2009-01-03 14:06:00
The past few days I've been digging around the web, getting more inspiration for my/our next trip to Japan. I'm subscribed to blogs like Danny Choo, Kirai Net and Akiba Blog (NSFW) all of which provide me with no end of cool ideas.
For instance, Danny Choo (son of world famous designer Jimmy Choo) takes the most beautiful photographs all across Tokyo, all the while writing nice articles about his work and life in Japan. The picture above was taken from the observation deck of the Shin-Marunouchi building, which he recently visited for a feature article. Seen in the photograph is Tokyo's "central station" which is the city's main port for the shinkansen bullet trains. I arrived at Tokyo station the first time I entered the city and promptly got lost ^_^; On the right in the picture you'll also notice a low, grey building which is Tokyo's central post office. At the time I didn't know it, but standing in front of Tokyo station I actually shot a photograph the other way, of the Shin Marunouchi building :)
It's funny by the way how the architecture of Tokyo station reminds me of Amsterdam's central station :D On the outside they really do "feel" similar.
Anywho... Shin Marunouchi is definitely going on my To Visit list, mainly because of Danny's article. The shopping mall on the inside is exquisitely designed and there's a multitude of neat restaurants. Among them being Kua Aina, which'll be cool because I can finally say I had a burger "from that Hawaiian burger joint" :D
kilala.nl tags: japan, holiday, photos,
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2009-01-01 17:53:00
Well looky there! That's a whole new, fresh year in the Archives just waiting to be filled with all kinds of neat stuff :) Let's all make this a great year, okay?
Welcome in 2009 everyone ^_^
We had a great little party at our place last night, with six of our good friends coming over for dinner and games. Marli put together an awesome meal and Peter and Wendy made a yummy breakfast (which was server around 1300 *grin*).
Marli and I were beat after a long day, so we went to bed around 0030, but I was told that the fun and games continued until 0330 :) At least everyone had a good time.
kilala.nl tags: holiday,
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2008-12-27 18:43:00
Heh! Just like in the past few years Christmas was a fun time with our families, but it was far from relaxing ^_^ There was the usual bickering, there was the hectical preparation for the big dinner and of course there's also the huge amount of stuff we needed to haul around the country to accomodate Dana.
Ah, but still... It was good to have all the family together, dinner was great and Dana seemed quite happy with all of the attention, despite all the fuss. I also spent a few hours with step-father-in-law Dirk, flexing my PHP/MySQL muscles to help him set up a dynamic site for the local fierljeppen team.
So... It might not have been 100% relaxation, but at least it was 0% work. Holidays can be good to get things off your mind :)
kilala.nl tags: holiday, family, relaxing,
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2008-12-07 20:58:00
This weekend I "surprised" Marli with a weekend in the country, just to get away from it all. I'd taken the Friday off so we could take care of all the household chores in a hurry, letting us leave for the province of Drenthe around one. I'd rented a nice cottage at the Kuierpadtien camping park, which came at a nice price since it's off-season.
Incidentally, the area we visited this weekend is also where my dad used to go on holidays with his parents back in the fifties (or was it the sixties?). Wezuperbrug is home to about 200 people and is kind of stuck in the middle of nowhere, along with a few other small villages. We loved it :)
We really didn't do very much this weekend, but that's why it was so relaxing. No Internet, no work, no household work, just the three of us and nothing to tie us down. We had a nice dinner, we had breakfast together for the first time in a year and we made a small visit to the tiny town of Orvelte. Orvelte was voted number five in the list of the Netherlands' prettiest towns and it does live up to this! We arrived around 0930, mist still hanging thick in the air, with the town still quiet and peaceful.
I've mentioned before how we'd love to move to the country and Drenthe is one of the places we've been eyeing. The scenery's just lovely over there and the housing prices are just insanely low. We just checked out a real estate site and seriously: the difference in what you get for 200k between the provinces of Utrecht/Flevoland and Drenthe comes down to two rooms and about fifty m^2. Holy crap! Ie 4-5 rooms @100m2 versus 6-7 rooms @150m2. That's making things -very- tempting.
kilala.nl tags: holiday, relaxing, netherlands,
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2008-09-11 17:18:00
It was a bit inconvenient for $CLIENT, but I've decided (after a lot of pushing from Marli) to take my vacation a week early. I was feeling pretty near to burning up and Marli really wanted me to stay healthy before the baby comes. Of course that makes total sense (as a lot of wives' suggestions do), but I do feel a bit guilty about the decision.
Ah well... Come Monday I'll be home for two weeks, allowing me to sleep a lot, to relax and to do some sewing :)
kilala.nl tags: holiday, baby, relaxing,
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2008-06-07 14:34:00
I've had to cancel my attendance at the annual company outing.
For starters Marli wouldn't be coming along, given her work schedule next week. To accomodate for this I would've had to do groceries on Friday and rushed to Texel on Saturday morning. It would've also meant that I'd spend at least three to four hours of my weekend in the car driving back and forth.
Now, all of that wouldn't normally deter me from a road trip. My huge pile of homework however, would. ;_; This is one time that I'd have to let efficiency take the upper hand over fun. Ah, but in three weeks the school year will be over and I'll have a little less to worry about! /o/
EDIT:
I hope my colleagues have a lot of fun though. What with today's weather, it must be lovely on the islands this weekend. I also got to miss Mona's last day at Snow, which sucks. :( Good luck with your new job Monay! o/
kilala.nl tags: holiday, snow,
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2008-04-23 00:00:00
Yesterday I did something uncharacteristic of me: I took a night off :) No homework, no cooking, no cleaning.
Instead, we went out for a quick dinner at our favorite Greek restaurant in Nieuwegein, followed by a visit to our dear friends Peter and Wendy. It'd been too long since we last talked to them and they had a big book of pictures from their last holiday trip. Apparently they'd been to Costa Rica for a few weeks, without us knowing it. -That's- how long we hadn't spoken with them ;_;
Anywho... It looks like they had a great trip and they took some beautiful pictures. I saw how a pineapple grows and flowers for the first time in my life and I'm very happy for it. I learned something cool about a fruit I love :)
However, both Marli and I have to agree: Costa Rica (or middle and south America for that metter) is not a holiday destination that we'd pick.
Any country where frogs are the size of your finger nails and where bugs come as big as your fist is just a bit too fscked up for me :) Mosquitoes the size of a finger and meat eating flies that NOMNOMNOM at you -through- your jeans? No sirree! Not for me! ^_^; Besides, I loathe any abundance of creepy crawlies and Marli's just scared shitless of snakes.
We definitely enjoyed seeing all their photos and hearing their stories. But all of that did make us realize once more that we're people for the urban jungle, not the real jungle :) I usually feel at home in any city that I visit, within a few hours... That's my forte. Amsterdam, Leeds, Helsinki, Budapest, Prague, Tokyo? That's where I feel at home!
kilala.nl tags: holiday, friends, eww,
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2008-01-01 08:24:00
Well, it's officially 2008 in the countries that I'm involved with, so: HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Champagne all around :) It goes well with croissants over breakfast, so fsck it ^_^
kilala.nl tags: holiday,
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2007-12-31 19:49:00
Oh my :) I wish I'd an empty VHS tape with me, because I sure as heck would love to tape tonight's traditional Red & White New Year's TV show. It's so totally awesome ^_^
We'll watch the show for a few hours, with our roomies and then we'll head out to Shitennoji temple for the New Year's bells (and alcohol and food and friends, etc).
Yoshu! Welcomu too-sowsand-aato!
Happy new year everyone!
kilala.nl tags: japan, japan 2007, tv, holiday,
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2007-12-25 12:07:00
Yesterday we celebrated Christmas Eve with my family. Everyone who wasn't stuck in a foreign place (Finland, the US) was there, so we had a nice little gathering :)
Dinner was great, as always, and of course I overate. The salmon starters were alright, but (like every year) the ham was awesome. Apparently my dad had some Finnish minister bring over a Christmas ham from Finland, just in time for Christmas. Awesome stuff and it's a shame that I couldn't bring any with me. I mean: it'd spoil on the way to Japan ;_; By the end of the night I was falling over with both sleep and stomach cramps :D Ah, you gotta love the holidays.
It was very nice to be together with the whole family again. :) I would've posted a picture, if my camera and SD reader weren't packed already :p
kilala.nl tags: holiday, family,
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2007-12-23 11:54:00
With a bit of luck, this is what my trip's going to look like. There's still a few days that I can fill in, but I reckon I'll figure out what I'll do when I get there.
Now... I -really- must finish some homework for a group project at school. If I don't, then half of our presentation will fall apart :( Crappy thing is that I really don't feel like doing my homework. The trip to Japan is just -too- close! -_-;
EDIT:
I'm putting together a Google map with all of my destinations. You can find it here.
kilala.nl tags: japan, holiday, japan 2007,
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2007-12-21 13:53:00
A few days before my departure to Japan, the pieces to the puzzle start falling together. I've made a list of things that I really want to see, leaving a few days to spare.
Tokyo-area:
* The Ghibli museum
* The Miraikan museum of tech
* Namco Namja Town
* Visit my Arsian acquaintance Durf (assuming that he's in town)
* Some shopping in Akiba
Osaka-area:
* New Year's
* The Kojasan temples
Kumamoto-area, on Kyushu (southern island):
* The Kyushu Railway History museum
* The ryokan Chikurakutei
Wow! This is going to be awesome <3 It'll be especially exciting to visit Kyushu by myself, since I really don't speak any Japanese :D
kilala.nl tags: japan, holiday, japan 2007,
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2007-10-12 10:46:00
Back in August my father and his special lady-friend took a holiday trip to Finland. Coming back they brought at least two trays of Kopparberg's Cider with them. Last night, over a great family dinner, they were sweet enough to donate a few cans to me. Result! ^_^
Seriously, I love Kopparberg cider. That's one of the only beer-alikes that I could get drunk on 'cause it's just so damn tasty! It's almost like drinking alco-nade, or something :)
The default flavour's pear, but I also adore the forrest fruits and the blueberry flavours. I just read about a blueberry/lemon mix that also sounds lovely.
It's a shame this stuff is so expensive in the Netherlands, if you even manage to find a shop that sells it. Ikea sells the non-alco variation, but even that comes at a premium. ;_;
kilala.nl tags: finland, holiday, drinks,
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2007-09-06 11:31:00
A little over six months ago I was home alone for about a week, while Marli took a well deserved trip to the UK. The week flew by and I didn't really notice any big changes, mostly because I kept so busy.
Well... Tonight Marli will embark on a trip down up the Rhine with a friend of hers. Nathalie and her husband co-own a freighter that hauls all kinds of stuff between the Netherlands and Germany. Marli was invited to join them on one of their trips, to have a bit of a holiday.
The realisation has just hit me that:
* Tonight she'll leave
* I won't see her for about a week
* Yes, I will be home alone, again
I didn't realise it before... I guess I've been too busy with work and school. *sigh* Just like last time I'll get through things easily, not noticing much because I'm so busy. But that doesn't mean things won't get lonely in the evenings :/
EDIT:
Nathalie quickly informed me that they'll be travelling UP the Rhine, not down it. Which is of course logical, since they'll travel upstream. Or actually, I hope they'll travel up AND down the Rhine because I don't feel much for driving seven hours to pick Marli up in the south of Germany ^_^;;
kilala.nl tags: family, holiday,
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2007-06-03 21:38:00
Marli just called me to inform me that we'd gotten our tax returns in. It's a lot. I'm not kidding.
She demands that I join my friends in Japan come December.
Holy shit. o_O
What with the after-Con melancholy and now this, I'm about to cry XD.
kilala.nl tags: japan, holiday, holy shit,
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2007-05-30 07:28:00
Unfortunately I won't be attending Assembly 2007 this year ;_;
I've mucked about a bit too much with my vacation days at work, meaning that I'm already at a negative subtotal for this year. I've also had a little accident with my company car in Paris, the repairs for which come from the same budget that would have covered my trip.
No money + no vacation days = no Assembly 2007.
Shame, 'cause I was really looking forward to visiting my family and Helsinki.
kilala.nl tags: holiday, conference,
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2007-05-27 11:45:00
Paris, the city of lights, the city of love... The city that perpetually smells like an open sewer...
Marli and I have never gotten what the big deal is about Paris, or at least we've never been as enamoured with the city as some of our relatives and friends. In all honesty I do believe that a great part of our distaste for the city is caused by prejudice, but still it just doesn't excite us that much. I'm glad to say though that one of my prejudices about France has been broken, for no longer will I say: France, great country, shame about the people. Just about every single person we've spoken to during our stay was great :)
Our two nights' stay at the Porte d'Italie Holiday Inn Express came courtesy of my employer Snow, who'd given all their employees a Bongo Weekend Paris in the fall of 2006. The hotel was comfortable, clean and the staff was -very- good. Unfortunately the breakfast served was the standard Paris fare, which would barely sustain an anorexic. The hotel also lacked a restaurant of its own, so we dined next door at the Porte d'Italie Campanile. Their food is absolutely great and still affordable, although I'd really wouldn't want to stay there overnight.
Disney Land Resort Paris as it's called these days was an absolute blast! I'd never expected to have as much fun as I did, thinking that I'd feel overall meh because of my expectations of the Disney company. Well, it was nothing as I'd expected and I found myself grinning from ear to ear for most of the day. Something about that amusement park just got under my skin and got me feeling very, very happy.
We didn't go into that many rides, instead choosing to take things easy and to take in the sights and sounds of the park. While everything is uber-cultivated I have to say that I found the whole park stunningly beautiful. Each attraction is lovingly crafted and I just couldn't find any flaws with the designs. The gardens were clean, well kept and colourful and the attractions were fun and queues weren't horrible (mind you that we did go on a weekday).
So what rides -did- we go on? Well, since I've always loved trains and such we just had to start the day off with a train ride around the park. The ride offers you a quick and comfortable way around the park with the added benefit of driving an actual 5/8th scale steam loc. Glee!
Star Tours is one of those flight simulator deals that has you on board of the Dagobah Express (it's set in the Star Wars background) which accidentally gets side tracked into a battle around the Death Star. Very awesome and I'm still astounded by how convincing the gravity effects of a tilting box are ^_^
Pirates of the Caribean is an indoors boat ride that takes you past dioramas of towns being raided by pirates. Puppetry and silly effects galore, including one or two steep water slides. Phantom Manor is a similar deal that takes you through a haunted mansion and the surrounding graveyards. We really loved these two rides as we're big fans of puppetry dioramas. The devil's in the details, you know?
Being the big kid that I am I would have loved to trounce around Adventure Island ^_^ I'm crazy about huge jungle gyms like that :D
By the by, travelling by car was no problem at all with the TomTom we have. It guided us right to the hotel without getting us lost in Paris or on the Peripherique for one minute. Speaking of that dreaded piece of highway, we can now wholly sympathize with Youp van 't Hek's diatribe on traversing said route. I really cannot stress the fact enough that tourists have no business on the Peripherique in the mornings and evenings.
kilala.nl tags: family, holiday,
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2007-05-21 20:52:00
In a few days Marli and I will be spending a day at Euro Disney (which is currently known as Disneyland Resort Paris) after years of promises and wishes. Due to budgetary reasons we'll only be staying one day, but that ought to be enough for us to enjoy ourselves properly.
Now that the day's getting closer and closer I'm preparing all sorts of loose ends, like how to get there and once we're there, how to pay for everything. Now you'd assume that Disney, being the family-friendly company that they are, will do their utmost best to provide their visitors with all the information they might need, in a clear and transparent fashion.
Well, you'd be assuming wrong :/
You see, the abomination that is DLRP's website is smeared across various sub-websites, each in its own style without any clear line connecting the sites. They don't even LOOK alike! D: If I were Karl Holz I'd fire the company who made that crappy-ass website along with the guys in PR who approved their work!
So thank $DEITY for websites run by DLRP's fans!
DLRP Magic is a staggeringly beautiful website, displaying what IMNSHO should have been Disney's real site! Their website is clear, user friendly and actually provides a lot of useful information. Unfortunately it didn't provide that one little piece of info that I needed...
DLP.info however did! They finally were able to answer my rather rudimentary question of which credit cards are accepted in DLRP. And thank $DEITY again that my AmEx is accepted as well! Now, DLP.info may not look as pretty as the other site I just plugged, but they sure as heck come through with the info.
EDIT:
Oh! Here's another one! Let's say that we're travelling by car and that we're using our SatNav system. Those boxen usually require a regular address for their destination. So, do Disney in their awesome wisdom share such information on their website? No. :[
EDIT2:
Luckily someone asked the same question in the TomTom online fora. I'll repeat the answer over here.
Anyone travelling to Euro Disney by car using satellite navigation should set the following destination: Boulevard du Parc, Coupvray, France. This street doesn't have any numbers, so when asked for an intersection, choose: Disney Village / Gare TGV.
kilala.nl tags: holiday,
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2007-05-01 07:20:00
Speaking of Koninginnedag... Yesterday was a lot of fun and it was great to see Peter and Wendy again. It'd been too long, especially considering the fact that we live only ten minutes apart by bike -_-;
It was great to just walk around Utrecht and watch all the other people who came out for the Queen's birthday. Loadses of pretty women abound, a lot of amateur musicians on the streets and cholera-infected kebabs wherever you look! There was this great Elvis cover-band playing on one of the locks in Utrecht's canals whose version of Fever really rocked. ^_^
Afterwards we went to Humphreys, a restaurant that came highly recommended by Peter. He classed it as "good food at a low price", while I'd say it was a decent price; twenty euros for a three course meal (excl. drinks) is about average to me. Still, the food -was- pretty good, the bread was awesome and I just loved the interior deco of the place.
It's just a shame that my stomach decided to go and ruin the day a bit. All the hot-cold-hot-cold inflicted on us by the weather had its impact on my intestines, causing me to jump at just about every lavatory I could find :/ Meh...
Still... That was a very nice day!
Oh! Did I mention that me and Marli -finally- managed to beat the Star Cup on 150cc in Mario Kart - Double Dash? W00t!
kilala.nl tags: holiday, friends, fun, health,
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2007-04-30 10:11:00
Ahh!... *sigh* This is nice and relaxing... Sleeping in until nine, surfing the web under my blanket on the couch, munching away at some cruesly. Good stuff! It's hard to imagine that only a kilometer away from my couch there's hundreds of thousands of people bustling through the city for Koninginnedag (that'll be the celebration of the Queen's birthday). In a few hours I'll join my friends Menno, Peter and Wendy to trawl through the city and to end up at some restaurant. Hopefully Marli can join us later on, if she can find the restaurant ~_^
Yesterday we'd gone to Menno's new place in Veenendaal, to inaugurate his backyard with it's very first barbecue. We'd dragged the Gamecube, our barbecue and some meats and veggies down there and had a very nice day. And I even learnt something about BBQing: using ordinary charcoal instead of the so-called briquettes is a lot different! On the one hand it's much easier to get the heat going, but on the other hand charcoal gets used up much quicker as well.
Also, speaking of national holidays, it's a shame we're not in Finland this week. I'd have loved to celebrate Vappu with my family. Vappu has become famous as "the day that the whole of Finland gets collectively drunk", but of course of more than that! It's a celebration that revolves around Labour Day, around students, and around family and friends. I wouldn't mind flying up to Helsinki for a nice picnic and my first taste of real Sima.
kilala.nl tags: holiday, friends, relaxing,
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2007-03-09 11:52:00
I've had three days off from work, to recover a bit from the irregular schedule I've had for the past few weeks. These three days have been spent quite well, both being -utterly- lazy (I've watched four seasons of Two pints of lager...) and being rather productive around the house.
We've had a bit of a mouse problem in the downstairs storage, so I cleaned it all out and bought a huge, plastic container to put our bin bags in. We used to leave the bags in an open basket, waiting for trash day on Friday, but apparently that got the meeces in. Anywho, this barrel easily holds four bags and has a lid so I'm sure I'll get rid of the mice rather quickly.
After the cleaning I've reorganised some of the shelf space, gotten rid of loads of crap that was still lying around after remodeling the place and I've -finally- done the final phase of moving into our apartment: I've finally moved the last of the tools and moving boxes into storage! ^_^ Was about time as well, after thirteen months...
I'll spend the rest of the day cleaning up and I may go for a bike ride as well. You may notice how I've inconspicuously left "exercise" and "bike rides" out of the previous paragraphs, even though I'd said I would ;_; Ah well... At least I'm relaxed again :)
kilala.nl tags: holiday, work, house, relaxing,
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2007-02-19 22:28:00
No not the movie, but literally: Marli's off for a short holiday in the UK with a friend of the family. She deserves it too since she hasn't had a real vacation for over two years now while my last trip was last year in April. And with her out of the country for a week that leaves me home alone, $EXPRESSION.
I really couldn't think of a proper expression to insert above.
* "Free as a bird" would have made it sound like I was happy to be alone and that I'd treat the week as if I was single. Which I most definitely will not.
* "To my own devices" would make me sound like the simpleton husband who can't do anything around the house. Which I most definitely am not.
* "Free to do as I please" would make Marli the oppressive wife who restricts her husband's movements. Which she most definitely is not.
Any suggestions as to a proper maxim are more than welcome. ^_^
What it boils down to is that I am utterly unencumbered in my schedule, with one less person to take into account. That sounds way more egotistical than I mean it to sound, but yet again I'm lacking for better words. I have to say though that it's a very fresh feeling, one that I haven't had for years.
So at the end of the day I feel that I've been very efficient about my schedule. I've achieved things while remaining unstressed and in a comfortable manner. I've folded five baskets of laundry and have laundered three baskets more. I've cooked a good meal, I've run a few errands, I've taken care of some festival work, I've done my ordinary job (night shift), I've been restoring an antique buffet and I even found enough time to fit in an hour or two of relaxation.
But, now that the day is coming to a close and I'm lying here in bed, alone, I wonder whether I wasn't just keeping myself occupied. Because right now the house feels a little foreign, like it's not mine. And I pay attention to all kinds of noises coming from outside that I usually ignore. And I can't help but notice that her blanket smells of her. *huggle blanket*
This is going to be a very interesting week.
kilala.nl tags: life, holiday, relaxing,
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2007-01-01 17:31:00
God it feels weird to enter that date for this post: 2007-01-01. *sigh*
Last night's get-together was great and I can't help but feel sad that it's over. Four of our best friends came over for dinner and company, while three were unfortunately absent: Menno's working in Austria, Wesley had to work and Jeanine had to cancel :( Shame really, cause we missed them!
But still: the evening+night+day were great and we enjoyed ourselves tremendously :)
Harmen and Remco joined us around fourish yesterday, with Remco even bringing us a set of candle glasses as a thanks for having him over (it was his first time as part of our group's tradition). He's such a sweet guy :3 Peter and Wendy joined us about half an hour later, since they had had some trouble packing all their stuff.
After a few hours of chitchat we settled into dinner, starting off with a Clinton Cocktail (chicken, mandarin, lettuce and a mild curry sauce), followed by the table grill. We had a wide selection of meats, both standard fare (beef, chicken, hamburger, etc) and wild game (boar, kangaroo, ostrich, duck, etc). All this was accompanied by various greens, a big salad made by Harmen's mother and breads. Desert was arranged by Peter and Wendy: a selection of three ice creams, accompanied by exotic fruits. Yummy to say the least!
After dinner we had just enough time to watch a movie in order to be finished before midnight. It's remarkable how hard it is to find a DVD that all six of us could agree upon from the five hundred odd DVDs that we own! In the end we had settled for only four DVDs, out of which we finally picked The Craft, a classic thriller. The other three, that had to be dropped because the votes were rather dispersed were Constantine, Serenity and Mirrormask.
Naturally midnight included the requisite hugs, kisses and phone calls (or text messages) to relatives, friends and colleagues. I'd phoned Menno earlier in the evening, to ensure that I'd at least get to speak to him :) I'm glad to hear that he's doing fine and that his job in Austria agrees with him. Hang in there Menno! We miss you too!
Finally, before heading off to bed around 0200, we played a bunch of rounds of Mario Kart on the 'Cube, passing around the controllers.
I was the first to awaken again, around 0945. Since everyone else was still asleep it gave me the chance to prepare breakfast at my leisure: serving breads, cheese and cold cuts on neat plates, baking croissants, making coffee and tea, preparing all the fruit juices, cooking and frying eggs and veggies. All in all, it was a lot of food that would end up keeping us at the table for almost an hour. I really think we ought to get together like this more often, sleeping over and having breakfast together in the morning.
While working in the kitchen, Remco woke up and joined me. One of the things that occurred to us was the fact that we're a really diverse bunch of people all joined by coincidence and circles of friendship :) In random order we had: a sysadmin, a lab technician, an economist, a metal worker, a healthcare professional and a shop keeper. That's what I love about getting together with friends-of-friends: you really end up with a mixed bunch!
The day was closed off with a game of Mario Party, which Marli had to miss out on 'cause she went to visit some of her relatives. Everyone else left around 1630 and now the house feels very empty and silent ;_;
Now... I think I'll go clean up a little and try to wind down. Maybe play a few rounds of Mario Kart to push away any mopiness. And tomorrow's a new day at the office, so I gotta prepare for that as well...
*sigh* We really need to get together like this more often...
kilala.nl tags: holiday, friends, cooking,
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2006-12-31 14:47:00
Since my friends will probably not appreciate me being on the computer around midnight tonight, I thought I'd talk to all you guys now :)
I hope everyone has a great evening/night and that the new year will bring loads of happiness and success to you all.
Which reminds me... A new year also means a new section to the Archives! I gotta get cracking on that code tomorrow! :) I don't think my code's currently set up to work with posts outside 2006...
kilala.nl tags: holiday,
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2006-12-24 09:39:00
I can't believe it! This is the very first time in the five years that I've been running my personal website that I'm going to wish my visitors a merry Christmas. How the heck did I never do that before?!
So there you have it: merry Christmas to you lot! Or "happy holidays" if it pleases you better...
Marli and I exchanged our pressies a bit early, since we'll be visiting family all weekend and we'd rather do it in private :)
Marli got me two new games for the NDS (WarioWare and Worms), plus a replacement screen protector for when the original gets worn out. Of course, I'm _very_ happy :D
And I had the most blinding flash of insight when it came to getting her a present! That's usually very rare, as I'm quite dense ;_;
Pictured above is the shirt that Marli bought especially for this holiday season. She'll be wearing it with a black suit that looks very smart on her. Now I realised that she didn't have any jewelry to match the shirt, so I went out to my favorite jewelers: Esmann Juweliers. Unfortunately they don't have a website, but that isn't very odd given that they deal in antiques and handmade jewelry. They most definitely are not the run-of-the-mill jewelers like Lucardi or another high street shop.
Anywho, over at Esmann's I found these wonderful flower earrings, with petals and a center of deep red garnet. Very nice!
And now we're off to a busy weekend :)
* Tonight we'll go to my father's for the traditional Christmas dinner! So, thankfully, what I'd reported earlier hasn't come true entirely!
* Tomorrow we'll be at Marli's mother's place for the traditional Christmas day with them.
* Tuesday we'll be back at my dad's to meet up with his girlfriend's family, for more company and merriment.
kilala.nl tags: holiday, clothes,
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2006-12-22 07:06:00
In contradiction to my original plans I did in fact visit Sun Microsystem's Christmas extravaganza this year. I'd never been to their Christmas parties before and colleagues had always told me about how great it was, so I just had to go. My luck would have it that this year's event was a bit of a doozy :( I was told by friends that the event had been much larger in previous years, with many more stalls showing off all kinds of neat things.
I did finally get to see a real live Thumper though. That's one mean looking box! Twenty-four terabytes of storages in one 4U enclosure. Nice!
Anywho: it was nice meeting up with some people whom I hadn't seen in years, mostly folks from my $PREV-CLIENT days. And it was great of Sun to continue their long standing tradition: gifting every visitor of the event with a clouted Christmas tree!
So now our house smells of pine and we have a nice looking tree in our den. She's pretty decent to look at, although I'm still waiting for the branches to sag down a little. That should give her some more body.
What else is there?
* This evening I'll be picking up my new glasses at the opto.
* We're still on the hunt for a few more Christmas' presents.
* This Saturday I'll start cleaning the house in preparation of our traditional New Year's dinner.
For over five years now it's been tradition to have a few of our very best friends over for dinner on New Year's eve. We'll gather four to eight people, me and Peter'll cook a slamming dinner and we'll have fun and games into the night. I'm already looking forward to it!
Though this year I've promised Peter to leave the Dancing Stage: Mario Mix in its box :D I don't think he enjoyed that all that much last year.
kilala.nl tags: holiday, unix, work,
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2006-12-13 06:50:00
For as long as I remember my family has always celebrated Christmas Eve together.
When I was a kid, our grandparents used to come over from Rotterdam and Nonna (my Finnish grandmother) would fly over. We'd have a great, big dinner with all of us. After dinner we'd all go outside to look for Santa Claus, if we could see him fly by in his sleigh. And invariably, when we'd return to home, there'd be a great, big pile of presents underneath the Christmas tree. :)
Over the years the group has dwindled (grandparents both died years ago, Nonna has gotten too old and sickly to travel, parents got a divorce and my brother Niklas has moved to Finland), but still we continued to celebrate the Eve.
That is, until this year.
My sister and her boyfriend will be in Finland for the holidays (I'm jealous!) and none of my father's girlfriend's kids can make it on the 24th either. And so, yesterday evening my dad asked if it would be alright if we came 'round on the 26th instead. Then, he said, we'd have a much bigger group.
And naturally we agreed, 'cause that's what you do. I mean, he was feeling bad enough as it is about forgetting to arrange for a nice stay-over somewhere (the original plan was for us and them to go to some far-away part of the Netherlands).
So that's how a great family tradition finally came to its end.
... *sigh* ... It really does make me sad, 'cause I have so many good memories of those evenings...
But! Screw all this sulking! Marli and I have decided that next year we won't let this happen! We will continue the tradition instead, dragging as much family as we can into our home on the 24th! There'll be dinner, drinks, snacks and presents! Hooray!
EDIT: I really don't mean to be blaming my dad for this, if that's how it sounds. It's just a matter of circumstances.
kilala.nl tags: family, holiday, meh,
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2006-12-12 06:28:00
*yawn* *stretch*
Last night Snow had their annual Christmas dinner, with all of my colleagues and their respective partners. All in all we had around a hundred-twenty people in the restaurant. And not just some restaurant, but Het Koetshuis in Bennekom! Like many of the other restaurants bearing a "koetshuis" name (or the many variations of it) it's a fancy-schmancy kinda place, but the food's pretty darn great!
Because Snow has grown quite rapidly over the past year, Operations had decided against a formal seating arrangement around tables in favor of a "walking dinner" where people are expected to mingle. Not really our kind of thing, so after an hour or so we found a nice table and some nice folks to spend the rest of the evening with. As was expected from this walking dinner, all food was brought around on tiny plates and you could get a larger portion of meat from a buffet. As I said: the quality of the food was very good. At one or two occasions I did get the feeling that they had been trying a bit too hard to make something luxurious, but hey...
And naturally, like each year, Snow had gotten both the coworkers and their partners some presents. Every Snowy will get a personalised North Face coat, with both the Snow logo and his/her name on it (the logo I like, but the name seems kinda ghey). And "the wives" got a set of uber-strong magnets, not unlike these, although the set we got includes either two or four balls, instead of a fifty-odd set of tiny magnets.
I'm not sure which North Face coat it is, 'cause I didn't get a very good look at it yesterday evening. I did get to try it on, to find my proper size. It kind of resembles the asphalt grey Free Thinker, but I almost hope that it isn't. That coat's worth around $500. o_O
Anyway: a great evening! I was very happy to finally meet my carpooling colleague's wife (who scores quite high on the geeky-scale) and my friend Deborah's boyfriend.
EDIT:
Operations decided to put us out of our misery and posted the presents' details on our Wiki. The coat is the Mountain Guide (which still rings in at $400. youch!) and the magnets are Neotexx Spheres.
kilala.nl tags: work, holiday, fun,
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2006-12-11 06:19:00
I mentioned on the 26th of November (in the comments field) that we'd be celebrating Sinterklaas with a bunch of friends. Well, we did and it was a load of fun :)
As is the tradition for grown-ups on this evening, we all had drawn a name of one of the other visitors a few weeks in advance. We'd have to make a surprise for that person, containing a small present. Wikipedia doesn't waste much explanation on surprises, but it does cover them lightly. Basically, it calls them an "ingenious wrapping for a present". Which doesn't really do it justice IMHO.
For example, I had drawn my friend Peter's brother-in-law who's a construction engineer. Hence, I built a block puzzle of a house where one of the blocks (namely the master bedroom) contained his present.
Marlijne had drawn Peter's sister, who's a lab technician and a hamster fanatic. So she made a stuffed hamster, with the present hidden away under some straw in the box.
And finally, Marlijne (being the huuuuge Inu Yasha fan that she is) got a nude, yet sexless Inu Yasha doll, holding up a sign saying "Where are my manbits?! T_T".
Other surprises included Sinterklaas on his horse, a 7kg steel candle stick (with the present hidden inside), a pack of coffee (which I got) and a rabbit pen.
All in all: a day filled with fun, wonder, food and shitloads of candy :) I'm very happy that we were invited again and I really want to thank Peter and Wendy for their hospitality again. Thanks guys! See you in a few weeks for our New Year's dinner :)
kilala.nl tags: friends, holiday,
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2006-11-03 23:48:00
*sigh* This vacation-deal sure is great!
I may be behind on the video gaming front, but in the meantime I've taken a wonderful walk through our local park as well as spent some quality time with Marli.
Today, after dropping Marli off at work, I spent more than'n hour at De Slegte, which is a bookstore that specializes in both second hand books and cheaper books, bought in bulk. What's so great about their Utrecht store is that it's laid out in a wacky manner :)
The shop's spread out across six floor, all connected by small staircases and winding passages. The interior _really_ smells of books (doesn't it amaze you how many bookshops _don't_ smell of books?!) and is filled with piles and piles of books.
I for one love digging through the second hand stuff, since that's where the interesting old books pop up! For example, I bought a _lovely_ book on Japanese woodcuts, that is bound in a very peculiar manner. Instead of having a hard cover that's attached to the pages themselves, you have to untie the hard cover after which you can take the bound pages out. Very nifty. Another fascinating book I ran into (but didn't buy) was a book from the 1920s, describing the Rosecrucians take on human evolution and how it fits in with the bible.
Speaking of God... I mentioned Ceiling Cat weeks ago, right. Just half an hour ago I ran into the picture above. I thought it to be pleasing in all manner of fashions <3
Now... To finish my whisky-cream and to get some cuddles and sleep. See you lot tomorrow.
kilala.nl tags: holiday, netherlands,
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2006-11-01 21:07:00
Just so's you guys don't think I'm a total recluse: of course I won't stay cooped up in the house for the whole twenty days. I'll also be getting plenty of fresh air and exercise... Not something you get often in my line of work. Bike rides, a bit of walking and probably even a day of sailing with my dad :)
I'll also be getting back into my old 22-05 rhythm: sleep at ten, wake at five. I know that the structure and discipline required for that help me a lot...
kilala.nl tags: holiday, rhythm,
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2006-11-01 12:20:00
The selection has been made. The consoles have been connected, dusted and polished. Copious amounts of coffee are at the ready. And my extra fluffy, stuffed tiger is on the couch to keep me company.
I'm set! Let the gaming begin!
As I told you guys before I'll be spending the better part of my holiday playing console games that I should have finished a long time ago. Games that I dearly love, but that I never played till the end. A veritable crime against gaming -_-
Here's my selection for the next twenty days, in order of preference.
The very first console RPG that I owned, Grandia 2 on the Dreamcast. A good story, decent voice acting and a beautiful battle system make for a great title. My favourite game out of the fifty-something that we own.
Wind Waker is a beautiful game to look at. Parts of it may get repetitive, but I really would love to see the story play out. And I just love the sailing around the world that you have to do.
Ahh, Secret of Evermore! The action RPG that I grew up with. My brother owned this game for his SNES and we both loved the game. Not quite as good as Secret of Mana or Chrono Trigger, but still very enjoyable (and a lot more affordable). Now finally, after thirteen years, I will finish this game to the end!
Another classic that I grew up with: Ocarina of Time. Although I won't be playing it on the Nintendo64 like my brother used to, I'm sure it'll still be as enjoyable as it was the day that it came out. Back then I let my brother do most of the playing, but this time around I want to be the one that kills Gannondorf!
The seminal SNES platformer. I've come a long way in finishing the game, but I got stuck in the damn forest where you need to find the secret exit. *grr* I'll beat you yet Bowser!
A great platformer for the Sega Megadrive. I've heard loads of good things about this game and would love to play it for real. As opposed to the two levels I tried once after buying the game.
The same thing goes for Sparkster. A great Megadrive game that I never played in ernest. Now's the time to do so!
And finally, another platformer that I grew up with: Castlevania 4. A fscking awesome sound track and nice visuals make it a treat. The later levels can be rock hard though.
Looking back this list does tell you something about my gaming preferences. The top four is completely comprised of RPGs and action RPGs. The latter four are all platformers. Only when you start sifting through my backup pile do you find stuff like shooters, fighters and puzzlers.
Also, most of the stuff on the list is what we'd call Retro stuff. Wind Waker is definitely a next-gen title and some would say Grandia 2 is one as well. But aside from that, most of the stuff is 16-bit. Hmm.
Now... This afternoon I'll have an intake with Snow, but after that I can get stuck in. Jawsome!
kilala.nl tags: games, holiday, snes, megadrive, dreamcast,
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2006-06-06 13:44:00
So today I went out and went out and splurged on some uber-headphones: the Shure e2G set. They're of the in-ear, background-noise-cancelling variety which comes in very handy at the office. I've worn in-ear buds before (the portophones at our festival use the same kind), but it's still something I need to get used to. For one they really -do- cancel out any background noise (don't wear these when taking part in traffic!!) and secondly they just feel very strange :3
This weekend was Snow's annual family outing. We visited the Molenheide bungalow park in Belgium to spend a few days relaxing. A whole bunch of my colleagues took flying lessons in Cessna and UltraLight airplanes, while me and Marli visited the Japanese gardens in Hasselt. All in all it was a short holiday, paid in full by my employer! How many other employers do stuff like this for their people?! Personally I see myself working for Snow in the years to come :)
Another positive thing about these weekends away is that you get to spend some time with colleagues you don't normally speak to. In this case we spent quite some time hanging around with Foobar and Willow and my new colleague Ben and his girlfriend.
kilala.nl tags: snow, work, holiday, relaxing,
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2006-04-17 13:01:00
So now I'm back from my long weekend in Finland and I have to say: boy, was it relaxing! It was really nice to be out of the loop for a while, forcing myself not to think about work and other responsibilities. I spend my days playing Animal Crossing, hanging about with my family, having yummy Finnish food and sight-seeing.
It was great being back in Helsinki, even though I had to be apart from Marli for a few days. The weather was absolutely awesome, as if someone up there new I was there for my peace and quiet. Only during the last few hours of my stay did the weather turn sour.
Naturally I brought back a load of swag, since there're so many great things you can get in Finland which just aren't available over here.
First off there were the requisite candies from Fazer, like Marianne, Fazer Mint, Geisha and so on. Then there were the traditional Moomin mugs and some books from our childhood. And finally a few cans of cider and two packs of riisi piirakka (rye pastries filled with rice). Also, for a friend's birthday Marli told me to bring back something from Finnish tradition, so I brought back a bottle of lakka liquor and a tin of bear soup. Yes... Bear... :3
I have to admit that I'm still considering moving to Finland altogether. My mom and me discussed the matter, with the pro's and the con's. Well, who knows?! Maybe, someday, we'll move over there ^_^
kilala.nl tags: finland, holiday, relaxing,
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2005-01-06 00:53:00
Currently listening to "Tales of a librarian" by Tori Amos
So.. We got home from our little holiday in the UK just a couple of hours ago. I must say that it's nice to be back at my own PC and to have all of our familiar stuff around (yay for the bed!).
A big part of the following three to four days will be spent on the following things:
1. Clean up the house :# We left in a bit of a hurry due to the holidays, so it's a bit messy around here.
2. Research my eMate. There's still a lot to learn about this neat gizmo and I'll be documenting every little bit.
3. Solder a serial cable which allows me to use the eMate as a portable console for our UNIX boxen.
4. Update my website and add some new graphics and logos.
kilala.nl tags: holiday,
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2004-01-10 23:11:00
First off, while it's still allowed: HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE! I'm usually not the kind of guy who likes saying it, so I thought I'd take care of all of you in one blow :D
So... We went of a two weeks holiday to Finland recently, bot to visit my mother and to see the country in winter, and we loved it! Not only did we get to see snow and temperatures which we never encounter in the Netherlands, but we also got to try out the Fin's excellent cuisine. Mom: thank you _very much_ for having us over! We enjoyed staying with you guys a lot!
Now, in a lot families "vacation" leads to "home video" and as per this last holiday it does in ours as well ^_^ So I finally got to try my skills at Final Cut Express! Before starting though I needed to make a couple of upgrades to my Mac, which has lead to two updates in the Mac section. The articles are marked in the sidebar with [U]. Be sure to check'em out, since my grades for Apple are dropping!
kilala.nl tags: finland, holiday, family,
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2003-07-23 12:12:00
About a month ago (maybe a bit more), when we were away on holiday, Marli arranged things so that we could buy a UK Megadrive 1 from this guy we knew over there. It was still in a very good shape, but a bit mucky looking. So I decided to try and find a way to really get the original black luster of the box back. I found out that _the_ way to do this is to get a can of Pledge (the stuff your aunty Betty uses to polish her wooden tables) and use that to polish/wax the consoles exterior. The end results of this beautifying process can be seen on the left in the menu
During that same holiday I decided to put the fact that we were in the UK, Mekka of the retro gamer, to good use! Once, we took the bus into Leeds, and dropped by the local Computer Exchange (or CEx as it is also known). Now if you're ever in the London or Leeds area, be sure to drop by these shops. They may have very little in the area of SNES stuff, but it's a veritable paradise for Sega lovers and for those seeking more exotic stuffs (NeoGeo Pocket, import Dreamcast games, etc). I also made a couple of good deals on Megadrive games on Ebay with people in the UK! It's _very_ nice to save on shipping and I can recommend anyone who's planning to go to the UK to either make some deals with people in the UK and have them send the parcels to your staying address before you guys (or if you're going to be there for a week or two, just shop around EBay when you're there!).
Oh! And last but definately not least! It's probably even the best news since a while ^_^ For my birthday Marli bought me a GAMECUBE!! Now I know that's now retro, but ya gotta love it!
kilala.nl tags: holiday, family,
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All content, with exception of "borrowed" blogpost images, or unless otherwise indicated, is copyright of Thomas Sluyter. The character Kilala the cat-demon is copyright of Rumiko Takahashi and used here without permission.
