A certain number of people will have received a mail from me regarding a little event in March. Please go check your mailbox and reply before March 2nd 2005. I know it's short notice, but such is life :)

I'd like to have ALL of you people there together, coz I love you all.

As I got home this morning, I had two options : go to bed or do some small chores first. I decided to do the latter and thus at 7AM I was washing my work sweater by hand because the bloody thing can't be machine washed, nor tumble dried. I need it tomorrow night (and it's expected to be incredibly cold) so I had to wash it this morning. I know from last time that it needs close to 2 full days to dry.

I'm gonna hang around a bit now, then entertain the fuzzies, have something to eat before I head off to work again. One more night after this and then I'm off for a day and a half. I might head off to Batibouw on wednesday, but I ain't sure yet.

Lots of drama at work, even though I think we all saw it coming. On the one hand I'm quite relieved that it's resolved, on the other hand I'm still convinced it could have ended differently. Well, the past is the past and we'll have to move on, don't we?

Those recent changes do have quite an impact on next months working schedule though, making my shifts "bounce" all over the place. I'll be spending almost as much time adjusting my sleeping schedule as I'm spending on actually working. And that's only March... starting April we head off to a *very* busy period that'll possibly last till somewhere in November.

I managed to finish the draft of that paper on thursday and am now up to version 1. I think it only needs another read and possibly some slight changes before I send it off for review. It'll be posted online at one of my other sites as well.

No explenation needed I suppose :)

This entry will contain various bits and pieces, unrelated to each other.

Tonight I should be getting my schedule for the coming month, so I'll know for sure what days and nights I have to work. Which is good because there are some things I have to plan.

West : In the state of Alabama, selling sex toys remains illegal, based on a law dating from 1998. The Supreme Court refused to consider the appeal against the law, as filed by some users of these toys as well as salesmen. According to Alabama legislators, the free sale of sex toys would lead to prostitution and other "undesirble sexual acts". ACLU backed the people appealing the law, based on the assumption that the law interferes with acts committed between consenting adults in their private and intimate life. The Supreme Court apparently owns you in the USA.

East : In the Dutch city of Tilburg (The Netherlands) sex toys can now be purchased through a vending machine in the wall of a pub. At first the council advised against it because it wouldn't fit the neighborhood, but after the vending machine itself was altered to fit in, they approved. The machine disperses vibrators, sex toys, lingerie and lubes. In order to prevent minors purchasing articles, the vending machine only accepts bankcards.

I wonder who leads the healthiest sexlife? The people of Tilburg or the Alabama posse?

The Google ads that I've been serving in the navigation menu on the right side seem to match my content quite well. At first there were tons of ads for ice-cream machines (I wonder where they got that idea) but lately they've shifted to spy and adware removal tools, green energy, ecological resources, wind and water power and such. Which makes me happy as I consider it an easy way for readers to find out some more about things that I write about. The web is complex and often hard to navigate, but there is so much information out there...

Oh, I almost forgot : Firefox 1.0.1 has been released. Go grab a copy, as it contains mainly security patches and some bugfixes as well.

If you're running windows XP (Home or Pro) SP2, install the http.sys hotfix that prevents your machine from crashing with a Stop 0x05 (INVALID_PROCESS_ATTACH_ATTEMPT) error in some cases. The following versions of windows are affected as well : Windows Server 2003 (all editions), Windows XP Media Center Edition SP2 and Windows XP Tablet PC Edition 2005.

Oh my. I went out shopping today and came home with more than I went out for. I got the new Barbara and Allan Pease book on body language (in dutch, I couldn't find the original english copy) and a Live DVD from Natalia. As I was walking around in Fnac, I just knew I had so much items on my wishlist, but I couldn't remember the authors of some books, so I didn't find them :(

Next time I go out shopping, they should either provide internet access so I can look up my wishlist instantly, or I should remember printing it off in advance.

I was having dinner while watching TV and stumbled accross "Niki's secret", a bachelor like program that I usually don't follow at all. However, as I was watching, somehow I just got sucked into it and I watched it till the end. I suppose you'll know The Bachelor (or The Bachelorette)? Well, Niki's Secret is more of the same, but this time the main character, Niki, ain't gay or straight, but a bit of both. She's bi, and both dates a group of lesbian females as well as a group of straight males. Neither group knew about the others, but in todays episode the guys were told about her secret. I think they all reacted quite well after the initial suprise, but I think things may change along the way, as both groups start realizing that one can't "compete" with someone who plays in another league. Sure, love is not about competing, I do know that, but we all want to be our best when trying to win someones heart, don't we? I think the key to success will be to be who they are and not compete at all. Men and women are totally different after all, and cannot be compared.

One thing that struck me as very honest and true was when Niki announced her being bi : "I'm not looking for a man or a woman. I'm looking for a person I can love and be together with. Their sexe doesn't matter."

Impressive words, wouldn't you say? Especially since quite some people in this world have not yet gotten past the fact that gay people exist. I think they'll be totally confused when they hear about bi-people.

A.nnie Lennox
B.jörk
C.ure (The)
D.ead Can Dance
E.minem
F.ront 242
G.od Module
H.uman League
I.nkubus Sukkubus
J.ohnny Cash
K.ate Bush
L.aïs
M.issy Elliott
N.eikka RPM
O.MD
P.ink
Q.ueen
R.ammstein
S.kinny Puppy
T.he Crüxshadows
U.2
V.NV Nation
W.ithin Temptation
X.-Marks The Pedwalk
Y.ello
Z.Z top

If you post this on your blog, lemme know! I'm always interested in getting to know new bands.

Today was good and interesting. Stuff I gotta do tomorrow : find a shop that carries sea salt and buy some, work out a draft copy of a paper, shop for food and stuff.

Sounds simple enough, wouldn't you say? Let's hope so!

I just received the new Electrabel Energiek magazine in my snail mail box, and after reading their "Electrabel Green" section online, I must admit they've outdone themselves. The amount of advertising, marketing and pressure they are currently throwing at it is quite impressive, but that is just about it. I think they jump on the ecological bandwagon because it sells, period.

They present themselves as the biggest supplier of green energy in Belgium, yet in 2004 Electrabel Green Products Flanders (EGPF) sold 4 of their waterpowered powerstations, because "these small scale waterpower stations don't fit our production" to Ecopower. I don't have current production figures for these stations, but the waterpower station of Rotselaar alone produces close to 500.000 kWh/year, good to cover the energy need of about a 150 families.

I can accept that it may economically be not too interesting to keep those stations running, but then please don't shout that you're doing whatever one can do, for the good of the environment. I welcome everything that takes off pressure and gives the environment a break, even the smallest break, yet I do have quite some distrust when it comes to their "Green Power" marketing campaign. Especially because it'll lead to people thinking that Electrabel is the only/best/biggest producer of green energy in Belgium, while there are lots of alternative small scale solutions, often better suited to ones needs and much more responsible when it comes to green energy production.

Ah well... capitalism and marketing at it's best I suppose. Which reminds me : is anyone going to Batibouw this year? Maybe we can hook up and all go together?

One could assume that I'm writing about the city of light, in France, but that would be a bit too cultural for this blog, don't you think? No, instead I'd like to share some thoughts on Paris Hilton, the high profile "babe" you see do stupid things and generally show off the fact that she knows little about the "real world".

Beyond all the glamour and glitter is a women, just like you and I though. Well, not like me, obviously, but like most women I guess. She likes to get freaky and hit it off with her partner. That sounds quite normal to me, but then there is the thing that most women or couples don't videotape their rolls in the hay, and then have them leaked. Which is exactly what happened to Paris.

As I was looking for some more info on the recent T-Mobile Hack that left thousands of sms messages, photo's and personal data profiles of it's users vulnerable, I stumbled accross the good old Paris Hilton Sex Tape. How the T-Mobile Hack and the Paris Hilton Sex Tape are related is quite simple : Paris was one of the people affected by the hack, and amongst other things, her phonelist of frieds and contacts has been made available on the web. Much to the joy of many, but to the disgust and annoyance of people on Paris' list.

But let's not get distracted. I studied the tape closely - hey, the job needs to be done - and have reached the following conclusion : Paris likes sex. Her boyfriend (?) likes sex. They fuck, suck, lick and play, and generally enjoy themselves. Which is totally great if you ask me. In fact, everything they do on tape differs little from what Joe and Jane Average do every once in a while. With the exception that they don't have the tape become public, or the fact that they're "worth" several million dollars. However it seems that exactly those two things was all that was needed to create a scandal around something as great as two people having sex.

So, for all of you out there, wondering and not having seen the tape yet, I'll tell you exactly what is on the tape. And when you know it all, think to yourself : "Was going through all those words really worth it? Did I really *need* to know that? Has my life improved in any way now?". It seems to me that there is little (f)actual value into it all, and it's usually the tabloids that profit from it.

Now, before we get graphic, I'm sort of stuck with one question : "Did Paris leak the tape herself (or did she have it leaked?". Honestly, I don't know, but I wouldn't be suprised about it. It created a buzz of media attention, but there are several catches to this kind of media storm : it fades fast and in order to make it work the next time, you'll have to top last times performance. Where will we end up?

Short wrap up of the Paris Hilton Sex Tape : Paris tapes herself in the bathroom, evaluating her boobs (which are small but nice by the way). Guy plays with cock and teases Paris in bedroom (nightvision). Paris plays with her pussy while getting filled missonary style. They move to a doggy style position, and after quite a few minutes, they switch to a woman on top screw. Back to doggy, this time heads facing the camera. Her face looks as if she's watching cartoons while he fucks her. Back to missionary and finally she sucks him. We're about halfway through the tape now and the rest is basically more of the same, but this time taped during daylight, resulting in better lighting conditions.

So... was that worth reading 646 words? I doubt it. Stop focussing on others and deal with yourself first.

Unrelated : I'll be doing a short extra shift tomorrow, filling in for a colleague for a couple of hours. Should be able to leave around 17h00 and then off I go for a visit to bodymetals in Sint-Niklaas.

While I was having a nice and warm bath, I was called twice. I refused to let those calls interrupt my bathing, so when I finally got out of the bath, I dialled 1919 to know what number tried to get in touch with me. Sure enough, it was Joco & Eef's number, so I called them back.

Sheer coincidence - what else can you call it - made me interrupt them as well, while they were erm... doing a little number of their own (Going at it like rabbits? Doing it doggystyle? 69 anyone? Who cares? I interrupted.), but that I couldn't know. Well, if I had turned on the webcams maybe I could, but I didn't^*.

Joco's PC somehow got a little infected while Eef was browsing images on the web last night, and he couldn't remove one of the files because the system didn't allow him access. My first idea was that the virus was planted on the system using a GDI+ exploit that I wrote about months ago, although I'm not sure. It's hard to diagnose virusinfections over the phone. I told him to get back to work on his lovely lady and that I would send him a mail explaining how to please her turn off system protection and get rid of the infected file.

^* I'm kidding about the webcams, really. Webcams are so last years' news. Streaming high quality video is the thing you're looking for, if you're not invited to the party. DSL or a Cable connection with some clever setup will usually deliver nice and crispy images for your viewing and other pleasures.

No, serious. They don't have webcams in their bedroom. I think. Even if they did, that's their business, not yours or mine. Really. Think about it.

Note : Everything that was written down in this post is the truth, but some parts may be slightly exaggerated, mystified or added for effect. It's all in jest, I tell you! Enjoy this FK entry.

(Kindly borrowed from Tine)

1. What is the furthest you've ever travelled?
From Belgium to the US and Canada

2. Which meal is the one you cook best?
Wok. I'm a wok artist :)

3. Where do you buy most of your clothes?
Clothes? Who needs clothes? Bare skin, I tell ya!

4. What is your home town famous for?
Chocolate, diamonds, it's harbor and the Red Light District. Oh, and the rise of an extreme right party :(

5. What was your best subject at school?
Biology, I think.

6. What sort of music would you never listen to?
Schlagers are not really my favorite, but I listen to a lot.

7. Is there anything you would never eat?
Hm... I'll try anything once.

8. How many languages can you speak? What are they?
Dutch, English, French

9. Which sport do you like playing or watching the most?
I like doing some bowling, and hardly watch sports.

10. Can you play a musical instrument? Which one(s)?
My mouth. But that can hardly be considered musical :)

11. What is the worst illness/injury you've ever had?
Broken arm, lots of years ago.

12. Which blogging tool do you prefer?
Movable Type, although I alse experimented with WP, and set up WP blogs for others.

13. What was the last charity you gave to?
http://www.centromujeresmexico.org

14. How many romantic relationships have you had?
Hardly enough. I don't run from one to the next.

15. Where was the last restaurant you visited?
Oh, that's a hard one. Renteniershuis, last month.

16. Have you ever seen a band live? Which one?
I've seens lots of bands live. Front 242, Metallica, ...

17. Which famous person would you like to meet? Why?
I think I'd like to chat with Björk, and date Tanja. Why? Because both of them are incredibly interesting and lovely women!

18. Have you ever been on television?
I think I might have, but I don't recall what it was about. It was waaaay in the past though.

19. Have you ever stayed overnight in hospital?
Yes, when I was lots younger and had some concussions. I've had a few over the years ;)

20. What is your ultimate ambition?
I don't have an ultimate ambition, because I change and adapt my goals to the situation and reality. Todays ambition is to get laid. Wait, that's my goal every day...

As you might have noticed, the president of the United States will be visiting Belgium starting tomorrow, for three days. He's scheduled to leave on wednesday, after having met with various "important people" (my choice of words, not his).

At least three different protests are planned to show him that his politics don't fly here, and that most people would like to see him take a less egocentric path, and take into consideration that there is more to this world than just the USA and it's policies.

According to a recent article in GVA - one of the major newspapers in Belgium - at least 2500 policemen will be dispatched to keep the thousands of protesters away from Bush and NATO as wells as EU headquarters. I think the way politicians and governements handle protests says a lot about their democratic values, doesn't it?

Shelter those who can make a difference on the highest level from every kind of protest and different opinions, and you're doing well... or so it seems. To me it seems those are the tactics of chickens, running. If you are certain about your policies and open to criticism, one doesn't run nor does one keep protesters confined to guarded areas far away from the actual summits. Sooner or later some people will decide they've had it with all those limitations and sneak through, break through or take up different forms of protest, possibly less peaceful. Remember the saying : back a dog into a corner and he'll bite. Democracy is nothing different and as soon as a critical mass is reached, changes cannot be stopped anymore. In the best case one can try to guide them, gently.

I'm working on sunday, monday and tuesday, but I might head off to Brussels on tuesday afternoon, depending on what info I can find in regard to protests going on.

Links : www.bushwanted.org - www.stopusa.be - Greenpeace Belgium

I went to bed quite early, so I would get enough sleep to last the day. I laid awake most of the time, watching every minute pass by. I feel - and probably look - like I've had 15 minutes of fame sleep instead of the close to 6 hours I actually spent under the covers of my warm bed. This bears bad news when you have to work a 9 hour shift.

Just by leaving 1 comment on a blog. I agree it was a slightly "evil" comment, but it was partially in jest and partially because I was irritated with the "shiny happy people mood" around the world that day. However, I don't feel like I attacked anyone personally, what can hardly be said about the owner and some of their friends replies.

(from karma, the blog owner) 'ServMe': who is interested in getting anything from you? - you are definitely more pathetic than me - or else why would you be a lowly security guard while I am a senior executive? Leave your shit in your own doorway, asshole (or in it).

Well, dear Karma : I actually chose to be working as a security guard, after a career in IT. It seems you, as a "senior executive", should know better as to judge people by their job, but appartently that quality is absent from your book. Namecalling never helped anyone, and only looks bad on those participating in it.

I deal with higher and top management on a nearly daily base, and I agree that there are assholes amongst them, but most don't look down on people working for them and those that assure they can perform their management job without worrying about other things.

While you may find your job as a "senior executive" more important than mine as a "lowly security guard", I can assure you both are needed and neither of them are possible without the other. Do you also look down on mailmen, garbage collectors or the people filling bags in the supermarket? None of those jobs might be desirable or high profile, but they get done and need to be done. "Fire them all" I'd say but please, be prepared to collect your own garbage, stuff your own bags and let's not even think about reading, writing and sending out letters.

A *full* day off tomorrow (friday) and then I start the (way too) early shift on saturday. Which of course means that friday will be a terribly short day anyway, but it's better than nothing I'd say. This also means I will *not* be attending the wedding of my cousin, or the reception I was invited to. Sorry, but with work and switching from late to early shifts I really don't see any way to make that work.

Most activity tomorrow will consist of hunting down virusses, erasing spyware and conquering adware - not on my computer, but on that machine a colleague from work brought in.

Late last night, I got SP2 for XP installed on it, which luckily got rid of quite a few annoying windows instabilities, I got Norton AV up to date and got rid of some more spyware and virusses. Only 17 or so files left that are tagged as suspicious and can not be removed, most likely because the virus/spyware is still active somewhere in memory. A bit of searching on the web should take care of most though.

It seems the Scott Wills breakdancing load on my blog is slowly diminishing, either because more people have the video file, or because it is a few entries down now. It is possible though that a new influx of people will start happening as more people become aware that they should be searching for B-Boy Junior instead.

A quick look at some stats seems to affirm it :

I haven't slept much last night, which means I'll probably feel like shit as the day progresses. To be honest, this has been going on since the new work schedule was introduced where we go from graveyard shifts to sunset, instead of from graveyard back to sunrise. I just can't seem to adapt to the gentle change in sleeping patterns, whereas with the hard change (night to morningshifts) I only suffered for a day or two every 21 days or so.

Currently I've got trouble sleeping for 3 to four days, every 2 weeks. If this keeps up, and I can indeed pinpoint it to the new system (I hope it's not the reason though, since there is little chance it'll be changed) I'm in for serious trouble.

As I couldn't sleep I got up earlyish (8AM) and just hooked up a computer that a colleague brought along last night. It suffered from some kind of error and it was powered down hard (ripping the powercord from it) now leading to a bluescreen with a UNMOUNTABLE_BOOT_VOLUME error in windows XP. A quick search leads me to believe I should be able to fix it with a chkdisk /p, so let's see what happens and whether or not I can access it at all.

Box analysis : I got the box running again, a chkdisk /p did indeed solve the main problem. After booting into XP Home though, I instantly noticed that it was severely plastered with spy and adware. A first check with Ad-Aware (an up-to-date version) returned no less that 856 hits. Of which 8 were running spyware processes, and I had already killed off some manually. Off to do a cold boot, run another check, then run SpyBot SD over it, hook it up to the net to update on patches and the latest virus definitions and then I'll see how far we get.

It's "love everyone around you and spend lots of cash or you won't be the true lover" day again. Go forth and replicate, multiplicate, procrastinate or whatever you feel like, just don't irritate me with your fuzzy feelings.

Yes, I know I'm not rational or objective about it. Yes, I know I'm probably just frustrated and jealous. So, what's your point?

update : I'm usually a shiny happy people person, but today I don't feel like it. My ISP seems to be having mailserver problems (again) so even the constant stream of spam has been diminished to just a drop. When I opened the snailmail box, there were three letters and a bunch of advertising in it, and two of those letters ain't even for me. Why the mailman always picks out my mailbox to drop off everything he doesn't know where to deliver remains a question though. It also makes me wonder where *my* mail ends up on a bad day...

Letter number 3 was for me, and once again contained proof that my employer seems unable to add 1 and 1 and get 2 as a result. In short : they fucked up the hours I worked again. I'm getting used to it though, but I must say that they got my hours of December 2004 correct, and it only took 1 recalculation. Joy Joy.

Off to grab something to eat and then off to work. Be back in a couple of hours.

I just edited and checked close to a 150 older posts of mine, changing some URL's around and putting them all in the correct category. While I was doing so, I came accross this old joke :

A penguin is driving through Melbourne on a hot summer day when he notices his oil light is on. He gets out of the car and sure enough, it's leaking oil all over the road. The penguin drives around the corner to a service station and asks the mechanic to take a look at it. The mechanic says he has a few others to look at first, but if he comes back in an hour he can tell the penguin what is wrong with his car.

The penguin agrees and goes for a walk. He finds an Ice cream shop and thinks a big bowl of vanilla ice cream will really hit the spot since he's a penguin and its Melbourne in the summer, after all. He sits down at the Counter and starts on his ice cream. Of course the poor bastard has no hands so it is rather messy. By the time he is done he has ice cream all over his flippers and his mouth - a total mess.

He waddles back to the service station and says to the mechanic, "Did you find out what is wrong with my car?"

The mechanic replies, "It looks like you've blown a seal."

"No no", says the penguin. "it's just icecream!"