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Life in Norway is great; the fantastic nature, the way of living, and…some interesting habits 😉 read more about those in the ‘what-is-typical-norwegian‘ article.

At the very end there is a nice list to check if one has been in Norway too long:

(I don’t qualify… 😉 )

1. You think there is no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing
2. You associate warm rice porridge with Saturday and Xmas eve
3. It seems nice to spend a week in a small wooden cottage up in the mountains, with no running water and no electricity
4. You think cross-country skiing is the only “real” skiing
5. You know at least five different words describing different kinds of snow
6. A sharp intake of breath (“jah”) has become part of your active vocabulary
7. You associate Friday afternoon with a trip to Vinmonopolet (The Wine Monopoly)
8. It’s acceptable to eat lunch at 11.00 and dinner at 15.00
9. Your front door step is beginning to resemble a shoe shop
10. Silence is fun

It is hard to miss; the London 2012 – Summer Olympic Games start today! The opening ceremony (so far) was fantastic; a vibrant show filled with many references to Great Brittain’s history and culture, creative special effects, music from all decades and energy, lots of energy.

Experience tells me that the Games have a tendency to suck you in, so I’d better stay away from the TV, or I won’t be able to stop watching! 😉

Apple released OS X Mountain Lion yesterday, its latest (and greatest?) OS and I took the leap and updated my Macbook Air today. The Carbo Copy Cloner backup I took turned out to be useless (well, most backups normally are); the upgrade went super-smooth and I was done within 20 minutes. The gain? Around 200+ new features, I mostly love:

– The (unexpected) performance improvement; Apple has a pretty good track record on improving speed of the new OS over the old one, how do they do this, it’s great!

– AirPlay Mirroring allowing me to send my MacBook Air screen to my HDTV (it works fantastic!)

– Dictation; making it possible to use my voice instead of the keyboard, amazing!! (I actually ‘typed’ this sentence using the Dictation feature without any error!!)

– Messages, bringing iMessage (iDevice to iDevice messaging app) to my Mac…handy as in the end a full keyboard does type faster than the small virtual one on my iPhone!

– Notes & Reminders, which are both syncing between my iPhone and Mac, it makes it super easy to keep track of things

So far OS X Mountain Lion makes me a happy geek, although I might give Adam Curry‘s development of his Mountain Goat OS a try! 😉

Did you ever feel so tired during the day that there was only one thing you *really* wanted (/needed)…to take a nap? Well the science is in: watch this video and learn that science supports your wish; take a 10-30 minute ‘Power-Nap’ and get more energy out of your day, stop relying on caffeine and still remain productive (share this video with your boss)!

(haha, I guess the Spaniards are not that far off, taking a siesta in the afternoon! 😉 )

It was a great week, having my parents over in Norway the past week! As they visited Oslo and Norway many times before (last year a six week vacation all the way to the North Cape), we could skip the tourist highlights and go right back to work in da house…sounds like a true vacation to me, eh? 😉

Dad’s middle name is handyman, and there is (was? 😉 ) enough to do in the house to keep him busy. Mom too has the ‘I can’t sit still’ virus, so we have all been pretty busy these past days (while enjoying the lovely moments with Misha). Yeah, we were able to create a good mix between ‘working’ and relaxing, so it was a win-win week that we all enjoyed a lot!

And now…it is father-son time, yay!!

July 22 in Norway has become a day of dedication to the open society to make sure that last years terror attacks will never be forgotten (the court-case is still ongoing). Today has been filled with nationwide commemorations including a memorial concert in Oslo tonight. The city was once again filled with roses…the perpetrator lost, the people won.

Quite special was the song that Bruce Springsteen (with ‘Little’ Steven Van Zandt) performed: We Shall Overcome.

Sunny summer weather, ‘city-explorer’ shoes on, vibrant Oslo city center, an angel in a stroller interested in everything and everyone, and Ingrid as tour guide…it all came together today: Mishas’s first summer trip through Oslo was a big success, he loved it!

My parents loved the tour around Oslo center; Aker Brygge, Nationaltheatret, Litteratur Huset, Karl Johans Gate, Oslo Domkirke, the Regjeringskvartalet (where last years terror attack took place), a splendid view over the city from the Stratos cafe (12 floors up), Akershus Festning and the Rådhus…a lot of walking, with some refreshing breaks in between! 😉

It is great to have Misha around the coming weeks. I haven’t seen him for over 3 weeks and wow, the little angel has GROWN! There is something new every day in his life and by now he is able to stand up, using some support, but still…SO cute!! And he is SO proud on this accomplishment as you can see from the look on his face below:

Despite the early wake-up call this morning (alarm clock set at 4am since we were flying at 7am 🙁 ) and despite the fact that yesterday was my first day off, *today* feels as vacation has really started; home with Misha (and my parents) in the beautiful Norwegian nature and experiencing something that NL has missed for a while…SUN! 😉

It’s gonna be good; relaxing days and enjoying time with Misha for two weeks, yay!

The Costa Rican sun is long gone, so I figured it is time to change the profile picture I use for various Social Media from the summer look in Costa Rica to this one…taken last Saturday at the Tiësto concert…partyyyyy! 😉

And yes, I do do requests…raise your hand if you prefer my old Costa Rica profile picture (or the Sponge Bob crazy hat 😉 ) and I will consider putting it back hehe 😉

After a few days in NL I can conclude that the weather god decided to skip the summer season for NL this year; Ray, Ray, Rain all day long as you can see in the video below (shot from Robbert’s balcony)…wtf!

My vacation starts tomorrow; as there is no chance to enjoy a sunny day at Kijkduin beach, I hope that the weather god has better plans for the Norwegian summer season, let’s start it on Wednesday!

One party is nearly over and the next is about to begin! 😉 Adam & Micky’s bachelor party yesterday was fan-friggin-tastic; great people, good vibes, ITM!!
Today you can find me at Breda Live today, great artists on stage that we’re gonna enjoy in typical Dutch summer weather; cloudy with some showers…I am pretty sure that Lefties Soul Connection, Ilse DeLange, Kane, Hardwell and Tiësto will make us forget about anything weather related! 😉

Wow, almost 8 years after the infamous encounter between me and Adam Curry (check out this special Daily Source Code moment!!) I am finally gonna hook up with him again!!

It took a bachelor party for his upcoming wedding to make it happen, so we won’t ‘meet’ in the ‘Studio A8’ on the dutch highway A4, and there won’t be any podcast being recording this time…Supperclub it is! Tonight, and Adam & Micky’s Bachelor party is the occasion…heaps of fun!!

It is deadline week once more. The word deadline (‘meeting a deadline’) still confuses me; I have never seen a line dying (yet?!), nor did I meet a dead one… 😉

All I know is that the pressure in the team is ON and the days are LONG! Looking at the work done so far, I do feel that we are in pretty good shape to…uhh, well, ‘meet’ this deadline and stand out with our proposal…oh yeahhhh!

Wow, Huis & Naat’s wedding yesterday was fantastic, it is SO valuable to have a group of friends like this!

Just one of many memorable moments from yesterdays party; a chinese food order via the wedding guestbook (I guess he/she was hungry 😉 )…yeah, it was that kinda party! 😉

Right after I arrived in NL tonight I went to Kissy’s new home (she is on vacation) to fulfill my promise to setup a NAS and the AppleTV for her. It’s *so* much easier when you know what you’re doing…uhh, once a geek always a geek! 😉

I anticipated on internet being available making this job easypeasy (I was told that the welcome package arrived last week, and I seriously thought it would be installed by the provider, Ziggo), but that was unfortunately not the case. Instead of a quick ‘n smooth install of the MediaCenter setup, it turned out to be a half half frustrating night as Ziggo doesn’t have their internet activation act together. Anyway, giving up ain’t me, and this blogpost confirms that the internet is up, the TV is working and…I’m almost done with the NAS & AppleTV…quite a techie night. 😉

Honestly, how can anyone believe that violence is the solution for peace? Just have a look around and see what is going on in way too many places on our globe…tell me, does it *really* work??

Einstein said it before: “We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them”…this woman makes it even more clear! 😉

The future of interacting with a computer is coming soon, very soon…it is called Leap Motion, the biggest step up since the introduction of the mouse, and it is very promising, and futuristic, and exciting, and intriguing, and affordable ($70), and well, until recently pure Hollywood material!!

Check out the two YouTube clips below that show off Leap Motion, a breakthrough mostly in software that enables you to use gestures by your hands, pen, etc. in 3D to control virtually anything on your computer. Wow! The possibilities seem endless; just imagine this technology combined with holographic projections, etc. (and yes, Apple should definitely acquire Leap Motion 😉 )

Grrrrroovy, iWant!! (indeed, a geek-alert should have preceded this blogpost 😉 )

I looked into the mirror this morning and said to myself: ‘rabbit, rabbit‘! It is supposed to be the first thing to say on the first day of a new month so it will bring me good luck for the coming month…just what I need for this month of new beginnings…

My brother is turning 38 today (trying to catch up, but lagging 2 years behind 😉 )…Hurra for Deg Bro, or rather ‘Felix Aniversário’ as he celebrates his Birthday in Portugal this year, NICE & Njoy!