raymondpoort.com

I left Norway today for almost five weeks (!)…for all the right reasons; a day at the Pinkpop festival tomorrow (it will be great with performances of De Staat, Manic Street Preachers, Elbow and Coldplay! 😉 ), working from the dutch office coming week followed by two weeks vacation in Corsica…oof, I am SO looking forward to vacation!! I will work some days after ‘Le Corse’ and then head to Slovakia for Pohoda 2011!! A great couple of weeks ahead, yayyy! 😉

It seems that I left Norway just in time, heavy rain has caused floods and problems with the mobile network, wow! Leaving Norway was a close call; I was flying on standby and all flights were packed…luckily the pilot granted me a seat in the cockpit (thx Robert and Raymond!), it is becoming a habit! 😉 It was a Boeing 737-900 this time, less electronics, more ‘real’ flying, FUN!

It is asparagus season, which is great since I *love* asparagus (especially with Hollandaise sauce 😉 ). The chef in the canteen at work apparently loves them too, since he puts asparagus soup on the menu every other day. Quite nice, but there is a drawback; your urine smells TERRIBLE afterwards! (and quite fast too, within 30 minutes!) 😉

Studies on this phenomenon are not consistent, but it is believed that most people do produce the bad smell after eating asparagus, but only about 22% of the population have the genes to actually smell it…and I am one of the lucky ones! 😉

A summary of last Monday’s WWDC keynote speech, done as a musical by a bunch of geeks who didn’t make it through the America’s Got Talent auditions…oh well, it is something different for a change. 😉

Kahlil Gibran: “It is well to give when asked but it is better to give unasked, through understanding.”

The past years Apple traditionally used its World Wide Developers Conference to introduce new hardware, specifically a new version of iPhone recently. 😉 This years WWDC was different, but not less exciting (even if you think that Apple is evil who is only after world domination by uhhh <Apple fanboy alert> creating uber user-friendly devices and software! 😉 ).

Steve Jobs was on stage doing his keynote speech (aka. ‘Stevenote‘, watch it here!) and by now the whole world knows about Mac OS X Lion, iOS5 and iCloud (seriously, how *important* can this really be? It is *everywhere* on the web, as if there is no real news! 😉 )

Anyway, since the info is all over the web, I’ll spare you the details (everything can be found in the links above and below!). The only thing I want to say is that Apple did it once again!! With OS X Lion, iOS5 and iCloud they set another big step forward into usage simplification of ‘that-damn-complex-thing-called-computer’, allowing people to focus on tasks that matter to them instead of getting distracted by ‘what action do I need to perform now so that my computer does its thing’! 😉

A typical sunny Sunday, filled with all sorts of small sunny Sunday things to fix in and around the house; most of my time went into fixing three (!) flat tires on two (!) bicycles and mounting the satellite dish to its new permanent place (easy peasy for a certified VSAT installer! 😉 ).

Fixing things feels good, especially when the sun shines! 😉

Nothing beats sailing the Oslo fjord on a sunny day like today! 😉
The wind brought us to a terrific spot for some sunbathing, swimming (freezing cold btw.!! 😉 ) and uhhh, a BBQ on the boat!!

The sunset on the way back to Oslo is a bonus which made the day complete…truly magnificent!

Summer has arrived and I *love* it!

Blue skies, temperatures of 25C and up (close to 30C today actually!!), and the new veranda is a bliss! 😉

Even though we live ‘Up North’, we do remember and love the land ‘Downunder’ for its people and habits: so indeed, weather like means that we have a ‘Barbie‘ *everyday*! 😉

BBQ Season 2011 is officially open…come over and join the fun!!

(oh, no worries mate, unlike the Ozzies we DON’T burn the meat until it is completely black! 😉 )

Albert Camus: “We only know of one duty, and that is to love.”

It all began with an iPhone…
March was when my son celebrated his 15th birthday and I got him an iPhone.
He just loved it. Who wouldn’t?

I celebrated my birthday in July
and my wife made me very happy
when she bought me an iPad.

My daughter’s birthday was in August
so I got her an iPod Touch.

September came by, so for my wife’s birthday
I bought her an iRon.

It was around then that the fight started . . .
What my wife failed to recognize is that the iRon can be integrated into the home network with the iWash, iCook and iClean. This unfortunately activated the iBitch.

Which led me to the iHospital and iGet out Thursday.

😉 😉