everything in the world. Are you an innocent 7 year old boy in Helsinki? Piss on you! Are you a 19 year old sex crazy kitten in Ontario? Piss on you! (Erm, let's just make an exception here) You are together with everyone else the reason the world is fucking miserable today. If only it were weekend already... I'm still stuck in Brussels and it seems like I won't be able to leave anyway soon. I've got an appointement later tonight to go over at a friends place, have a bite and then go off to the pub for a drink. The poor man has sprained his ankle, and is plastered in, so he can't wander off to far ;)

I've just decided to have a blast and lotsa fun tonite, so I just stopped caring 20 seconds ago... let the whole place go to hell, fall into pieces, I don't mind. This weekend is for fun. All the rest... fuck off!

Today has been a long day, but at least there are positive things as well

Incredibly, what else can I write? Some planner has decided to concentrate all installations of the last beta release of the software in or around the capital. While this might be quite handy b'coz the HQ is based there as well, it certainly is less handy for people that have to travel halfway thru the country to reach their assigments. Good thing is however, that installations went more or less smooth today. Ran into some problems again, but it seems it's not really unsolvable, and the basic idea of installing beta release software on client machines, is ofcourse to catch some of those always present real life environment bugs that you just can't seem to find when doing lab tests. Enough work stuff now... it's time for :

Shite of the Day : Ricki Lake

Just to make a quick point here... Anything, anyone, or evertything can qualify for Shite of the Day, it used to be websites thus far, but today I've taken it one point further... This Shite of the Day is awarded to Ricki Lake for being a utterly fake brainless cow. I mean... have you ever watched her show? Tonight I saw an episode called New Mate, Ex Agree or whatever... the point being : will people be able to talk their new lover into having a threesome with their ex? How stupid can these topics get? This is aproximately the same level as the current president of the United States. (Note to Ricki : he's called Bush and he'd make a great husband for you... then you can actually share a braincell). Then pretty interesting conversations like this start happening :

Ricki : Hi Mister Big Guy! What have you got to tell us?
Guest : Yo Ricki! I'm seeing Bitch Sister right now and I wanna *beep* her while my ex, who's name is Fat Babe, joins us in a threesome.
Ricki : Wow... and do they know about that? Lets bring in our next guest : Bitch Sister.... (lotsa applause)
Guest 2 : Hi Ricki.. Hi Big Guy.
Ricki : Hey Bitch Sister, I think Big Guy has something to tell you. Tell her Big Guy.
Guest : Erm... you know I still hang around with Fat Babe, and I was wondering if you would like a threesome with her and me?
Guest 2 : What?! Are you out of your *beep* mind! You pathetic *beep* *beep* *beep*
Ricki : Ok, Fat Babe happens to be here as well, let's bring her in!
Guest 3 : Yo. Word.
Ricki : Go ahead Big Guy.
Guest : Yo Fat Babe... I wanna *beep* you and Bitch Sister at the same time.. you know and the two of you hitting it off too..
Guest 3 : What?! Are you out of your *beep* mind! You pathetic *beep* *beep* *beep*
Ricki : Seems she's not liking the idea Big Guy. We'll be back for more in a second!
++ Insert advertising for diapers here ++
Ricki : Welcome back to the show... Has anyone changed his mind? No? No? No?
Audience : Yo Fat Babe and Bitch Sister : I'll do you both up the *beep* if you loose that *beep*
(Big Guy looks sad and wonders what went wrong. Fat Babe and Bitch Sister french eachother)
Ricki : If you feel the need to involve a third person in to a relationship, first try to find out what you are missing in it. You should not hurt anyone's feelings.
See you all tomorrow for another episode of Ricki...

Duh! Pretty boring, not? At least at Jerry's they kicked ass everyone now and then! Besides... Jerry always has Steve to lighten up the show up a bit... being the big dude he is. What has Ricki to entertain you with? Humour? Not even close! Intelligence? What do you mean, the earth revolves around the sun? Looks? A seacow in bikini would look sexier!

Ah... so you don't agree with my excellent view on Ricki Lake? Too bad dude... try to convince me to change my mind!

Star of the Day and Shite of the Day : http://www.belgo-restaurants.com/

Yikes... this is actually the second time I write this entry since the crappy IE suddenly closed on me... thus causing everything to be completely lost. Maybe I should just make microsoft.com Shite of the Day? Nah, that would be too easy. Shit, I suddenly realize that the piece I'm writing right now, does not resemble at all what I was writing earlier. Crap. Insanity does have it's setbacks too it seems... or would this be alzheimer instead of insan.... erm, what was I saying?

Oh, just a quick personal note to Pascale in the UK : Thanks for suggesting the above mentioned site as Star of the Day! I actually made it Shite of the Day as well since they seem to think Belgium is French or so! Waterzooi � la Gantoise??? How about Gentse Waterzooi, you lame brittons? Yeah flame me for it... I guarantee a personal answer to all of the flames I receive. Just keep in mind I might as well post your crappy flame mail on friedkitten.com, thus making you look stupid for the world to see. But hey, if I wouldn't do so, you'd make a fool out of yourself anyway.
Hmm... what I actually wanted to write to Pascale is the following (please forget all written above) : If you don't feel like replying to the mail I send you, no problem... then we'll just cancel the trip alltogether and reschedule it for 2016 or so. We can go check out retirement homes for fucking oldies then.

Question : do old people still fuck? Not that I really wanna know, but it would look cool if we got in some nice statements about this... - Calling all wankers over 60 years old : how much do you still spank the monkey or feed the pussy? Send in your e-mails now! What? No e-mail address? Try finding your glasses and put them on your head, stupid! If you manage to point the mousepointer (that's why they call it a mousePOINTER!) to FEEDBACK and click there, you can send me a nice e-mail. There is no need to list your real name or address in the e-mail, so you can skip calling your psychiatrist to ask for your name.

Tip of the day for 60 plussers : Talk your wheelchaired neighbor into wheeling his chair into a river... then declare Napoleon actually won worldwar 2, and that the river is not to be blamed as it was gently running and minding it's own things while your neighbor was driving and manouvered the wheelchair (and him or herself if done correctly) into the stream, not the other way round. If they don't believe you, ask to get some more of those nice pills the night nurse gave you last time.

Bands go all flashy on their websites : Front 242 and Rammstein

Seems like exhibitionism is finally kicking off on the web... bands ain't sticking with boring static sites no more, but they all become flashy! Mind you, not all flash enabled or even totally flash powered sites are great... flash is a tool, not a source. You can pretty easy mess the navigation of a site completely up with flash, but you also could in plain HTML, so that ain't a reference. What I was just trying to show is that these bands not only kick ass, but they also have a kick ass website... even if you don't know or like the music, you will probably be surprised by the awsome design of the site. It's really a multimedia experience.

More things that don't go as planned

I've just noticed that the javascript for one reason or another doesn't work in Opera. This probably is because Opera follows does strict implementation of the standards as set by the W3, better known as the World Wide Web Consortium. That ofcourse does not solve the problem that some people who log on to friedkitten.com might not see the archives. I'll be recoding the page tonite and make sure that there will be an extra link for browsers that choke on the javascript implementation of it.

Boring update news.. things ain't going as planned!

Just been busy another few hours adding new stuff to friedkitten.com, mostly just cosmetic details, but I like to tune everything just fine. However, as you can obviously see, the archives do work (thanks to Phil Ringnalda for the fab scripting) but the white space below the drop down menu keeps bugging me. I've changed the script, added and removed lines.... but it seems I'm stuck with the fact that javascript somehow adds a line below where it executes. (I'm referring to the two white lines below the HOME | CONTACT | FEEDBACK links). Actually the idea was to code it all into one line, but as I couldn't find a way to do it right away, I kinda skipped it for now... but hey, there's always tomorrow!

Got an e-mail from work this afternoon that I'll be required to travel to brussels every day till august 24th, and that basically is a very very bad idea... but they don't know that yet! Never ever try to take my toys away, or stuff me in a strict office regime (you know... start at 9, quit at 5) for all hell will break loose.

Last time I went off to brussels to test the new software I actually used the software and created some payments from a (as far as I knew) fake account. Next day one of the higher brids of the test team comes inquiring about some payments for a total value of over $33,000... Luckily the payments were blocked by the banks, but they'll never forget my name!

Enuff crap for now, I'm gonna hit the sack, although it's still pretty early for me...

Shite of the Day : stuffedturkey.com

Ever wondered what happens on x-mas day when you've gotten all ingredients to make a fabulous stuffed turkey, only to come to the conclusion the cat ate the recipe? You can either throw out the turkey and decide to have stuffed cat later that day, or you could simply turn to stuffedturkey.com. Duh! You can't! It seems like Santa's lazy elves forgot to develop that site. I want to claim emotional disturbances and deprived expectations right now, where's is my industrial strength lawyer? I suggest everyone sends their comments to [email protected] and get him to move his turkey! I'll be checking again 'round x-mas time! Save the stuffed turkey now!

Star of the Day : thespark.com

If you've never heard of thespark.com you ain't lived as far as I'm concerned. It ofcourse also means you've missed all those crazy scientific projects like the StinkyFeet Diaries, or the recently started Fat Project. Not meant for the faint of heart or those who read this while having dinner, these tests are the max in scientific testing. Apart from that, thespark.com kicks ass way too much ass. I wonder if there are more of these things out there?!

Few tips for people visiting thespark at work : put all your calls on hold, install boss-ware (or even better, visit thespark with your boss), hide inside the xeroxroom where no one can spot you and send everyone you know a mail about friedkitten.com. Yep, it's a shameless plug, but we gotta start somewhere, don't we?

Brainless Note : Things that don't work in Microwaves (source : friedkitten.com)

Here's a short list for things you shouldn't be putting in your microwave :

frisbee's (go all whoppy) - raw eggs (explodes) - kitten (becomes fried...) - underwear (??? don't ask!) - mother in law (this could be an exception however) - CD's (become frisbee's) - squeeky toys (stops making noise) - smaller microwaves (what's the point?!) - mobile phones (not even after dropping in toilet bowls... although they manage to work at UHF for a very short period of time).

Wicked Story - Bizarre accidents happen to mobile phones (source : ananova)

According to ananova.com insurance companies get up to 20% more claims about lost or damaged mobile phones. In Britain the most popular way to effectively trash a mobile phone is to drop it in water (this includes toilet bowls). Over 10,000 phones are lost every, according to figures from insurance claims. In case you are planning on committing insurance fraud, either go with the flow and claim you dropped it into the toilet, or try to be creative and claim your gerbil ate it.

Have you lost a mobile phone yet, perferably in a very bizarre way? Let us know!

Treeloot.com

Have you ever been wondering what the reason is you get all that spam in your mailbox? Here is one... Cleverly disguised as a game, promoted with banners all over the internet, treeloot.com seems to be an innocent way to spend some time. Think again! The cute monkey lures you into clicking the same stupid tree over and over again... going for those $25,000 bananabucks - I don't buy it for a second. It's banners, sponsors and pop-up screens all over the place, and they all wanna grab your e-mail address, real name and address, income... I'm actually wondered they don't ask your sexual behaviour! (Hehehe... they can't since it's illegal to store that kind of information).
Here's a quote from their 'Treeloot Privacy Policy' :

1.2 Redemption Information. In order to redeem Banana Bucks won playing the Treeloot Game, individuals are required to provide personal information to the Company (the "Redemption Information"). An individual redeeming Banana Bucks will also need to agree to receive marketing materials from third parties.
...
2.4 Direct Mail and Telemarketing. The Company uses User Information to advertise, directly or indirectly to individuals over the telephone and using postal mail.
...
3.1 Sale or Transfer to Third Parties. The Company may sell or transfer User Information to third parties.

See??? It's just a big bad information gathering device... And addictive as hell...

Goateestyle.com
Each and every day you'll find either a Star of the Day, or a Shite of the Day... If you think something is worth mentioning here, send a mail to [email protected] or [email protected] - Prepare for some surprises though as this is insanity at it's best...

Today it's time to present Star number one, and what would be better as to start off with the site that actually makes me start this one? Funky, Funny and Goatee... what more could you ask for?! If you get there, send my regards to Ryan and Pan.

Playboy goes missing in Van Buren Township, Michigan(source : CNN)

Don't even start wondering why CNN covers a Playboy missing. It's not another series of brutal murders, or violent rapes... Playboy is a 3 year old alligator. Does that warrant a cover story from CNN, I doubt it... besides, I really wonder how someone can loose a three and a half foot gator? Shouldn't that be easy to spot? I'm sure some handbag manufacturer will turn up to volunteer to catch the animal.

Kick Off @ friedkitten.com

I'm quicly developing a headache. It's not from a lack of sex (... yeah right!) but rather from working (... yeah right again!) on this box the last 7 hours straight. Maybe it would be about time to stop the bit beaming and start a tour of duty in the real world. What do you mean, real world? This ain't the real world? Damn! Zoink! re:boot completed. Administrator logged off. Account disabled.