Archive for the ‘Blog Entries’ Category

Roadtrip Corsica, the sequel

Tuesday, June 28th, 2011

After last Sunday’s fantastic roadtrip we opted for another day cruisin’ through the Corsican highlands! We took the scenic route from AlΓ©ria to SartΓ¨ne and drove back along the coastline.

Absolutely STUNNING views and pictures that look terrific due to the mixture of green trees, gray/grey/brownish rocky mountain tops and the bluest of blue skies! (and some occasional turquoise blue seawater! πŸ˜‰ )

 

(click to enlarge)

Roadtrip Corsica part 1

Sunday, June 26th, 2011

Haha, today’s planned roadtrip from East to West Corsica, AlΓ©ria to Ajaccio, got literally blocked by a uhh road block, but that didn’t stop us from having a FANTASTIC trip through the Corsican mountains! (Corsica is actually known as the most mountainous island in the Mediterranean)

It will not be the last roadtrip for sure, below a short impression…and yes, the sky is indeed cloudless blue! πŸ˜‰

 

Roadtrip Corsica 2011

Roadtrip Corsica 2011

Roadtrip cows - Corsica 2011

Roadtrip Corsica 2011

Roadtrip Corsica 2011

Roadtrip Corsica 2011

(click to enlarge)

Beach Volleyball on the … ;)

Friday, June 24th, 2011

Well, the name gives it away; beach volleyball is played on the…beach (duh)! πŸ˜‰

It has been *ages* ago since I last played volleyball, and though this one was just for fun, it was great to get into it again…I just LOVE this game!! Some of the players could not get enough after 2 hours of play (in 30+C!) today, so I have a date for some more serious beach volleyball playing: the match starts coming Monday at 5pm, BE there and…GAME ON! πŸ˜‰

Vacation Reading List

Thursday, June 23rd, 2011

Oof,Β  my vacation reading list is longgggg this year! (well, actually as long as I want to make it!)

Besides the good’old paper books, we loaded the iPad with uhmmm 7,500 books!! (thx Muriel! πŸ˜‰ )

I will finish the ‘real’ books first and as you can see below, those are enough to read already:

Eckhart Tolle – The Power of Now (this book keeps coming back, and keeps giving me new insights, ‘IT IS’ v2! πŸ˜‰ )
Leif G.W. Persson – Linda
Richard Branson – Screw It, Let’s Do It! (Gaat Niet Bestaat Niet)
Monaldi & Sorti – Dissimulazione (Versluiering)

Hehe, a happy blogger turns into a happy reader! πŸ˜‰

BBQ’ing on Corsica

Wednesday, June 22nd, 2011

With weather like this, there is just one ‘best’ way to make dinner: a BBQ (aka β€˜Barbieβ€˜)!

It took us a day to find one (a one-timer, the search for a more permanent bbq continues!), so guess what was for dinner today? Oof, this certainly adds to the vacation feeling, yayyy! πŸ˜‰

(wine tip of the week: Chateau Janon, Entre-Deux-Mers 2009, give it a try at sunset! πŸ˜‰ )

Summer vacation!!

Monday, June 20th, 2011

Summer is about to ‘formally’ start (tomorrow at 17:16h UTC πŸ˜‰ ), and vacation time is here. We are however not not taking any chances with weather in either Norway or NL, and are on our way to Corsica! Two full weeks of sun, fun, beach, cocktails (virgin ones for Kissy πŸ˜‰ ) and overall relaxing! It’ll be our last vacation with ‘just the two of us’, so it’s gonna be quite special.

The forecast is FANTASTIC as you can see below, it’s gonna be good!

(click to enlarge)

Stars, stars, STARS…and the Milky Way

Sunday, June 19th, 2011

An amazing video, Plains Milky Way, which uses the Time-lapse technique to show you the dreamworld version of night skies filled with stars and the Milky Way! The video is shot by Randy Halverson who explains the what and how on his Vimeo page.

The soundtrack for the video, β€œExodus”, is created by Simon Wilkinson fromΒ thebluemask.com.

More of these Time-lapse videos can be found on dakotalaps.com. or the dakotalapse YouTube channel.

And more bands today

Saturday, June 18th, 2011

I can’t get enough of live music, after Guus, The Baseballs and Doe Maar yesterday, I am at the Parkfeest today! πŸ˜‰ Several nice bands on stage, with Kane as closing act!! Once again, HEAPS of fun!! πŸ˜‰

Guus and Doe Maar tonight

Friday, June 17th, 2011

Hehe, not the easiest blogpost-title for y’all english readers…! πŸ˜‰
Fact is that I am on my way to Guus Meeuwis‘ ‘Groots met een zachte G’ concert tonight in the PSV stadion, Eindhoven…uhhh, Guus Meeuwis?? πŸ˜‰ Yeah, indeed, his music is not really my cup of tea…then again, we’re with friends, the ambiance is supposed to be FANTASTIC, and they should have enough beer to make me forget the music! πŸ˜‰
It’ll be a great deal of fun, two support acts; The Baseballs and…the infamous dutch ska band from the 80’s (that’s uhh my time! πŸ˜‰ ) Doe Maar will be performing too, and THAT…will be truly HEAPS of fun!!

Mom’s Birthday

Wednesday, June 15th, 2011

My mom turns 62 today: Happy Birthday Mom!!

We are wondering what to give her: bungee jumping or sky diving/parachuting? The hot air ballooning gift for her 60th Birthday was such a success, even though it looked so challenging upfront…haha, we should be able to increase the bar now! πŸ˜‰

Then again, perhaps not: it apparently takes a LONG time to before a present ‘materializes’ as we finally went hot air ballooning a month ago, our present TWO years ago!

Lazy Whitsunday

Sunday, June 12th, 2011

A lovely ‘after-Pinkpop’ day this has been, quiet and lazy, a true Whitsunday; playing FIFA11 most of the afternoon (game f*^#ing ON! πŸ˜‰ ) and we went to see an adventurous movie in this evening; Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides…in 3D which makes uhhh, PenΓ©lope Cruz verrrry real!! πŸ˜‰

Pinkpop 2011!!

Saturday, June 11th, 2011

Going to a festival for one day instead of a whole weekend has a big advantage; there is no tent to set up! The drawback: no tent means no access to the camping, so no aceess to the Pinkpop afterparty…oh well, the day was terrific anyway! I was finally able to close a circle with the Manic Street Preachers; they canceled their performance at Rock Werchter around 15 years ago… πŸ˜‰
Simple Plan and Elbow were great and Coldplay concert was absolutely fantastic! Pinkpop 2011, done that, and enjoyed it!!

Gone from Norway

Friday, June 10th, 2011

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! πŸ˜‰ ), 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! πŸ˜‰

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! πŸ˜‰ It was a Boeing 737-900 this time, less electronics, more ‘real’ flying, FUN!

The smell of Asparagus

Thursday, June 9th, 2011

It is asparagus season, which is great since I *love* asparagus (especially with Hollandaise sauce πŸ˜‰ ). 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!) πŸ˜‰

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! πŸ˜‰

 

WWDC 2011: The Musical

Wednesday, June 8th, 2011

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. πŸ˜‰

Apple’s WWDC 2011: software only

Monday, June 6th, 2011

The past years Apple traditionally used its World Wide Developers Conference to introduce new hardware, specifically a new version of iPhone recently. πŸ˜‰ 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! πŸ˜‰ ).

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! πŸ˜‰ )

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’! πŸ˜‰

Fixing things

Sunday, June 5th, 2011

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! πŸ˜‰ ).

Fixing things feels good, especially when the sun shines! πŸ˜‰

Sailing on the Oslo fjord

Saturday, June 4th, 2011

Nothing beats sailing the Oslo fjord on a sunny day like today! πŸ˜‰
The wind brought us to a terrific spot for some sunbathing, swimming (freezing cold btw.!! πŸ˜‰ ) 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!

BBQ’ing day after day after day

Friday, June 3rd, 2011

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! πŸ˜‰

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*! πŸ˜‰

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! πŸ˜‰ )

iJoke

Wednesday, June 1st, 2011

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.

πŸ˜‰ πŸ˜‰