Archive for October, 2008

QOTD October 31 2008

Friday, October 31st, 2008

Sophocles: “One word frees us of all the weight and pain of life: That word is love.”

Out with the team

Thursday, October 30th, 2008

I’ve had my first team meeting today, a good brainstorm session earlier this afternoon and we’re now getting ready for dinner in the city. Seven engineers with various backgrounds and skills, the obvious geeky talk every now and then πŸ˜‰ plus some interesting ideas how to get the work done…they’re the fuel of the company and I see them as heroes…it’s gonna be fun to work with them!

Snow!!

Wednesday, October 29th, 2008

Main topic for discussion today was the snow arriving in Oslo. You would think that Norwegians are used to it, but no, the first day snow hits Oslo people go crazy…I went to work today by car, summertires still on and got stuck in huge traffic, mainly caused by people that shouldn’t drive a car in the first place! Man, it was a great experience to drive on the highway, there were people stopping without apparent reason, switching on their emergency lights and waiting for the snow to pass (no chance!). The best thing to see was this BMW 645 and the owner changing tires to cope with the snow conditions…on the friggin’ highway I tell you!! Amazing!!
It was great to be out there today πŸ˜‰

It’s getting c-c-c-cold

Tuesday, October 28th, 2008

The temperature dropped below zero today, quite a difference with the 12 degrees above that we enjoyed last Sunday…wintertires are mandatory from coming Saturday,Β  the same day as when 60kph becomes the speedlimit on the Oslo ring…I guess it’s safe to say that winter is getting unavoidable close now, bbrrrr! (and, YAY, skiing galore! πŸ˜‰

Google Earth for iPhone

Monday, October 27th, 2008

Official Google Blog: “Even before we introduced Google Earth back in 2005, the team had long dreamed of being able to carry the Earth around in your pocket. Well, today that dream becomes a reality as we introduce Google Earth for iPhone and iPod touch.”

Get it, it’s great!

Kissy’s Birthday

Sunday, October 26th, 2008

My baby has her Birthday today, 34, a true ‘threenager’! It won’t be forgotten; she managed to celebrate it 5 times this year… πŸ˜‰

iTunes Genius

Saturday, October 25th, 2008

We’re gonna have a dinner for 8 tonight celebrating Kissy’s 34th Birthday tomorrow. Food and drinks are gonna be great (I trust Kristel’s cooking and the wine selection) πŸ˜‰

For the music during the night I’m gonna try the iTunes ‘Genius’, it’s supposed to be great in selecting songs that fit together…well, the proof of the pudding is in the eating! πŸ˜‰

Back home, it’s WEEKEND!

Friday, October 24th, 2008

I just came back home after two rather busy days out traveling.

They started yesterday with getting up at an aweful 4am (aahhh!) followed by flying to NL, meeting, lunch, meeting, meeting, driving to Brussels, dinner at 10:30pm, beer, some more beer, a convenient 6h sleep (double as the night before), breakfast, meeting, lunch, driving back to NL, arriving at the airport 30 minutes before departure and still catching my plane (indeed, flights are becoming bustrips! πŸ˜‰ )…intense days, overall good results and having fun with colleagues (as always), life ain’t all that bad!

QOTD October 23 2008

Thursday, October 23rd, 2008

Henry David Thoreau: “Go confidently in the direction of your dreams! Live the life you’ve imagined. As you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler.”

Still no internet…

Wednesday, October 22nd, 2008

My internet provider, a small one in the village I live in, told me that I’m pretty unlucky to have a problem with connecting to the Net specifically this week; they normally have three operators at work, but two are on holiday and one had a funeral today…it basically means that the internet at my home is still down, two days in a row now, and it will ‘hopefully’ be fixed somewhere tomorrow…DAMN!!

Thank you WordPress for releasing the WordPress for iPhone app, it enables me at least to share my frustration with y’all. πŸ˜‰

Internet down

Tuesday, October 21st, 2008

The internet at home has been down the whole day…I only found out after I came back from work and wasn’t able to get tech support anymore. Better luck tomorrow the lady said, it blows since I needed to get some work done tonight…
It’s amazing when you think of it, the Net became such a big part of life in just 10 years orso…ha, and the unavailability made me go to bed just after 22.00h! (am also dead tired which is the actual reason for hitting the hay so early…;))
Heyhey, give it a couple more years and an internet outage will have the same effect as a power outage years ago; baby-boom 9 months later?!? (no plans here though, still in practising-mode ;))

First day

Monday, October 20th, 2008

Today was my first day in the new position! Well, kind of; I still have some ‘previous life’-tasks to finish and to handover, obviously. It’ll keep me pretty pretty busy the coming weeks, how I *love* new challenges! πŸ˜‰

Anyway, in November I will have three weeks in Bali/Jakarta to ‘recover’ and charge the battery…hehe, no drama here! πŸ˜‰

QOTD October 19 2008

Sunday, October 19th, 2008

Vida D. Scudder: “It is through creating, not possessing, that life is revealed.”

I can’t reveal…

Saturday, October 18th, 2008

…I can’t reveal what I am up to today, but it’s gonna be great! I have written and deleted a lot of words in this post already, and decided to shut up for now, I would give it away otherwise and I can’t let that happen!!

The MacBook is IN!

Friday, October 17th, 2008

No big surprise; we’re the happy owner of a new Apple MacBook! The machine is now in NL and should be hitting home on Sunday, cool! Kissy returned from the States today and was able to setup the notebook herself (she’s a smart girl, and well, Apple makes things easy too) and got her first Gmail chat out to me, yay!!

Can’t wait to lay my hands on the device!

Coincidentally I (finally) got the tax-return in yesterday; it was a bit higher than expected and matches the purchase of the MacBook…ain’t that karma? πŸ˜‰

QOTD October 16 2008

Thursday, October 16th, 2008

John Abrams: “If the people who make the decisions are the people who will also bear the consequences of those decisions, perhaps better decisions will result.”

Norway – The Netherlands soccer game

Wednesday, October 15th, 2008

I have tickets for the Norway against The Netherlands soccer game at UllevΓ₯l stadium tonight! Hmm, which team should I support?

Statistically and looking at the most recent games, the dutch should easily win, they simply have the better players…but you never know; Norway is always difficult, their type of play is hard to break, at least for the dutch.

We will see, either result would be fine for me…but if you have a chance to see the match on tv, go watch it and be on the lookout for ONE orange colored guy standing in between the norwegian fans! (yes, I got a ‘norwegian’ ticket πŸ˜‰ )

New Apple MacBooks!

Tuesday, October 14th, 2008

Apple CEO Steve Jobs today revealed new MacBooks in the special notebook event.

Most of the details were ‘known‘ by the community already, and it is great to see them confirmed. I won’t write about the different models, the new way to produce notebooks with a precision unibody enclosure from a solid piece of aluminum, new state of the art NVIDIA graphics, brilliant instant-on LED-backlit displays and new large glass Multi-Touch(TM) trackpad…THAT information is available on several techsites or via the video of the Keynote. πŸ˜‰

The new MacBooks look great, and timing could not have been better; the new notebooks are available from today and Kissy coincidentally flew to LA today…YAY!!

I have been holding off some months now…one 13-inch MacBook please! πŸ˜‰

Catching up on podcasts

Monday, October 13th, 2008

Being away from home and not ‘enjoying’ a 30-45 minutes commute to work doesn’t do me good on keeping up with my favorite podcasts. So, again I’m behind on Adam Curry’s Daily Source Code and others such as No Agenda, tech5, The MacCast, TWiT and The Gillmor Gang.

Hehe, if you’re looking for me this week, look for the guy with his earbuds in! πŸ˜‰

Apple’s new MacBooks

Sunday, October 12th, 2008

More information (and even pictures!) of the new Apple MacBooks (& MB Pro) are published on various websites. Apple once again seems to be unable to stop the information from getting out there, before they release new products in the special event

They used to be so good at that; Steve Jobs pulling a surprise out of his sleeve during his presentation (his famous last ‘one more thing‘ sentence), I guess that having so more attention to Apple products worldwide makes it harder to stop people in the production facilities and/or Apple Stores from revealing information to the (internet) community.