And ...

... Christmas is a wrap!

We had fun, though ... Food and drink and presents and Kamiel. I like Christmas. I look forward to it. From about october on, actually ... One of those things. It's one of those annual things we hold dear even if I'm currently not affiliated with any imaginary friend associated with the birth of the Christ. My christmasses are a pagan affair this time with heathen scandinavian food, or something.

Currently back at work. Funny how the trains are totally deserted these days. It's like, a holiday, or something.

Through all the preperations and eating and general lack of doing anything really active this week (although Aikido went on, business as usual ... go, Chris, go!) I have to say that I'm now relatively exhausted. But I've got a thing again tomorrow. It's going to be ... a thing. What do you do? It's family.

I hope to leave 2008 with as many appandages and sensory tools as I went in to it. However, should the worst come to happen I have already discussed the merrits of glass eyes with Süüsje. I sincerely hope it doesn't get to that stage, though. It must have been a weird discussion to have. It made sense to me, at least, but, to be honest, I was having a bit of a headache at the time. My point was that I really don't see the point of replacing an eye you lost with a duplicate of the aforementioned eye. It would be fake and would only serve to remind me of what I would have lost. I think I'd go for an unconventional choice., Do something really insane, like a monochrome glass ball, in stead of a fake eye. The argument that it might be less upsetting to society if you would take the perfect replica I don't find very convincing. In the end it's my face. Society can go fuck itself.

Well, maybe an eye patch if the situation really demands it.

Also: Patriots, 11-5, no play off season. Chargers, 8-8, play off season! There is no justice.

That said: the teams I like in the play offs are: Chargers (grumble) but I want to see those two running backs finally become great. Ravens ... because they're called Ravens. Falcons ... because they're called Falcons. Eagles because they handed the Cowboys their hats, which was fun. For me. Not for the Cowboys. Vikings. Because they're called ... and because I like watching Adran Peterson.

So, that said ... some bloody Manning will probably win in the end.

Also, the Steelers have a nice coach, he reminds me of Foreman from House, M.D. I just don't like the Steelers much. Hines Ward broke someone's jaw and sort of laughed it off. Yukkie.

Also, also, ... I really don't like the NY Giants'coach. That man reminds me of the old cliché of the grumpy old man with a shotgun that threatens people so that they will get off his lawn. Grumpy person. That he got a loss at the hands of the Vikings was ... good.

Oh ... I almost forgot: Doctor Who on the 1st! Wasn't Tennant dreamy?!?! A clever story and with clever twists and a lot of cyberpunk stuff thrown in for fun. I liked it. My girl thinks that lately the christmas specials are too serious and not laugh-out-loud funny. But her frame of reference was the very first one with the introduction of the skinny boy in a suit, and let's face it, that was hilarious. Fast-paced, ridiculous dialogue, Lion King, blood control, over the top swordfight ... fantastic! Hard to top that. But this was a classic Doctor Who affair and one well appreciated. Whatever the girlfriend&critic say ...

Very curious as to what the future brings for the franchise. Doctor Who and The Planet of the Dead. Scary ...

We ...

... wish you a merry Christmas and here is a picture of a bunny with huge balls.

For ...

... the first time in ages a post from the trenches, that is, my 'work'.

Once again the services I provide for this institue have gone unappreciated by it. The annual christmas gifts thing was not bestowed upon me. Apparently, that is too expensive. The present as such is crap, but the appreciation would be nice. Instead I was sitting here with three colleagues, 1 regular, two others, like me, hired from elsewhere. The gentleman giving out the presents enters, gives the regular employee her gift, states: 'well ... there are no others of your team here' and proceeds to leave ...

Even our presence here is denied.

Luckily, my own boss, Karin, came almost instantaneously to the door bearing gifts of champagne and mugs. Just to let us know that we too are loved.

What a set of wankers here. I feel it ... unwise to reveal some of the things that go on here but let me tell you: investing in a small gift for borrowed personel would be the least of the waste around here.

Wankers.

With my direct colleagues, however, I have a good contact. Yesterday we went to a nearby museum, which was nice and afterwards we had a high tea. Which was nicer. The museum was the Hermitagein Amsterdam. There are paintings by Casper David Friedrich on loan there. There were some nice pieces there, but all in all, the vast majority of the paintings failed to convince me. Also, there were four rooms in the museum, so, it's currently very small. One room was dedicated to paintings by people before Friedrich, one room was dedicated to paintings by people after him, one room were his own paintings ... and then Fiedrich had a stroke and could no longer make oil paintings so one room is filled with drawings made by him. All in all ... weird. Little Friedrich in a Friedrich show.

Also weird: most people disappeared beneath headphones for an audio tour making discussion about the works mostly impossible and also sort of defeating the idea of doing a team excursion.

The high tea was fun, though. I actually drank tea! Weird ... Loads of nice yummie things ... Unfortunately I got a bit of a headache afterwards so it all ended in misery and non-training but still it was a good day.

Weeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!

... I'm at 'R'. Also, I seem to go to another Amsterdam museum today. I feel so cultural ... of course, as I say this, I'm gearing up to shift Rammstein into iTunes, so I might be the last person to ask anything on the subject of culture.

... I seem to have lost the name of the museum ...

Anyway. That was embarrassing.

Yesterday I witnessed the breakdown of communication between my roommates at work over the purchase of an amount of pens. Instead of just, you know, ordering a few boxes, someone wanted to know the exact amount of pens that were needed ... I suppose you have to be a little precise to do this job. But there ought to be limits.

... not a classic anecdote as such.

Someone got mad and annoyed yesterday because I dared disturb him by doing my job? Is that better story material?

... it really isn't. I need to get a better quality of stories ...

We're ...

... at the 'M'. Unfortunately ... that's where life stops being funny. 'M' is one whole shelf. It has Metallica and Marillion. And they have put out loads of CD's ... and I have some 'extra'.

Ipod's are good. Filling them is ... interesting. I wouldn't be able to do it without my love ...

Oh ... and yesterday we saw the skull. I had hoped for an Aha-erlebnis. In stead we got a look at a tacky skull and we got reprimanded by a very surly little security guard for wanting to see the skull up close, from the front and for longer than 5 seconds.

The piece is not art. The commotion it generated sort of is.

In the end, someone got rich, some people got robbed, and some people made too much noise.

I ...

... have an Ipod. Or ipod. I don't know.

What I do know is that my discman died and that I should have gotten an ipod years ago. But money and thinking and inability to make any decision ever kept me from going that way. I'm quite set in my ways, really.

But now I'm dumping everything I own musically on there, with the help of my girl, to make, for me, the most perfect travelcompanion ever. It really feels special to always have the perfect song with you. There is magic in hearing the right song at the right time. There really is. It powerful. It's ... beyond description. It's moving and beautiful.

I'll make it perfect. With things I love on it. I shall be very ecstatic.

Hey!

It was my birthday!

I didn't really celebrate as the mess and stress of the rest of the jests of november and december got a bit much. There wasn't any space in any weekend. Therefore I have moved it to january. We'll see whether life is more friendly to my personal celebration of the earth spinning round the sun once more. Darn it, if it wasn't the little planet that could all over again.

(I stole that sentence).

I still got to have a most excellent day, though. With nice gifts, playing WoW and doing nothing useful, scotch, cigar and diner. Yay! There should be more days like that, right?

I was happy.

In other news ... my dad's in the hospital again. I wish him loads of well ...

In yet other news, this time of the more comical variety, at least; I think so:

What do you do when you're a professional athlete with a contract worth 35 million dollar, 11 of which is guaranteed, you're having an okay career with occassional scuffles and a little injury time just enough so that your team has its eye on you? Well, what do you do?

You go into a nightclub and you shoot yourself in the thigh with your illegal glock .40 of course, ensuring that the whole sport's world looks at you and thinks you're a huge dick for not actually knowing what the hell a safety is even if it is bloody obvious you at least know the word because safeties are those people that ram you down whenever you have the bloody ball.

Idiot.

I though it before and I'll say it now: the Giants should never have won last year's Superbowl. Obviously they're really too stupid. Althought that has never stopped any american, ever ...